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Black Quotidian: Everyday History in African-American Newspapers

NY Amsterdam News - February 5, 1977 - cover

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February - Archived Posts
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February 1, 1980: Atlanta Daily World on Carter G. Woodson and articles from 1926-27 on first “Negro History Week.”
February 2, 1936: Atlanta Daily World and black press editorial cartoons on Ethiopian anti-colonial battle against Italy.
February 3, 1948: Atlanta Daily World on efforts to block black voting rights on anniversary of passage of 15th Amendment.
February 4, 1956: Pittsburgh Courier on Montgomery Bus Boycott, in honor of Rosa Parks’ birthday.
February 5, 1977: New York Amsterdam News, “Roots Captivates Millions of T-Viewers.”
February 6, 1982: Cleveland Call & Post advertisement for Wilber Black, the (Jheri) “Kurl King” and Black’s Pride Hair Care Center.
February 7, 1944: Los Angeles Tribune ad for “Sweet ’n’ Hot” revue featuring Dorothy Dandridge.
February 7, 1948: Cleveland Call and Post editorial cartoon on segregation of University of Oklahoma Law School and Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher.
February 8, 1964: New York Amsterdam News covers NYC school boycott, the largest civil rights protest in U.S. history.
February 9, 1935: Selection of articles from Norfolk Journal and Guide on anti-lynching work, Negro History Week, Imitation of Life, and Paul Laurence Dunbar.
February 10, 1959: Philadelphia Tribune reports on voter registration efforts in the city.
February 11, 1928: Valentine’s Day wishes from the Chicago Defender Junior.
February 12, 1949: “Grow Old With Me” short story in Baltimore Afro-American.
February 13, 1960: Greensboro sit-in protests in Norfolk Journal and Guide and Cleveland Call and Post.
February 14, 1946: Los Angeles Sentinel on fire in Fontana that killed O’Day, Helen, Barry, and Carol Ann Short.
February 15, 1975: Pittsburgh Courier editor-in-chief Hazel Garland on professional opportunities for retired black athletes and lack of black television news anchors.
February 16, 1965: Chicago Defender on the death of Nat King Cole.
February 17, 1979: Ad for The Warriors in New York Amsterdam News, and article by Amsterdam News intern Nelson George.
February 18, 1944: Atlanta Daily World on Harry Alpin, the first African-American reporter to cover a White House press conference.
February 19, 1910: Clubwoman Ida Cummings in the Baltimore Afro-American.
February 20, 1969: “Bowling Around L.A” by Los Angeles Sentinel columnist Juanita Blocker.
February 21, 1970: Black journalists’ statement of support for the New York Times’ Earl Caldwell and his right to protect confidential sources in the Black Panther Party.
February 22, 1965: The black press on the murder of Malcolm X.
February 23, 1957: Philadelphia Tribune on Thomas Edison (formerly Northeast) High School and how board moved school to create segregated facility.
February 24, 1934: Carter G. Woodson in Pittsburgh Courier on “Forgotten Negroes.”
February 25, 1939: Blanche Thompson, Irvin C. Miller, and “Brown Skin Models” revue in Norfolk Journal and Guide.
February 26, 1949: Baltimore Afro-American on Satchel Paige and other black major league baseball players heading to spring training.
February 27, 1937: New York Amsterdam News on Dr. Anna Cooper Johnson’s new dental office in Harlem.
February 28, 1978: Philadelphia Tribune on MOVE conflict with Philadelphia authorities eight years before bombing.
February 29, 1956: Chicago Defender on Leap Year tradition of single women courting bachelors.
February 5, 1977 On February 5, 1977, the arts and entertainment section of the New York Amsterdam News focused on the television miniseries Roots. Roots traced Alex Haley’s family history from West Africa through slavery and emancipation in the United States. Published by Doubleday in the fall of 1976 and broadcast by ABC in the winter of 1977, Roots was read by millions and watched by millions more. “In the wake of this monumental event in the history of popular culture,” the Amsterdam News wrote, “Americans of all colors are reflecting on just what this amazing phenomenon meant, what impact it will have on shaping a new American mass consciousness and just how it will influence the future of race relations in this country. In a way, ‘Roots’ was one long overdue American history lesson delivered with the kind of perspective rarely depicted in conventional history books.” Roots became a cultural phenomenon in large part because it was a large-scale commercial production (an “epic” book and a television “event”) that readers and viewers could enjoy in the private, everyday spaces of their homes. The newspaper also called attention to the “curious irony” of “the historical timing of ‘Roots,’ coming in the wake of Jimmy Carter’s ascendency to the presidency (aided by the overwhelming support of Blacks) and appearing only a few months after the television showing of ‘Gone With The Wind,’ that other epic film dealing with race relations in the Civil War South. ABC must feel justifiably proud of having the vision to air ‘Roots,’ a show unprecedented in the history of American television. However, it is lamentable that commercial television chooses as its normal fare the kind of programming that is directly antithetical to ‘Roots.’ ‘Roots’ is the exception to T.V.’s norms” (click to view PDF).

I have been thinking a lot about Roots over the last couple of years as I have been researching and writing Making Roots: A Nation Captivated, which will be published in August 2016 by University of California Press. I have created a Scalar companion website for the book that includes a map of the lectures Alex Haley gave about his family story in the decade before Roots, a selection of letters to the editors of newspapers across the country about Roots, lyrics from hip-hop songs that reference Roots, editorial cartoons related to Roots, and interviews about Roots with scholars of black history and culture.

One of the scholars I was fortunate to interview is Alondra Nelson, author of the new book The Social Life of DNA: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation after the Genome. On the connections between Roots and The Social Life of DNA, see Nelson’s essay “Roots and Genes” in Aeon Magazine.