Hanley's Funeral Home

Constructed in 1915 and originally used as a lodge, this building became the home of a funeral business founded by W.H. Hanley, a native of Winchester, Tennessee, who learned the trade while working for David T. Howard Funeral Home, Atlanta's first Black owned funeral parlor. Hanley later started his own business, first opening at 250 Edgewood Avenue before moving to this location in 1925. His enterprise grew into one of the largest Black owned funeral homes in the South, and within five years a second funeral home opened on Ashby Street. After Hanley's death in the late 1930's, his employees continued operating the businesses as Hanley's Bell Street and Hanley's Ashby Street Funeral Home. The Bell Street location handled two of Black Atlanta's largest funerals, for boxer “Tiger” Flowers in the 1920's and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in 1968.

Atlanta, Georgia · United States