Episodes Nearest to May 24, 1883: 1 through 25 of 25

  1. Uncommon Access and Consumerism
    date May 24, 1883map NEW YORK, New Yorktags Science/Technology, Economy

    The souvenir booklet distributed by merchandiser Frederick Loeser during the initial weeks of the opening of the New York and Brooklyn Bridge on May 24, 1883, represented an early example of direct marketing. The crush of pedestrian traffic that gathered on the bridge's promenade deck was anxious to experience what was described as the "Eighth Wonder of the World", and no doubt contained shoppers....

  2. African American Lynched During Prison Transfer
    date May 8, 1883 to May 13, 1883map CADDO, Louisianatags African-Americans, Crime/Violence, Health/Death

    On May 8, 1883, a Texan was arrested at the ferry landing in Shreveport, Louisiana for the murder of William H. Lyon. The Texan's name was D.C. Hutchins, and he was an African American. The paper described Hutchins as a desperado and noted that he had been a terror to the decent citizens of Bossier parish, La. The citizens of Bossier parish were indignant at the crime. The paper also noted with...

  3. Alumni meeting at the Male High School to protest changes in the studies
    date June 9, 1883map JEFFERSON, Kentuckytags Education

    On June 9, 1883, the alumni of the Male High School in Louisville, KY had a meeting in their high school's chapel to discuss and protest the future of the school's academic studies. The goal was to prevent the school board from changing the school's current curriculum. The school's alumni had many attendees, including many important and influential men. <br />At this time,...

  4. Memorial Day Address at Staunton
    date June 9, 1883map AUGUSTA, Virginiatags Health/Death, War

    It was a day to honor the memories of those who died in battle and to think about the history of their great nation. Captain Micajah Woods of Charlottesville delivered a stirring Memorial Day address to the people of Staunton, just twenty-two years since the Civil War. Captain Woods spoke as one who had fought in the fields as a Southern soldier during the war and could relate to the experiences...

  5. Lynch mob justice claims Wesley Warren in Prospect, Tennessee.
    date June 21, 1883map WARREN, Tennesseetags African-Americans, Crime/Violence, Law, Race-Relations

    A small party of men lynched Wesley Warren for the murder of James Trice, a clerk at the town store in Prospect, Tennessee, which was located 76 miles south of Nashville. J.M Neal purchased a large amount of corn from Trice and stayed at the store until 1A.M. when he boarded a train for Pulaski, Tennessee. Authorities suspected that Warren and his accomplices entered the store at 2 A.M and killed...

  6. Duel Outside Waynesboro
    date June 30, 1883map AUGUSTA, Virginiatags Crime/Violence, Health/Death, Law

    They decided to meet in a wooded area around two miles outside of Waynesboro in the mist of the early morning. At six o'clock on June 30, 1883, Mr. Elam and Mr. Beirne met one another to settle the score as gentlemen always had before - with a duel. The procedure was decided in advance, specifying the use of Colt's six-shooters at eight paces. All men not directly involved with the business...

  7. Race Relations and Labor Unions in Nineteenth Century New Orleans
    date 1883map ORLEANS, Louisianatags Labor Union, Race Relations

    The history of the nineteenth century United States rarely speaks of racial cooperation, however evidence of a few such scenarios are historically documented. The end of slavery in the United States all but destroyed the agrarian economy of the southern states, and even with the constitutional abolition of slavery racial hostility ran high throughout the country. Yet as the country attempted to...

  8. American Women’s Social Status in 1800’s
    date January 1, 1883 to December 31, 1883map NEW YORK, New Yorktags poverty, Women, social status

    Emily Faithfull, an English women right’s activist and writer, discovered an interesting phenomenon during her trips to the United States in 1872 and 1882. Many middle class and upper class women she met were leading a harsh life after losing their fathers or husbands. In two cases, the daughter of a navy Commander and the wife of a General of the United States Army were not able to make a living...

  9. More to the WCTU than Meets the Eye
    date 1883map SUFFOLK, Massachusettstags Temperance Movement, Temperance, woman's suffrage

    In a letter to a temperance friend in the late 1800’s Francis Parkman, a Temperance supporter, called a woman who was part of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union out on what he thought the Temperance Movement was about. He writes to the woman saying that temperance was nothing more than, “A wedge to universal woman suffrage”.

    In the late 1800‘s people began to become concerned...

  10. Petition for Mercy
    date January 5, 1883 to 1883map ISLE OF WIGHT, Virginiatags African-Americans, Crime/Violence, Government, Law

    Governor Cameron received a petition from a substantial number of Virginia citizens who were concerned with the injustice of a court decision in Virginia. The petitioners wanted a commutation of the sentence of the black man Preston Harris, who was sentenced to be hung for arson. Harris sent fire to the jail where he was housed, though no one seemed to know if it was accidental or purposeful. All...

  11. Marsh J Polk Defrauds The State of Tennessee of four hundred thousand dollars
    date January 6, 1883 to 1883map DAVIDSON, Tennesseetags Government, Law

    Marsh J Polk, the treasurer of the state of Tennessee and the nephew of President Polk, raised suspicion when he refused to pay interest on bonds enacted by the state. Tennessee needed the revenue from the bonds to repay the forty million dollar deficit created by Civil War devastation. A committee from the general assembly investigating Polk's personal accounts discovered that he transferred...

  12. Southern Baptists Demand Total Prohibition
    date March 29, 1883map TALLADEGA, Alabamatags African-Americans, Church/Religious-Activity, Crime/Violence, Law, Politics, Migration/Transportation, Race-Relations

    On March 29, 1883, the Baptist journal, Christian Index, implored the citizens of Talladega County, Alabama to support the outlaw of alcohol trafficking. In 1881, Talladega County proposed a vote on the outlaw of alcohol consumption and the African American population allegedly voted in a bloc against the prohibition. The article blamed the African American population for the failure...

  13. The President Comes to Town
    date April 5, 1883 to 1883map PRINCE WILLIAM, Virginiatags Government, Politics, Migration/Transportation

    The town of Petersburg had been anticipating this day for over a week. The President was passing through on his way to Jacksonville, Florida, and he had been expected for a couple days. But finally, on April 5, 1883, his train came through. The train pulled into the station, and while it was clearly an expensive and impressive presidential car, it was not very extravagant. The observation deck...

  14. Boys and Baseball
    date February 9, 1883map NEW YORK, New Yorktags Adolescence, New York City 1880s, City Life

    Boys do not like sitting around and talking. They would much rather be running, jumping, throwing, and screaming.

    So it comes as a complete surprise to see that on February 9, 1883, a group of adolescent boys, aged anywhere from ten to sixteen, gathered together as delegates of eleven of New York's grammar schools to form a baseball club. The boys came from the city's schools, known...

  15. Farmer's Alliance as a Political Alliance
    date February 6, 1883map GRANVILLE, North Carolinatags Agriculture, Government, Politics

    The threat of a trust formed between cigarette manufacturers in order to control the price of Bright Leaf tobacco grown in the North Carolina Piedmont greatly alarmed the members of the Farmer's Alliance living in the Bright Belt region of North Carolina where this tobacco was grown. In order to prevent just five individuals or corporations from dictating the price of a product whose production...

  16. San Francisco in the late 1800s
    date September 23, 1883map SAN FRANCISCO, Californiatags San Francisco, U.S. Cities

    After the United States won its freedom and began to expand itself westward, many of the cities throughout the country began to flourish in their own specific ways. A journal kept by Captain Willard W. Glazier recorded a variety of cities he visited while traveling through the United States in the late 1800s.  Captain Glazier visited many cities, including San Francisco.

    When Captain Glazier...

  17. Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute Opened
    date October 1, 1883map PITTSYLVANIA, Virginiatags African-Americans, Education

    Education has always been the most stressed issue advocated by Civil Rights activists. From education one gains knowledge of his or her surroundings and from that knowledge can go forth to establish oneself in the ever-changing world. For African-Americans, education was paramount in the fight for equality. Though creating schools for blacks was not easy in the late 19th century south, some innovative...

  18. Calvin Gray's Murder
    date December 24, 1882 to December 30, 1882map HAWKINS, Tennesseetags African-Americans, Crime/Violence, Health/Death, Law, Race-Relations

    On the night of December 24, 1882, near the town of Mooresburg in Hawkins County, Tennessee, African American Calvin Gray was accused of stealing hogs on Mrs. Joseph Gill's farm. He was later released for lack of evidence. On the following Saturday, December 30, an unknown group of people sought retribution for the alleged robbery and bombarded Gray's home, pounding violently on the door...

  19. A Black Voice, the Spark of the Modern Civil Rights Movement.
    date October 20, 1883map MADISON, Alabamatags Civil Rights, Black, Black Press, Huntsville Gazette, William Gaston

    Saturday, October 20, 1883 William Gaston used pages in The Huntsville Gazette to publish an article that shocked the black community. The headline read, “The Civil Rights Act: The United States Supreme Court Declares the Act Unconstitutional.” According to Gaston, “These cases [presented to the Supreme Court] were respectively prosecutions under that act for not admitting certain colored...

  20. Danville Riot
    date November 3, 1883 to November 5, 1883map PITTSYLVANIA, Virginiatags Crime/Violence, Race-Relations

    Racial tension in the late 19th century peaked in the Southeastern United States. Blacks fought what seemed to be an impossible objective as they sought out equality in a predominately white world. Nevertheless slow and steady progress was being made as African American advanced in social, political, and economic arenas. These establishments brought with them the wrath of Southern white fear...

  21. Governor Mahone's Views on the Riot
    date November 3, 1883 to November 6, 1883map PITTSYLVANIA, Virginiatags African-Americans, Crime/Violence, Economy, Government, Politics, Race-Relations, Urban-Life/Boosterism

    On November 3, 1883, a black man refused to move off the sidewalk for a white man, and the ensuing violence caused a riot throughout the city of Danville as whites and blacks were attacked each other. One white man and five black men were killed. Each side blamed the other for starting the riot. Its repercussions sent shockwaves through the state of Virginia, especially with the November elections...

  22. Public Education for African Americans in Alabama
    date November 13, 1883map MOBILE, Alabamatags African-Americans, Education, Government, Race-Relations

    On the morning of November 13, in Birmingham, Alabama, the United States Senate Sub-Committee on Education and Labor resumed session. Witnesses were gathered from all over the state to testify to the committee, many of them hailing from the Gulf Coast of Mobile, Alabama. Two prominent white residents of the county testified about the cotton and coal production in the state, suggesting economic improvements...

  23. Woman's Christian Temperance Union Letter in Newspaper
    date December 12, 1883map WILKINSON, Georgiatags Health/Death, Education, Government, Law, Women

    A casual reader of the Southerner & Appeal might have noticed a column titled To the Women of Georgia. Mrs. Richard Webb, of Savannah, Georgia, was an ardent member of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. In her letter to the newspaper, she insisted that women take up the cause of prohibition and promote alcohol education for young children in order to prevent drunkenness in adulthood....

  24. Thomas E. Watson elected into Georgia General Assembly
    date November 1, 1882map MC DUFFIE, Georgiatags Race-Relations

    Early in his career, Tom Watson was influenced by many leaders of the Confederacy, and he was drawn to local politics. After attending the Convention of 1800, he was determined to run for legislature. He appealed to Georgians as a defender of the old way of life and he was first elected to the state legislation representing McDuffie County in 1882. <br />During the campaign, he discovered...

  25. Women's Christian Temperance Union
    date October 28, 1882map DAVIDSON, Tennesseetags Church/Religious-Activity

    Liquor, as Edward Ayers explains, took a heavy toll on the South, especially since alcohol became much easier to get as the numbers of towns and stores increased. Often, churches went on the offensive, trying to reform what they saw as the “greatest threats to their moral standards.' In the New South, women had an increasingly important role on church committees, and thousands of younger...