African origins

African Americans are the descendants of Africans who were forced into slavery after they were captured during African wars or raids. They were captured and brought to America as part of the Atlantic slave trade.^[19] African Americans are descended from various ethnic groups, mostly from ethnic groups that lived in West and Central Africa, including the Sahel. A smaller number of African Americans are descended from ethnic groups that lived in Eastern and Southeastern Africa. The major ethnic groups that the enslaved Africans belonged to included the Bakongo, Igbo, Mandinka, Wolof, Akan, Fon, Yoruba, and Makua, among many others. Although these different groups varied in customs, religious theology and language, what they had in common was a way of life which was different from that of the Europeans.^[20] Originally, a majority of the future slaves came from these villages and societies, however, once they were sent to the Americas and enslaved, these different peoples had European standards and beliefs forced upon them, causing them to do away with tribal differences and forge a new history and culture that was a creolization of their common past, present, and European culture .^[21] Slaves who belonged to specific African ethnic groups were more sought after and became more dominant in numbers than slaves who belonged to other African ethnic groups in certain regions of what later became the United States.^[22]

The Middle Passage

Before the Atlantic slave trade there were already people of African descent in America. A few countries in Africa would buy, sell, and trade other enslaved Africans, who were often prisoners of war, with the Europeans. The people of Mali and Benin are known for partaking in the event of selling their prisoners of war and other unwanted people off as slaves.^[20]

Transport

In the account of Olaudah Equiano, he described the process of being transported to the colonies and being on the slave ships as a horrific experience. On the ships, the enslaved Africans were separated from their family long before they boarded the ships.^[25] Once aboard the ships the captives were then segregated by gender.^[25] Under the deck, the enslaved Africans were cramped and did not have enough space to walk around freely. Enslaved males were generally kept in the ship's hold, where they experienced the worst of crowding.^[25] The captives stationed on the floor beneath low-lying bunks could barely move and spent much of the voyage pinned to the floorboards, which could, over time, wear the skin on their elbows down to the bone.^[25] Due to the lack of basic hygiene, malnourishment, and dehydration diseases spread wildly and death was common.

The women on the ships often endured rape by the crewmen.^[20] Women and children were often kept in rooms set apart from the main hold. This gave crewmen easy access to the women which was often regarded as one of the perks of the trade system.^[25] Not only did these rooms give the crewmen easy access to women but it gave enslaved women better access to information on the ship's crew, fortifications, and daily routine, but little opportunity to communicate this to the men confined in the ship's hold.^[25] As an example, women instigated a 1797 insurrection aboard the slave ship Thomas by stealing weapons and passing them to the men below as well as engaging in hand-to-hand combat with the ship's crew.^[25]

In the midst of these terrible conditions, enslaved Africans plotted mutiny. Enslaved males were the most likely candidates to mutiny and only at times they were on deck.^[25] While rebellions did not happen often, they were usually unsuccessful. In order for the crew members to keep the enslaved Africans under control and prevent future rebellions, the crews were often twice as large and members would instill fear into the enslaved Africans through brutality and harsh punishments.^[25] From the time of being captured in Africa to the arrival to the plantations of the European masters, took an average of six months.^[20] Africans were completely cut off from their families, home, and community life.^[26] They were forced to adjust to a new way of life.

Black population in the 1700s

By 1700, there were 25,000 enslaved Black people in the North American mainland colonies, forming roughly 10% of the population. Some enslaved Black people had been directly shipped from Africa (most of them were from 1518 to the 1850s), but initially, in the very early stages of the European colonization of North America, occasionally they had been shipped via the West Indies in small cargoes after spending time working on the islands.^[33] At the same time, many were born to Africans and their descendants, and thus were native-born on the North American mainland. Their legal status was now clear: enslaved for life, with Black children inheriting the same status.^[34]

As European colonists engaged in aggressive expansionism, claiming and clearing more land for large-scale farming and the construction of plantations, the flow of enslaved Africans brought to the continent rapidly increased, beginning in the 1660s.^[35] The slave trade from the West Indies proved insufficient to meet demand in the now fast-growing North American slave market. Additionally, most North American buyers of enslaved people no longer wanted to purchase enslaved people who were coming in from the West Indies—by now they were either harder to obtain, too expensive, undesirable, or more often, they had been exhausted in many ways by the brutality of the islands' sugar plantations.^[36] From the 1680s onward, the majority of enslaved Africans imported into North America were shipped directly from Africa, and most of them disembarked in ports located in what is now the Southern U.S, particularly in the present-day states of Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, and Louisiana.

By the turn of the 18th century, enslaved Africans had come to fully supplant indentured servants in proving the labor source for the rapidly expanding plantation system of the Southern Colonies.^[37] The population of enslaved African Americans in North American grew rapidly during the 18th and early 19th centuries due to a variety of factors, including a lower prevalence of tropic diseases.^[38] Colonial society was divided over the religious and moral implications of slavery, though it remained legal in each of the Thirteen Colonies until the American Revolution. Slavery led to a gradual shift between the American South and North, both before and after independence, as the comparatively more urbanized and industrialized North required fewer slaves than the South.^[39]

By the 1750s, the native-born enslaved population of African descent outnumbered that of the African-born enslaved. By the time of the American Revolution, several Northern states were considering the abolition of slavery. Some Southern colonies, such as Virginia, had produced such large and self-sustaining native-born enslaved Black populations that they stopped taking indirect imports of enslaved Africans altogether. However, other colonies such as Georgia and South Carolina still relied on a steady influx of enslaved people to keep up with the ever-growing demand for agricultural labor among the burgeoning plantation economies. These colonies continued to import enslaved Africans until the trade was outlawed in 1808, save for a temporary lull during the Revolutionary War.

South Carolina's Black population remained very high for most of the eighteenth century due to the continued import of enslaved Africans, with Blacks outnumbering whites three-to-one. In contrast, Virginia maintained a white majority despite its significant Black enslaved population.^[40] It was said that in the eighteenth century, the colony South Carolina resembled an "extension of West Africa". Legal importation of enslaved Africans halted in 1808 when the newly formed United States outlawed the slave trade on the earliest date allowed by the Constitution. Despite the ban, small to moderate cargoes of enslaved Africans continued to be illegally brought into the U.S., only ending for good in 1859.^[41]

Gradually, a free Black population emerged, concentrated in port cities along the Atlantic coast from Charleston to Boston. Enslaved people who lived in the cities and towns had more privileges than enslaved people who did not, but the great majority of enslaved people lived on southern tobacco or rice plantations, usually in groups of 20 or more.^[42] Wealthy plantation owners eventually became so reliant on slavery that they devastated their own lower class.^[43] In the years to come, the institution of slavery would be so heavily involved in the South's economy that it would divide America.

The most serious slave rebellion was the 1739 Stono Uprising in South Carolina. The colony had about 56,000 enslaved Blacks, outnumbering whites two-to-one. About 150 enslaved people rose up, seizing guns, ammunition, and killing twenty whites before fleeing to Spanish Florida. The local militia soon intercepted and killed most of the slaves involved in the uprising.^[44]

At this time, slavery existed in all American colonies. In the North, 2% of people owned enslaved people, most of whom were personal servants. In the south, 25% of the population relied on the labour of enslaved people.^{[in what fashion? who, plantation owners or small-time farmers?]} Southern slavery usually took the form of field hands who lived and worked on plantations.^[45] These statistics show the early imbalance that would eventually tip the scale and rid the United States of slavery.^[46]

American independence

The colonists eventually won the war and the United States was recognized as a sovereign nation. In the provisional treaty, they demanded the return of property, including enslaved people. Nonetheless, the British helped up to 3,000 documented African Americans to leave the country for Nova Scotia, Jamaica and Britain rather than be returned to slavery.^[55]

The Constitutional Convention of 1787 sought to define the foundation for the government of the newly formed United States of America. The constitution set forth the ideals of freedom and equality while providing for the continuation of the institution of slavery through the fugitive slave clause and the three-fifths compromise. Additionally, free Black people's rights were also restricted in many places. Most were denied the right to vote and were excluded from public schools. Some Black people sought to fight these contradictions in court. In 1780, Elizabeth Freeman and Quock Walker used language from the new Massachusetts constitution that declared all men were born free and equal in freedom suits to gain release from slavery. A free Black businessman in Boston named Paul Cuffe sought to be excused from paying taxes since he had no voting rights.^[56]

In the Northern states, the revolutionary spirit did help African Americans. Beginning in the 1750s, there was widespread sentiment during the American Revolution that slavery was a social evil (for the country as a whole and for the whites) that should eventually be abolished. All the Northern states passed emancipation acts between 1780 and 1804; most of these arranged for gradual emancipation and a special status for freedmen, so there were still a dozen "permanent apprentices" into the 19th century. In 1787 Congress passed the Northwest Ordinance and barred slavery from the large Northwest Territory.^[57] In 1790, there were more than 59,000 free Black people in the United States. By 1810, that number had risen to 186,446. Most of these were in the North, but Revolutionary sentiments also motivated Southern slaveholders.

For 20 years after the Revolution, more Southerners also freed enslaved people, sometimes by manumission or in wills to be accomplished after the slaveholder's death. In the Upper South, the percentage of free Black people rose from about 1% before the Revolution to more than 10% by 1810. Quakers and Moravians worked to persuade slaveholders to free families. In Virginia, the number of free Black people increased from 10,000 in 1790 to nearly 30,000 in 1810, but 95% of Black people were still enslaved. In Delaware, three-quarters of all Black people were free by 1810.^[58] By 1860, just over 91% of Delaware's Black people were free, and 49.1% of those in Maryland.^[59]

Among the successful free men was Benjamin Banneker, a Maryland astronomer, mathematician, almanac author, surveyor, and farmer, who in 1791 assisted in the initial survey of the boundaries of the future District of Columbia.^[60] Despite the challenges of living in the new country, most free Black people fared far better than the nearly 800,000 enslaved Blacks. Even so, many considered emigrating to Africa.^[56]

Abolitionism

Abolitionists in Britain and the United States in the 1840–1860 period developed large, complex campaigns against slavery.

According to Patrick C. Kennicott, the largest and most effective abolitionist speakers were Black people who spoke before the countless local meetings of the National Negro Conventions. They used the traditional arguments against slavery, protesting it on moral, economic, and political grounds. Their role in the antislavery movement not only aided the abolitionist cause but also was a source of pride to the Black community.^[71]

In 1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe published a novel that changed how many would view slavery. Uncle Tom's Cabin tells the story of the life of an enslaved person and the brutality that is faced by that life day after day. It would sell over 100,000 copies in its first year. The popularity of Uncle Tom's Cabin would solidify the North in its opposition to slavery, and press forward the abolitionist movement. President Lincoln would later invite Stowe to the White House in honor of this book that changed America.

In 1856 Charles Sumner, a Massachusetts congressmen and antislavery leader, was assaulted and nearly killed on the House floor by Preston Brooks of South Carolina. Sumner had been delivering an abolitionist speech to Congress when Brooks attacked him. Brooks received praise in the South for his actions while Sumner became a political icon in the North. Sumner later returned to the Senate, where he was a leader of the Radical Republicans in ending slavery and legislating equal rights for freed slaves.^[72]

Over 1 million enslaved people were moved from the older seaboard slave states, with their declining economies, to the rich cotton states of the southwest; many others were sold and moved locally.^[73] Ira Berlin (2000) argues that this Second Middle Passage shredded the planters' paternalist pretenses in the eyes of Black people and prodded enslaved people and free Black people to create a host of oppositional ideologies and institutions that better accounted for the realities of endless deportations, expulsions, and flights that continually remade their world.^[74] Benjamin Quarles' work Black Abolitionists provides the most extensive account of the role of Black abolitionists in the American anti-slavery movement.^[75]

The Black community

^[76] Black people generally settled in cities, creating the core of Black community life in the region. They established churches and fraternal orders. Many of these early efforts were weak and they often failed, but they represented the initial steps in the evolution of Black communities.^[77]

During the early Antebellum period, the creation of free Black communities began to expand, laying out a foundation for African Americans' future. At first, only a few thousand African Americans had their freedom. As the years went by, the number of Blacks being freed expanded tremendously, building to 233,000 by the 1820s. They sometimes sued to gain their freedom or purchased it. Some slave owners freed their bondspeople and a few state legislatures abolished slavery.^[78]

African Americans tried to take the advantage of establishing homes and jobs in the cities. During the early 1800s free Black people took several steps to establish fulfilling work lives in urban areas.^[79] The rise of industrialization, which depended on power-driven machinery more than human labor, might have afforded them employment, but many owners of textile mills refused to hire Black workers. These owners considered whites to be more reliable and educable. This resulted in many Black people performing unskilled labor. Black men worked as stevedores, construction worker, and as cellar-, well- and grave-diggers. As for Black women workers, they worked as servants for white families. Some women were also cooks, seamstresses, basket-makers, midwives, teachers, and nurses.^[78] Black women worked as washerwomen or domestic servants for the white families. Some cities had independent Black seamstresses, cooks, basketmakers, confectioners, and more.

While the African Americans left the thought of slavery behind, they made a priority to reunite with their family and friends. The cause of the Revolutionary War forced many Black people to migrate to the west afterwards, and the scourge of poverty created much difficulty with housing. African Americans competed with the Irish and Germans in jobs and had to share space with them.^[78]

While the majority of free Black people lived in poverty, some were able to establish successful businesses that catered to the Black community. Racial discrimination often meant that Black people were not welcome or would be mistreated in White businesses and other establishments. To counter this, Black people like James Forten developed their own communities with Black-owned businesses. Black doctors, lawyers, and other businessmen were the foundation of the Black middle class.^[80]

Many Black people organized to help strengthen the Black community and continue the fight against slavery. One of these organizations was the American Society of Free Persons of Colour, founded in 1830. This organization provided social aid to poor Black people and organized responses to political issues. Further supporting the growth of the Black Community was the Black church, usually the first community institution to be established. Starting in the early 1800s^[81] with the African Methodist Episcopal Church, African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church and other churches, the Black church grew to be the focal point of the Black community. The Black church was both an expression of community and unique African-American spirituality, and a reaction to European American discrimination. The church also served as neighborhood centers where free Black people could celebrate their African heritage without intrusion by white detractors.^[78] The church was the center of the Black communities, but it was also the center of education. Since the church was part of the community and wanted to provide education; they educated the freed and enslaved Black people.^[82] At first, Black preachers formed separate congregations within the existing denominations, such as social clubs or literary societies. Because of discrimination at the higher levels of the church hierarchy, some Black people like Richard Allen (bishop) simply founded separate Black denominations.^[83]

Free Black people also established Black churches in the South before 1800. After the Great Awakening, many Black people joined the Baptist Church, which allowed for their participation, including roles as elders and preachers. For instance, First Baptist Church and Gillfield Baptist Church of Petersburg, Virginia, both had organized congregations by 1800 and were the first Baptist churches in the city.^[84] Petersburg, an industrial city, by 1860 had 3,224 free Black people (36% of Black people, and about 26% of all free persons), the largest population in the South.^[85][86] In Virginia, free Black people also created communities in Richmond, Virginia and other towns, where they could work as artisans and create businesses.^[87] Others were able to buy land and farm in frontier areas further from white control.

The Black community also established schools for Black children, since they were often banned from entering public schools.^[88] Richard Allen organized the first Black Sunday school in America; it was established in Philadelphia during 1795.^[89] Then five years later, the priest Absalom Jones established a school for Black youth.^[89] Black Americans regarded education as the surest path to economic success, moral improvement and personal happiness. Only the sons and daughters of the Black middle class had the luxury of studying.^[78]

Haiti's effect on slavery

The revolt of enslaved Haitians against their white slave owners, which began in 1791 and lasted until 1801, was a primary source of fuel for both enslaved people and abolitionists arguing for the freedom of Africans in the U.S. In the 1833 edition of Nile's Weekly Register it is stated that freed Black people in Haiti were better off than their Jamaican counterparts, and the positive effects of American Emancipation are alluded to throughout the paper.^[90] These anti-slavery sentiments were popular among both white abolitionists and African-American slaves. Enslaved people rallied around these ideas with rebellions against their masters as well as white bystanders during the Denmark Vesey Conspiracy of 1822 and the Nat Turner Rebellion of 1831. Leaders and plantation owners were also very concerned about the consequences Haiti's revolution would have on early America. Thomas Jefferson, for one, was wary of the "instability of the West Indies", referring to Haiti.^[91]

Dred Scott v. Sandford

Peter^[92] aka Gordon, a former enslaved person displays the telltale criss-cross, keloid scars from being bullwhipped, 1863.

Dred Scott was an enslaved man whose owner had taken him to live in the free state of Illinois. After his owner's death, Dred Scott sued in court for his freedom on the basis of his having lived in a free state for a long period. The Black community received an enormous shock with the Supreme Court's "Dred Scott" decision in March 1857.^[93] Black people were not American citizens and could never be citizens, the court said in a decision roundly denounced by the Republican Party as well as the abolitionists. Because enslaved people were "property, not people", by this ruling they could not sue in court. The decision was finally reversed by the Civil Rights Act of 1865.^[94] In what is sometimes considered mere obiter dictum the Court went on to hold that Congress had no authority to prohibit slavery in federal territories because enslaved people are personal property and the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution protects property owners against deprivation of their property without due process of law. Although the Supreme Court has never explicitly overruled the Dred Scott case, the Court stated in the Slaughter-House Cases that at least one part of it had already been overruled by the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868, which begins by stating, "All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside."^[95]

Racial terrorism

In 1865, the Ku Klux Klan, a secret white supremacist criminal organization dedicated to destroying the Republican Party in the South, especially by terrorizing Black leaders, was formed. Klansmen hid behind masks and robes to hide their identity while they carried out violence and property damage. The Klan used terrorism, especially murder and threats of murder, arson and intimidation. The Klan's excesses led to the passage of legislation against it, and with Federal enforcement, it was destroyed by 1871.^[112]

The anti-Republican and anti-freedmen sentiment only briefly went underground, as violence arose in other incidents, especially after Louisiana's disputed state election in 1872, which contributed to the Colfax and Coushatta massacres in Louisiana in 1873 and 1874. Tensions and rumors were high in many parts of the South. When violence erupted, African Americans consistently were killed at a much higher rate than were European Americans. Historians of the 20th century have renamed events long called "riots" in southern history. The common stories featured whites heroically saving the community from marauding Black people. Upon examination of the evidence, historians have called numerous such events "massacres", as at Colfax, because of the disproportionate number of fatalities for Black people as opposed to whites. The mob violence there resulted in 40–50 Black people dead for each of the three whites killed.^[113]

While not as widely known as the Klan, the paramilitary organizations that arose in the South during the mid-1870s as the white Democrats mounted a stronger insurgency, were more directed and effective than the Klan in challenging Republican governments, suppressing the Black vote and achieving political goals. Unlike the Klan, paramilitary members operated openly, often solicited newspaper coverage, and had distinct political goals: to turn Republicans out of office and suppress or dissuade Black voting in order to regain power in 1876. Groups included the White League, that started from white militias in Grant Parish, Louisiana, in 1874 and spread in the Deep South; the Red Shirts, that started in Mississippi in 1875 but had chapters arise and was prominent in the 1876 election campaign in South Carolina, as well as in North Carolina; and other White Line organizations such as rifle clubs.^[114]

Robert McDaniels lynched. Apr. 13, 1937

The Jim Crow era accompanied the most cruel wave of "racial" suppression that America has yet experienced. Between 1890 and 1940, millions of African Americans were disenfranchised, killed, and brutalized. According to newspaper records kept at the Tuskegee Institute, about 5,000 men, women, and children were murdered in documented extrajudicial mob violence—called "lynchings." The journalist Ida B. Wells estimated that lynchings not reported by the newspapers, plus similar executions under the veneer of "due process", may have amounted to about 20,000 killings.^[115]

Of the tens of thousands of lynchers and onlookers during this period, it is reported that fewer than 50 whites were ever indicted for their crimes, and only four were sentenced. Because Black people were disenfranchised, they could not sit on juries or have any part in the political process, including local offices. Meanwhile, the lynchings were used as a weapon of terror to keep millions of African-Americans living in a constant state of anxiety and fear.^[116] Most Black people were denied their right to keep and bear arms under Jim Crow laws, and they were therefore unable to protect themselves or their families.^[117]

Women in the beauty business

Although most prominent African American businesses have been owned by men, women played a major role especially in the area of beauty. Standards of beauty were different for whites and Black people, and the Black community developed its own standards, with an emphasis on hair care. Beauticians could work out of their own homes, and did not need storefronts. As a result, Black beauticians were numerous in the rural South, despite the absence of cities and towns. They pioneered the use of cosmetics, at a time when rural white women in the South avoided them. As Blain Roberts has shown, beauticians offered their clients a space to feel pampered and beautiful in the context of their own community because, "Inside Black beauty shops, rituals of beautification converged with rituals of socialization." Beauty contests emerged in the 1920s, and in the white community they were linked to agricultural county fairs. By contrast in the Black community, beauty contests were developed out of the homecoming ceremonies at their high schools and colleges.^[129][130] The most famous entrepreneur was Madame C. J. Walker (1867–1919); she built a national franchise business called Madame C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company based on her invention of the first successful hair straightening process.^[131]

Soldiers

The U.S. armed forces remained segregated during World War I. Still, many African Americans eagerly volunteered to join the Allied cause following America's entry into the war. More than two million African-American men rushed to register for the draft. By the time of the armistice with Germany in November 1918, over 350,000 African Americans had served with the American Expeditionary Force on the Western Front.^{[132][133][134]}

Most African American units were relegated to support roles and did not see combat. Still, African Americans played a significant role in America's war effort. Four African American regiments were integrated into French units because the French suffered heavy losses and badly needed men after three years of a terrible war. One of the most distinguished units was the 369th Infantry Regiment, known as the "Harlem Hellfighters", which was on the front lines for six months, longer than any other American unit in the war. 171 members of the 369th were awarded the Legion of Merit.

157th I.D. Red Hand flag^[135] drawn by General Mariano Goybet

From May 1918 to November 1918, the 371st and the 372nd American Regiments were integrated under the 157th Red Hand Division^[135] commanded by the French General Mariano Goybet. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal (U.S. Army) by General Pershing.^[136] The African American Regiments earned glory in the decisive final offensive in Champagne region of France. The two Regiments were decorated by the French Croix de Guerre for their gallantry in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive.^[137] · ^[138]

December 12, 1918

General Order No. 245

"The red hand division during nine days of violent fight was always an exceptional model for the victorious advance of the fourth army. Dear Friends of America you will be back home to the other side of the ocean, don' t forget ‘’ The Red Hand Division."

"Our friendship has been cemented in the blood of the brave and such a link will be never destroyed Remember your General who is proud to have commanded you and be sure of his endless recognition. ."

General Goybet commanding the 157th Division. ^[139]

During World War I, the 372nd Infantry Regiment was composed of segregated National Guard units as well as draftees.^[140]

Among these National Guard units, the 1st District of Columbia was re-designated the 1st Battalion of the 372nd Infantry

Enlisted men of the 1st Separate Battalion, an all African-American unit, examining weapons in the old army arms room prior to World War I

In 1917, fearing espionage, D.C. National Guard elements were mobilized 12 days before the U.S. officially entered World War I to protect reservoirs and power plants around District of Columbia Military officials were concerned that too many of the D.C. units were made up of men with foreign roots, thus the job of protecting vital facilities fell to the all-black 1st Separate Infantry, the only unit the military believed could be trusted with this mission.

Colored messengers of Motorcycle Corps, 372nd Headquarters, who kept communication lines alive at all hours during the big drive in Champagne, Argonne and at Verdun.

Eventually the 1st Separate was mustered into active service and re-designated the 1st Battalion of the 372nd Infantry. In France, unsure of what to do with an African-American regiment, the 372nd was attached to the French Army's 157th "Red Hand" Division. The soldiers fought in Meuse-Argonne, Lorraine and Alsace, where they were awarded the Croix de Guerre—one of the highest honors bestowed by the French military. Général Goybet, the 157th commanding general, gave the unit a Red Hand insignia in honor of their service. The red hand appears today on the crest of the 372nd Military Police Battalion. Although many D.C. National Guard units were mobilized, the 372nd was the only one to actually see combat during the war.^[141]

Distinctive unit Insignia: 372 MP Bn. Red hand on right side

Corporal Freddie Stowers of the 371st Infantry Regiment was posthumously awarded a Medal of Honor—the first African American to be so honored for actions in World War I. During action in France, Stowers had led an assault on German trenches, continuing to lead and encourage his men even after being wounded twice. Stowers died from his wounds, but his men continued the fight on a German machine gun nest near Bussy farm in Champagne, and eventually defeated the German troops.^[142]

Stowers' sisters, Georgina Palmer and Mary Bowens, with Barbara Bush and President George H.W. Bush at the Medal of Honor presentation ceremony

Stowers was recommended for the Medal of Honor shortly after his death, but according to the Army, the nomination was misplaced. Many believed the recommendation had been intentionally ignored due to institutional racism in the Armed Forces. In 1990, under pressure from Congress, the Defense Department launched an investigation. Based on findings from this investigation, the Army Decorations Board approved the award of the Medal of Honor to Stowers. On April 24, 1991–73 years after he was killed in action—Stowers' two surviving sisters received the Medal of Honor from President George H. W. Bush at the White House.^[143]

Home front and postwar

With an enormous demand for expansion of the defense industries, the new draft law in effect, and the cut off of immigration from Europe, demand was very high for underemployed farmers from the South. Hundreds of thousands of African-Americans took the trains to Northern industrial centers in a dramatic historical event known as the Great Migration. Migrants going to Pittsburgh and surrounding mill towns in western Pennsylvania between 1890 and 1930 faced racial discrimination and limited economic opportunities. The Black population in Pittsburgh jumped from 6,000 in 1880 to 27,000 in 1910. Many took highly paid, skilled jobs in the steel mills. Pittsburgh's Black population increased to 37,700 in 1920 (6.4% of the total) while the Black element in Homestead, Rankin, Braddock, and others nearly doubled. They succeeded in building effective community responses that enabled the survival of new communities.^[144][145] Historian Joe Trotter explains the decision process:

Although African-Americans often expressed their views of the Great Migration in biblical terms and received encouragement from northern black newspapers, railroad companies, and industrial labor agents, they also drew upon family and friendship networks to help in the move to Western Pennsylvania. They formed migration clubs, pooled their money, bought tickets at reduced rates, and often moved ingroups. Before they made the decision to move, they gathered information and debated the pros and cons of the process....In barbershops, poolrooms, and grocery stores, in churches, lodge halls, and clubhouses, and in private homes, southern blacks discussed, debated, and decided what was good and what was bad about moving to the urban North.^[146]

After the war ended and the soldiers returned home, tensions were very high, with serious labor union strikes and inter-racial riots in major cities. The summer of 1919 was known as the Red Summer with outbreaks of racial violence killing about 1,000 people across the nation, most of whom were Black.^[147][148]

Nevertheless, the newly established Black communities in the North nearly all endured. Joe Trotter explains how the Blacks built new institutions for their new communities in the Pittsburgh area:

Black churches, fraternal orders, and newspapers (especially the Pittsburgh Courier); organizations such as the NAACP, Urban League, and Garvey Movement; social clubs, restaurants, and baseball teams; hotels, beauty shops, barber shops, and taverns, all proliferated.^[149]

Cotton

The largest group of Black people worked in the cotton farms of the Deep South as sharecroppers or tenant farmers; a few owned their farms. Large numbers of whites also were tenant farmers and sharecroppers. Tenant farming characterized the cotton and tobacco production in the post-Civil War South. As the agricultural economy plummeted in the early 1930s, all farmers in all parts of the nation were badly hurt. Worst hurt were the tenant farmers (who had relatively more control) and sharecroppers (who had less control), as well as daily laborers (mostly Black, with least control).^[181]

The problem was very low prices for farm products and the New Deal solution was to raise them by cutting production. It accomplished this in the South by the AAA, which gave landowners acreage reduction contracts, by which they were paid to not grow cotton or tobacco on a portion of their land. By law, they were required to pay the tenant farmers and sharecroppers on their land a portion of the money, but some cheated on this provision, hurting their tenants and croppers. The farm wage workers who worked directly for the landowner were mostly the ones who lost their jobs. For most tenants and sharecroppers the AAA was a major help. Researchers at the time concluded, "To the extent that the AAA control-program has been responsible for the increased price [of cotton], we conclude that it has increased the amount of goods and services consumed by the cotton tenants and croppers." Furthermore, the landowners typically let their tenants and croppers use the land taken out of production for their own personal use in growing food and feed crops, which further increased their standard of living. Another consequence was that the historic high levels of turnover from year to year declined sharply, as tenants and coppers tend to stay with the same landowner. Researchers concluded, "As a rule, planters seem to prefer Negroes to whites as tenants and coppers."^[182]

Once mechanization came to cotton (after 1945), the tenants and sharecroppers were largely surplus; they moved to towns and cities.

A call for "The Double Victory"

The African-American newspaper The Pittsburgh Courier called for the "double victory" or "Double V campaign" in a 1942 editorial, saying that all Black people should work for "victory over our enemies at home and victory over our enemies on the battlefield abroad".^[183] The newspaper argued that a victory of the Axis powers, especially Nazi Germany, would be a disaster for African-Americans while at the same time the war presented the opportunity "to persuade, embarrass, compel and shame our government and our nation...into a more enlightened attitude towards a tenth of its people".^[183] The slogan of a "double victory" over fascism abroad and racism at home was widely taken up by African-Americans during the war.^[183]

Wartime service

Eight Tuskegee Airmen in front of a P-40 fighter aircraft

Over 1.9 million Black people served in uniform during World War II. They served in segregated units.^[184][185] Black women served in the Army's WAAC and WAC, but very few served in the Navy.^[186]

The draft starkly exposed the poor living conditions of most African-Americans with the Selective Service Boards turning down 46% of the Black men called up on health grounds as compared to 30% of the white men called up.^[183] At least a third of the black men in the South called up by the draft boards turned out to be illiterate.^[183] Southern Black people fared badly on the Army General Classification Test (AGCT), an aptitude test designed to determine the most suitable role for those who were drafted, and which was not an IQ test.^[187] Of the Black men from the South drafted, 84% fell into the two lowest categories on the AGCT.^[188] Owing to the high failure rate caused by the almost non-existent education system for African-Americans in the South, the Army was forced to offer remedial instruction for Afro-Americans who fell into the lower categories of the AGCT.^[188] By 1945, about 150, 000 Black men had learned how to read and write while in the Army.^[188] The poor living conditions in rural America which afflicted both white and Black Americans led the Army to undertake remedial health work as well. Army optometrists fitted 2.25 million men suffering from poor eyesight with eyeglasses to allow them to be drafted while Army dentists fitted 2.5 million draftees who would have been otherwise disqualified for the bad state of their teeth with dentures.^[189]

Most of the Army's 231 training camps were located in the South, which was mostly rural and where land was cheaper.^[190] Black people from outside of the South that were sent to the training camps found life in the South almost unbearable.^[191] Tensions at army and navy training bases between Black and white trainees resulted in several outbreaks of racial violence with Black trainees sometimes being lynched.^[191] In the so-called Battle of Bamber Bridge on 24–25 June 1943 in the Lancashire town of Bamber Bridge saw a shoot-out between white and Black soldiers that left one dead.^[192] In an attempt to solve the problem of racial violence, the War Department in 1943 commissioned the director Frank Capra to make the propaganda film The Negro Soldier.^[191]

The segregated 92nd Division, which served in Italy, was noted for the antagonistic relations between its white officers and Black soldiers.^[188] In an attempt to ease the racial tensions, the 92nd Division was integrated in 1944 by having the all Japanese-American 442nd Regimental Combat Team together with one white regiment assigned to it.^[188] The segregated 93rd Division, which served in the Pacific, was assigned "mopping up" duties on the islands that the Americans mostly controlled.^[188] Black servicemen greatly resented segregation and those serving in Europe complained that German POWs were served better food than what they were.^[191]

The Navy was segregated and Black sailors were usually assigned menial work such as stevedores.^[193] At Port Chicago on 17 July 1944, while mostly Black stevedores were loading up two Navy supply ships, an explosion occurred that killed 320 men, of which 202 were Black.^[194] The explosion was widely blamed on the lack of training for Black stevedores, and 50 of the survivors of the explosion refused an order to return to work, demanding safety training first.^[195] At the subsequent court martial for the "Port Chicago 50" on the charges of mutiny, their defense lawyer, Thurgood Marshall stated: "Negroes in the Navy don't mind loading ammunition. They just want to know why they are the only ones doing the loading! They want to know why they are segregated; why they don't get promoted, and why the Navy disregarded official warnings by the San Francisco waterfront unions...that an explosion was inevitable if they persisted in using untrained seamen in the loading of ammunition".^[195] Though the sailors were convicted, the Port Chicago disaster led the Navy in August 1944 to allow Black sailors to serve alongside white sailors on ships, through Black people could only make up 10% of the crew.^[195]

Through the Army was reluctant to send Black units into combat, famous segregated units, such as the Tuskegee Airmen and the U.S. 761st Tank Battalion proved their value in combat.^[196] Approximately 75 percent of the soldiers who served in the European theater as truckers for the Red Ball Express and kept Allied supply lines open were African-American.^[197] During the crisis of the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944, the Army allowed several integrated infantry platoons to be formed, through these were broken up once the crisis passed.^[193] However, the experiment of the integrated platoons in December 1944 showed that integration did not mean the collapse of military discipline as many claimed that it would, and was a factor in the later desegregation of the armed forces.^[193] A total of 708 African Americans were killed in combat during World War II.^[198]

The distinguished service of these units was a factor in President Harry S. Truman's order to end discrimination in the Armed Forces in July 1948, with the promulgation of Executive Order 9981. This led in turn to the integration of the Air Force and the other services by the early 1950s.^[199][200] In his book A Rising Wind, Walter Francis White of the NAACP wrote: "World War II has immeasurably magnified the Negro's awareness of the American profession and practice of democracy...[Black veterans] will return home convinced that whatever betterment of their lot is achieved must come largely from their own efforts. They will return determined to use those efforts to the utmost".^[201]

Home front

Rosie the Riveter

Due to massive shortages as a result of the American entry into World War II, defense employers from Northern and Western cities went to the South to convince blacks and whites there to leave the region in promise of higher wages and better opportunities. As a result, African Americans left the South in large numbers to munitions centers in the North and West to take advantage of the shortages caused by the war, sparking the Second Great Migration. While they somewhat lived in better conditions than the South (for instance, they could vote and send children to better schools), they nevertheless faced widespread discrimination due to bigotry and fear of competition of housing and jobs among white residents.

When Roosevelt learned that many companies in the defense industry were violating the spirit, if not the letter of Executive Order 8802 by only employing Black people in menial positions such as janitors and denying them the opportunity to work as highly paid skilled laborers, he significantly strengthened the Fair Employment Practice Committee (FEPC) with orders to fine the corporations that did not treat their Black employees equally.^[202] In 1943, Roosevelt gave the FEPC a budget of half-million dollars and replaced the unpaid volunteers who had previously staffed the FEPC with a paid staff concentrated in regional headquarters across the nation with instructions to inspect the defense industry's factories to ensure the spirit and letter of Executive Order 8802 was being obeyed.^[202] Roosevelt believed that having Black men and women employed in the defense industry working as skilled laborers would give them far higher wages than what they ever had before, and ultimately form the nucleus of a Black middle class.^[202] When the president learned that some unions were pushing for black employees to be given menial "auxiliary" jobs in the factories, he instructed the National Labor Relations Board to decertify those unions.^[202] In 1944, when the union for trolley drivers in Philadelphia went on strike to protest plans to hire African-Americans as trolley drivers, Roosevelt sent in troops to break the strike.^[202] In 1942, Black people made up 3% of the workforce in the defense industry; by 1945 Black people made up 8% of the workforce in defense industry factories (Black people made up 10% of the population).^[202]

Racial tensions were also high between whites and ethnic minorities that cities like Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, and Harlem experienced race riots in 1943.^[203] In May 1943, in Mobile, Alabama, when the local shipyard promoted some Black men up to be trained as welders, white workers rioted and seriously injured 11 of their Black co-workers.^[192] In Los Angeles, the Zoot Suit riots of 3–8 June 1943 saw white servicemen attacking Chicano (Mexican-American) and Black youths for wearing zoot suits.^[192] On 15 June 1943, in Beaumont, Texas, a pogrom saw a white mob smash up Black homes while lynching 2 Black men.^[192] In Detroit, which expanded massively during the war years with 50, 000 Black people from the South and 200, 000 "hillbilly" whites from Appalachia moving to the city to work in the factories, competition for sparse rental housing had pushed tensions to the brink.^[192] On 20 June 1943, false rumors that a white mob had lynched 3 Black men led to an outbreak of racial rioting in Detroit that left 34 dead, of whom 25 were Black.^[192] On 1–2 August 1943, another race riot in Harlem left 6 Black people dead.^[192]

Politically, Black people left the Republican Party and joined the Democratic New Deal Coalition of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, whom they widely admired.^[204] The political leaders, ministers and newspaper editors who shaped opinion resolved on a Double V campaign: Victory over German and Japanese fascism abroad, and victory over discrimination at home. Black newspapers created the Double V campaign to build Black morale and head off radical action.^[205] During the war years, the NAACP expanded tenfold, having over half a million members by 1945.^[183] The new civil rights group Committee of Racial Equality (CORE), founded in 1942, started demonstrations demanding desegregation of buses, theaters and restaurants.^[183] At one CORE demonstration outside a segregated restaurant in Washington, DC in 1944 had signs reading "We Die Together', Let's Eat Together" and "Are you for Hitler's Way or the American Way?".^[183] In 1944, the Swedish economist Gunnar Myrdal published his bestselling book An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy where he described in much detail the effects of white supremacy upon Black Americans, and predicated in the long run the Jim Crow regime was unsustainable, as he argued that after the war African-Americans would be not willing to accept a permanent second class status.^[206]

Most Black women had been farm laborers or domestics before the war.^[207] Despite discrimination and segregated facilities throughout the South, they escaped the cotton patch and took blue-collar jobs in the cities. Working with the federal Fair Employment Practices Committee, the NAACP and CIO unions, these Black women fought a Double V campaign against the Axis abroad and against restrictive hiring practices at home. Their efforts redefined citizenship, equating their patriotism with war work, and seeking equal employment opportunities, government entitlements, and better working conditions as conditions appropriate for full citizens.^[208] In the South, Black women worked in segregated jobs; in the West and most of the North they were integrated, but wildcat strikes erupted in Detroit, Baltimore, and Evansville where white migrants from the South refused to work alongside Black women.^[209][210] The most largest of the "hate strikes" was the strike by white women at the Western Electric factory in Baltimore, who objected to sharing a bathroom with Black women.^[192]

Hollywood

"Stormy Weather" (1943) (starring Lena Horne, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, and Cab Calloway's Band), along with Cabin in the Sky (1943) (starring Ethel Waters, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, Lena Horne, and Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong), and other musicals of the 1940s opened new roles for Black people in Hollywood. They broke through old stereotypes and far surpassed the limited, poorly paid roles available in race films produced for all-Black audiences.^[211][212]

Social issues

After the civil rights movement gains of the 1950s–1970s, due to government neglect, unfavorable social policies, high poverty rates, changes implemented in the criminal justice system and laws, and a breakdown in traditional family units, African-American communities have been suffering from extremely high incarceration rates. African Americans have the highest imprisonment rate of any major ethnic group in the world.^[225] The Southern states, which historically had been involved in slavery and post-Reconstruction oppression, now produce the highest rates of incarceration and death penalty application.^[226][227]

Knowledge of Black history

Surveys of 11th- and 12th-grade students and adults in 2005 show that American schools have given students an awareness of some famous figures in Black history. Both groups were asked to name 10 famous Americans, excluding presidents. Of those named, the three most mentioned were Black: 67% named Martin Luther King Jr., 60% Rosa Parks, and 44% Harriet Tubman. Among adults, King was second (at 36%) and Parks was tied for fourth with 30%, while Tubman tied for 10th place with Henry Ford, at 16%. When distinguished historians were asked in 2006 to name the most prominent Americans, Parks and Tubman did not make the top 100.^[233]

Scholars of African American history

Regional histories

• History of slavery in Alabama
• History of slavery in Florida
• History of slavery in Georgia (U.S. state)
• History of slavery in Kentucky
• History of slavery in Maryland
• History of slavery in New York (state)
• History of slavery in Virginia
• History of slavery in Texas
• History of slavery in West Virginia
• History of slavery in Missouri
• History of slavery in Louisiana
• History of slavery in North Carolina
• History of slavery in South Carolina
• History of slavery in Tennessee
• History of slavery in Delaware

Civil rights movement

• Civil rights movement (1865–1896)
• Civil rights movement (1896–1954)
• Civil rights movement
• Civil rights movement in popular culture
• History of civil rights in the United States
• Timeline of the civil rights movement
• 19th-century African-American civil rights activists
• List of civil rights leaders
• List of photographers of the civil rights movement
• Plantation house
• Post–civil rights era in African-American history

By state:

• African Americans in Alabama
  • Black Belt (region of Alabama)
• African Americans in Arkansas
• African Americans in Florida
• African Americans in Georgia
• History of African Americans in Kansas
• History of African Americans in Kentucky
  • List of Kentucky women in the civil rights era
• African Americans in Louisiana
• African Americans in Maryland
• African Americans in Mississippi
• African American history of Nebraska
• African Americans in New Jersey
• African Americans in New York
• African Americans in North Carolina
• African Americans in Oklahoma
• History of African Americans in Oregon
• African Americans in South Carolina
• South Carolina in the civil rights movement
• African Americans in Tennessee
• African Americans in Texas
• African Americans in Utah
• African Americans in Virginia
  • First Africans in Virginia

In other regions:

• African Americans in Atlanta
• African Americans in New York City
• African Americans in Omaha, Nebraska
• Civil rights movement in Omaha, Nebraska
• Black Belt (region of Chicago)
• Black history in Puerto Rico
• History of African Americans in Boston
• History of African Americans in Chicago
• History of African Americans in Dallas-Ft. Worth
• History of African Americans in Detroit
• History of African Americans in Houston
• History of African Americans in Philadelphia
• History of African Americans in San Antonio
• African Americans in Davenport, Iowa
• History of African Americans in Austin
• History of African Americans in Jacksonville, Florida
• African Americans in Washington, D.C.
• African Americans in Ghana
• African Americans in Israel
• African Americans in France
• History of African Americans in Baltimore

Reference books

• Brown, Nikki L.M., and Barry M. Stentiford, eds. The Jim Crow Encyclopedia (Greenwood, 2008) online
• Earle, Jonathan, and Malcolm Swanston. The Routledge Atlas of African American History (2000), excerpt and text search
• Finkelman, Paul, ed. Encyclopedia of African American History, 1619–1895: From the Colonial Period to the Age of Frederick Douglass (3 vols, 2006)
• Finkelman, Paul, ed. Encyclopedia of African American History, 1896 to the Present: From the Age of Segregation to the Twenty-first Century (5 vols, 2009), excerpt and text search
• Hine, Darlene Clark, Rosalyn Terborg-Penn and Elsa Barkley Brown, eds. Black Women in America – An Historical Encyclopedia (2005), excerpt and text search
• Loewenberg, Bert James and Ruth Bogin. Black Women in Nineteenth-Century American Life: Their Words, Their Thoughts, Their Feelings (Pennsylvania State UP, 1976).
• Lowery, Charles D., and John F. Marszalek, eds. Encyclopedia of African-American Civil Rights: From Emancipation to the Present (1992), online edition
• Palmer, Colin A., ed. Encyclopedia Of African American Culture And History: The Black Experience In The Americas (6 vols, 2005)
• Richardson, Christopher M.; Ralph E. Luker, eds. (2014). Historical Dictionary of the Civil Rights Movement (2nd ed.). Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 9780810880375.
• Salzman, Jack, David Lionel Smith, and Cornel West, eds. Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History (5 vols, 1996).
• Smallwood, Arwin D. The Atlas of African-American History and Politics: From the Slave Trade to Modern Times (1997).

Surveys

• Bennett, Lerone, Before the Mayflower: A History of Black America, 1619–1962 (2018), classic survey; ASIN B08SCBR8WY
• Franklin, John Hope, and Alfred Moss, From Slavery to Freedom. A History of African Americans (2001), standard textbook; first edition in 1947 excerpt and text search
• Harris, William H. The Harder We Run: Black Workers Since the Civil War (1982). online edition
• Hine, Darlene Clark, et al. The African-American Odyssey (2 vols, 4th edn 2007), textbook excerpt and text search vol 1
• Holt, Thomas C., ed. Major Problems in African-American History: From Freedom to "Freedom Now," 1865–1990s (2000), reader in primary and secondary sources
• Holt, Thomas C. Children of Fire: A History of African Americans (Hill & Wang; 2010), 438 pp.
• Kelley, Robin D. G., and Earl Lewis, eds. To Make Our World Anew: A History of African Americans (2000). 672pp; 10 long essays by leading scholars online edition
• Kendi, Ibram X. and Keisha N. Blain, eds. Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619–2019 (One World, 2021). 528pp; anthology of 80 essays
• Litwack, Leon, and August Meier. Black Leaders of the 19th Century. (1988)
  • Franklin, John Hope, and August Meier, eds. Black Leaders of the Twentieth Century. (1982), short biographies by scholars.
• Mandle, Jay R. Not Slave, Not Free: The African American Economic Experience since the Civil War (1992), online edition
• Nash, Gary B. "The African Americans’ Revolution" in The Oxford Handbook of the American Revolution ed. by Jane Kamensky and Edward G. Gray (2012) online at DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199746705.013.0015
• Painter, Nell Irvin. Creating Black Americans: African American History and Its Meanings, 1619 to the Present (2006), 480 pp.
• Pinn, Anthony B. The African American Religious Experience in America (2007) excerpt and text search
• Tuck, Stephen. We Ain't What We Ought To Be: The Black Freedom Struggle from Emancipation to Obama (2011).
• Weiner, Mark S. Black Trials: Citizenship from the Beginnings of Slavery to the End of Caste (2004).

Since 1914

• Allen, Walter R., et al. "From Bakke to Fisher: African American Students in US Higher Education over Forty Years." RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 4.6 (2018): 41–72 online.
• Breen, William J. “Black Women and the Great War: Mobilization and Reform in the South.” Journal of Southern History 44#3 (1978), pp. 421–440. online, World War I
• Finley, Randy. "Black Arkansans and World War One." Arkansas Historical Quarterly 49#3 (1990): 249–77. doi:10.2307/40030800.
• Graham, Hugh Davis. The Civil Rights Era: Origins and Development of National Policy, 1960–1972 (1990)
• Hemmingway, Theodore. “Prelude to Change: Black Carolinians in the War Years, 1914–1920.” Journal of Negro History 65#3 (1980), pp. 212–227. online
• Patler, Nicholas. Jim Crow and the Wilson administration: protesting federal segregation in the early twentieth century (2007).
• Patterson, James T. Grand Expectations: The United States, 1945–1974 (Oxford History of the United States) (1997)
• Patterson, James T. Restless Giant: The United States from Watergate to Bush v. Gore (Oxford History of the United States) (2007)
• Scheiber, Jane Lang, and Harry N. Scheiber. "The Wilson administration and the wartime mobilization of black Americans, 1917–18." Labor History 10.3 (1969): 433–458.
• Wynn, Neil A. African American Experience During World War II (2011)
• Yellin, Eric S. (2013). Racism in the Nation's Service. doi:10.5149/9781469607214_Yellin. ISBN 9781469607207. S2CID 153118305.

Activism and urban culture

• Bernstein, Shana. Bridges of Reform: Interracial Civil Rights Activism in Twentieth-Century Los Angeles (Oxford University Press, 2010)
• Black Jr., Timuel D. Bridges of Memory; Chicago's First Wave of Black Migration: An Oral History, (2005). ISBN 081012315-0
• Boyd, Herb, ed. The Harlem Reader: A Celebration of New York's Most Famous Neighborhood, from the Renaissance Years to the 21st Century (2003), primary sources
• Branch, Taylor. Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954–1963 (1988); Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years, 1963–1965 (1998); At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965–1968 (2006)
• Carle, Susan D. Defining the Struggle: National Racial Justice Organizing, 1880–1915 (Oxford University Press, 2013)
• Cash, Floris Loretta Barnett. African American Women and Social Action: The Clubwomen and Volunteerism from Jim Crow to the New Deal, 1896–1936 (Praeger, 2001)
• Garrow, David. Bearing the Cross: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (1999)
• Gasman, Marybeth and Roger L. Geiger. Higher Education for African Americans before the Civil Rights Era, 1900–1964 (2012)
• Grossman, James R. Land of Hope: Chicago, Black Southerners, and the Great Migration (1991)
• Hornsby, Alton. Black Power in Dixie: A Political History of African Americans in Atlanta (2009)
• Hunt, Darnell, and Ana-Christina Ramon, eds. Black Los Angeles: American Dreams and Racial Realities (2010)
• Kusmer, Kenneth L. and Joe W. Trotter, eds. African-American Urban History since World War II (2009)
• Moore, Shirley Ann Wilson. To Place Our Deeds: The African American Community in Richmond, California, 19101963 (2000)
• Osofsky, Gilbert. Harlem: The Making of a Ghetto: Negro New York, 1890–1930 (1966)
• Orser, W. Edward. "Secondhand Suburbs: Black Pioneers in Baltimore's Edmondson Village, 1955–1980." Journal of Urban History 10, no. 3 (May 1990): 227–62.
• Pattillo-McCoy, Mary. Black Pickett Fences: Privilege and Peril among the Black Middle Class (1999)
• Player, Tiffany Angel. The Anti-lynching Crusaders: A Study of Black Women's Activism (PhD dissertation, University of Georgia, 2008) online
• Rabaka, Reiland. Hip Hop's Amnesia: From Blues and the Black Women's Club Movement to Rap and the Hip Hop Movement (Lexington Books, 2012)
• Self, Robert O. American Babylon: Race and the Struggle for Postwar Oakland (2003)
• Spear, Allan H. Black Chicago: The Making of a Negro Ghetto, 1890–1920 (1969)
• Sugrue, Thomas J. Sweet Land of Liberty: The Forgotten Struggle for Civil Rights in the North (2008)- 720pp comprehensive history of civil rights issue in the North, 1930s–2000s online
• Sugrue, Thomas J. The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit (1996) online
• Thomas, Richard Walter. Life for Us Is What We Make It: Building Black Community in Detroit, 1915–1945 (1992)
• Washburn, Patrick S. The African American Newspaper: Voice of Freedom (Northwestern University Press, 2006)
• Wiese, Andrew. Places of Their Own: African American Suburbanization in the Twentieth Century (2004).
• Wiese, Andrew. "Black Housing, White Finance: African American Housing and Home Ownership in Evanston, Illinois, before 1940." Journal of Social History 33, no. 2 (Winter 1999): 429–60.
• Wiese, Andrew. "Places of Our Own: Suburban Black Towns before 1960." Journal of Urban History 19, no. 3 (1993): 30–54.
• Williams, Doretha. "Kansas Grows the Best Wheat and the Best Race Women: Black Women's Club Movement in Kansas 1900–30." (2011) online.
• Wilson, William H. Hamilton Park: A Planned Black Community in Dallas (1998)

Historiography and teaching

• Arnesen, Eric. "Up From Exclusion: Black and White Workers, Race, and the State of Labor History," Reviews in American History 26(1) March 1998, pp. 146–174 in Project MUSE
• Dagbovie, Pero Gaglo. African American History Reconsidered (2010); 255 pages; excerpt and text search
  • Dagbovie, Pero. The Early Black History Movement, Carter G. Woodson, and Lorenzo Johnston Greene (2007) excerpt and text search
  • Dagbovie, Pero Gaglo. "Exploring a Century of Historical Scholarship on Booker T. Washington." Journal of African American History 2007 92(2): 239–264. ISSN 1548-1867 Fulltext: Ebsco
• Dorsey, Allison. "Black History Is American History: Teaching African American History in the Twenty-first Century." Journal of American History 2007 93(4): 1171–1177. ISSN 0021-8723 Fulltext: History Cooperative
• Ernest, John. "Liberation Historiography: African-American Historians before the Civil War," American Literary History 14(3), Fall 2002, pp. 413–443 in Project MUSE
• Eyerman, Ron. Cultural Trauma: Slavery and the Formation of African American Identity (2002) argues that slavery emerged as a central element of the collective identity of African Americans in the post-Reconstruction era.
• Fields, Barbara J. "Ideology and Race in American History," in J. Morgan Kousser and James M. McPherson, eds, Region, Race, and Reconstruction: Essays in Honor of C. Vann Woodward (1982),
• Franklin, John Hope. "Afro-American History: State of the Art," Journal of American History (June 1988): 163–173. in JSTOR
• Goggin, Jacqueline. Carter G. Woodson: A Life in Black History (1993)
• Hall, Stephen Gilroy. "'To Give a Faithful Account of the Race': History and Historical Consciousness in the African-American Community, 1827–1915." PhD dissertation, Ohio State University, 1999. 470 pp. DAI 2000 60(8): 3084-A. DA9941339 Fulltext: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses
• Harris, Robert L (1982). "Coming of Age: The Transformation of Afro-American Historiography" (PDF). Journal of Negro History. 57 (2): 107–121. doi:10.2307/2717569. JSTOR 2717569. S2CID 149836969. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-12-21. Retrieved 2017-06-01.
• Harris, Robert L., Jr. "The Flowering of Afro-American History." American Historical Review 1987 92(5): 1150–1161. ISSN 0002-8762 in Jstor
• Higginbotham, Evelyn Brooks (1992). "African-American Women's History and the Metalanguage of Race". Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society. 17 (2): 251–274. doi:10.1086/494730. S2CID 144201941.
• Hine, Darlene Clark (2007). "African American Women and Their Communities in the Twentieth Century: The Foundation and Future of Black Women's Studies". Black Women, Gender & Families. 1 (1): 1–23. JSTOR 10.5406/blacwomegendfami.1.1.0001.
• Hine, Darlene Clark, ed. Afro-American History: Past, Present, and Future (1980).
• Hine, Darlene Clark. Hine Sight: Black Women and the Re-Construction of American History (1999), excerpt and text search
• Hornsby Jr., Alton, et al. eds. A Companion to African American History (2005). 580 pp. 31 long essays by experts covering African and diasporic connections in the context of the transatlantic slave trade; colonial and antebellum African, European, and indigenous relations; processes of cultural exchange; war and emancipation; post-emancipation community and institution building; intersections of class and gender; migration; and struggles for civil rights. ISBN 0631230661
• McMillen, Neil R. "Up from Jim Crow: Black History Enters the Profession's Mainstream." Reviews in American History 1987 15(4): 543–549. ISSN 0048-7511, in Jstor
• Meier, August, and Elliott Rudwick. Black History and the Historical Profession, 1915–1980 (1986)
• Nelson, Hasker. Listening For Our Past: A Lay Guide To African American Oral History Interviewing (2000), excerpt and text search
• Quarles, Benjamin. Black Mosaic: Essays in Afro-American History and Historiography (1988).
• Rabinowitz, Howard N. "More Than the Woodward Thesis: Assessing The Strange Career of Jim Crow", Journal of American History 75 (December 1988): 842–56. in JSTOR
• Reidy, Joseph P. "Slave Emancipation Through the Prism of Archives Records" (1997), online
• Roper, John Herbert. U. B. Phillips: A Southern Mind (1984), on the white historian of slavery
• Strickland, Arvarh E., and Robert E. Weems, eds. The African American Experience: An Historiographical and Bibliographical Guide (Greenwood, 2001). 442pp; 17 topical chapters by experts.
• Trotter, Joe W. "African-American History: Origins, Development, and Current State of the Field," OAH Magazine of History 7(4), Summer 1993, online edition
• Wright, William D. Black History and Black Identity: A Call for a New Historiography (2002), proposes new racial and ethnic terminology and classifications for the study of black people and history.excerpt and text search
• Yacovone, Donald (April 8, 2018). "Textbook Racism. How scholars sustained white supremacy". Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved April 18, 2018.

Primary sources

• Aptheker, Herbert, ed. A Documentary History of the Negro People in the United States. (7 vols, 1951–1994)
• Baker, Ray Stannard. Following the Color Line: An Account of Negro Citizenship in the American Democracy (1908) online.
• Berlin, Ira, ed. Free at Last: A Documentary History of Slavery, Freedom, and the Civil War (1995)
• Bracey, John H., and Manisha Sinha, eds. African American Mosaic: A Documentary History from the Slave Trade to the Twenty-First Century, (2 vols, 2004)
• Bureau of Education, Department of the Interior. Negro Education: A Study of the Private and Higher Schools for Colored People in the United States, Volume II. (Bulletin, 1916, No. 39) (1917) online
• Chafe, William Henry, Raymond Gavins, and Robert Korstad, eds. Remembering Jim Crow: African Americans Tell About Life in the Segregated South (2003) excerpt and text search
• Finkenbine, Roy E. Sources of the African-American Past: Primary Sources in American History (2nd edn 2003)
• Hampton, Henry, and Steve Fayer, eds. Voices of Freedom (1990), oral histories of civil rights movement
• Hart, Albert Bushnell (1910). The Southern South. D. Appleton. ISBN 9780837118901. by a white Harvard professor; focus on race relations
• King Jr., Martin Luther. I Have a Dream: Writings and Speeches That Changed the World (1992), excerpt and text search
• King Jr., Martin Luther. Why We Can't Wait (1963/1964; 2000)
• King Jr., Martin Luther. The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr.: Volume VI: Advocate of the Social Gospel, September 1948–March 1963 (2007) excerpt and text search
• Levy, Peter B. Let Freedom Ring: A Documentary History of the Modern Civil Rights Movement (1992), online edition
• Rawick, George P. ed. The American Slave: A Composite Autobiography (19 vols, 1972), oral histories with ex-slaves conducted in the 1930s by Works Progress Administration
• Sernett, Milton C. African American Religious History: A Documentary Witness (1999) excerpt and text search
• Wright, Kai, ed. The African-American Archive: The History of the Black Experience Through Documents (2001)