Chicago's Newberry Library unveils 'treasure' of photos depicting Black History
CHICAGO (CBS) –It's Black history in living color. The Newberry Library in Chicago has acquired rare images from a critical period in U.S. history, early in the 20th century.
They're not on display, but as CBS 2's Joe Donlon learned, they're free and available for everyone.
The contents of a box had long been a mystery, but now, it's unlocked to the public and revealing 100 years of history.
"This is the box that it was originally carried around in in the 1920s and that it came to us in," said Will Hansen, curator of Newberry Library. "It really is like a treasure chest."
The treasure is a collection of 44 images produced by the Methodist Episcopal Church. The fragile glass lantern slides depict the great migration of African Americans from the south to cities primarily in the north.
"It's really special to us to be able to show these, probably the first time in about 100 years that anyone has seen them, because they are their connection of Chicago's African American community, but other African American communities throughout the country, to this story, which is one of the most important transformations in American history," Hansen said.
The images capture life in the south depicting African Americans working in cotton fields, in sugar cane fields, progressing to the lives they envisioned, and eventually lived in cities like Detroit, Philadelphia and Chicago.
"I love the image of the basketball team, which is St. Mark's Church basketball team," Hansen said. "St. Mark's is one of the great African American Methodist churches here in Chicago. Their basketball team won the city church league in 1921-1922."
"There's one image of a social worker visiting a family in what is essentially tenement housing," he added. "You can see a stove. You can see a little sink ... and they're all kind of crowded in there, but the image is so full of pride and so full of optimism.
"One of the things that churches like St. Mark's stepped up to do was provide daycare for these families," Hansen said. "And you have this image of these children in a room with smiling women looking over them. And they're leading them in prayer before lunch. Again, it's such an optimistic hopeful kind of image for how these communities hopes their lives might be in a city like Chicago."
Donlon: "How do you put into words the value of a collection like this?"
Hansen: "As far as we're concerned, it's priceless. We collect for research value, not monetary value. But they're certainly monetarily valuable. They have a research value and an emotional value, a sort of impact , for the people whose stories are reflected in them, that I think is really incalculable. It's priceless."
Donlons: "The thing that stands out to me is just what a valuable snapshot it is of life."
Hansen: "One of the things that I really love about the set is, it's history on the ground, it's history as it's being made. None of us think, 'Oh, I'm making history right now.' But these people really were. They were part of a transformation of the City of Chicago, and the country as a whole, without really knowing it."
The Newberry isn't calling it an exhibit, because the images aren't on display, not yet anyway, but you can see them online and even download them for free. Just go to Newberry.org.
