@jimthehistorian.bsky.social
In May 1861, Mary Anna Custis Lee fled Arlington House and put the keys in the hands of Selina Gray, who had been born into bondage on the estate. One of the very few surviving images of an enslaved person at Arlington. jimthehistorian.substack.com/p/arlington-...
Arlington, Virginia. Washington, General Lee and the Pentagon
The history of the land from George Washington, Arlington House, General Lee, and Queen City.
jimthehistorian.substack.com
Today in history, on September 13th, 1937, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that sitting Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black had been an active member of the Ku Klux Klan. Almost 20 years later, he joined the unanimous decision in Brown v. Board. www.newspapers.com/article/pitt...
U.S. Supreme Court Hugo Black revealed as Ku Klux Klan member
Clipping found in Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on 9/13/1937. U.S. Supreme Court Hugo Black revealed as Ku Klux Klan member
newspapers.com
Hugo Black counted in 1938: in the Fourteenth Amendment's first 50 years, under half of the 1% of cases invoking it were brought by Black Americans. More than half were brought by corporations. Part one: A. Philip Randolph and two Marches on Washington. jimthehistorian.substack.com/p/the-14th-a...
The 14th Amendment: The March on Washington
The 14th Amendment, Part One: A. Philip Randolph and why the fight for jobs went to the street instead of the Supreme Court.
jimthehistorian.substack.com
A History of America and Canada Virginia made it a crime to teach him to read. No American medical school would take him, so he earned his degree in Toronto. Moved to Canada. He returned in 1863 as the first Black officer in the U.S. Army. jimthehistorian.substack.com/p/a-history-...
A History of America and Canada
The first Black officer in the United States Army earned his degree in Canada, because no American school would have him. Canada would not have given him the commission.
jimthehistorian.substack.com
The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Catholic Church My posts will focus on the people not sold South. jimthehistorian.substack.com/p/the-727-wh...
The 272 - "Why Do I Deserve This?"
In 1838 the Maryland Jesuits sold the people they had baptized, and sent them to Louisiana because Louisiana was Catholic.
jimthehistorian.substack.com
Shenandoah County School Districts were forced to stop honoring the confederacy. Again! But who were the people living here all these generations? open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
The People In Shenandoah County's History
A county spent a lifetime deciding whose names its schools would bear. The Valley’s buried history tells the rest.
open.substack.com
The Pittsburgh Underground Railroad - The Masters Stopped Coming open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
The Pittsburgh Underground Railroad - The Masters Stopped Coming
They made one American city unusable to slavery. The people they did it for are the ones the record lost.
open.substack.com
I had been surprised to learn the roadblocks to studying Black History. More than once. That was a few decades ago. Now I try to remind or educate others of the efforts to silence the past. It's not new. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
Dorothy Porter Wesley and the Fight to Preserve Black History
How a woman born in rural Virginia built one of the world’s greatest African American research collections.
open.substack.com
Pittsburgh’s Underground Railroad didn’t hide. It organized publicly, printed agent names in the Black press, and confronted slaveholders at the wharf. Full piece, including Daniel Lockhart and the most complicated rescue in the network’s history: open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
The Pittsburgh Underground Railroad - In Your FACE!
After March 1847, anyone an enslaver brought into Pennsylvania was free on arrival. Somebody had to reach them and say it out loud, in daylight. And Pittsburgh's Black community was ready.
open.substack.com
I always thought Pittsburgh's history was unique and not understood outside of Western Pennsylvania. I had no idea just how unique. The Pittsburgh Underground Railroad - Setting the Scene open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
The Pittsburgh Underground Railroad - Setting the Scene
In the decades before 1850, Pittsburgh's businesses and Black communities built systems at odds with each other. In between was a legal ambiguity. Until the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
open.substack.com
John Hancock's Ledger Vanity and Happiness are Incompatible. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
John Hancock's Ledger
A bill of sale, a proclamation, and the question that came back with armies.
open.substack.com
On anniversaries like this, we celebrate what has endured while remembering those who carried us here. Gratitude and grief often walk together. One does not diminish the other; each gives the other meaning. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
America 250: The Promise We Are Still Striving To Make Complete
Frederick Douglass demanded it in 1852. Martin Luther King Jr. demanded it again in 1963. In between, a man named John W. Jones spent nine years answering it himself.
open.substack.com
Rachael and I went to the 10 year anniversary of the Smithsonian's NMAAHC. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
Best Wishes for Your Continued Success
The 10th Anniversary of the Opening of the NMAAHC
open.substack.com
This is a book talk I attended recently. The best talks are when the author reveals life beyond the pages of the book. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
The Las Vegas of the East Coast
Jeffery Bennett and The Black Belt of VA: The Untold Stories of African American History
open.substack.com
Fairfax County took a Buffalo Soldier’s land, paid his family $11,000, and built a soccer field. New on Jim the Historian. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
Nothing Else Will Feel Like Home
The Black communities of Northern Virginia built schools, churches, and land. Fairfax, Loudoun, and Prince William Counties had other plans.
open.substack.com
Danville, Virginia. 1963. There is more to this story... open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
Sixty-Three Years Ago Today, Danville, Virginia Was a Police State
Danville, Virginia, 1963. There is more to this story.
open.substack.com
Frederick Douglass gave a speech that needs to be heard today. substack.com/@jimthehisto...
The White Man's President: Under His Rule
The Freedmen's Memorial, April 14, 1876. Everyone knows Lincoln. Almost no one knows what Frederick Douglass said about him that day, or why it is relevant today.
substack.com
Waterford: A Fair Built on Memory... Our family has a history with the small town of Waterford because of 4H! open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
Waterford: A Fair Built on Memory
The Black community that built this village, and the school that outlasted almost everything.
open.substack.com
The Waterford community has such a unique history… thought I would share this one, too open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
Waterford: Virginia's Unique Culture
How geography, commerce, slavery, and conscience divided a Virginia borderland before the Civil War.
open.substack.com
The history of New Orleans is the history of America. This is the country by the people. Just as the church is, regardless of the official history. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
New Orleans: A Reflection of America
In New Orleans, Black Catholic women received one tradition, remembered another, and built a faith the Church is still learning to see.
open.substack.com
I wrote this in October but omitted key details needed to understand people's motives. Even now, many citizens are unaware that in New Orleans, you can trace the family histories of enslaved people. This is the only Southern city this is possible. open.substack.com/pub/jimthehi...
Beyond the Law: The Defiance of Rose Herera
How One Mother's Fight for Her Children Tested Freedom, Law, and the City That Shaped Her
open.substack.com
