The Hannah Gray Home was established in 1861. The Home is named after Hannah E. Gray, an African American woman who was a seamstress and laundry woman for Yale students and people in her community. She requested that upon her death her home be designated for low-income elderly women of color. Hannah Gray was described as a gentle woman, with no direct descendants who used portions of her earnings to support her church and abolitionists here and in Canada. Hannah Gray’s original home on Dixwell Avenue was destroyed by fire but rebuilt years later. The 20th Century Club, a group of African American women from the Episcopal, Baptist, Methodist and Congregational churches on Dixwell Avenue, came together to save the financially-struggling Home. In 1911 the home moved to 235 Dixwell Avenue. It was later remodeled and reopened.

Text source courtesy Greater New Haven African American Historical Society.

On the Lower Dixwell Tour

1 | St. Luke’s Episcopal Church

2 | Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church

3 | Goffe Street Special School for Colored Children & Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Masons

4 | The Odd Fellows

5 | East Rock Lodge #141, I.B.P.O.E. of W.

6 | Congregation Keser Israel

7 | United House of Prayer for All People

8 | Police Station 4

8 | St. Martin de Porres Catholic Church

9 | Lyric Theater

10 | Dixwell Community House

11 | Winchester School

12 | Dixwell Congregational Church, United Church of Christ

13 | Hannah Gray Home

14 | Varick African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church

15 | Florence Virtue Homes

16 | N. & B. Sosensky’s Hardware

17 | Monterey Club

18 | Curry’s Confectionery

19 | NXTHVN