African American Newspapers in the South comprises sixteen newspapers, all manually rekeyed to provide better search and accessibility. They provide a unique journalistic record of the African American experience in the segregated American South. Included are complete runs of newspapers from the District of Columbia, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and West Virginia:

The collection documents the African American press in the southern United States from Reconstruction through the Jazz Age. Written by African Americans for African Americans, the firsthand reporting, editorials, and features kept readers abreast of current domestic and international events, often focusing on racial issues. The editors didn’t shy away from exposing discrimination and violence, including the emotionally laden topic of lynching. Yet the newspapers also covered lighter fare, reporting on civic and religious events, politics, foreign affairs, local gossip, and more.

Articles aimed to dispel false assumptions about African Americans perpetuated by mainstream newspapers:

• promoting self-help literature

• encouraging readers to purchase homes

• supporting local black-owned businesses, many of which advertised in the papers

• highlighting middle-class deportment within the African American community

Many of the newspapers strongly supported African American troops during World War I, carrying fundraising campaigns, recruitment notices, draft rolls, and government advertisements for Liberty Bonds.

Most of the papers also featured poetry, lessons on manners and prayer, instruction for raising children, lifestyle advice for young men and women, and news about churches and their governing bodies, particularly the African Methodist Episcopal (A.M.E.) Zion church.

The Advocate, 1907–1912
Athens Republique, 1921–1926
The Banner-Enterprise, 1883–1884
The Bee, 1882–1884
The Black Dispatch, 1917–1922
The Educator, 1874–1875
The Langston City Herald,1892–1900
The Louisianian, 1870–1871

The Muskogee Cimeter, 1904–1920
The Nashville Globe, 1907–1918
The National Forum, 1910
Pioneer Press, 1911–1917
The Republican, 1873–1875
Semi-Weekly Louisianian, 1871–1872
The Tulsa Star, 1913–1921
Western World, 1903–1904

African American Newspapers in the South is now on the History Commons platform.

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Related Collection: African American Newspapers - General