"Florida's First African-American Insurance Company"

[Afro-American Life Insurance Company]: [Georgia]:

[Small Collection of Materials Related to the Afro-American Life Insurance Company].

[Atlanta, Ga. 1949]. Eight printed documents, most completed in manuscript. Some folds, mostly minor dust-soiling, wear, and creasing, moderate toning and some unobtrusive chipping. Very good. Item #5007

An interesting group of documents issued from the Afro-American Life Insurance Company's Atlanta District during the Jim Crow period. The collection includes a Member's Receipt Book issued by an agent of the company in La Grange, Georgia, with twenty manuscript entries in pencil collecting weekly insurance dues for a policy holder named Minnie B. Reed over the course of a few months in 1949; a small folder issued to Reed, presumably to hold her receipt book; four loose, partially-printed receipts for premiums paid by a man named Paul Ealy (also in 1949), completed in manuscript (weekly payments for life insurance for both of these policy holders was twenty-five cents); and two blank application forms for the company's insurance service. The application forms include the company's home office address in Jacksonville, Florida, and indicates the company's expansion through the use of several ink stamps applied to most of the documents indicating the material emanated from the company's Atlanta office. The present grouping provides an interesting snapshot of insight into the company's activities, costs, and reach during the period just after World War II.

"Florida's First African-American Insurance Company -1901-2001. The Afro-American Insurance Company, formerly the Afro-American Industrial and Benefits Association, was founded in 1901 to provide affordable health insurance and death benefits to the state's African-Americans. Founded by the Reverend E.J. Gregg, E.W. Latson, Abraham Lincoln Lewis, A.W. Price, Dr. Arthur W. Smith, J.F. Valentine, and the Reverend J. Melton Waldron, the Afro's first office at 14 Ocean Street was destroyed by the great Jacksonville Fire two months after it opened on May 3, 1901. It then moved to 621 Florida Avenue, the home of treasurer and future president, Abraham Lincoln Lewis (1865-1947). From their next home office at 105 E. Union Street, the company wrote millions of dollars of insurance policies and started district offices in Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and Texas..." - Historical marker at the site of the company's original location in Jacksonville.

Price: $550