changing pattern of settlement + segregation impact on civil

Mass Migration into Harlem from 1905

• The 1904 and 1905 real estate crashes in Harlem made housing accessible to Black residents who had previously been excluded. 

• on manhatten island (NYC)

• most famous BA community in the world

• distinct BA urban culture - Harlem renaissance in the 1920s

• attractive to BAs because of the subway and available housing (empty area in the middle of a city fueled the great migration and many southerners came to stay there)

• 1920-30, 87,000 BAs arrived and 118,000 WAs moved out

• Claude Mckay - harlem was the ‘black capital of the world’

• harlem renaissance

  • urban music, poetry and literature eg. Zora Neale Hurston

  • race relations were believed to be improved through art

  • Great Depression brought it to an end

• harlem saw racial tensions (despite sense of community, culture and race consciousness)

• 1935 and 1943 - Harlem race riots

• post WWII harlem declined economically due to overcrowding

  • harlem unemployment = 2x NYC

  • low life expectancy

  • crime and drug abuse

  • in the 1960s Harlem was the base of the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X and Black Panthers

  • more recently there has been an influx of middle class BAs who have revitalised Harlem

Chicago riot, 1919

• Red summer of 1919 - 26 race riots across US, Chicago being the worst

• began 27 July - over 30 degrees Celcius

• Eugene Williams (17, black) had entered a public beach on Lake Michigan usually reserved for WAs - he was attacked and drowned

• when a BA was arrested, a group of BAs attacked the police

• the rioting was mainly in the SOuth Side of Chicago where 90% of Chicago’s black population lived

• riot lasted 5 days, 23 BA died, 15 WAs died, 537 BA wounded

• white rioters attacked BA homes and 1,000 black families were made homeless

• riot was brought to an end by the Illinois National Guard and a large thunderstorm

• underlying cause: drawn to the north by the promise of employment, Chicago BAs doubled from 1916-1918. the competition for housing and creation of black-dominated areas (South Side) divided the city racially. as BAs moved in, WAs moved out

Tulsa (Oklahoma) riot, 1921

the city attracted lots of white and black migrants because of its oil discoveries and companies

• 30 May 1921, a young BA, Dick Rowland, was falsely accused of sexually assaulting a white girl and was arrested

• the following day, the local newspaper (Tulsa Tribune) published a fictitious story claiming that Rowland had scratched the hands and face of the white girl

• that night (31) nearly 2,000 WAs surrounded the gaol where Rowland was imprisoned to lynch him

• a predominantly BA area of tulsa (greenwood) was attacked by white mobs that night and 200-300 BAs were killed and around 1,000 black homes and businesses were burned

• 2500 BAs (half of Tusla’s black population) then left

Watts riot, August 1965

• despite legal gains (civil rights act 1964, voting rights act 1965, Brown vs Board, etc) BAs still faced social and economic problems - causing unrest in the period 1964-66 (239 outbreaks of racial violence in over 200 US cities from 64-66) - and the inner-city areas of the north and west were mainly untouched by the gains of the civil rights movement - these areas had high unemployment, crime and poor houses

• a young BA motorist was arrested for alleged drunk driving on the 11 August

• crowds watching the arrest and the police officers erupted into violence which sparked a large-scale riot in Watts, a very poor BA neighbourhood in LA

• rioters burned and overturned cars and looted white stores

• over 14,000 California NG troops were sent in

• over 3500 black rioters in Watts 11-15 August - protesting against poor housing, unemployment and police harassment

• 34 people (white and black) were killed and 1,000 injured

• property damage exceeded $40 million, mainly to white-owned businesses

Newark riot, 1967

• Newark’s housing segregation caused racial tension between BAs and WAs

• in 1967 Newark had the second highest % of crime and infant mortality

• short-term causes of the riot:

  • the mayor’s selection of secretary to the Newark School Board caused fighting between BAs and WAs

  • plan to build the New Jersey College on a 50 acre site where BAs thought should be used to build new houses for BAs

  • July - BA taxi driver was arrested for allegedly assaulting a policeman

• led to 4 days of rioting

• On day 3 - NG open fired on the rioters

• by the end of the 4 days - 1,000 BAs injured, $10 million property damage, 26 BAs killed (including 10 year old Edward Moses)

de facto segregation in Levitt estates

• huge economic disparity between white and non-white americans in the 1950s - in 1953, the average white family income was $4,400 a year but $2,500 for the average black family. by 1960, the gap had grown to $5,800 (WA families) and $3,000 (BA families) - due to the 1950s being a period of affluence in US (but only for WAs)

• popultion of those liviing on rural farms - 23 million in 1950 to 13.4 in 1960

• in the 1950s, USA’s 12 largest cities gained 1.8 million BA residents

• by the 60s, many cities were becoming more segregated and central cities tended to house non-white people while suburbs were dominated by WAs - interracial tensions now in northern and western cities (as opposed to in the old-south previously)

• the Federal Housing Administration supported anti-Jewish and anti-black housing restrictions - led to inner-city, rundown, overcrowded ghettos for non-white people

• white movement to suburbia was aided by Levittowns - William Levitt - purpose-built new communities of affordable private housing for white americans only. 1950-60, 18 million white peoplemoved to the suburbs. in 1957, Daisy (BA) and William Myers who moved into Levittown in Pennsylvania faced immediate attacks

• not just migration from inner-city to suburbs, also from north-east to the Sun Belt

increasing desegregation of the south post-1970

• sports teams that had been only white (baseball) were now integrated

• Maynard Jackson became the first black southern mayor (1973) since 1877

• from 1969 to 1974, black US children attending segregated schools had fallen from 68% to 8%

• other BAs stayed in the same poorly paid and housed existence they had before legal desegregation

all due to the slow changes after the civil rights movement gains - Brown vs Board (54) and Civil (64) + Voting (65) Rights acts