W.E.B. Du Bois Publishes The Philadelphia Negro 1899

W.E.B. Du Bois published The Philadelphia Negro in 1899, the first major sociological study of a Black American community, based on door-to-door fieldwork in Philadelphia's Seventh Ward. Du Bois documented how racism — not inherent deficiency — produced poverty and crime. The work established empirical social science as a tool of racial justice and laid the foundation for Du Bois's lifelong challenge to Booker T. Washington's accommodationism.