Guided trail
Up From the Nadir: Migration & the New Negro
After Reconstruction collapsed, Black America faced its lowest point — and answered with mass migration, new institutions, and a cultural and political awakening.
- 1EventPlessy v. Ferguson
1896: the Supreme Court blesses segregation, opening the "nadir" of race relations.
- 2EventBooker T. Washington's "Atlanta Compromise"
Booker T. Washington counsels patience and self-help — and is challenged.
- 3EventW.E.B. Du Bois publishes "The Souls of Black Folk"
Du Bois rejects accommodation and names the color line as the problem of the century.
- 4EventThe Niagara Movement
A militant new movement demands full rights — the seed of the NAACP.
- 5EventThe Great Migration begins
Millions begin leaving the South for Northern cities and jobs.
- 6EventRed Summer
White mobs attack Black communities across the country — and Black Americans fight back.
- 7EventThe Tulsa Race Massacre
1921: a thriving "Black Wall Street" is destroyed in Tulsa.
- 8PersonMarcus Garvey
Marcus Garvey builds the largest Black mass movement in history around pride and self-determination.
- 9EventThe Harlem Renaissance flowers
In Harlem, the "New Negro" remakes American art and letters.