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The history of racial inequality in America
Research on ida b wells
The history of racial inequality in America
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The thing that stands out about Ms. Ida B. Wells is that she was a one man or should I say one woman wrecking crew when it came to crusading journalism. Especially when it came to equal rights, racism and lynching in her time.
Wells was born in Mississippi in 1862 to two slave parents. She was the oldest of her seven siblings. At the time that Wells was born Abraham Lincoln had just passed the Emancipation Proclamation. The proclamation declared, "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free". So when she was growing up although the south was still very racist, she and her siblings were able to go to school. It was very important to Wells' parents that their children got an education. That is where her foundation for being a journalist began. Tragedy struck in 1878 when the yellow fever epidemic killed her parents and her youngest sibling. At age sixteen Wells became responsible for her younger siblings. She took a job as a teacher and did other jobs on the weekends to support herself and her brothers and sisters.
Wells attended Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. One day while taking a train to school, she was told by the conductor to move to the back of the train to a smoking car. She would not move and as a result of him trying to move her she bit him. The conductor eventually got help and moved her to the back of the train. At the next stop she got of the train and went back to Memphis. She filed a lawsuit against the railroad company. She ended up winning her case in court and was given a five hundred dollar settlement, but the Tennessee Supreme Court overturned the decision claiming that her intension was to cause trouble on the train. These experiences of injustice are what sparked Wells to take a stand and write about these things so that people of color at the time would try to make changes and fight for their equal rights. "I firmly believed all along that the law was on our side and would, when you appealed to it, give us justice. I felt shorn of the belief and utterly discouraged."
Wells began to write in black publications as an author of articles that were about race an politics in the South, she wrote under the alias Iola.
Upon reflecting on today's quarter projects an image came into my mind. It was a circle with a bunch of different arrows moving out from a common center trying to push out of the circle that contained them (see below). I found this to be an apt description of the individuals we discussed in class today. All of them worked to apply pressure to society in different ways. One common link I saw between Emma Goldman, Eugene V. Debs and Ida B. Wells was applying political pressure. Although they worked towards different goals I could see a common thread between the methods they used to apply pressure which often involved writing and trying to communicate their ideas to the masses. I found these ideas to be a rather efficient way to spread these beliefs
The history of The Black Civil Rights Movement in the United States is a fascinating account of a group of human beings, forcibly taken from their homeland, brought to a strange new continent, and forced to endure countless inhuman atrocities. Forced into a life of involuntary servitude to white slave owners, African Americans were to face an uphill battle for many years to come. Who would face that battle? To say the fight for black civil rights "was a grassroots movement of ordinary people who accomplished extraordinary things" would be an understatement. Countless people made it their life's work to see the progression of civil rights in America. People like W.E.B. DuBois, Marcus Garvey, A Phillip Randolph, Eleanor Roosevelt, and many others contributed to the fight although it would take ordinary people as well to lead the way in the fight for civil rights. This paper will focus on two people whose intelligence and bravery influenced future generations of civil rights organizers and crusaders. Ida B.Wells and Mary Mcleod Bethune were two African American women whose tenacity and influence would define the term "ordinary to extraordinary".
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was a unique and vital character in American history. She played an imperative role in the equality and advancement of not just African-American women, but women in general. Although she was born a free women in Maryland she had an unparalleled knack for describing and capturing the evils and horrors of slavery. She wrote a plethora of novels, short stories and poems. In her early years she taught in both Ohio and Pennsylvania, after leaving teaching she left teaching to lecture for the Maine Anti-slavery society along with other anti-slavery organizations. She also worked to help fugitive slaves escape to Canada through the Underground Railroad. Frances E. W. Harper was an impeccable writer and human being, she made unmatched contributions to history through her works as an equal rights activist and beautifully captures the identity of
Ida B. Wells-Barnett dedicated her life to social justice and equality. She devoted her tremendous energies to building the foundations of African-American progress in business, politics, and law. Wells-Barnett was a key participant in the formation of the National Association of Colored Women as well as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). She spoke eloquently in support of Marcus Garvey and the Universal Negro Improvement Association. The legacies of these organizations have been tremendous and her contribution to each was timely and indespensible. But no cause challenged the courage and integrity of Ida B. Wells-Barnett as much as her battle against mob violence and the terror of lynching at the end of the 19th century.
Hi, my name is Ida Bell Wells-Barnett also known as Ida B. Wells. I was born on July 16, 1862, in Holly Springs, Mississippi. My father, James Wells, worked as a carpenter. My mother, Elizabeth “Izzy Bell” Warrenton, worked as a cook. I was born into slavery, owned by Mr.Bollings who treated us fairly well. I was the oldest daughter out of 9 siblings. My father was involved with the Freedmen's Aid Society and helped start Shaw University, known as Rust College, for the newly freed slaves. I received my early schooling there until age 16. In 1878, both my parents and one of my siblings died in a yellow fever outbreak. I cared for my siblings and got a job as a teacher. In 1882, I attended Fisk University in Nashville. I took college courses
Ida B. Wells was born into slavery, and lived in Holly Springs Mississippi. She was later freed, and learned from her parents what it meant to be a political activist. By 1891, Wells was the owner of the newspaper, Free Speech, and was reporting on the horrors that were occurring in the south. Wells, along with other people of the African American activist community were particularly horrified about the lynching’s that were occurring in the south. As a response to the lynching that was occurring, and other violent acts that the African American community was dealing with Wells wrote three pamphlets: Southern Horrors, The Red Record, and Mob Brutality. Muckraking and investigative journalism can be seen throughout these pamphlets, as well as Wells intent to persuade the African American community, and certain members of the white community to take a stand against the crime of lynching. Wells’ writings are an effective historical text, because she serves as a voice to an underrepresented African American community.
Ida B. Wells-Barnett is an investigative journalist who wrote in honesty and bluntness about the tragedies and continued struggles of the Negro man. She was still very much involved with the issue even after being granted freedom and the right to vote. Statistics have shown that death and disparity continued to befall the Negro people in the South where the white man was “educated so long in that school of practice” (Pg. 677 Par. 2). Yet in all the countless murders of Negroes by the white man only three had been convicted. The white man of the South, although opposed to the freedom of Negroes would eventually have to face the fact of the changing times. However, they took every opportunity and excuse to justify their continued horrors. There were three main excuses that the white man of the South came up w...
...re and an American hero she devoted her life to working towards equal rights for all women. Through writing, speaking, and campaigning, Anthony and her supporters brought about change in the United States government and gave women the important voice that they had always been denied. Any study of feminism or women’s history would be incomplete without learning about her. She fought for her beliefs for 50 years and led the way for women to be granted rights as citizens of their country, Thanks to Anthony’s persistence, several years after her death, in 1920 women were given the right by the Nineteenth Amendment of the Constitution. I do believe she was the key figure in women getting the right to vote. “She will forever stand alone and unapproached, her fame continually increasing as evolution lifts humanity into higher appreciation of justice and liberty.”
Ida B. Wells was dedicated to journalism and letting people know what is going on. With her journalism investigation instincts, she uses to identify what excuses the whites use to identify lynch campaign against blacks. In the following essay, I will explain what reasons for this vicious and sustained campaign of violence against African-Americans.
Throughout her career Ida achieved more than anyone thought was possible for an African American women during that time. However, it was not an easy process. Ida faced many hardships throughout her career including, racial discrimination, gender discrimination, and hate from the people she fought against. Ida faced all her problems head on which is a major reason for her success. She continued to persevere even when everyone seemed to be against her. She never took no for an answer and always worked hard till she accomplished her goals. Everyone knew and still knows Ida as a hard worker, determined to fight for the rights of her and others around her. Ida died in Chicago on March 25th of 1931 but her legacy continues to live on.
Barnett, Ida B., and Ida B. Barnett. Southern horrors and other writings: the anti-lynching campaign of Ida B. Wells, 1892-1900. Boston, MA: Bedford Books, 1997.
...hting for all possible rights. Ida B. Well's kept up her fight for black equality for all African-Americans. Her fight stayed alive for some time until mutual friends such as Washington and Fortune decided to push her out of newspaper journalism for black rights and eventually out of the NAACP.
Wells. In May 1892, whites envied three of her friends for opening a successful grocery store. Her friends were arrested, then taken from jail, and lynched. Lynching was a very public act that differs from ordinary murders or assaults because it is a killing that is against the boundaries of due process; the legal requirement that all states must respect all legal rights owed to a person. This horrific execution took place every other day in the 1890’s, but the mob killing of the innocent three men who owned the grocery store was extremely frightening. In protest 2000 black residence left Memphis that summer and headed West for Oklahoma, but Ida B Wells stayed and began her own research on lynching. Her editorials in the “Memphis Free Speech and Headlight” confronted the Lynch Law; which was said to be in place to protect white women, even though they leave white men free to seduce all the colored girls he can, yet black men were being lynched for having consensual relations with white women. Ida B. Wells states, “No one believes the old thread lies that Negro men assault white women, and if the southern white men are not careful they will overreach themselves and a conclusion will be reached which will be very damaging to the moral reputation of their women”. Whites were outraged with her words and Wells was fortunately away in the East when a mob came looking for her, they trashed the offices
Wells was a fearless anti-lynching crusader, women’s rights advocate, journalist, and speaker. After her parents passed away she became a teacher and received a job to teach at a nearby school. With this job she was able to support the needs of her siblings. In 1844 in Memphis, Tennessee, she was asked by the conductor of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad Company to give up her seat on the train to a white man. Wells refused, but was forcefully removed from the train and all the white passengers applauded. Wells was angered by this and sued the company and won her case in the local courts; the local court appealed to the Supreme Court of Tennessee. The Supreme Court reversed the court’s ruling. In Chicago, she helped to develop numerous African American women and reform organizations. Wells still remained hard-working in her anti-lynching crusade by ...
... she addressed many problems of her time in her writings. She was an inspirational person for the feminism movements. In fact, she awoke women’s awareness about their rights and freedom of choice. She was really a great woman.