Black History Month: Then, Now, and Still to Come
Welcome to Black History Month!
We honor Black history, Black excellence, and Black resilience all year round, including February. We can’t wait to share the people, places, events, and moments that shape our past, present, and future.
The COVID-19 pandemic was the latest crisis to rely upon the Urban League Movement’s enduring role as the nation’s economic first responders, but it was far from the first. The National Urban League’s Black History Month campaign, Urban League Fights for You: Then, Now, and Still to Come highlights the movement’s 111-year history of meeting the unique needs of our communities time and time again, from the Great Migration through the Civil Rights Movement to the racial reckoning of 2020 and beyond. We’ll share the Urban League story — and Black America’s story — all month long through interviews with key Urban League leaders, historical documents and photographs, and dynamic dialogue.
The Great Migration
The Great Migration is a critical part of Black American history, one that reshaped America’s cities and presented new challenges, opportunities, and lessons for African Americans seeking opportunity.
Around the turn of the 20th century, about 90 percent of Black Americans lived in the rural South. The 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson Supreme Court decision cemented segregation and the start of Jim Crow in the South, driving Black people to the northern industrial cities in what is called The Great Migration.
Black Americans would be met with hostility and systemic racism that trapped them in overcrowded neighborhoods and underpaid them for their work.
The Committee on Urban Conditions Among Negroes was formed in 1910. The following year, it merged with two other organizations dedicated to improving the industrial working conditions and urban living conditions of Black Americans to form the National League on Urban Conditions Among Negroes. By 1920, the name had been shortened to the National Urban League.
George Edmund Haynes was the FIRST Executive Director of the National Urban League, serving from 1911 to 1918.
Haynes established the first Black social work training program at Fisk University. Through this program, he advocated for the creation of a pipeline of black social workers who could serve Urban League affiliates across the country.
Hayes also co-founded Opportunity: A Journal of Negro Life, an academic magazine that also published African-American literature and arts for more than two decades.
This is just a snapshot! Follow more of the journey on social media at @NatUrbanLeague.
