"No ma'am, no Negroes here at all": African Americans in Johnson County, Arkansas, 1865--1920
by Koenig, Jennifer S., M.A., University of Arkansas, 2009 , 140 pages; AAT 1458997
Abstract (Summary)
"In the years after the Civil War, African Americans throughout Arkansas and the South were moving partially to fulfill their dreams of equality, education, freedom of religion, and landownership. These dreams were not limited to those only in the deep South, but also to living elsewhere, such as Johnson County Arkansas. From 1865 to 1920, historians can see that Johnson County African Americans were moving for economic opportunities. When they moved, they also were able to educate their children through school, become more diverse in their occupations, build and attend their own churches, and have some political freedoms despite white racism, the extremes of negrophobia, disfranchisement, and the inset of Jim Crow. This thesis will look different aspects of their lives and how the diverse landscape impacted their lives, forcing them to move and be, by 1920, isolate to just a few sections of the county."[/]