The Great Migration

The great migration North brought on numerous race related issues

Northerners began to join the KKK whose membersip rose from 100k in 1921 to 4m in 1924

The increased visibility of racial difference caused white Americans to try to separate the races

In 1911, Baltimore passed its first residential segregation law

Race riots began:

  • East St Louis 1917

  • White gangs attacked black residents who were perceived as a labour threat

  • After WW1 as soldiers returned home, white men resented black Americans for the competition in jobs and housing

  • Worst riots took place in Chicago



Great Migration → more diverse cities → job + housing competition → racial tension

(Caused by WW1, + more populous cities which leads to section 3
Job opportunities)


Chicago Riots 1919

50k black Americans had moved into Chicago between 1919 and 1920

White residents hated this, 58 bombs were thrown

In 1919, a 15 year old black boy crossed the dividing line on a beach at Lake Michigan

He was stoned to death by white people

Black Chicagoans rioted and were arrested

Two week of rioting, during which Irish and Polish workers attacked black ghetto residents

  • 15 white people killed

  • 25 black people killed

  • 500 people injured

  • homes of 1k black families destroyed


Tulsa Context

Oklahoma offered cheap land and political freedom from territory status

This meant both white and black people migrated there

Due to white migrants being former enslavers, lynching was common

When it became a state in 1907, it introduced Jim Crow laws

By 1910, 25 all black towns were established

1917 SC ruled residential segregation unconstitutional but this was ignored


Tulsa Race Riot

Race relations worsened as returning Black veterans from WW1 became more assertive

Tulsa contained the wealthiest black population, known as “black wall street”

Rumours of a lynching spread after a black man supposedly assaulted a young white female

Armed black mob to defend supposed assailant inspired white people to arm themselves

White mob attacked the area

1k black homes burnt down

300 black people died, 800 white people injured


In Conclusion

Lynchings may have declined in the 1920s

But the riots show how migration and war were catalysts for change

Riots lead to further tension and the consolidation of defacto segregation

  • In 1921, Chicago realtors adopted “restrictive covenants” which prohibited white sellers from selling or renting to black people

Huge black ghettos developed in Chicago and Detroit

School segregation begins