African American Newspapers provides online access to more than 350 U.S. newspapers chronicling a century and a half of the African-American experience. This unique collection, which includes historically significant papers from more than 35 states, features many rare 19th-century titles. Newly digitized, these newspapers published by or for African Americans can now be browsed and searched as never before. Part of the America’s Historical Newspapers collection, African American Newspapers was created from the most extensive African-American newspaper archives in the world. Titles in Series 1 come from the Wisconsin Historical Society, Kansas State Historical Society and the Library of Congress, while titles in Series 2 come from the American Antiquarian Society, Center for Research Libraries, the Library of Congress, and New York Public Library.
The collections span life in the Antebellum South; the spread of abolitionism; growth of the Black church; the Emancipation Proclamation; the Jim Crow Era; the Great Migration to northern cities, the West and Midwest in search of greater opportunity; rise of the NAACP; the Harlem Renaissance; the civil rights movement; political and economic empowerment; and more. Teachers and students will find firsthand perspectives on notable Americans from Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington to W.E.B. Du Bois and Martin Luther King, Jr., as well as obituaries, advertisements, editorials and illustrations.
African American Newspapers, Series 1: 1827-1998: Features 280 newspapers from 35 states, beginning with Freedom’s Journal (NY), the first African American newspaper published in the United States
African American Newspapers, Series 2: 1835-1956: More than 75 newspapers published in 22 states and the District of Columbia.
Coverage: 1827-1998