Late 19th Century (1877-1900) – Page 2

By Jeff Ofgang

The Savannah Tribune, July 30, 1960. On Page 1 is an article titled “Negroes Petition For Desegregated Recreational Facilities.”

Savannah maintained separate and unequal public park systems for black and white people from the end of the Civil War until the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Black Savannahians were barred by custom from entering the largest and finest parks due to Jim Crow segregation.

As a graduate student in public history at Georgia Southern University, I wanted to learn how the City of Savannah enforced park segregation through a combination of social customs and administrative actions.

I interned at the City of Savannah Municipal Archives and continued researching this topic alongside archives director Luciana M. Spracher.

This resulted in the curation and creation of a digital exhibit, “Jim Crow in Savannah’s Parks,” using official documents to detail how racism openly guided decisions by the City of Savannah’s Park and Tree Commission, and by the Mayor and City Council, who decided where and when to build and improve parks and recreation facilities.

The resources of the Digital Library of Georgia were critical to my research.

A digitization subgrant from DLG that was awarded recently to the City of Savannah Municipal Archives paid to digitize the minutes of the Park and Tree Commission from its founding in 1896 through 1972.

I read through sixty years of meeting minutes, a task made possible during the COVID-19 pandemic only because these records were digitized and freely available online, which made it possible for me to access them from home.

The Digital Library of Georgia also has digitized copies of the speech books of Malcolm R. Maclean, the mayor who guided Savannah toward agreements desegregating restaurants, hotels, theaters, and other public accommodations even before the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Black-owned newspapers chronicled Jim Crow in Savannah, while the “white” press largely ignored it until the 1950s. The Georgia Historic Newspapers website, maintained by the Digital Library of Georgia, gave me access to decades of the Savannah Tribune, Savannah’s leading black newspaper, which I also used in the exhibit.

The digital exhibit, “Jim Crow in Savannah’s Parks,” is hosted by Georgia Southern University, with links from the City of Savannah website. You can view the exhibit at georgiasouthern.libguides.com/savannahparks

–Editor’s note: A piece on Georgia Public Broadcasting’s “Political Rewind” about the exhibit aired on May 17, 2022. Tune in at the 46:00 mark!

Black and white photograph of a young African American boy standing next to a cow in a fenced pasture. — Julia King Collection – boy with cow https://dlg.usg.edu/record/midm_jkic_682

In partnership with the Midway Museum, the Digital Library of Georgia has just made the Julia R. King Collection available online.

King (1863–1952) was a descendant of the Roswell King (1765–1844) family of Georgia plantation owners and managers who owned land, property, and enslaved people across Georgia dating back to the 1700s.

The collection includes essential documents related to slavery, including estate appraisals and inventories that include the first names of enslaved African Americans. It will be of particular interest to those doing family research on people enslaved in Liberty County, Georgia.

Stacy Ashmore Cole, the creator of “TheyHadNames.net: African Americans in Early Liberty County Records, secretary of the Midway Museum Board of Governors, and president of the Coastal Georgia Genealogical Society, describes the importance of these records.

“The Midway Museum’s Julia R. King Collection contains essential references to enslaved people unavailable elsewhere.

These documents will interest them and others who have not yet discovered their ancestry.

The study of these enslaver families, including the Kings, is critical to Liberty County African American genealogical and historical research.

They had a long tradition of keeping enslaved people within their families through inheritance, lending, and gifting, including down the white female lines. Because of this, the only way to trace a particular enslaved person is often through probate and enslaving family documents.

The small size of the collection and its relative geographical remoteness have made it difficult for academic researchers to prioritize. The Midway Museum is also in an area vulnerable to hurricanes.

Digitization ensures that we preserve these materials and make them easily accessible for future generations.”

View the entire collection online

###

About the Midway Museum

Since its founding, the Midway Museum has been supported by the descendants of the Midway Church members, who have provided 18th- and 19th-century family heirlooms, documents, books, genealogical lineages, and heirloom furnishings, paintings, and artifacts. Many Midway Church descendants still live in Liberty County and coastal Georgia, serve on the Board of Governors, and visit during the Midway Church’s annual Homecoming. Visit themidwaymuseum.org/

About the Digital Library of Georgia

The Digital Library of Georgia is an award-winning GALILEO initiative housed at the University of Georgia Libraries. With the state’s cultural heritage organizations, the DLG shares Georgia’s history online for free through its websites. The project supports its partner organizations by offering free and low-cost services. The DLG also serves as Georgia’s service hub for the Digital Public Library of America and as the home of the Georgia Newspaper Project, the state’s historic newspaper preservation project.

Visit our website at dlg.usg.edu
Facebook: http://facebook.com/DigitalLibraryofGeorgia/
Twitter: @DigLibGA
Instagram: @diglibga
Subscribe to our listserv

Selected images from the collection: