The animosity between whites and African Americans in Georgia often resulted in violent conflicts. In 1881, Walter Rountree took a walk one day from the University of Georgia with his brother and some of his friends. They encountered two African American men at the town courthouse and a conflict ensued. All the men drew their pistols against one another. In the shooting that followed, Walter Rountree...
Stella Haas, a resident of New Orleans, Louisiana, had her photograph taken by W.A. Johnston's photograph gallery in Wytheville, Virginia. Her portrait, like the other nine in the 1881 collection of photographs from western Virginia was taken as a solo frame and was presented as a "carte-de-visite," or postcard. Although the portrait did not reveal anything about Stella Haas except her hometown,...
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...
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...
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...
Chinese immigration was an important issue in San Francisco in the mid 19th century. The Burlingame Treaty of 1868 gave the Chinese full rights to immigrate to the United States. When an economic depression hit in the 1870's, an intense competition for jobs lead white residents to become extremely opposed to Chinese immigration. In the May 21st, 1876 issue of the Daily alta California newspaper,...
In April 1882, two young ladies from St. Clair, Tennessee traveled with three men to attend the Church Hill Institute in Church Hill, Tennessee. The two ladies were invited to spend the night at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Nugent, but declined the offer because the women did not want to inconvenience the family because the Nugents were already hosting many other guests. The women also wanted to travel...
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...
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...
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...