#214: Margaret Garner (Part 1)

Garner was a slave who lived in Kentucky during the Pre Civil War era and in 1856, her and her family escaped to Ohio. After her husband was retrieved and the remainder of her family was surrounded at their hideout, things took a turn.

#215: Margaret Garner (Part 2)

She killed her two year old with a butcher knife because she rather her be dead than to return back to slavery. She planned to do the same to herself & her other children but they were detained before it could occur.

#216: Margaret Garner (Part 3)

Abolitionists wanted Garner tried for murder because it would establish an enslaved persons rights. Garner was put on trial and instead convicted for destruction of property and sent back into slavery. She later died in 1858.

#217: Origins of “Black Power”

Kwame Turé (formerly Stokely Carmichael) popularized the term “Black Power” as a slogan for James Merediths voter registration drive in MS. However, the term was first used in the 1950s by Richard Wright, the African American novelist.

#218: Red Summer (Part 1)

There were race riots in more than 25 cities in the summer and fall of 1919. James Weldon Johnson, activist and writer would coin the term. Chicago, DC and Elaine, Arkansas were among the worst riots that year.

#219: 40 Acres and a mule (Part 1)

At the end of the Civil War, General Sherman issued a Special Field Order which set aside land along South Carolina, Georgia and Florida coasts to give to 40,000 freedmen. Each family was supposed to get no more than 40 acres.

#220: 40 Acres and a mule (Part 2)

The lands were former plantations confiscated during the war.

Andrew Johnson stated that bringing a slave to your property would increase its value by 75%. After the CW came the first time land was more valuable than a slave.

#221: 40 acres and a mule (Part 3)

In April of 1865, Johnson issued pardons, took most of the land back from the freedman and returned it to the ex Confederates. Around only 2000 freedmen would keep their land.

#222: Suburban Gardens

Suburban Gardens was D.Cs only amusement park. It opened in 1921 by a black-owned real estate concern called the Universal Development and Loan Co. The owners included architect H.D. Woodson and John Paynter, descendants of slaves.

#223: York

York was the slave that aided Lewis and Clark on their expedition. Encountered during their journey were a group of Natives that had never seen a negro. Overwhelmed in awe, they tried to “rub the black” off of him, to see if he was a real man.

#224: Edwin Pratt (Part 1)

Historians call Edwin Pratt the MLK of the north. He pushed for desegregation, an end to police brutality and the reconstruction of black neighborhoods. He was a founding member of the Central Area Civil Rights Committee and Seattle Urban League.