“The foreman would let you know if it was safe. Because he said something was safe didn’t mean it was safe.” This is how Ulysses S. Anderson described the safety conditions at Sloss Furnace, a pig-iron producing blast furnace in Birmingham, Alabama. While being interviewed by the Sloss Furnace Association Anderson spent a great amount of time describing the safety conditions he encountered...
Post World War II the Unites State’s history is shaped by activism. Starting with the African American civil rights movement, feminist and homosexuals found their voice and followed with their own activist movement. Sarah (Mrs. Joe K) Galloway’s story, “Joyce Kilmer Was Right!” is a small representation of this, particularly the feminist movement.
In her story Galloway tells how in...
Orlando Sanford airport stands east of state road 17-92 about twenty miles north of Orlando. Today the Orlando Sanford is a small commercial airport, dwarfed by Orlando International Airport only thirty miles away. While Orlando International may be bigger, it was a product of the Disney Empire, which moved in during the 1970s. Orlando Sanford Airport, however, was originally an important naval...
H. S. Chamberlain had a problem on his plate back in the mid-twentieth century. Everyone sought cheap labor in the steel and coal industries, but feared employing certain groups of people because of their behavior. Blacks treated with trepidation were the majority of workers in these industries. For the most part, blacks saw nothing but discrimination and fell under the watchful eyes of white...
Up until about the mid 1950s in Florida, racial segregation was all too common with the Jim Crow laws. It was impossible for an African American to get his paintings into a gallery, no matter how good or famous he was. There was one group of painters, however, who came over this hurdle by selling their paintings straight to businesses- motels, offices and other such places. These men, the Florida...
Betti Wiggins proudly declares, “I am in the ‘urban ag’ movement.” Wiggins, born in North Carolina, arrived in Detroit at two months old. She lived in a single-family apartment in Black Bottom, the city's predominantly African-American neighborhood, with her mother, father, aunt, uncle and five cousins. In Wiggins’ early childhood, her mother developed tuberculosis. With help from...
On November 2, 1943 Ralph W. Crego was elected into office as Mayor of Lansing in Michigan’s capital city. He would serve the City of Lansing for almost two decades until he was finally defeated in the election of 1961. During the long span of his eighteen years serving the city, Mayor Crego led Lansing through the 1940s and 50s - a period of urban renewal in the United States. Crego’s daughter,...
Betty DeRamus’ parents moved from Alabama to Detroit sometime in the early 1940’s where they settled in the Black Bottom neighborhood on Detroit’s eastside on St. Aubin Street. Betty grew up with another Black family with the last name Shephard, whom she believed at the time were her actual cousins and referred to them as so. When she was a bit older, her family moved to 2 different homes...
On March 17, 1951 the Sandspur—Rollins College’s student news publication, published an article called “Trustees Back Faculty Cuts.” The newspaper article reported on the responses of various groups at Rollins on their opinions on the faculty dismissals that were carried out by President Wagner and supported by the Board of Trustees. According to the article, Rollins and faculty...
An excerpt from a Department of Commerce report, which was drafted on June fifteenth,1950 in response to the Federal Government’s report on suspected homosexual employees in the civil service, helps to provide insight about the conditions and treatment of homosexuals in the Civil Service during the period of time known as the “Lavender Scare (1945-1950’s) a time in which...