McCollum Hall is a historic building block that was an entertainment venue in Fort Myers, Florida. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places[1] and is a site on Florida's Black Heritage Trail.[2] It included a gas station and was listed in The Negro Motorist Green Book guide for African Americans. Murals are now next to it.[1] A rope line segregated the upstairs area where performances and dancing were located. It was "at the heart" of Fort Myers' Dunbar Community.[3] It is at 2701 Dr Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. It is an Art Deco style building.[4]
It was built in 1938 by Clifford "Buck" McCollum, Sr. and his wife Gertrude[5] and became a center of entertainment and commerce. It hosted performers including Louis Armstrong, B. B. King, Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, and Duke Ellington[3] between the 1930s and 1960s. In 2022, a developer was contracted to renovate the building and to add apartments adjacent.[6]
It was used by the U.S.O. (United Service Organization) to host black servicemen from Page and Buckingham Army Air Fields. It was also a site for black professional baseball players visiting during spring training and hosted boxing matches.[5]