Introducing Charlie’s Place

Beloved. Notorious. Defiant. Folk hero. These are just a few ways to describe Charlie Fitzgerald, the entrepreneur who owned an integrated nightclub during Jim Crow in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. What happened in Myrtle Beach at Charlie’s Place would come to define a community and generations to come. This is the almost forgotten history of Charlie’s Place.

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Pushkin music, dance lyrics. The creation of it, more than
any judge's gabble, brought the races together.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
In the nineteen thirties, forties and fifties, segregation was the law,
but one mysterious black club owner, Charlie Fitzgerald, had his
own rules. Segregation in the day, integration that night.

Speaker 1 (00:50):
And dance, Oh my god.

Speaker 3 (00:52):
We didn't worry about what went on outside.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
It was like stiffing in another world.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Inside Charlie's place, black and white people could listen to
music and dance together.

Speaker 3 (01:03):
Girl, I've see so many people up in there.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
It was grown and people from all over South Carolinas
are jolly fish, sure please. Charlie's was on the Chitlin
Circuit where black artists could perform in the South.

Speaker 3 (01:16):
Heard of him. Oh yees, God, Ruth Brown, j Brown,
Curtis Mayfield, you're drifted with Otis Red. At Domino, we
had as many whites as we had blacks when they
had a.

Speaker 2 (01:28):
Band, but not everyone was happy about it.

Speaker 1 (01:33):
But there was a lot of shooting. Peoples running there
in through the building and the shot and you know,
they're just chaos.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
During that time, they was, you know, looking for Charlie
and you saw the KKK.

Speaker 1 (01:46):
Yeah, they was dressed up in their uniform.

Speaker 3 (01:50):
The KKK set out to ray Charlie, take him away
from here. He wanted people to unite and some just
did not want that.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
Everyone was paying close attention to the things Charlie did.
But did anyone know who Charlie really was?

Speaker 1 (02:07):
I think he came from Jamaica, someplace.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
I'm saving you from Georgia.

Speaker 1 (02:10):
They came from north Nobody knew exactly where. Nobody talked
about where he came from. A lot of people knew him,
but didn't really know him. He was using another name.
Where he found out Charlie was big question mark.

Speaker 2 (02:24):
Was he a businessman, a showman, a criminal, a hero?
Charlie was an example, a power.

Speaker 1 (02:36):
They had to crush you.

Speaker 2 (02:47):
Charlie's Place a nightclub that defied segregation, A man who
became a legend, A story that was nearly lost to
time until now. A five part series from Atlas Obscura
and Rococo Punch in partnership with Pushkin Industries and presented
by Visit Myrtle Beach. Listen to Charlie's Place on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast

(03:17):
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