Good Morning POU! We are continuing our look at newspapers, magazines and other circulars created for and by African Americans in the 18th and early 19th century. Finding out more and more some tidbits I wasn’t aware of concerning the differing factions of African American leaders at that time through these publications and it sure isn’t all pretty! I’m sure today’s entry will spur lively posts.
The Indianapolis Freedmen, The Washington Bee and The Boston Guardian
The Indianapolis Freeman, first published on July 14, 1888, by Edward Elder Cooper in Indianapolis, Indiana, was the first illustrated black newspaper in the United States. Cooper sold the paper to George L. Knox in 1892; Knox shifted the paper’s political allegiance from Democratic to Republican. It was circulated nationally and considered by many the leading black newspaper in America. Hurt by the Depression and competition from the Indianapolis Recorder, the paper ceased publication in 1926.
The paper frequently featured the writings of Richard W. Thompson, who was managing editor from 1888-1893. He was closely associated with Booker T. Washington and twice served as an assistant of Emmett Jay Scott, in 1903 when Scott was Washington’s assistant at the Tuskegee Institute and again in 1918 when Scott was special assistant to the Secretary of War during World War I. He played an important role in the support of Washington against the attacks against Washington by William H. Ferris in 1903. He also had a long running antagonism with William Calvin Chase of the Washington Bee over their varied opinions of Booker T. Washington.
By 1899, Thompson was managing editor of the Colored American (a DC newspaper, not to be confused with the Colored American magazine), and in the early 1900s he ran what was called the Negro Press Bureau, a syndicated news service to about a dozen black newspapers which Booker T. Washington secretly subsidized and which was one of his prime agencies for influencing black editors.
In 1903, Thompson was receiving $12 per month from Washington or the Tuskegee Institute to subsidize his income and to pay for pro-Washington reportage. Upon receiving funds from Washington, Thompson noted that he could influence five papers to support Washington’s interests: The Kentucky Standard, the Freeman, the Advocate, the Citizen, and the Colored American. He could also occasionally send letters to the Chicago Monitor. Recognizing the importance of this subsidy, Thompson recommended W. Allison Sweeney, editor of the Chicago Monitor, the Chicago Conservator, and the Chicago Leader to receive subsidy as well.
The Washington Bee was a Washington, D.C.-based American weekly newspaper founded in 1882 and primarily read by African Americans. Throughout almost all of its forty years in publication it was edited by African-American lawyer-journalist William Calvin Chase. The newspaper was aligned with the Republican party. It continued publication, with gaps in 1893 and 1895, until 1922, shortly after editor Chase’s death.
The Bee’s publication history coincided with a two-generation period of American history during which the political roles of African-Americans were sharply constrained by the politically reactionary Redeemers. Successful professional-level African Americans, such as editor Chase, faced ceaseless political battles in order to hold on to the limited gains made in previous generations. Chase’s editorials at first criticized accommodationist black leaders such as Booker T. Washington, but later made peace with the influential Tuskegee leader for financial consideration.
Chase had written against Washington, but needed the money and supported a number of Washington’s political goals. For example, Washington used his political influence with Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft to try to remove Lafayette M. Hershaw and Freeman H. M. Murray from their government positions and spy on meetings of the Niagara Movement headed by W. E. B. DuBois in 1905 and 1906.
Both Thompson, of the Indianapolis Freedmen and Chase, of the Washington Bee, felt uncomfortable supporting Washington’s actions in these matters (Chase moreso than Thompson), and received additional payment from Washington to secure their support. Thompson had already referenced the movement with some sarcasm and proceeded to avoid the movement in his papers, writing “to advertise the movement by opposition even, would be to magnify it.”
Outside of this sphere, Booker T. Washington was criticized by some members of the black press, especially in the Boston Guardian, considered a “militant” publication. Important critics included William Monroe Trotter, editor of the Guardian, William H. Ferris, George W. Forbes, and Clement G. Morgan.
The Boston Guardian was co-founded by William Monroe Trotter and George W. Forbes in 1901 in Boston, Massachusetts, and published until the 1950s. The paper enjoyed broad appeal with readers outside of Massachusetts, featuring news of interest to people of color from across the nation, as well as social notes, church news, sports, and fiction. Within its editorial opinion columns, Trotter often assailed the conservative accommodationist ideology of Booker T. Washington.
The paper became a forum for a more outspoken and forceful approach to gaining racial equality, and its contributors and editorials (which were generally written by Trotter) regularly attacked Washington. The paper’s editorial stance brought a stream of criticism from more mainstream African-American publications: the New York Age, calling it “putrescent”, wrote that “Editor Trotter … makes himself smelt if not felt”; another wrote that the Guardian was “carrying its cases too fast and too far”, and that Trotter suffered from a “mental malady”. The Guardian had limited circulation, but was highly influential as one of only 200 African-American publications in the country. It suffered financially due to Trotter’s poor accounting and inattention due to his heavy schedule. Forbes, who principally worked as a librarian in the city library, left the business in 1904 because of Booker T. Washington’s legal assaults on the newspaper and pressure by Washington supporters on his employers.
At the behest of Trotter, William Ferris came to Washington DC and gave a presentation critical of Washington in front of the Bethel Literary and Historical Society on January 6, 1903. As a reply, R. W. Thompson of the Indianapolis Freedmen spoke in front of the Second Baptist Lyceum on January 25 in support of Booker T. Washington. Thompson laid out 15 principles of the Washington and the Tuskegee Institute, focusing on agricultural, industrial, and labor as the path to black improvement and stating that Washington does not, for instance, endorse the elimination of suffrage for blacks in any state, but that black people must make his own place in the world.
The Second Baptist Lyceum met again on February 3 to hear a paper by Jesse Lawson in favor of Washington. In support of Washington were Robert H. Terrell, Bishop Walters, Dr. William Bruce Evans, J. H. Ewing, and Thompson, and those against were W. H. Ferris, Armond W. Scott, Lafayette M. Hershaw, T. M. Dent, Shelby James Davidson, and Mrs. Ida D. Bailey.
Also in attendance were John C. Dancy, George Henry White, Mrs. Anna Evans Murray wife of Daniel Alexander Payne Murray, Reuben S. Smith, Kelly Miller, Prof. Lewis Baxter Moore, and John P. Green – who were all neutral. Thompson’s articles about these meetings in support of Washington’s position was published in the Atlanta Age, the Indianapolis Freeman, Philadelphia Tribune, Baltimore Afro-American Ledger, The Charleston WV Advocate, and the Colored American. This controversy continued into the summer where important meetings in Louisville and Boston saw heated arguments between the Bookerites (supporters of Washington) and the Trotterites (supporters of William Trotter) which even led to blows and Trotter’s and Granville Martin’s (a Trotterite in attendance) imprisonment.
The friction in the African-American community continued and Thompson’s role as a newspaperman remained fundamental. In 1905, W. E. B. Du Bois and William Monroe Trotter founded the Niagara Movement as a call for opposition to racial segregation and disenfranchisement, and it was opposed to policies of accommodation and conciliation promoted by African-American leaders such as Booker T. Washington. Washington requested that Emmett Scott direct Thompson and other newspaper men, including William Calvin Chase, to ignore the Niagara Movement.
Washington countered Trotter’s attacks in the Boston Guardian with a variety of tactics. He took various legal actions against Trotter, including at least one libel suit and criminal charges. In addition, he used his network to apply pressure to Trotter’s supporters in their workplaces (in some cases government and academic positions). In addition, he had other sympathizers secretly infiltrate and report on activist meetings organized by Trotter and others. Washington also provided financial support and expertise to start other publications in Boston to counter Trotter’s radical voice. As a result of such activities, Trotter’s printer dropped the activist and his newspaper as a client. But Trotter found another printer and continued publishing the Guardian despite the setback. The newspaper would struggle after the death of Trotter in 1934 and finally cease publication in the 1950s.