African-American History

Learn about African American history with these old magazine articles. Find information on Black Civil Rights violations in the 1920s.

The Bible and Slavery
(The North American Review, 1864)

This is a book review written during the American Civil War of a British work titled, Does the Bible Sanction American Slavery by a well known anti-imperialist of the time named Goldwin Smith (1823-1910).

Is African slavery, as it exists in our Southern states, an evil or a good thing? Is it, or is it not, consistent with a high sense of duty to man and to God, and with the requirements of that state of Christian civilization which the foremost nations of the world have reached?

The second part of the article is available upon request.

The 1964 Harlem Race Riot
(Pageant Magazine, 1964)

James Baldwin remembered other Harlem riots he had witnessed… KEY WORDS: 1964 Harlem Race Riot newspaper article,1964 Harlem Race Riot

The Hampton Institute as it Stood in 1921
(The Independent, 1921)

Attached is a 1921 account of the Hampton Institute; it’s past, present and future is entirely outlined in this magazine article that was written by a celebrated journalist of the time, Mr. Talcott Williams (1849 – 1928).

Click here for the Ku Klux Klan Archive.

The Hampton Institute as it Stood in 1921
(The Independent, 1921)

Attached is a 1921 account of the Hampton Institute; it’s past, present and future is entirely outlined in this magazine article that was written by a celebrated journalist of the time, Mr. Talcott Williams (1849 – 1928).

Click here for the Ku Klux Klan Archive.

The Hampton Institute as it Stood in 1921
(The Independent, 1921)

Attached is a 1921 account of the Hampton Institute; it’s past, present and future is entirely outlined in this magazine article that was written by a celebrated journalist of the time, Mr. Talcott Williams (1849 – 1928).

Click here for the Ku Klux Klan Archive.

The Hampton Institute as it Stood in 1921
(The Independent, 1921)

Attached is a 1921 account of the Hampton Institute; it’s past, present and future is entirely outlined in this magazine article that was written by a celebrated journalist of the time, Mr. Talcott Williams (1849 – 1928).

Click here for the Ku Klux Klan Archive.

The Hampton Institute as it Stood in 1921
(The Independent, 1921)

Attached is a 1921 account of the Hampton Institute; it’s past, present and future is entirely outlined in this magazine article that was written by a celebrated journalist of the time, Mr. Talcott Williams (1849 – 1928).

Click here for the Ku Klux Klan Archive.

The Hampton Institute as it Stood in 1921
(The Independent, 1921)

Attached is a 1921 account of the Hampton Institute; it’s past, present and future is entirely outlined in this magazine article that was written by a celebrated journalist of the time, Mr. Talcott Williams (1849 – 1928).

Click here for the Ku Klux Klan Archive.

The Hampton Institute as it Stood in 1921
(The Independent, 1921)

Attached is a 1921 account of the Hampton Institute; it’s past, present and future is entirely outlined in this magazine article that was written by a celebrated journalist of the time, Mr. Talcott Williams (1849 – 1928).

Click here for the Ku Klux Klan Archive.

Agent is Held for Enticing Negroes
(The Atlanta Georgian, 1917)

One of the seldom remembered casualties in the Northern migration history was the prosecution of those Whites who both encouraged and provided monetary favors to the African-American families seeking a better life in the North.

To learn how many African-Americans served in the W.W. I American Army, click here.

Racial Segregation in Truxton, Virginia
(Popular Mechanics, 1919)

A small notice appeared in POPULAR MECHANICS MAGAZINE that announced African Americans will be allowed to live in a new town located in Virginia intended to house the employees of the naval station in nearby Portsmouth. Due to small reports as this, Truxton proved to be a destination during the African-American migration period.

American Arts and the Black Contribution
(Literary Digest, 1917)

The attached column is an abstract of an article that first appeared in THE NEW YORK EVENING POST in 1917. The original article was penned by NAACP secretary James Weldon Johnson (1871 – 1938)

I believe the Negro possesses a valuable and much-needed gift that he will contribute to the future American democracy. I have tried to point out that the Negro is here not merely to be a beneficiary of American democracy, not merely to receive. He is here to give something to American democracy. Out of his wealth of artistic and emotional endowment he is going to give something that is wanting, something that is needed, something that no other element in all the nation has to give.

Johnson was quick to point out that American popular culture was enjoyed the world-over and these dance steps and catchy tunes were not simply the product of the Anglo-Saxon majority.

The First Elected African-American Judge
(Literary Digest, 1924)

An article about Albert B. George (1873 – ?) of Chicago, the first African-American to be elected as a municipal court judge:

An epochal scene will presently be enacted in one of the divisions of Chicago’s Municipal Court, pointed out several editors, when there will ascend to its bench Albert Baily George, the Negro just elected Municipal Judge on the Republican ticket by 470,000 votes. In the past a Negro here and there has been appointed judge, notably Robert H. Terrell (1857 – 1925) of Washington, we are told, but this is the first election of one to a regular judicial office.

Judge George’s ancestors were slaves in old Virginia. His success, says the CHICAGO TRIBUNE, ‘has sent a thrill of hope through the black belts – a new incentive to work and decent living.; It is considered ‘a milestone in the journey of the negro race out of the wilderness of slavery, an application of the principles of democracy which may point the way to better things for both races.’

An Interview with Dr. George Washington Carver
(Ken Magazine, 1938)

A profile of Dr. George Washington Carver (1864 – 1943):

One of the greatest agricultural chemists of our day was born a slave 80 years ago. He has given the world approximately 300 new by-products from the peanut…Today Dr. Carver is the South’s most distinguished scientist. He turned the peanut into a $60,000,000 industry.

I simply go to my laboratory, shut myself in and ask my Creator why He made the peanut. My Creator tells me to pull the peanut apart and examine the constituents. When this is done, I tell Him what I want to create, and He tells me I can make anything that contains the same constituents as a peanut. I go to work and keep working until I get what I want.

Racial Integration in the U.S. Army
(Coronet Magazine, 1960)

Inasmuch as racial integration was the social goal for a vast majority of Americans in 1960, this article made it clear that racial harmony in the U.S. Armed Forces was not simply the goal, it was the reality. Written by a journalist who visited as many as ten U.S. Military establishments throughout Europe and North Africa in order to see how President Truman’s Executive Order 9981 had effected American military culture.

Read about racism in the U.S. Army of W.W. I

The Negro’s Northern Exodus
(The Literary Digest, 1931)

Click here to read a second article about the great migration.

Tolerance at the Polls
(Pageant Magazine, 1953)

Speaking of thawing ice:

In 1942 Roper Poll found only 42 per cent of Americans saying ‘yes‘ to the question ‘Are Negroes as intelligent as Whites and can they learn just as quickly if given education and training?‘ After W.W. II the number rose to 57 per cent.

‘The Tenth Man”
(Pathfinder Magazine, 1939)

This is a light history of the African-American people; weak in some spots, informative in others, it’s greatest value lies in telling the story of Blacks in the Thirties.

Because the colored race comprises almost a 10th of the population of the United States, sociologists sometimes refer to the Negro as ‘the Tenth Man.’ As such, he is little known to the other nine. Yet there are 12,500,000 colored persons in the nation – black, brown and some so white that 10,000 pass over the color line every year to take up life as whites.