[3] Payton worked in the family barber shop until April 1899, when he decided to make more of himself, and left for New York City, against the wishes of both parents.

Payton got charge of more houses, and began to deal in real estate for himself as well as for others, until he was making profits of thousands of dollars per month.

[8] Yet other sources write that Payton's first success came when he approached the manager of an apartment house on West 133rd Street, which tenants were fleeing because a murder had been committed there, and persuaded him to have the chance to fill it with Black families.

He appealed to Black investors specifically, both to their social justice and profit motives, with an ad stating: "Today is the time to buy, if you want to be numbered among those of the race who are doing something toward trying to solve the so-called 'Race Problem.'"

[8][11] The Afro-American Realty Company bought and leased property in Harlem neighborhoods never until then "invaded" by Black tenants, occasioning near panic among neighboring owners.

During the last three years the flats in 134th between Lenox and Seventh Avenues, that were occupied entirely by white folks, have been captured for occupation by a Negro population.

Nearly all the old dwellings in 134th Street to midway in the block west from Seventh Avenue are occupied by colored tenants and real estate brokers predict that it is only a matter of time when the entire block, to Eighth Avenue, will be a stronghold of the Negro population.White residents were outraged; one sign advertising for colored tenants for a formerly white building was burned to local acclaim.

[8] It was not as successful as some stockholders had anticipated, though, and in October 1906, 35 of them brought a lawsuit, charging that the prospectus was fraudulent and overstated the company holdings when it was issued.

[10] Payton was arrested on civil fraud charges in January 1907,[15] and the courts ruled in favor of the plaintiffs for investments, damages, and legal costs, later that year.

The company issued its first and only dividend in June 1907, but never recovered from the negative publicity effects of the lawsuit and the depression of 1907, stopping operations in 1908.

The entire street was white in 1900; by the time of the 1915 New York State census, the block was almost completely inhabited by Black tenants.

The buildings were renamed after prominent Black figures in the Americas: Crispus Attucks, Toussaint L'Ouverture, Phyllis Wheatley, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Frederick Douglass, and Booker T. Washington.

They worked to fulfill Payton’s dream of making this Harlem neighborhood a political and cultural capital for African-Americans in the area.