History Of Black Wall Street ' Little Africa '

1122 Words3 Pages

The History of Black Wall Street “Little Africa” The history of this tragic story begins a little before the actual beginning of “Little Africa”. This story begins after slavery has supposedly ended, but a whole new era of cruelty, inhuman, and unfair events have taken place, after the awful institution of slavery when many of my people were taken from their home, beaten, raped, slaughter and dehumanized and were treated no better than livestock, than with the respect they deserved as fellow man. This story begins when the Jim Crow laws were put into place to segregate the whites from the blacks. The main idea of the Jim Crow laws was to keep black people away from whites, to live separately but equally. Most often this did not happen, which the whites were expecting the “Negros” to be lower than themselves and unable to function without them, until a community in Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA, was started by blacks in 1908. They lived in a community called Greenwood. With only fifteen thousand residents, the blacks built their own little country despite the adversity they had received. Their community was one of the richest in the USA. So, it seems the Jim Crow laws that was meant to leave them destitute, was the option for the blacks to thrive. Blacks had their own businesses, schools, movie theaters, churches, transportation system, and they even had their own airlines. They were their own doctors, teachers, architects, pastors, artists, and musicians. As a bonus they were also very oil rich as well. Even when the economy was low “Little Africa” still did very well, even when the whites weren’t. But due to the years of economic success the blacks had, the whites were jealous and the KKK was reorganized in 1915. Though they had trouble f... ... middle of paper ... ...would help them, managed to rebuild the buildings without any loans from any bank. The rebuilt Greenwood lasted well into the 1950s. Their business thrived even through the Great Depression. By 1978, there were two establishments that remained standing, and they would not last long either. Another enemy of “Little Africa” would do what none of the others could, succeed in bringing down Black Wall Street. What was this enemy? Integration. Integration killed “Little Africa” because of something the whites called “Urban Renewal”. Another way to crush what the blacks had accomplished, and lie to their descendants, making them think that their ancestors were nothing but slaves. The reason I chose this as my pivotal moment was because many people do not know of this very wonderful and tragic story of the successful, business savvy, and intelligent ways of the black people.

Show More
Related

  • Olaudah Equiano And Phillis Wheatley's View On Religion

    1464 Words  | 3 Pages

    The origin tale of the African American population in the American soil reveals a narrative of a diasporic faction that endeavored brutal sufferings to attain fundamental human rights. Captured and forcefully transported in unbearable conditions over the Atlantic Ocean to the New World, a staggering number of Africans were destined to barbaric slavery as a result of the increasing demand of labor in Brazil and the Caribbean. African slaves endured abominable conditions, merged various cultures to construct a blended society that pillared them through the physical and psychological hardships, and hungered for their freedom and recognition.

    Read More

  • Baldwin's Views on Struggles of Blacks in America

    1533 Words  | 4 Pages

    Since the 1880?s, when European nations colonized Africa, Europe had almost complete control over the continent, but this changed during the 1950?s and 60?s. By 1958, ten African countries had gained their independence, and sixteen more joined the list in 1960 alone. Although these nations? gain of independence demonstrates the ability of blacks to overpower their white oppressors, Baldwin argues ?The word ?independence? in Africa and the word ?integration? here are almost equally meaningless; that is, Europe has not yet left Africa, and black men here are not yet free? (336). While black people had been legally free in the United States since 1863, two decades before the European colonization of Africa, they were still not truly free, almost a century later.

    Read More

  • Gilbert Osofsky’s Harlem: The Making of a Ghetto

    1090 Words  | 3 Pages

    This book was written in the 1960’s so it is hard to tell what were Osofsky’s biases, misconceptions, and influences while writing this book. There are a few passages that come across as ignorant or biased towards the Black community, but there is no doubt that this extensive analysis does do justice to the history and situation of Harlem, New York. Osofsky does a great job of framing his study socially, economically, and philanthropically, but he does little in the way of politics. His analysis does not include a political framework that would help answer some questions of political racism, de facto segregation, de jure segregation, public welfare, impoverished schools, etc. At some points throughout the book, it seems as though Osofsky is blaming the Black community for their own troubles.

    Read More

  • African American History in A Red Record

    794 Words  | 2 Pages

    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...

    Read More

  • What Are The Similarities Between The Jim Crow And Slave Codes

    973 Words  | 2 Pages

    Jim Crow laws were a formal, codified system of racial apartheid that dominated the American South for three quarters of a century beginning in the 1890s. (Jim Crow Laws, PBS). Jim Crow laws had the same ideals that slave codes had. At this time slavery had been abolished, but because of Jim Crow, the newly freed black people were still looked at as inferior. One of the similarities between slave codes and Jim Crow laws was that both sets of laws did not allow equal education opportunities. The schools were separated, of course, which cause the white schools to be richer and more advanced in education than black schools. This relates to slave codes because slaves were not allowed to read which hindered their learning of when they were able to read and write. Another similarity is alcohol. In the Jim Crow era persons who sold beer or wine were not allowed to serve both white and colored people, so they had to sell to either one or the other. This is similar to slave codes because in most states slaves were not allowed to purchase whiskey at all, unless they had permission from their owners. Slaves did not eat with their white owners. In the Jim Crow era whites and blacks could not eat together at all, and if there was some odd circumstance that whites and blacks did eat together then the white person was served first and there was usually something in between them. This relates to slave codes because

    Read More

  • Racial Domination, Racial Progress By Matthew Desmond And Mustafa Emirbayer

    1425 Words  | 3 Pages

    For more than two hundred years, a certain group of people lived in misery; conditions so inhumane that the only simile that can compare to such, would be the image of a caged animal dying to live, yet whose live is perished by the awful chains that dragged him back into a dark world of torture and misfortune. Yes, I am referring to African Americans, whose beautiful heritage, one which is full of cultural beauty and extraordinary people, was stained by the privilege given to white men at one point in the history of the United States. Though slavery has been “abolished” for quite some years; or perhaps it is the ideal driven to us by our modern society and the lines that make up our constitution, there is a new kind of slavery. One which in

    Read More

  • Summary Of Racism And Slavery In King Leopold's Ghost?

    1426 Words  | 3 Pages

    Racism and slavery have always been a part of the world’s history, but sometimes people become ignorant to the severity of such mistreatment. This is proven in Adam Hochschild’s book King Leopold’s Ghost. People in Congo, Africa suffered many years of mistreatment brought on by King Leopold the second. King Leopold took what was theirs and made it his own by force and abuse. Eventually these people rightfully revolted in attempt to reclaim what is theirs and demand better treatment.

    Read More

  • Jim Crow Law Dbq

    396 Words  | 1 Pages

    In 1863 to 1877 Reconstruction brought an end to slavery, it paved the way for the former slaves to become citizens. The African Americans wanted complete freedom. However, that right became a setback and were seen as second class citizens. Before the end of the Reconstruction, a legislation was passed called the Jim Crow law. The law enforced the segregation of people of African descent. The legislation was a system to ensure the exclusion of racial groups in the Southern States. For example, separate transportation law, school division, different waiting rooms both at the bus terminals and hospitals, separate accommodations, marriage law and voting rights. The Jim Crow law was supposed to help in racial segregation in the South. Instead,

    Read More

  • Jim Crow Laws Thesis

    311 Words  | 1 Pages

    The ending of the Civil War sought as a new beginning for many African-Americans who were finally given the freedoms that many had hoped for and the equality between blacks and whites. That hope soon became false when Jim Crow laws were put into place. Through the time period of 1877 to the mid-1960s, Jim Crow laws were operated as the racial caste system primarily in southern and border states in the U.S. (Pilgrim). This system discriminated African-Americans as the status of second-class citizens that was directed under

    Read More

  • African American Reconstruction Essay

    997 Words  | 2 Pages

    Blacks were discriminated almost every aspect of life. The Jim Crow laws helped in this discrimination. The Jim Crow laws were laws using racial segregation from 1876 – 1965 at both a social and at a state level.

    Read More

  • Jim Crow Laws

    847 Words  | 2 Pages

    “Jim Crow was more than a series of rigid anti-black laws. It was a way of life.” (“What was Jim Crow?”). The laws created a divided America and made the United States a cruel place for over 70 years. The Jim Crow Laws caused segregation in the education system, social segregation, and limited job opportunities for African Americans.

    Read More

  • The Causes And Effects Of The New Jim Crow Laws

    736 Words  | 2 Pages

    The laws known as “Jim Crow” were laws presented to basically establish racial apartheid in the United States. These laws were more than in effect for “for three centuries of a century beginning in the 1800s” according to a Jim Crow Law article on PBS. Many try to say these laws didn’t have that big of an effect on African American lives but in affected almost everything in their daily life from segregation of things: such as schools, parks, restrooms, libraries, bus seatings, and also restaurants. The government got away with this because of the legal theory “separate but equal” but none of the blacks establishments were to the same standards of the whites. Signs that read “Whites Only” and “Colored” were seen at places all arounds cities.

    Read More

  • The Persecution Of African Americans

    1155 Words  | 3 Pages

    “You are a nothing little nigger” is one of the demeaning phrases African American human beings have heard over the years in an effort to keep them in a state of persecution. This paper will discuss the persecution of the African American. The following documents the struggles, gut wrenching pain, and heart ache of African American people have endured and are still suffering with today.

    Read More

  • Summary Of George Fredrickson's Religion And The Invention Of Racism

    1038 Words  | 3 Pages

    “evil” shows how unfairly these black Africans were treated (93). The author further justifies the

    Read More

  • Fredrick Douglass: The Effects Of Colonization

    1008 Words  | 3 Pages

    Fredrick Douglass said, “The white man 's happiness cannot be purchased by the black man 's misery.” Douglass provides an intriguing perspective, people of color become agents of production. The dehumanization of their bodies creates a machine used for European’s takings. These machines are then programed to believe they need the colonizer for upgrades (industrialization), and instead are left with unforeseeable problems (poverty). The system of Colonization relies on people of color to cooperate in order for it to succeed. While the exploitation of Colored spaces relies heavily on the notion of inferiority. Power becomes a detrimental force that jeopardizes the colonizer (Europeans) and the colonized (West Africans) by capitalizing culture,

    Read More

More about History Of Black Wall Street ' Little Africa '

Open Document