Owens–Thomas House

The Savannah Protest Movement was an American campaign led by civil rights activists to bring an end to the system of racial segregation in Savannah, Georgia. The movement began in 1960 and ended in 1963. Throughout the first half of the 20th century, African Americans in Savannah were subject to Jim Crow laws that enforced a strict system of racial segregation whereby they were not allowed to use many of the same facilities used by white people. However, African Americans attempted to push back against this system, and by the 1940s, the NAACP, under the leadership of Ralph Mark Gilbert, organized voter registration drives among the black population and negotiated agreements with moderate city officials to secure certain improvements for the community, including the hiring of African American police officers and greater investment in infrastructure, such as road repairs and the creation of a new high school. By the early 1960s, W. W. Law had become the president of the local NAACP chapter, with Hosea Williams serving as vice president and head of the local youth council. On March 16, 1960, the movement began with a series of sit-ins conducted by several dozen student activists at segregated lunch counters throughout downtown Savannah, resulting in the arrest of three protestors at Levy's Department Store. Over the next several months, protestors continued to target segregated facilities with sit-in related protests, in addition to marches, pickets, and other forms of direct action. Additionally, Williams organized the Chatham County Crusade for Voters to mobilize the city's black voting bloc to push for change from the city government. By October 1961, a partial agreement was reached to desegregate some facilities in the city, though protesting continued to achieve complete desegregation. By mid-1963, Williams, who by this time had become affiliated with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), began to hold nighttime marches that saw hundreds of arrests and an instance of rioting that resulted in the burning of at least one building and the mobilization of the Georgia National Guard. Following this, white businessmen in the city agreed to a full desegregation of the city and the city government, under Mayor Malcolm Roderick Maclean, agreed to rescind all remaining segregation ordinances. This officially came into effect on October 1, bringing an end to the movement. The Savannah movement is notable among protests of the civil rights movement for its length, its achievement of full desegregation, and for the general lack of violence when compared to other movements, such as the Birmingham campaign. Following the movement, Williams left Savannah to become a member of the SCLC national board, where he led a nationwide voter registration program during the 1960s. Meanwhile, in Savannah, Law served as NAACP local president until retiring in 1976. In 2016, the Georgia Historical Society installed a Georgia historical marker to commemorate the protest movement at the site of the former Levy's Department Store.

Oglethorpe Square is one of the 22 squares of Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located in the second row of the city's five rows of squares, on Abercorn Street and East President Street, and was laid out in 1742. It is south of Reynolds Square, west of Columbia Square, north of Colonial Park Cemetery and east of Wright Square. The oldest building on the square is the Owens–Thomas House, at 124 Abercorn Street, which dates 1819.Upper New Square, as it was originally known, was laid out in 1742 and was later renamed in honor of Georgia founder General James Oglethorpe, although his statue is located in Chippewa Square, to the southwest. The home of Georgia's first Royal Governor, John Reynolds, was located on the southeastern trust lot (now a parking lot of The Presidents' Quarters Inn) overlooking the square. Reynolds arrived in Savannah on October 29, 1754. The residences of the Royal Surveyors of Georgia and South Carolina were located on the northeastern trust lots, the site of today's Owens–Thomas House. The Presidents' Quarters Inn, a 16-room historic bed and breakfast, is located in the southeastern trust lot. The square contains a pedestal honoring Moravian missionaries who arrived at the same time as John Wesley and settled in Savannah from 1735 to 1740, before resettling in Pennsylvania.A Savannah veterans’ group had unsuccessfully proposed erecting a memorial to veterans of World War II in Oglethorpe Square It was instead installed on River Street. The Unitarian Universalist Church was originally based on the square, prior to its move to the western side of Troup Square, a third of a mile to the southeast.

The James Mills House is a home in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located in the southeastern tything block of Oglethorpe Square and was built in 1855. It is part of the Savannah Historic District, and was built for James G. Mills, a commission merchant and factor. As of 1860, his office was at 200 Bay Street.Historic Savannah Foundation saved the property from demolition around a century after its construction. In a survey for the foundation, Mary Lane Morrison found the building to be of significant status.It is a detached sidehall townhouse, as is its neighbor to the west at 201–203 East York Street. It has a piazza on its eastern side.

17 Hundred 90 Inn & Restaurant (also stylized as 17Hundred90 Inn & Restaurant) is a historic inn, restaurant and tavern in Savannah, Georgia, United States. Located on East President Street, just west of Columbia Square, it is Savannah's oldest inn, occupying a building dating to 1790, thus pre-dating the foundation of the square. The entrance to its tavern is at the corner of Lincoln Street and East York Street. The property, which is situated in the Savannah Historic District, occupies what was originally three separate residences. The western part of the building (on Lincoln Street), built around 1822 by Steele White, was a duplex. The smaller eastern section, meanwhile, was built by the Powers family in 1888. The ground level is believed to be part of an earlier structure that was burned in the Savannah fire of 1820.The inn also owns a three-story guest house across East York Street.Anna Powers, a former resident of one of the three properties from the late 18th century into the early 19th century, supposedly jumped out of one of its windows to her death after an argument with her love interests, an English sailor who had gone AWOL to be with her. Another version is that Powers was pushed to her death, possibly by another female who was in love with the same sailor. Her ghost reportedly haunts the property.The inn was featured in a season 2 episode of My Ghost Story.

Leopold's Ice Cream is an ice cream parlor located in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It was founded in 1919 by two Greek-immigrant brothers, George and Peter Leopold, who had moved to Savannah from Brazil, Indiana, to be near their sister, Demetra, who had married Savannah local George Paul Carellas. The business was closed by current co-owner Stratton Leopold in 1969; he reopened it at a new location 35 years later with his wife.

Mary Marshall Row is a historic row house in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It stands at 230–244 East Oglethorpe Avenue, overlooking Colonial Park Cemetery from the north. They are contributing properties of the Savannah Historic District, itself on the National Register of Historic Places. The properties were built as rental properties for Mary Magdalene Marshall, a noted investor and philanthropist, between 1855 and 1856. They were designed by Charles Cluskey. In 1959, the demolition of the properties was prevented by the Historic Savannah Foundation. Other similar-style row houses exist in Savannah's Gordon Row, the Jones Street Quantock Row, the Chatham Square Quantock Row, William Remshart Row House and McDonough Row.

The Mary Marshall Houses is a duplex building in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located in the southwestern civic block of Oglethorpe Square and was built in the 1840s as rental property for Mary Marshall. It is part of the Savannah Historic District.A structure on the same lot, but which faced onto East President Street, is visible in Historic American Buildings Survey photographs taken in the mid-20th century. This building was later demolished, after which the rears of today's duplex were extended.In a survey for the Historic Savannah Foundation, Mary Lane Morrison found the building to be of significant status. In 1964, Walter C. Hartridge wrote: "This trust lot, which is bounded by Abercorn and Drayton Streets, contains two buildings that are among the finest structures of the Greek Revival period in the United States. Hartridge also stated, incorrectly, that the property was designed by Charles B. Cluskey, although he could have been responsible for its early form that was later expanded upon.

The Isaiah Davenport House is a historic home in Savannah, Georgia, United States, built in 1820. It has been operated as a historic house museum by the Historic Savannah Foundation since 1963. The house is located at 324 East State Street, in the northwest corner of Columbia Square.

Columbia Square is one of the 22 squares of Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located in the second row of the city's five rows of squares, on Habersham Street and East President Street. It is south of Warren Square and between Oglethorpe Square to the west and Greene Square to the east. The oldest building on the square is at 307 East President Street, today's 17 Hundred 90 Inn, which, as its name suggests, dates to the 18th century.The square was laid out in 1799 and is named for Columbia, the poetic personification of the United States. In the center of the square is a fountain that formerly stood at Wormsloe, the estate of Noble Jones, one of Georgia's first settlers. It was moved to Columbia Square in 1970 to honor Augusta and Wymberly DeRenne, descendants of Jones. It is sometimes called the "rustic fountain," as it is decorated with vines, leaves, flowers, and other woodland motifs.Irish immigrant William Kehoe built a house on the eastern side of the square, at 130 Habersham Street, in 1885. After both his business and his family expanded, he built a larger home, completed in 1892, diagonally across the square at 123 Habersham Street.The Timothy Bonticou Double House, at 418–420 East State Street, was moved one block south from 419–421 East Broughton Lane in 1972. The office of Historic Savannah Foundation is in the southwest tything of the square, at 321 East York Street.

The Marshall House is a historic building in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It was opened in 1852 by Mary Magdalene Marshall as one of Savannah's first hotels (although it was built thirty years after the City Hotel, the city's first). Located on East Broughton Street, it is the city's oldest operating hotel today, owned by Savannah's HLC Hotels, Inc., which also owns the city's Olde Harbour Inn, the Eliza Thompson House, the East Bay Inn, the Gastonian and the Kehoe House. The building was occupied by the Union Army in 1864 and 1865 during the American Civil War.Ralph Meldrim was proprietor of the Marshall House in 1857, and he erected a 12-foot-high iron veranda on the front of the second floor of the property.A decade later, the Marshall Hose Company, a volunteer fire department, was founded to protect the property, and others, in Savannah.The Florida House, an adjoining property, became part of the Marshall House in 1880.The hotel closed between 1895 and 1899. When it reopened, electric lights and hot and cold plumbing was installed on every floor. Joel Chandler Harris, author of the Uncle Remus series, was a resident at the property around this time.Mary Marshall's estate collected rent on the property until 1914.In 1933, Herbert W. Gilbert, a Jacksonville native, leased the building and changed its name to the Gilbert Hotel.Gilbert sold the hotel in 1941, at which point it had a lobby, dining room, living room, reading room, 66 guest rooms, one suite, an apartment and six storage rooms.The property was named the Geiger Hotel for a period.The Marshall House closed in 1957 due to an economic downturn. The upper three floors were abandoned, but the ground floor was used by shopkeepers up until 1998. The building was restored the following year and reopened to the public as Savannah's oldest hotel.Original parts of the building include the Philadelphia pressed brick on the exterior, the Savannah grey brick throughout, its staircases, wooden floors, fireplaces and the doors to each guest room. Several claw-foot baths date to 1880. The veranda and gas lights were reproduced in the likeness of the originals.An 1830 portrait of Mary Marshall, who died in 1877 at the age of 93, is hanging in the lobby after it was acquired from the estate of Jim Williams, the central figure in John Berendt's non-fiction novel Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.The hotel has a reputation of being haunted.

The Christian Camphor Cottage is a home located at 122 East Oglethorpe Avenue in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is believed to be the oldest extant structure in the city, dating to around 1764. It is part of the Savannah Historic District, and in a survey for Historic Savannah Foundation, Mary Lane Morrison found the building to be of significant status.A saltbox house, the property was originally two storeys; it was raised onto a brick foundation in 1871. Its original balcony was remodeled in 1907.

The John Berrien House is a historic home in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located at 322–324 East Broughton Street, at its intersection with Habersham Street, and was built around 1794. One of the oldest extant buildings in Savannah, it is now part of the Savannah Historic District, and was built for major John Berrien, an army officer during the American Revolutionary War. Berrien lived in the house until 1797, when he moved to Louisville, Georgia. He sold the property to William Stephens, of Beaulieu Plantation. Stephens died in the home in 1882, at which point John Macpherson Berrien brought it back into the Berrien family. He lived there periodically until his death, also in the home, in 1856. Berrien's son-in-law Francis Bartow inherited the home, and he sold it to William Lake three years later.Lake split the property into two townhouses in 1871, with his brother-in-law, pharmacist Dr. Benjamin Hardee, occupying the eastern side. He had his offices on the first floor and lived in the upper storey.The gardens that original owner Berrien had laid out in the western lot of the two lots he purchased were replaced by a row of townhouses.The property was converted into a tenement in 1916. The building was raised over three feet the following year, with the original ground floor demolished and replaced with modern commercial space. The interior of the upper floors were divided into smaller rooms, thus original details were lost or covered up.The building was remodeled between 2012 and 2016. The stucco that had been added to its exterior in the 20th-century changes was removed, revealing the original clapboard siding, which was made of beaded cypress. Its removal also revealed the home's original cornice. The building was lowered, onto an 18th-century-style ground floor construction.