The Jim Crow north : the struggle for civil rights in Pottstown, Pennsylvania / Matthew George Washington.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Washington, Matthew George, author.

Series:

Civil rights and the struggle for Black equality in the twentieth century

Civil rights and the struggle for Black equality

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

African Americans--Civil rights--Pennsylvania--Pottstown--History--20th century.

African Americans.

Civil rights movements--Pennsylvania--Pottstown--History--20th century.

Civil rights movements.

African American civil rights workers--Pennsylvania--Pottstown--History--20th century.

African American civil rights workers.

Civil rights workers--Pennsylvania--Pottstown--History--20th century.

Civil rights workers.

Segregation--Pennsylvania--Pottstown--History--20th century.

Segregation.

Pottstown (Pa.)--Race relations--History--20th century.

Pottstown (Pa.).

Pottstown Mercury.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (ix, 316 pages, 14 unnumbered pages of plates) : illustrations, maps.

Other Title:

Struggle for civil rights in Pottstown, Pennsylvania

Path to Open

Place of Publication:

Lexington, Kentucky : University Press of Kentucky, [2024]

Summary:

Located approximately forty miles northwest of Philadelphia, the working-class borough of Pottstown does not immediately come to mind as an influential site of the Black freedom struggle. Yet this small town in Pennsylvania served as a significant hub of interracial civil rights activism with regional as well as national impact. In The Jim Crow North: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, Matthew George Washington adds another interpretive perspective to historiography by using both the "freedom North" and the "long civil rights movement" theoretical models to frame the borough's unique history. Primary documents, including newspaper accounts, census records, oral histories, and correspondence present a vivid account of a rapidly changing town, from the dawn of its civil rights movement during World War II to the revitalization of its NAACP branch in the early 1950s and its activism throughout the 1960s. Placing special emphasis on the demographic nature of the movement, Washington explores how interracial collaboration among the working class made up the movement's critical base—and how, through it all, Black activists remained front and center. This critical examination of Pottstown illuminates the struggle for African American civil rights in one of the long-ignored urban spaces of the North, providing a rich and in-depth portrait of the Black freedom struggle of postwar America.

Notes:

Title from online title page (viewed on November 6, 2024).

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Print version: Washington, Matthew George. Jim Crow north.

ISBN:

9781985900257

1985900254

9781985900264

1985900262

OCLC:

1427155695

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.-- From publisher's website.