Parramore is a

neighborhood A neighbourhood (Commonwealth English) or neighborhood (American English) is a geographically localized community within a larger town, city, suburb or rural area, sometimes consisting of a single street and the buildings lining it. Neigh ...

in west-central

Orlando, Florida Orlando ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Orange County, Florida, United States. The city proper had a population of 307,573 at the 2020 census, making it the fourth-most populous city in Florida behind Jacksonville, Florida, Jacksonville ...

. It is a historical neighborhood for Orlando residents of

African descent Black is a racial classification of people, usually a political and skin color-based category for specific populations with a mid- to dark brown complexion. Not all people considered "black" have dark skin and often additional phenotypical ...

, and suffered greatly during the

Jim Crow The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws introduced in the Southern United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that enforced racial segregation, " Jim Crow" being a pejorative term for an African American. The last of the ...

era. In 2015, the unemployment rate was reported as 23.8% and median household income was $15,493. The area was developed as a segregated

African-American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa. ...

community. It was built in the 1880s by Orlando's fourteenth mayor, and

Confederate A confederation (also known as a confederacy or league) is a political union of sovereign states united for purposes of common action. Usually created by a treaty, confederations of states tend to be established for dealing with critical issu ...

soldier, James B. Parramore, as a development "to house the blacks employed in the households of white Orlandoans." While the historic east border of Parramore was Division Avenue (which marked the line where

residents living in the west could not cross into the east after sundown),

Interstate 4 Interstate 4 (I-4) is an Interstate Highway System, Interstate Highway located entirely within the US state of Florida, maintained by the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT). Spanning along a generally southwest–northeast axis ...

was constructed directly between Parramore and the prosperous and mostly white neighborhoods of central downtown, just east of Division Avenue and just west of the railroad tracks. Parramore's "official" boundaries (according to the city of Orlando) extend to Interstate 4, but the regions in between Division and the interstate are generally not residential, hosting such facilities as the

Kia Center Kia Center (formerly Amway Center) is an indoor arena located in the downtown core of Orlando, Florida. The arena is home to the Orlando Magic of the National Basketball Association (NBA), the Orlando Solar Bears of the ECHL, and the Orlando Pr ...

and the

Bob Carr Performing Arts Centre Bob Carr Theater (originally the Orlando Municipal Auditorium and formerly the Bob Carr Performing Arts Centre) is an auditorium located in Orlando, Florida. Opening in 1927, the venue is currently owned by the City of Orlando and in 2013, the s ...

. Smaller businesses are located on the west side of Division Avenue and include grocery stores, barber shops, and soul food restaurants. Many of the issues facing Parramore historically and currently can be traced to institutionalized or even unintentional neglect from the city and county governments, exacerbated by the fact that the city limits of Orlando do not extend all the way through, and therefore one block might be dependent on city services while being bordered on three sides by blocks that depend on county services. The western border of Parramore is

Orange Blossom Trail U.S. Route 441 (US 441) in Florida is a north–south United States Highway. It runs from Miami in South Florida northwest to the Georgia state line, with the overall route continuing to Tennessee in the Rocky Top area. Like all AASHTO ...

, a thoroughfare where violence and other crimes are common. Orlando officially considers Parramore to be three separate neighborhoods: Lake Dot (between Colonial Drive and Amelia Street), Callahan (between Amelia Street and Central Boulevard), and Holden/Parramore (between Central Boulevard and Gore Street). All three are bounded on the east by Interstate 4 and on the west by Orange Blossom Trail. A

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

stadium,

Inter&Co Stadium Inter&Co Stadium (formerly Orlando City Stadium and Exploria Stadium) is a soccer-specific stadium in downtown Orlando, Florida. The stadium is located along West Church Street in the Parramore neighborhood west of downtown Orlando. It is the ...

, was built in Parramore along West Church Street between Glenn Lane and Terry Avenue.

Libraries

In 1924 the Booker T. Washington Branch of the Albertson Public Library in downtown Orlando opened to serve Parramore and West Orlando at a time when the deeply segregated city did not welcome black residents into its main branch. The library was housed in the former rectory of St. John’s Episcopal Church and possessed two reading rooms and a collection of over 1,000 books. The first Head Librarian, Eddie T. Jackson, was also the first black librarian in Orlando. Jackson was a member of the NAACP and the National Council of Negro Women and a Orange County school teacher for 34 years. The Booker T. Washington Library continues on today in its current location in the Lila Mitchell Community Center in the MetroWest neighborhood of west Orlando. In recent years, the Little Free Library program has brought books into the Parramore community again. Little Free Library as a national book exchange program began in 2009 and has resulted in two dozen in Orlando, with multiple in the Parramore neighborhood. The small book depositories provide book borrowing for free with the expectation that the borrower will return the book after reading and donations of books are encouraged. In Spring 2013 a Little Free Library opened at 212 S. Parramore Avenue to provide residents with a free way to access and share literature. The library is sponsored by the Orlando City Soccer Club and New Image Youth Center. In May 2021 Orlando Utilities Commission helped to open four new Free Libraries in Parramore. These are located at John H. Jackson Neighborhood Center, Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church, Shiloh Baptist Church of Orlando and the New Image Youth Center.

References

{{Coord, 28.5385, -81.3889, display=title Neighborhoods in Orlando, Florida History of racial segregation in the United States