Remembering Tampa Bay's historic Black communities

In a segregated Tampa and St. Petersburg where Jim Crow was king and excluded Black people from the world around them, they began to create a world of their own.

The historic Deuces neighborhood in south St. Pete is one prime example.

“During segregation, this was the home to more than 100 businesses,” said Veatrice Farrell, executive director of Deuces Live. “We joke that people could literally live and die on the street. [Mercy] hospital was on 14th Avenue and 22nd Street and on the corner of 9th Avenue and 22nd Street, there was the funeral home.”