Black Paris Tours operate Tuesday-Friday, year round except for the months August, late December and January.
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Explore Black Paris of Yesterday and Today
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About the Founder
 Ricki Stevenson, the founder of Black Paris Tours, has served as lead guide since its inception in 1998. Stevenson, a native of Oakland, California, is a former TV news anchor/reporter and talk show host. She holds a master's degree in History, with an emphasis on African and African American history. Stevenson says the idea for Black Paris Tours grew out of her lifelong dream of living in Paris and six years experience as an international travel reporter. Black Paris Tours is listed in Fodor's Guide to Paris and in the 2003 Access Guide to Paris. Ms. Stevenson and Black Paris Tours are also profiled in the June 2000 issue of Emerge Magazine, in the November 2001 issue of Stanford Magazine, in the March 2002 issue of Heart and Soul Magazine, and in the March 16, 2003 issue of San Francisco Chronicle Magazine. Black Paris Tours was highlighted in a Wall Street Journal article on cultural tourism, November 5, 2003, was featured in the 2004 France Guide in a full page article "African Americans Abroad" and was the focus of a profile in the January, 2005 issue of Black Enterprise Magazine!
For Further Information, Contact Black Paris Tours :
Rickis@club-internet.fr
From the U.S. 011.331.46.37.03.96
In Paris: 01.46.37.03.96 or 06.62.68.03.96
Go to Black Paris Tours web page: www.google.com "Black Paris Tours"
For further information, Contact Black Paris Tours :
From the US 011.331.46.37.03.96 In Paris: 01.46.37.03.96 or 06.62.68.03.96
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Chicago Sun Times
Section: Travel
Page: 1
Headline: Chicagoans learn inspiring lesson
Byline: Lisa Lenora
Subject: TRAVEL - TOURISM
PARIS--You don't expect to take a history quiz while on vacation. But when you meet Ricki Stevenson, founder of Black Paris Tours, you do. Standing in the Paris Tourism Bureau Office on the Champs Elysees, she hands me a purple sheet of names. I stare at the page, "Which of these African Americans were longtime visitors, performed in or lived in Paris?" Three columns of more than 100 greats including Josephine Baker, Jean Baptiste Pointe du Sable, Langston Hughes and Ida B. Wells fill the page. The question, seemingly so easy, gives me pause. Surely, not all these names roamed the streets of this city? (I won't give away the answer, but you will be surprised) It is at this moment you realize as an African American your place in this rich civilization and the world. In late May, two friends and I became more enlightened about all things African American after meeting Stevenson, an expatriate who moved to Paris five years ago with her daughter after being inspired by Josephine Baker's legacy. Through her velvet voice, a product of her former life as a TV newscaster in California, our guide leads us through the arrondissements of the black experience. Complete with a pocketsize album of pictures and a tape recorder of music, she walks you to the haunts of historymakers. You gaze at the Arc de Triomphe, where abolitionist William Wells Brown climbed the more than 200 stairs to overlook Paris. You stroll the Champs Elysees, where the 369th regiment, the "Harlem Hellfighters" received a hero's welcome following World War I. You stare at a sign indicating Thomas Jefferson's former residence--the place where he and the black slave Sally Hemings had a rendezvous in 1787 and conceived their first child. And you peer into the doors of the former cabaret/nightclub "Chez Sidney," opened in 1951 by New Orleans-born Sidney Bechet, the founding father of jazz. Her complete tour finds any student amazed at the depth of this history lesson--enough so, you find yourself envisioning Baker strutting down the Champs Elysees dripping in diamonds and furs with her pet cheetah, "Chiquita," climbing the Arc de Triomphe with Brown and cheering African-American soldiers. Each story Stevenson told makes you hungry to know more and ask questions galore. Like an African griot, she pulls out story after story, all sprinkled with factoids. It is this engaging approach by Stevenson that left a lasting impression on Dorothy Tucker, general assignment reporter for WBBM-Channel 2, who took the tour last year. Tucker, along with 12 other family members, headed to Paris for a vacation. Forever the history buffs, they embarked on a Black Paris Tour, too. Unknowingly, the experience exceeded her expectations. "I had done my homework before going to Paris," she says. "I knew about Josephine Baker and Louis Armstrong and many of the black artists. I had read about the places they had frequented. But Stevenson created for me the images about their life. It provided, for me as an African American, a connection to Paris--to be able to understand the contributions African Americans made to the country, to the arts. It was a place where they were allowed to breathe, grow and work without going through the back door. I became grateful to the French for allowing my people to grow." The highlight for Tucker was to see her two sons, then 9 and 11 years old, engaged by Stevenson's anecdotes about World War I and the soldiers. "I knew when she started talking and they were staring at her, they were hanging on to her every word. They never once complained. I even forgot they were there because they were so quiet. They were entertained." But more importantly, Tucker says, she and her husband are committed to educating their children about diverse cultures, giving them firsthand exposure by taking annual trips both domestically and abroad. No matter where they go, they visit museums and historical sites. The Black Paris Tour was one such experience to help them understand their place in the world context. "The tour will provide anybody with a slice of American life in Paris," she says. "These are Americans who not only made
contributions to Paris but to America." And Stevenson's Black Paris Tour relays the story.
Specifically
To contact Stevenson for your own tour, e-mail her at Rickis@club-internet.fr or call from the U.S. (011.331.46.37.03.96). Cost is 90 Euros for the seven-hour tour. We only took the
half-day tour, which is filled with tons of history.
Black Paris Tours is widely published around the world. Here are some online publications about the tour:
 Be Part Of The Experience!
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 sacre coeur
 Eifel Tower
 Arc de Triomphe
 Paris Dome
PARIS BY NIGHT
INTERESTED IN NIGHTLIFE????
LET BLACK PARIS TOURS GUIDE YOU TO FAMOUS AND HISTORIC JAZZ CLUBS AND NIGHTCLUBS ....OR TO A SOULFUL SUNDAY GOSPEL BRUNCH.
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Tour Cost:
90 Euros per person for the day-long walking-metro-bus tour (does not include lunch).
50 Euros for the half day tour which lasts four hours. Euros only please!!
Discounts for groups of 6 or more.
Black Paris Tours, an experience you will cherish years to come!!!!
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