Part IV, Going South . . .

Again
Shannon Carter, PhD Spring 2011

Lecture, Week Four: Going South

In the early part of the twentieth century, the African American populations
previously concentrated in the South began to migrate northward, most often by
train. Called “The Great Migration,” the moves had a significant impact on
American culture. After WWI and, especially, WWII, moves northward continued
until around 1970, most often by car.
Later in the twentieth century, the trend
northward began to slow and by about
1970 the number of African Americans
moving south began to surpass the
number migrating from the South.
Notice the pattern of in-migration,
largely to the area often referred to as
the Sun Belt.
What might account for that trend and
those like it? What might your own
research reveal about such trends as
they’ve played themselves out in this region of the country?
How might we make use of these overarching themes in developing our video essays
about life in Northeast Texas? They won’t be directly relevant to everyone’s projects,
but they are most certainly relevant to some. I hear these very themes echoed in the
oral histories of our local African American citizens, and I see these themes among
the Northeast Texas Digital Collections more generally. How might your own
projects provide additional commentary on broader cultural themes like these? What
about other, relevant cultural themes?

A. From Rust Belt to Sun Belt1

1
Images and text for Section A from Inmotion: The African American Migration (see url
in Part I of Week Four Lecture)
Part IV, Going South . . . Again
Shannon Carter, PhD Spring 2011

Back Home

Figure 1: Reproduced with permission

from Ebony/Johnson Publishing
Company. Ebony, 1998

The first six decades of the twentieth century have been characterized by one of the most significant
demographic shifts in the history of the United States: the movement of millions of African Americans
from the rural South to the urban North. By 1970, however, this shift began to reverse. During the 1970s,
the South added two million African Americans to its population, more than tripling the figure for the
previous decade. The 1980s and 1990s would bring an even more substantial return migration and
population retention. Shown here, Nancy and Olin Foster move into their new home in the South.
Part IV, Going South . . . Again
Shannon Carter, PhD Spring 2011

Brain Gain

Figure 2: Reproduced with

permission from
Ebony/Johnson Publishing
Company, Ebony,
September 1973

The return migration includes many college graduates and professionals seeking career opportunities.
Unlike the previous migration from south to north, the net migration rates for those with college degrees or
with at least some college were higher than for those with lower education levels. Between 1995 and 2000
Georgia, Texas, and Maryland had a particularly large influx of college-educated African Americans. New
York was the top brain-drain state, losing more than eighteen thousand African-American college graduates
in that five-year period. Barbara Merriday was one such migrant: after teaching in New York City, she
returned to Atlanta to work as an associate engineer at the Atlanta Western Electric Company in the early
1970s.
Part IV, Going South . . . Again
Shannon Carter, PhD Spring 2011

Better Opportunities

Figure 3: Keith Hadley

The economic attractions of the South extend beyond manufacturing employment. African-American
migrants are also drawn to an overall lower cost of living in the region, as well as thriving middle-class
communities and career opportunities. The Houston family washes one of their vehicles in front of their
home in Stone Mountain, Georgia. Doris and Julia moved from Chicago.
Part IV, Going South . . . Again
Shannon Carter, PhD Spring 2011

Family Matters

Figure 4: David Wharton [2538-5]

The most often cited explanation for return is related to family. In a 1973 survey, more than half of the
respondents named kinship or family as the primary reason for moving to the South. Here, cousins from
North and South gather at a family reunion in Mississippi.
Part IV, Going South . . . Again
Shannon Carter, PhD Spring 2011

Retirement Years

Retirees are part of the return migration. Earnest Smith and his wife, Viola, feed their sixty chickens
outside their home in Vicksburg, Mississippi. Smith and his wife moved back to Mississippi in 1970 after
more than twenty-five years on Chicago's West Side.

Figure 5: Reproduced with permission from Ebony/Johnson Publishing Company. Ebony, August 1971.
Part IV, Going South . . . Again
Shannon Carter, PhD Spring 2011

B. Goin’ to Chicago

Goin’ to Chicago is a documentary with direct relevance to these themes, especially

with respect to the potential events and issues that may have helped turn the
migration patterns again southward.
Description:
Goin' to Chicago chronicles one of the most momentous yet least heralded sagas of American history -
the great migration of African Americans from the rural South to the cities of the North and West
after World War II. Four million black people created a dynamic urban culture outside the South,
changing America forever.

Goin' to Chicago traces this history through the personal stories of a group of older Chicagoans born
mostly in the Mississippi Delta. They share their bitter recollections of sharecropping - owing half of
each crop to the landowner, each beginning back-breaking labor in the fields at ten. A steelworker,
newspaper editor, blues musician and others movingly recall their journeys up Hwy. 61 to Chicago in
search of comparatively well-paying factory jobs. On the South Side they built a vibrant city-within-a-
city of thriving black businesses and civic institutions, proudly referred to as "Bronzeville."

They recall that after World War II increasingly self-assertive and prosperous blacks led a bitterly
resisted struggle to open up fair housing opportunities outside the ghetto. But just as the American
Dream was coming into reach for some, the steel mills and stockyards closed, leaving newer
immigrants trapped in decaying public housing projects and inner-city despair.

Free and easy access to the documentary is not available, though the trailer should
provide you with a good overview.2
In addition to the trailer, visit George King’s multimedia essay “Goin’ to Chicago
and the African American ‘Great Migration’” at Southern Spaces (December 2010).3
Provides an behind-the-scenes look at the goals of project and methods used to reach
those goals.

2
http://www.newsreel.org/nav/title.asp?tc=CN0041
3
Direct url to article: http://www.southernspaces.org/2010/goin-chicago-and-
african-american-great-migrations