Victory Grill, Historical music venue in East 11th Street, Austin, United States.
Victory Grill is a music venue at 1104 East 11th Street in Austin, Texas. It began as a small lean-to building and was soon moved to a larger building next door. The club operated as a restaurant and bar with a stage for live blues, rhythm and blues, and jazz performances.
Johnny Holmes founded this venue in 1945 as World War II ended, creating a space to welcome African American soldiers returning home. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1998 for its cultural importance.
The Victory Grill was a stop on the Chitlin' Circuit, the network of venues that booked Black performers under segregation. Its name marks the club's opening on V-J Day, 1945. Today the café serves southern cuisine with blues, jazz and urban contemporary shows, and runs educational programs linking past African-American musical forms to the present.
The venue at 1104 East 11th Street is open for private events, educational programs and cultural tourism rather than regular nightly shows, so confirm arrangements before travelling. The building is one of the last original Chitlin' Circuit juke joints and was restored after a 1988 fire.
It remains one of the few surviving original Chitlin Circuit venues where Black performers worked despite segregation laws. The space documents how African American musicians built careers and community despite legal barriers.
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