Mapping Every Place Rosa Parks Lived in Detroit
Rosa Parks is one of the most recognizable faces of the Civil Rights Movement. Most known for her refusal to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks’ other contributions are often overlooked, especially after she moved to Detroit with her husband, Raymond Parks, in August 1957.
The Rosa Louise (McCauley) and Raymond Parks Flat is her most well-known and important residence in the City of Detroit, but it isn’t the only place where she and Raymond lived in the Motor City.
Most of the information from this article was taken from the report on the Rosa and Raymond Parks Flat Historic District assembled by the Historic Designation Advisory Board, which leaned on research done by Quinn Evans Architects in 2019.
That research led to the structure’s listing on the National Register of Historic Places in 2021. The Historic Designation Advisory Board and City Council are working to have the property designated as a city historic district, protecting it from irresponsible renovation and demolition.
The map below plots every known location where Rosa Parks lived in Detroit. If you click on any of the points, you’ll jump down to information about that place and why it is important. Or, scroll past the map to read about all of the locations.
2672 South Deacon Street - Disassembled
When the Parks first moved to Detroit, they lived with Rosa’s brother, Sylvester McCauley, her only sibling. He was in the Army during the Second World War, moving to Detroit and having a family. I’m not certain how long he lived on Deacon Street, as the Library of Congress says that he was an employee of the Chrysler Motor Company, which was primarily an eastside endeavor, and 2672 South Deacon is roughly as far as you can go in Southwest Detroit without leaving it. Sylvester and his wife, Daisy, had 13 children. One of the McCauley relatives, Rhea, said she remembers living there in the 1950s and 1960s.
In 2014, Rhea McCauley purchased the home from the Detroit Land Bank for $500. According to the Detroit Free Press, it faced demolition in 2016. That year, Ryan Mendoza, an artist from New York living in Berlin, offered to disassemble the house and ship it to Germany to display it. By 2018, there were plans to bring it back to the United States to show it at Brown University, but there was an issue over the validity of the home, and the University backed out. Since then, I haven’t been able to track its whereabouts. Today, the address is a vacant lot used by a neighbor as a garden.
October 1957-Late 1958
Hampton, Virginia - Extant
Finding life difficult in Detroit, Rosa took a job in Virginia in October 1957. She worked as a hostess at the Holly Tree Inn at Hampton University. She hoped to bring Raymond to Virginia with her eventually, but it didn’t work out, so she returned to Detroit.
449 East Euclid Street - Demolished
Sanborn Fire Insurance Map, 1950
In late 1958, Rosa and Raymond Parks moved into an apartment at 449 East Euclid Street. I’ve found very little information on this building; however, the Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from 1950 tells us that the apartment included addresses 449 through 453 East Euclid Street and was crafted from veneered brick.
In 1942, the Detroit Evening Times published an advert for an apartment in the building. It listed it as a colored rental, meaning that non-whites were allowed to rent there. If it were listed as white, that meant non-whites couldn’t apply. The apartment was newly furnished and would work for a couple or single person.
The Parks didn’t stay here long, which was a trend of their early time in Detroit. Racism in Detroit was different than in the South but ever present, making their early lives hard here. Raymond wasn’t able to work as a barber early on, as he wasn’t licensed; however, he was eventually able to get registered and work in a shop on Windemere Street.
1930 West Grand Boulevard - Demolished
Sanborn Fire Insurance Map, 1951
In October 1959, the Parks moved into the Progressive Civic League’s building at 1930 West Grand Boulevard. Multiple organizations have shared this name over the years; however, I believe this one was organized in 1943 or 1945 in the home of Eugene Carey, the League’s first president. Eventually, the group moved to 5120 Milford Avenue and purchased the structure on Grand Boulevard in the mid-to-late 1940s. In a 1957 article in the Detroit Free Press, the group was said to strive to “unite and teach people to register to vote and to be good citizens.”
In 1945, No. 1930 West Grand Boulevard was still the Theresa Hotel. It was a small structure crafted from veneered brick with an auto garage out back. I’m not certain when it was built; however, it wasn’t there in 1910, according to fire insurance maps. In the early 1940s, it was listed as The Great Metropolitan Center Club, which had “palatial club rooms,” a “dining room,” “dormitory rooms for men of high moral standard,” a “music studio,” and more. Eventually, this structure was demolished to make way for Interstate 96, built in the 1970s. More specifically, I believe this structure was located where the service drive is today.
The Progressive Civic League employed the Parks, too. Rosa was the manager/treasurer, and Raymond worked as a caretaker. Research completed for the NRHP listing indicates that Detroit’s Civil Rights groups didn’t immediately welcome the Parks. This seems odd in retrospect, as they had been heavily involved in similar ones while living in the South.
3201 Virginia Park Street - Extant
In the Spring of 1961, Rosa and Raymond moved to 3201 Virginia Park Street, the lower flat of a duplex. The upper flat’s address was 3203 Virginia Park. While living here, Rosa did some of her most critical civil rights work; however, today, much of it has flown under the radar.
According to the research presented in the nomination for the National Register of Historic Places, this house is where Rosa Parks lived when she:
Was a distinguished guest of the NAACP Detroit branch at an event fighting housing discrimination in Oak Park, a suburb just outside Detroit
Was an integral part of the March to Freedom, where her friend Martin Luther King Jr. first gave a version of his I Have A Dream speech
Traveled to the capital for the March on Washington in August 1963
Attended Malcolm X’s speech at the Northern Negro Leadership Conference, today remembered as the Message to the Grass Roots. Rosa would later call Malcolm X a hero, showcasing her support for peaceful protest and more radical ideas of the 1960s
Volunteered for John Conyers’ campaign, eventually calling in favor of having Martin Luther King Jr. back the soon-to-be senator, which is something Reverend King rarely did. Conyers said that this won him the election
Worked in Conyers’ office after he was elected, staying employed by the congressman until she retired in 1988
Traveled to Alabama to partake in the Selma to Montgomery March in 1965
Lived through the Detroit Rebellion in 1967, where Raymond had his barber tools stolen and their car vandalized
Was honored in 1975 when 12th Street was renamed in her honor
Saw her husband pass away in 1977 at the age of 74. He was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery
Helped organize an effort to boycott an ordinance in Dearborn to keep non-residents out of parks (read as to keep black people from Detroit out, similar to how Grosse Pointe parks work today), which was effective, with the ordinance being scrapped on the eve of the protest
Rosa and Raymond Parks were active in the community throughout their time on Virginia Park Street. With two of Detroit’s most influential black churches nearby (Reverend Cleage’s Shrine of the Black Madonna Church and Reverend C. L. Franklin’s New Bethel Baptist Church), she was in the heart of Detroit’s Civil Rights, Black Power, and Black Nationalist movements.
9336 Wildemere Street - Extant
In 1988, Rosa, now a widow, moved to 9336 Wildemere Street, where she would remain until 1994. Today, the home is owned by the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute, a nonprofit she founded in 1987. Rosa stayed in this home until 1994 when she was assaulted and robbed in her home.
200 Riverfront Drive - Extant
After the assault, a group of Detroiters began work to move Rosa into better accommodations. A party that included former mayor Coleman A. Young helped secure her housing at Riverfront Towers downtown, where she would remain until her death.
Though she was slowing down, she took home some of her most notable awards while living on the banks of the Detroit River, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.
Rosa Parks died on October 24, 2005. Her funeral was at Greater Grace Temple on Seven Mile, where Aretha Franklin’s services were held in 2018.
Woodlawn Cemetery - Extant
Rosa’s funeral was on November 2, 2005, and she was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery, the burial ground with some of the most famous Detroiters’ remains. When she passed, Raymond and her mother, Leona McCauley, were reinterred with her in a small chapel in the cemetery.
Albert Kahn designed the chapel at Woodlawn Cemetery in 1905. It underwent significant renovations in the 1990s and was renamed the Rosa L. Parks Freedom Chapel after she and her loved ones were interred there.
Other Important Locations
Rosa Parks Boulevard
In February 1976, Detroit’s Twelfth Street was renamed after Rosa Parks after a vote from Detroit’s City Council. Part of the goal was to give the street a positive reputation instead of a negative one associated with the rebellion that started on the thoroughfare in July 1967. At the time, Parks told the Detroit Free Press, “I’m pleased with the decision, and I appreciate the honor.”
The Rosa Parks Bus
Students in front of the Rosa Parks Bus (photo by Kira Kessler)
The Henry Ford Museum acquired the bus on which Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on December 1, 1955, in 2001. The bus was verified thanks to a scrapbook made by Charles H. Cummings, the Montgomery Bus Station Manager, during the Montgomery Bus Boycott. According to the Henry Ford website, the Museum won the bus at auction, spending $492,000 in the process and outbidding the Smithsonian and the City of Denver. The museum additionally purchased Cummings’ scrapbook and spent over $300,000 restoring the bus, which was first displayed on February 1, 2003.
Rosa Parks is one of the best-known figures in the civil rights movement. Though her full legacy may be unknown to some, she was an undeniable champion for Detroit, the nation, and people everywhere.
