Astoria Hotel

The Astoria in 1956.
"As a young man in the late 1800s, Henry E. Braden, Sr. moved to New Orleans from the cotton fields outside Natchitoches, Louisiana. He opened a restaurant here called the Astoria, which he eventually expanded to include a barbershop, pool room, tavern, hotel, and the Astoria Gardens dance hall, one of the largest in the South for black audiences. (Successive generations of Bradens would go on to serve prominently in the civic life of New Orleans, often as the first people of color in their respective positions.) For decades the Astoria was a fixture of African-American society, hosting artists like Duke Ellington and Count Basie and luminaries of the black intelligentsia. For visitors turned away elsewhere in the Jim Crow South, the dignified service at the hotel was an oasis. It was popular for locals, too, who came here to eat, drink, dance. ..."
A Closer Walk (Audio)
The Birth of Jazz and the Jews of South Rampart Street