Chicago Race Riots

This slide show movie deals with the subject of the Chicago Race Riot of 1919 which makes up part of the plot of Color Me Dark. The original is much more visible. Soundtrack is by the great Joe Williams.
From wikipedia on the Chicago Race Riot.

The Chicago Race Riot of 1919 was a major racial conflict that began in Chicago, Illinois on July 27, 1919 and ended on August 3.It is considered to be the worst of the approximately 25 riots during the Red Summer of 1919. It lasted for several days and ended only after nearly 6,000 National Guard troops were deployed to put an end to the violence on the night of July 30. Most of the rioting, murder, and arson was concentrated in the city's Black Belt, but violent conflict occurred in areas throughout the city, including the Chicago Loop. The riot left 38 people dead (23 African Americans and 15 Caucasians), 537 injured (342 African-Americans) and approximately 1000 homeless.
Unlike southern cities until the 1960s, Chicago did not segregate most public accommodations. In fact, according to Walter Francis White, pre-1915 Chicago was reputed for its equitable treatment of Negroes in general. However, early 20th-century Chicago beaches were segregated.
After an inquest on the cause of death by the Cook County Coroner's Office which took 70 day sessions, 20 night sessions and 450 witnesses examinations, their report stated the finding that on July 27, 1919 Eugene Williams, a Black youth, drowned after tiring of holding onto a railroad tie during a stone throwing melee between blacks and whites on the 29th Street beach in the city's Douglas community. A witness recalled a single white male standing on a breakwater 75 feet from their raft, throwing rocks at them. Eugene was struck in the forehead; he panicked and drowned. The assailant ran toward 29th Street, but rioting had already erupted there regarding blacks who wanted to use the beach in defiance of its tacit segregation. The rioting escalated when a white police officer refused to arrest the white man who threw the stone earlier and instead arrested a black individual. Anger over this, coupled with Eugene Williams' death, led to five days of rioting.
Early reports with details of injuries and incidences showed injuries to Chicago Police officers and a Chicago fireman. Roaming gangs of Bridgeport whites perpetrated much of the violence, led by a group known as the Hamburg Athletic Club, whose members included a 17-year-old Richard J. Daley, who eventually served as the city's mayor from 1955 to 1976. No whites were ever indicted or prosecuted for any of the murders. Daley was soon elected leader of the Hamburg Athletic Club, and never confirmed or denied that he was involved in the violence.

Color Me Dark 3

from the discussion guide:

An Interview with Patricia McKissack
Richard F. Abrahamson, Ph.D. & Linda M. Pavonetti: You are quoted as saying, "I have mirrored some of my own experiences through the eyes of Nellie Lee in a very close-up and personal point of view." Could you share with us some of the most autobiographical episodes from Nellie Lee's dairy?
Patricia McKissack: My grandmother's family name is Love. I have one sister, Sarah Frances, (who is named after our two grandmothers--Sarah James Love and Frances Oldham). Our mother's name is Erma and our aunt's name is Nell. There were just the two of them. Our mother's mother, our grandmother Frances, had one sister, Willamae, and their mother Martha was a twin to Mary. So for four generations there were just two sisters.
My sister and I are very close. We share everything from secrets to clothing.
I named my characters after our mother and aunt because they were closest to the time period (1919).
RFA & LMP:In researching the Chicago Riot of 1919, what did you discover that surprised you most?
PM: When researching the Chicago riot, I was amazed that it went on for weeks. Most riots last a day or two. Unlike the rioting of 1960s when Blacks--out of frustration--took to the streets and destroyed property by burning and looting, in 1919 Whites went into Black neighborhoods and attacked people--beat them, burned homes and businesses. There were over 30 riots in 1919 all over the country--mostly over jobs. In many places, Blacks hid in their homes and waited for tempers to cool. But in Chicago, the Black community fought back--defended themselves. That was the major difference.
RFA & LMP: Erma Jean and Nellie Lee are wonderful characters who have a great relationship as sisters. If you had two or three words to describe each girl, what would those words be?
PM: Erma Jean is creative, loving, and sensitive. Nellie Lee is generous, assertive, and a natural leader.
RFA & LMP: Your readers are introduced to many important leaders from W.E.B. DuBois to Ida B. Wells-Barnett to Marcus Garvey and Madam C.J. Walker. Of the real people who walk through the pages of Nellie Lee's diary, are there one or two you most admire? Why?
PM: The "real" people who are in Color Me Dark are all people I admire. I admire Madam C.J. Walker because she made it possible for Black women to start their own hair salons and become independent. Up until that time women were not encouraged to work outside the home, but selling Madam Walker's products made it possible for Black women to have a career that was acceptable. That was a revolutionary idea in 1919, and it made Madam Walker the first self-made, female millionaire in the country. I also admire Ida B. Wells-Barnett. She was an outspoken civil rights leader who led the fight against lynching.
RFA & LMP: Do you feel that light and dark skin, social standing, or recent immigration from developing countries are issues among African Americans at the present time?
PM: I believe "different" is always a reason for people to discriminate. That is the point of the story. Different is to some people a synonym for wrong.
RFA & LMP: If youngsters were interested in reading one or two other books about this period in American history and the people who influenced the times, what titles would you recommend?
PM: I would suggest that young readers start with a biography of W.E.B. DuBois, Madam C.J. Walker, Marcus Garvey, and Ida B. Wells-Barnett. Historians often start the Harlem Renaissance at 1919. Poets and writers from that period such as Countee Cullen, Sterling Brown, and Langston Hughes would be very interesting for young readers to know about.
RFA & LMP: What is one question you'd like to ask children after they've finished reading the diary?
PM: Do you think the Loves made the right decision to leave The Corners to live in Chicago? Why?
RFA & LMP: What is one thing you hope young readers will take with them after reading Color Me Dark?
PM: I hope young readers will remember that it is not important where you are, but who you are with. If you are with people who love you, then you can overcome adversity of all kinds. The girls not only had a good family, they were also surrounded by a caring community.

Color Me Dark 2

More from the scholastic guide:
Thinking About the Book
1. Why did Erma Jean stop talking? What really happened to Uncle Pace?
2. Why does the sheriff of Bradford Corners want to stop Nellie's father and the other African American men from reading the Crisis magazines? What kind of stories does the magazine print? How could these pieces of paper have any effect on Bradford Corners?
3. What is a charlatan? Why is this word important in Nellie Lee's diary?
4. Where does the title for this book, Color Me Dark, come from?
5. Reverend Prince tells his congregation that "good things come from good thoughts" and that "ignorance and fear breed violence, and knowledge is the only way to overcome intolerance." How can thinking or knowledge be so powerful? What does Reverend Prince mean?
6. What incident started the Chicago Riot of 1919?
7. What is meant by "The Great Migration North"? Why did it take place?
Student Activities
1. In Nellie Lee's January 9, 1919 diary entry she writes about how she taught Uncle John Willis to "hand-clap" a rhyme. Create your own rhyme about something or someone in Color Me Black. Pick a partner and hand-clap the rhyme for your class or discussion group.
2. The Love family's life changed when they moved to Chicago. Compare and contrast the two ways of life — Bradford Corners, TN, to Chicago, IL. Make a Venn Diagram to help you visualize the differences and similarities between the two cities. For more information on the city of Chicago in 1900, visit the library's millennium site at http://www.chipublib.org/004chicago/1900/intro.html. Another Chicago Public Library site links to information on the 1919 Chicago race riots: http://www.chipublib.org/004chicago/disasters/riots_race.html.
3. There are several superstitions about the weather that appear in Nellie's diary: If it rains on Easter Sunday, it will rain seven Sundays thereafter. Red sky at night, sailor's delight, red sky at morning, sailors take warning. Interview adult members of your family or teachers in your school. See how many of these superstitions about the weather you and your discussion group can find.
4. Women in Bradford Corners worked very hard as sharecroppers in the fields. What professions or occupations were available for women in Chicago? How did Mrs. Love change? Some women, such as Madam C. J. Walker, provided opportunities and inspired others to follow in their paths. To learn more about Madam C. J. Walker's life and her hair care products, along with some interesting photographs from the early 20th century, go to http://www.madamecjwalker.com/.
5. Music was a vital force in the Harlem Renaissance. There were many creative forces in the African American community during the early 20th century. For information about James Weldon Johnson's Negro National Anthem, to print the words, view the sheet music, and actually hear "Lift every voice and sing" go to the following site: http://www.sc.edu/library/spcoll/amlit/johnson/johnson5.html. Click on the /Music/ button that will take you to http://www.sc.edu/library/spcoll/amlit/johnson/johnson2.html. Then scroll down to the song, "Lift every voice and sing." You can click on the sheet music to see an enlarged view, then continue scrolling to find the words and at the bottom of that section, you can click on the "listen to" link to actually hear the song. There is an alternative version — as a gospel song — at the following site: http://www.afroamericanflag.com/gospel.ram.
6. Read Patricia McKissack's other Dear America book, A Picture of Freedom: The Diary of Clotee, a Slave Girl. Compare Nellie Lee with Clotee. How are they different? How are they the same?

Color Me Dark

This is Part 1 of this excellent movie from the Dear America series
an excerpt from the scholastic site with a discussion guide on the book from which this movie was based

Growing up, award-winning author Patricia McKissack listened to her grandfather tell stories of how he and his brother left Nashville when they were seventeen and eighteen and headed north to Chicago in search of opportunity. Years later, when McKissack recalled her grandfather mentioning that they arrived in Chicago at the time of some terrible riots, she realized that her grandfather and his brother had been in the city during the Chicago Riot of 1919. McKissack says, "When asked how he survived those trying times, my grandfather used one word: 'family'."
Color Me Dark: The Diary of Nellie Lee Love, The Great Migration North is a story about the importance of family. Nellie's diary entries paint a picture of what is was like to be an eleven-year-old who leaves her grandparents and home town of Bradford Corners, Tennessee to accompany her family as they moved north to Chicago in search of a better life. Through Nellie Lee's eyes young readers witness the Chicago Riot of1919. They are introduced to influential African American leaders: W.E.B. DuBois, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Madam C.J. Walker, and Marcus Garvey among others.
Nellie and her family discover that racism and discrimination aren't just found in Bradford Corners. But they also realize anew the power of the Love family values — religion, education, hard work, and helping others. As they practice these values in Chicago, the dividends are pride in who they are, happiness, and a hard earned measure of prosperity. Patricia McKissack says, "I'd like for my readers to feel that 'family' means unity, and in unity there is strength." Color Me Dark succeeds in showing exactly that.
Summary
Nellie Lee is an ordinary girl who experiences extraordinary events. Her family name, Love, characterizes her comfortable, secure world in Bradford Corners, Tennessee. Comfortable and secure, that is, until the day her uncle Pace is murdered by the Ku Klux Klan.
Author Patricia McKissack gradually exposes the prejudice and segregation that exist in 1919 — even though slavery has been abolished for more than fifty years. Readers discover, along with young adolescent Nellie, how the white folks live on one side of Bradford Corners' only road, and the Colored people live on the other. Through Nellie Lee's questioning eyes, readers wait patiently with the Love family until given permission to enter the general store. We recognize the fear in the adults' faces when the sheriff warns against reading NAACP materials. And while Nellie Lee's father and uncle attempt to track down the only Colored doctor in two counties - who's miles away delivering twins — Nellie and her sister Erma Jean watch Uncle Pace's life slip away. With Pace's death, Erma Jean's voice abandons her. In order to find better treatment for his daughter, Mr. Love and Erma Jean depart for Chicago. Within weeks, Nellie Lee and her mother are packing to join them there.
Life in Chicago — even though there is less apparent segregation - is not the promised land Nellie Lee's family anticipates. However, the love, hope, and faith that sustained Nellie Lee's family in Tennessee hold them together in Chicago. Home, once a spacious two-story family residence with trees, becomes a two room walk-up with a shared toilet. Religion, always an integral part of their lives, becomes Nellie and Erma's deliverance. But underneath the refined exterior, Chicago is also a city of secrets. Mr. Love discovers that bribery opens — or shuts — doors as he struggles to establish his business. Lake Michigan, a cool refuge on steamy summer days, suddenly becomes the spark that ignites racial rioting. Nellie Lee and her family watch in horror as one of their friends drowns while white bystanders hurl rocks at the Colored swimmers who try to rescue him. For more than two weeks, Chicago and her inhabitants are held hostage while rioting consumes the streets: thirty-eight dead, hundreds injured, "and we dare not go beyond the South Side - especially after dark." De facto segregation becomes even more firmly rooted in Chicago.
Months later, Nellie Lee reflects on the year her family moved to Chicago. "There have been so many lynchings, so much rioting this year all over the country. James Weldon Johnson called 1919 the Red Summer because so much blood has been spilled. But yet we survived — battered and torn, but still standing." As her diary ends — on New Year's Eve, 1919 — after a year of tumultuous changes, Nellie Lee writes:
I will never forget 1919 — the year of the Red Summer — as long as I live. But as terrible as it was — the death of Uncle Pace, the loss of Erma's voice, the move to Chicago, the riots, the prejudices — I have happy memories, too.
Nellie Lee Love is a realist, a young African American teenager who understands hatred but knows love because of her strong family roots. Her grandparents, themselves the children of freed slaves, and their descendents form a family that respects and treasures each member. As Nellie Lee's father affirms, "A Colored family is like a beautiful bouquet of flowers — all different colors, sizes, and shapes. But each one just as beautiful in his or her own way." Nellie Lee's diary reveals her as the youngest blossom.

Harlem On My Mind: The Great Migration II

from 12/30/05, but this time with a google video version as well. Here's the great migration, in slide show form, with historical images instead of Jacob Lawrence's paintings. The more accurate soundtrack is entitled "Back Water Blues," by Bessie Smith. The source of the images is the great Schomburg Collection at the NYPL Digital site.

The Great Migration

originally from pseudo-intellectualism from 2/26/07:

I youtubed this slide show I made last year from Jacob Lawrence's book. I recently converted it to a DVD format and discovered it won't convert with a midi soundtrack (which I did originally for file size considerations), so I added Ellington's "Misty Morning" and "Night Train" instead. I think it works. There's just enough resolution to see some of the text in this smaller version. I also discovered that slide shows that work manually won't work as a DVD, so they all need an automatic timing mechanism.