-
Ida B. Wells Origins
Ida B. Wells was born on July 16th, 1862 in Holly Springs, Mississippi into slavery. Born as the daughter of house servants, she was freed by the Emancipation Proclamation. In September 1878, at the age of 16, Wells lost both of her parents and infant brother to the Yellow Fever epidemic and determined to keep her family together, Wells began teaching in surrounding areas. https://www.anb.org/view/10.1093/anb/9780198606697.001.0001/anb-9780198606697-e-1500924(http://www.timetoast.com) -
Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad Incident
During this time period, racially oppressive Jim Crow practices were taking hold in the South. She was forcibly evicted from the ladies’ car of the Chesapeake, Ohio and Southwestern Railroad Company, and she refused to ride in the segregated smoking car. She won a lawsuit against the company in the circuit court, but lost in the Tennessee Supreme Court (1887)
https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199827251/obo-9780199827251-0127.xml -
Period: to
1887-1891 Work
While continuing to teach elementary school to support her siblings., Wells became increasingly active as a journalist and writer. She was offered an editorial position for the Evening Star in Washington, D.C., and she began writing weekly articles for The Living Way weekly newspaper under the pen name "Iola." She wrote articles attacking racist Jim Crow policies. In 1891, Wells was fired from her teaching post due to her articles that criticized conditions in black schools. -
The lynching at The Curve in Memphis
Two Rival grocery stores, People's Grocery and a White Owned grocery store had been the meeting place of a racially targeted mob attack following an altercation. This resulted in the black store owner, Thomas Moss, being arrested with two employees.
Racially targeted citizens then broke into the jail and took the three men to be lynched, who were close with Wells. "The journalist took the train out to Oklahoma herself to assess the territorial advantages for future Negro immigration" -
Anger Fueled Editorials
The event led Wells to begin investigating lynchings using investigative journalist techniques. In her editorials, she challenged the idea of lynching in America and the racially motivated reasons behind them.
In May she wrote a Free Speech editorial in which she suggested that many rape charges arose from the discovery of voluntary sexual liaisons of white women with black men. While Wells was away, angry whites closed the newspaper office and ran her partner out of Memphis -
Challenging Rape Lynchings
As a very dangerous thing to do, she challenged white supremacy ideas with the Free Speech on May 21st. She disputed the old rationalization of the whites for lynching by intimating that Southern white women were sexually attracted to black men. And called for the same punishment of white men that raped black women. -
Southern Horrors and The Red Record
Wells challenged the South's cries of rape that allow them to continue on lynching people, and using rape as an excuse. She also challenged the violence towards black people in the South. She investigated the stories of reasons for lynching, many being for reputation.
She stated: "Nobody in this section of the country believes the old threadbare lie that black men rape white women." -
Period: to
Speaking in Different Countries
Wells traveled twice to different countries speaking on the injustices brought on by the lynching going on in America. England and Britain were shocked to hear about the severity of how blacks were being treated in America. So when Wells arrived to these countries, she received tons of support from the white community, which played a huge role in her fight for equality.
Here, she also spoke on women's suffrage and women's right to vote. -
Marriage and Children
Wells had a 1895 marriage to Chicago-based lawyer and fellow journalist Ferdinand L. Barnett, where she went into “limited retirement” but kept working for justice.
During this time she had four children with Barnett, and often brought them with the couple on the road. The couple were both journalists fighting for the same cause, so their lives were intertwined in every aspect. -
Later years and Death
Participating in the founding of such organizations as the NACW (1896), the Afro-American Council (1898), and the NAACP(1910), Wells-Barnett remained active in few.
Active in the Republican Party and three years before her death, began her autobiography and ran for the state senate. For more than four decades Wells-Barnett’s militant voice brought worldwide attention to the evil of lynching and influenced the course of American reform. She died in Chicago, Illinois to kidney failure.
