Tag Archives: Robert S. Abbott
Robert S. Abbott: Champion of “The Race”
In 1905 Robert Abbott began one of the biggest return-on-investment acts of his day: he invested 25 cents to issue 300 copies of his newspaper The Chicago Defender. Eventually this two-cent weekly paper—which he heralded as “The World’s Greatest Weekly”—made … Continue reading
Era Bell Thompson: Affirming American Meritocracy
Nearly without fail, the excerpt from Era Bell Thompson’s American Daughter, which I included in my book Black Writing from Chicago, is my students’ favorite. Leaving her native North Dakota in 1931, Era Bell Thompson came to settle in Chicago … Continue reading
Introduction to Black Writing from Chicago – Part 2
This is Part 2 of the introduction to my book Black Writing from Chicago. It continues to detail Chicago’s importance not only as a site producing great writers but also some of the greatest publishing ventures in black history, from the Chicago … Continue reading