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Period: 1500 to
The Triangular Slave Trade “They face each other, the Negro and the African, over a gulf of three hundred years- an alienation too vast to be conquered in an evening’s good will” (Baldwin 124)
The Transatlantic Slave Trade was a catastrophic commercial and economic enterprise that entailed the involuntary capture and transport of between 25 to 30 million African men, women, and children from their homelands to Europe, America, and the Caribbean to be sold as slaves. The Code Noir, a decree passed by King Louis XIV, attempted to legitimize the crimes committed against the millions of people uprooted and fettered by the Transatlantic Slave Trade. -
Arrival of the Puritans “ceases, quite, to arrive anywhere, on time, and thumbs his nose at the Puritans…” (Baldwin 130)
The Puritans were orthodox Protestants who were unsatisfied with the reforms of the Church of England and sailed to America in order to practice their faith as they saw fit. The Puritans believed God had chosen a small selection of people, “the elect,” for eternal salvation. The Puritans lived in a constant state of anxiety, always questioning whether or not their faith was strong enough to save them in the afterlife. -
“Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child” “His mother did not sing ‘Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child,’ and he has not.... ached for acceptance in a culture which pronounced...white skin the only acceptable beauty” (Baldwin 124)
“Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child” is a traditional African-American spiritual. The song dates back to the era of slavery in the United States when children born into slavery were frequently sold separately from their parents, shattering the parent-child bond. -
Serviceman’s Readjustment Act (GI Bill) “It is estimated that there are five hundred American Negroes living in this city, the vast majority of them veterans studying on the G.I. Bill” ( Baldwin 120).
At the end of World War II, the approximately 16 million American men and women who served in the armed forces would be unemployed and without any means to financially support themselves. Fearing an economic depression could result from this, Congress passed the Serviceman’s Readjustment Bill. The G.I. Bill, as it came to be known, provided aid to veterans to allow them to continue their education, search for jobs, and purchase homes. -
Period: to
48 State Flag
“The European tends to avoid the really monumental confusion which might result from an attempt to apprehend the relationship of the forty-eight states…” (Baldwin 122) -
Deep Are the Roots
Deep Are the Roots, a play by Arnaud d’Usseau and James Gow, follows the return of Brett, an African-American World War II hero, to the home of the former senator whom Brett’s mother worked for as a servant. Brett must navigate through the romantic and proprietary interests of the senator’s daughters and reconcile the differences of race relations abroad and in mainland America. -
Period: to
The Cold War “ ‘And how do you feel about it?’ he would ask, ‘it’ being anything- the Russians…” (Baldwin 121)
The Cold War was a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and its allies, the Western Bloc, and the Soviet Union and its satellite states, the Eastern Bloc, following World War II. Though the Cold War did not involve active fighting itself, parties involved supported proxy wars including the Chinese Civil War, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. Cold War conflicts were derived over issues of communism, nuclear weapons, and espionage. -
“Previous Condition”
“Previous Condition," from the collection Going to Meet the Man, was the first short story Baldwin published. The story follows Peter, an African-American actor who is secretly living in the apartment of his white Jewish friend until he is discovered by neighbors and evicted. Baldwin won a Rosenwald Foundation Fellowship for the story. -
Dr. E. Franklin Frazier Becomes President of the American Sociological Society
Dr. Frazier was a founding member of the D.C. Sociological Society and served as president in 1943-44. He went on to become the president of the American Sociological Society in 1948, delivering his presidential address “Race Contacts and the Social Structure” in Chicago. -
Louis Armstrong and orchestra perform in Paris “Bearing witness to this eternally tantalizing possibility, performers whose eminence is unchallenged, like Duke Ellington or Louis Armstrong, occasionally pass through” (Baldwin 119).
60 years ago today, Louis Armstrong and The All Stars played a concert at Salle Pleyel in Paris. -
Truman signs the Marshall Plan “What the American means is that he does not want to be confused with the Marshall Plan, Hollywood, the Yankee dollar, television, or Senator McCarthy” (132)
The Marshall Plan was written in order to aid the revitalization of Western Europe after World War II and to prevent this region from being vulnerable to the threat of communism. The plan offered aid to the USSR and its allies, but these countries rejected it. The plan was effective for four years, beginning in April 1948, providing $13 billion in economic assistance to those countries a part of the Organization for European Economic Co-operation. -
United States v. Paramount “What the American means is that he does not want to be confused with the Marshall Plan, Hollywood, the Yankee dollar, television, or Senator McCarthy” (Baldwin 132)
In United States v. Paramount, the Supreme Court ruled that five major U.S. film studios and three smaller ones violated anti-trust laws. This case ended the near-monopoly of the major studios and the vertical integration of the U.S. film industry. -
The United States Recognizes Israel as a Country
The Israeli Declaration of Independence was signed the day that country’s British Mandate expired. On this date, Israel became the independent Jewish state that it remains today. -
Truman Signs Executive Order 9981
Following in the footsteps of President Roosevelt, who issued Executive Order 8802 to forbid discrimination by military defense contractors and establish the Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC), President Truman signed Executive Order 9981 to continue efforts to desegregate the U.S. military. The order that “there shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed forces without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin.” -
President Truman Issues the Second Peacetime Military Draft in the United States
Amid growing tensions related to the Cold War, President Truman signed the second peacetime military draft in the United States. At the time, only 550,000 men remained in the U.S. military. The draft called for the registration of 10 million men to the Armed Forces. -
Duke Ellington Performs at Carnegie Hall
Duke Ellington's performance at Carnegie Hall in Manhattan, New York was recorded on the album "Duke Ellington and His Orchestra: Carnegie Hall November 13, 1948." -
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is Adopted
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was written and signed by the United Nations General Assembly at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris to produce the first international document to state the fundamental rights of all human beings and to protect these rights. The document has been translated into over 500 languages. -
Go Tell It on the Mountain
Go Tell It on the Mountain is a semi-autobiographical novel by James Baldwin that follows the experiences of John Grimes, an African-American teenager in 1930s Harlem and explores Grimes’ relationships with his family and church. Baldwin's first novel was published by Knopf. -
Giovanni’s Room
Giovanni’s Room, Baldwin’s second novel, is told from the perspective of an American man living in Paris who is struggling with his homosexuality. The the novel was rejected by Baldwin's previous publisher, Knopf, the book eventually went on to win a Guggenheim Fellowship. -
The Amen Corner
The Amen Corner, Baldwin’s first attempt at theater after publishing Go Tell It on the Mountain, discusses the role of the church for African American families and the consequences of discrimination-based economic disparity among African American communities. The play was produced at Howard University and directed by Owen Dodson.
