North Omaha author works to educate community on history of ‘The Deuce’

OMAHA, Neb. (WOWT) - A stroll down the 24th Street Corridor brings back good memories.

“The streets would be crowded on both sides with people walking everywhere all the time,” Patricia Allen recalled. “In the morning, late at night, and it was just a wonderful time.”

Allen, a north Omaha native, says the corridor was the heartbeat of the community.

“On this side of the street there were nothing but buildings just like this, from one end to the other,” Allen said.

The intersection of 24th and Lake was the pulse.

“This corner here was everything,” Allen said. “This was the spot to be. This was The Deuce. We first started calling it ‘The Deuce and a Quarter’ and then we cut it down to ‘The Deuce. A lot of people today don’t know what that is. They didn’t know what we were talking about. They were like ‘Where is that?’ It was kind of our own secret.”

Allen documented her memories and the rich history of The Deuce with a book bearing its name.

“One of the reasons that I wrote this book was because other people were writing about our history, and they hadn’t lived it,” Allen said. “They were talking about it, and they weren’t getting everything exactly correct. So, I thought, ‘Hey I know a little something, I’ll just write about it,.’”

She takes readers back to a time when businesses boomed and neighborhoods flourished.

“You name it, we had it,” Allen said. “All the professional people. We had lawyers, we had doctors, we had dentists. You didn’t have to go to a different area to go to your doctor and they were Black doctors. We had our movie theatres, we had our drugs stores. There was just nothing we didn’t have. We didn’t need any other area because we had it.”

The Deuce was also an entertainment mecca, attracting people from all over the country.

“It was just saturated with music and musicians, and they came from everywhere,” she said. “It wouldn’t be unusual to see Sidney Pottier sitting down at Allen Showcase, Jackie Wilson or James Brown.”

She shared picture after picture — the social clubs, the people, the night life.

“These were the young girls swooning over the young boys who were singing,” Allen said with a chuckle.

Times were good. That was, until 1969.

“This is the police officer, James Loder, who shot her in the back of her head,” Allen explained.

She’s talking about the time a white police officer killed a 14-year-old black girl named Vivian Strong.

“And it wasn’t the first shooting, but it was the fourth shooting,” Allen said. It was the last straw. Vivian Strong was the last straw.”

Loder later went to trial and was acquitted.

“That’s when people gathered on 24th Street,” Allen reflected. “People started throwing things, fires happened, buildings burned up, firemen came it, and it was just a three-day event. And we lost our community. And that was the end of The Deuce. Nothing was ever the same after that. We didn’t have anything anymore. The people who had the businesses didn’t come back. Even the rubble and the burnt buildings just stood like that. Like a little ghost town.”

To this day, you can still find boarded buildings, broken windows — and some broken spirits.

“I don’t think it’s ever going to be like it was before,” Allen said.

But Allen is still thankful for the progress that has been made to revitalize the corridor — like the new Shirley Tyree Theatre and the historic Fair Deal Café brought back to life with new owners.

“This was the place to be and we’re trying to get it back to that,” said Antoine Jackson, owner of Jackson’s Fair Deal Café.

She’s hoping her book will educate a new generation about what once was...

“I hope it gives them an idea of what we were about back then because we were a proud community,” Allen said. There was nothing embarrassing or shameful about our area, although other people may have thought it wasn’t so great, but we loved our area.”

…and what can be.

“So many people that don’t know will know a little more than what they knew before,” shared Allen. “[And that’s] mission accomplished.”

Her mission may not be done just yet, though. Allen says she has more to tell about her beloved Deuce. She’s considering writing another book. This one will focus on people — past and present — who made a positive impact on The Deuce.