CHARLOTTSVILLE, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – The Virginia Board of Historic Resources has approved a historical marker for one of the few lodging places in Charlottesville that served black travelers during racial segregation in Virginia. Built around 1947, the Carver Inn was featured in The Green Book at 701 Preston Avenue… just west of the train tracks on the north side of the road. The establishment offered fine dining, a private social club, as well as a beauty salon… and hosted famous guests such as Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and Thurgood Marshall. Gregory Swanson, the first African American to attend the University of Virginia, lived at the inn after his successful lawsuit to gain admission to the school’s graduate law program.

While technically not part of Vinegar Hill, nevertheless in the mid-1970s, the Carver Inn was demolished during a Preston Avenue road-widening project that razed several Black-owned properties.