Book Club Made Me Gay
...for example, free blacks in the urban North had established libraries, reading rooms, and literary societies. Such spaces were crucial for circulating essential movement texts, and for supporting the development...
Race and Labor in the 1863 New York City Draft Riots
...remains the most significant insurrection by civilians in American history. Opposition to the Civil War was largely fueled by a fear of newly freed blacks moving north and taking over...
Old English Has a Serious Image Problem
...features a diverse trio of teenagers: William is the mixed-race son of a French knight and a North African woman; Jacob is Jewish; and Jeanne is a peasant. It won...
The History of the KKK in American Politics
...costumed rides scared blacks, the group turned to vigilantism. As blacks were being freed and the country began extending civil rights—including voting rights—Klan groups called “Klaverns” formed around the South...
The Historical Need for Black Colleges
...the adult black population was functionally illiterate. Before these colleges could go about the serious business of higher education they first had to prepare blacks on the elementary and secondary...
What It Was Like To Be an African-American Soldier During the Civil War
...soldiers in the Union Army as prisoners of war. Death by hanging was not uncommon. In early 1863, the War Department allowed for the recruitment of free Blacks in the...
Understanding Woodrow Wilson’s Racism
...slaves and their descendants, as well as free blacks of the North. Wilson encapsulates that historic moment himself in a profile of Robert E. Lee. He calls Lee noble, heroic,...
Dr. Ossian Sweet’s Black Life Mattered
...his parents sent him north. He worked his way through prep school and college at Wilberforce University in Ohio, the first black university owned and operated by black Americans. He...
Harriet Tubman on the $20 Bill?
...a surprise to Americans that Canadians, too, claim Tubman as a national hero. The “North Star” of freedom had been a haven for escaped slaves and free blacks since the...
![By Unknown; distributed by Epoch Film Co. [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons](https://daily.jstor.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Birth_Of_A_Nation_1050x700-600x400.jpg)
“Birth of a Nation”: 100 Years Later
...as they pass a bill permitting the intermarriage of blacks and whites. We can’t hear what’s going on—The Birth of a Nation is a silent film—but the scene is identified...