After years of plans, renovations, and more than $10 million in city dollars, the A.G. Gaston Motel historic site will open to the public on Thursday, Birmingham city officials announced today.

The National Historic Landmark, located on Fifth Avenue North in downtown Birmingham will be open Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is free for now.

Visitors will get to enter the courtyard and tour a new exhibit dedicated to the motel’s founder, Birmingham businessman and trailblazing entrepreneur Arthur George A.G. Gaston. The grandson of formerly enslaved people, Gaston was born in abject poverty in Alabama’s Black Belt in 1892 and rose to fame as an early Black millionaire in America.

The motel is jointly owned by the city of Birmingham and the National Park Service. The park service manages the 1954 wing of the motel, which includes Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s War Room 30 where he strategized plans for the Civil Rights Movement. The city manages the 1968 wing, which includes the coffee shop and now the Gaston exhibit.

The National Park Service will assist in staffing the city-owned side of the motel, including recruiting and training volunteers. The NPS-owned side, originally built in 1954, is not yet open to the public.

“It is our hope that the gift of the restored Gaston Motel will serve to inspire residents and visitors for current and future generations to come,” Mayor Randall Woodfin said in a statement this afternoon. “This historic site is hallowed ground. The strategies, meetings, and work of activists that took place here contributed in part to the freedoms we have today.”

The building’s exterior is completely renovated to its original appearance. Additionally, the Mellon Foundation awarded a $1.1 million grant to support restoration of the interior coffee shop and original dining room, which now houses a new A.G. Gaston historical exhibit and a catering kitchen.

The motel site reopens in conjunction with the city’s observance of the 60th anniversary of major civil rights events of 1963.

During most tumultuous periods of the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham, luminaries including the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. turned to the Gaston Motel for refuge.

The motel was also the site of Room 30, known as the “war room,” where King, along with the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, gathered to develop strategies in the fight to end segregation. Their late-night negotiations and strategy sessions were intense. But the leaders emerged from Room 30 with a unified plan as they walked down to the courtyard to deliver messages to supporters and the public.

In addition to its civil rights connection, the motel — with its supper club and modern amenities — became a safe and welcoming place for overnight guests and event goers in Birmingham’s Black community.

Gaston built the motel in 1954 as one of the few public accommodations for Black people in the city. It closed in 1986, by then converted into a senior apartment building.

The city bought the property when Gaston was in the process of divesting his business empire. Gaston died in 1996 at age 103.

The motel in 2017 was included as part of the Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument by President Barack Obama in his final days in office.

[Read more and see photos: Descendants of AG Gaston tour new exhibit at their grandfather’s motel]

The designation allowed the National Park Service to acquire the 1954 wing of the motel with plans for additional programming in the coming years. Restoration began in 2019.

The city of Birmingham committed $10 million to restore the 1968 portion. Meanwhile, the Park Service is restoring and will manage the 1954 portion, including King’s room.

This week’s opening of the city’s exhibit is a portion of a larger restoration plan. Additional renovations led by the National Park Service will include a recreation of King’s room. Some other rooms will also be restored for public viewing. National Park Service work is ongoing.

The concept of restoring much of the original motel and incorporating a new institution around it is similar to the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, which integrates the old Lorraine Motel as a centerpiece.

King was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in 1968, and his hotel room and balcony are preserved as a centerpiece of the exhibit. Likewise, an eventual centerpiece at the Gaston Motel in Birmingham will include Room 30.

Admission is currently free. Beginning in late summer, an admission fee will be charged to visitors to help support the cost of operations.

Group and commercial tours must be pre-arranged to accommodate for the motel’s capacity. Schedule tours may be made at [email protected].