Today we’re talking about historic African American periodicals. These newspapers and magazines often had smaller circulations than their white, mainstream counterparts, making them harder to find and more collectible today. It’s a broad and varied field, which includes the abolitionist newspapers of the early 1800s like Freedom’s Journal and The North Star, the literary journals of the Harlem Renaissance, and more recent lifestyle magazines like Ebony and Jet. These periodicals were influential in promoting the social movements of their times and can provide an important parallel history directly from the Black voices that were all too often excluded from and ignored by the mainstream American press.
Brattlecast #95 - The Liberator & The North Star
Finally, some good news! Today we’re taking a look at the abolitionist newspapers of the 1800s. The Liberator was published here in Boston by William Lloyd Garrison, and argued that the institution of slavery was so deeply immoral that it must be ended immediately, a radical position at the time. Although it had a relatively small circulation, The Liberator was influential, shaping abolitionist thought and inspiring others to start their own publications, including Frederick Douglass, who founded his anti-slavery newspaper, The North Star, in 1847. Today, as a new chapter in America’s troubled civil rights history unfolds, these antique newspapers remain impressive for their fierce moral clarity in the face of violent opposition and for their insistence on emancipation and full equality.
Brattlecast #11 - Black and White and Read All Over
When did you last pick up a newspaper? Hopefully after 1851. Ken brings Jordan some authentic 19th century newspapers, and outlines the evolution of print periodicals in America. Learn about competing publications in Richmond and New York covering the Civil War, as well as the rise of mass print advertising, and its unfortunate side effect on slavery. There’s nothing quite like getting history right from the source.
