The very last photo in Geraldine Thompson's book on Black history in Orlando shows the future state senator herself, posing with then-Gov. Bob Graham.
Thompson, who died recently at age 76, was certainly part of that history. But she also had a key role in preserving it — through her work as a Democratic lawmaker since 2006, through writing and education, and the Wells'Built Museum of African American History and Culture, which she founded in Parramore in 2001.
>> Read Geraldine F. Thompson’s obituary, including service details.
‘Go back and fetch it’
Thompson made it her life's work to preserve Black history in Central Florida. She explained part of that mission in an oral history interview in 2021 for the University of Central Florida's RICHES Digital Archiving Project.
"I think there's so much of our history that deliberately has been left out, that we have to go back and claim it," Thompson said, "go back and fetch it as the African word Sankofa signifies."
The Wells'Built is in a historic brick hotel right around the corner from the Kia Center in downtown Orlando. The hotel was built 1929 by Dr. William Monroe Wells, one of Central Florida's few Black doctors in those days.
The hotel was the only Orlando accommodation listed as accepting Black guests in the 1940 "Green-Book," which offered guidance to African American travelers in the Jim Crow South.
Thompson led a nonprofit — the Association to Preserve African American Society, History and Tradition, known as PAST, Inc. — in preserving the building and establishing the museum.
She was born in New Orleans, grew up in South Florida and attended the University of Miami before moving to Orlando.
"I think that she saw the very special community that we have, specifically in Paramore, and it's really rich history, and just dove in," said historian Rachel Williams with the Orange County Regional History Center. "So she was incredibly inspired, I think, by our African American community here, and wanted to preserve that in a way that wasn't just for her."
Thompson worked as a public school teacher and Valencia College administrator, supporting minority, low-income and disabled students, before founding the museum and being elected in 2006 to the Florida Legislature.
She was married for 54 years to Central Florida's first Black county judge, now Senior Judge Emerson R. Thompson II, who also served as a circuit and appellate court judge. They had three children.
Preserving a history of triumph and tragedy
The youngest, Elizabeth Grace, sat for an interview in a quiet corner of the museum. Grace paused to control her emotions as she talked about her mother’s work.
"I would often tease my mom and say that she had four kids: myself, my sister, my brother and the Wells’Built," she said.
Grace said Thompson taught her that African American history is American history "and to try to tell the story of America, or, more specifically, Central Florida, without telling the story of African Americans, is a disservice, and it is not true."
Thompson sought to celebrate the triumphs of that Central Florida community and to capture and convey the horrors of racial injustice — like the Ocoee massacre of 1920, when a white mob burned homes and churches, killing an undetermined number of Black residents.
It started when two Black men tried to vote. One of those men, July Perry, was lynched by the mob.
Grace said Thompson saw the importance of remembering him "because we all enjoy here the right to vote, and he was a part of that, making sure that she had the right to vote, the right to run, the right to represent, and that her children had that same right."
Shanta Barton-Stubbs runs the New Image Youth Center, with summer and afterschool programs in Parramore, not far from the Wells’Built. She said the historically Black community has changed radically in the past 10 years and the children need the connection to their history.
It was Thompson's life’s work, she said, "to make sure that we are heard, we are understood, but most importantly, we know where we come from."
‘What mean ye by these stones?’
In the oral history recorded for UCF, Thompson compared her mission to the story from Exodus of the Israelites fleeing Egypt and crossing the parted Red Sea.
"But they were commanded, as they crossed," Thompson said, "pick up stones and, on the other side, use the stones to build a memorial so that they would not forget how they came across. And not only would they remember, but they were told that generations hence would pass the stones and ask, 'What mean ye by these stones?' and they would be able to tell the story."
Thompson likewise collected stones — stories, documents, photographs and treasured memorabilia — from African American families. She published them in a 128-page volume for the Black America Series in 2003.
And she filled the Wells’Built with that history.
In the UCF interview, Thompson reflected on a bill she filed renaming a highway for July Perry.
"That's kind of like, ‘What mean ye by these stones?’ So that when young people pass by and they see the road marker ... we can tell the story," she said.
"And of course, you can't tell the story if you don't know the story. So more of us need to know the story and more of us need to tell the story. ... That's the work that I do at the Wells'Built and in the Legislature, for that matter, talking about some of this history that has long been ignored."
"A lot of times we find in the history of African Americans across the country, a lot of their history is lost," said Williams, the Orange County Regional History Center historian.
"And wanting to preserve what there is and that we, you know, do have access to is incredibly important, because that history cannot be lost. We cannot forget that history. There's an immense amount to learn from that," Williams said regarding Thompson's work. "And I think that she really respected that idea."
