[116] In her hometown of Holly Springs, Mississippi, there is an Ida B. Wells-Barnett Museum in her honor that acts as a cultural center of African-American history. [9] Wells had been visiting her grandmother's farm near Holly Springs at the time, and was spared. [85], As a prominent Black suffragist, Wells held strong positions against racism, violence and lynching that brought her into conflict with leaders of largely White suffrage organizations. She was buried in Oak Woods Cemetery on Chicago's South Side. Wells, Judicial System", "History: Movement to Honor Anti-Lynching Crusader and Journalist Ida B. When Wells refused to give up her seat, the conductor and two men dragged her out of the car. Wells lived a very difficult childhood. [103], Instead of going to the back with other African Americans, however, Wells waited with spectators as the parade was underway, and stepped into the White Illinois delegation as they passed by. Like Wells, he spoke widely against lynchings and for the civil rights of African Americans. ...What a revelation of existing conditions your writing has been for me. [100], As Wells and Squire were organizing the Alpha Club, the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) was organizing a suffrage parade in Washington D.C. Underwood prevailed, Offet was released and subsequently pardoned by the Ohio Governor. Frederick Douglass praised her work: "You have done your people and mine a service. In 1896, Wells took part in the meeting in Washington, D.C., that founded the National Association of Colored Women's Clubs. [65], Her establishment of Chicago's first kindergarten prioritizing Black children, located in the lecture room of the Bethel AME Church, demonstrates how her public activism and her personal life were connected; as her great-granddaughter Michelle Duster notes: "When her older children started getting of school age, then she recognized that black children did not have the same kind of educational opportunities as some other students .... And so, her attitude was, 'Well since it doesn't exist, we'll create it ourselves. CBN.com – Born July 16, 1862, in Holly Springs, Mississippi, Ida B. Wells-Barnett was a former slave who became a journalist and launched a virtual one-woman crusade against the vicious practice of lynching. [73], In 1893, the World's Columbian Exposition was held in Chicago. [60] Despite these attacks in the White press, Wells had nevertheless gained extensive recognition and credibility, and an international audience of White supporters of her cause. In 1892, after three friends of hers had been lynched by a mob, Wells began an editorial campaign against lynching that quickly led to the sacking of her newspaper’s office. Her paternal grandmother, Peggy Wells (née Peggy Cheers; 1814–1887), along with other friends and relatives, stayed with her siblings and cared for them during the week while Wells was teaching.[10]. She quit and went into … Wells of Chicago, died Aug. 4 in Los Angeles. Du Bois, and more traditionally minded women activists, Wells often came to be seen as too radical. Wells, published in 1970. [35], Wells, in Southern Horrors, adopted the phrase "poor, blind Afro-American Sampsons" to denote Black men as victims of "White Delilahs". Following the funerals of her parents and brother, friends and relatives decided that the five remaining Wells children should be separated and sent to various foster homes. Wells and the pressure group she put together with Addams are credited with stopping the adoption of an officially segregated school system. "[22], The event led Wells to begin investigating lynchings using investigative journalist techniques. Who Was Ida B. Barnett founded The Chicago Conservator, the first Black newspaper in Chicago, in 1878. [69] However, in her autobiography, Wells stated that Du Bois deliberately excluded her from the list. Wells Battled Jim Crow in Memphis", College of Fellows of the American Theatre, "8 – White Women and the Campaign Against Lynching: Frances Willard, Jane Addams, Jesse Daniel Ames", Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, The Reason Why the Colored American Is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition: The Afro-American Contribution to Columbian Literature, "Announcement of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize Winners – Special Citation: Ida B. The store was located in a South Memphis neighborhood nicknamed "The Curve". In 1891, Wells was dismissed from her teaching post by the Memphis Board of Education due to her articles criticizing conditions in the Black schools of the region. During her summer vacations she attended summer sessions at Fisk University, a historically Black college in Nashville, Tennessee. [146] The Memphis Memorial Committee, alongside the Neshoba Community Center, will be seeking to honor Ida B. The Ida B. Barrett was dissatisfied with the response and was frustrated that the People's Grocery was competing with his store. James L. Fleming, co-owner with Wells and business manager, was forced to flee Memphis; and, reportedly, the trains were being watched for Wells' return. Ida B. Wells-Barnett died on March 25, 1931, at the age of 68, from a brief illness due to kidney failure. It won four awards from the AUDELCO (Audience Development Committee Inc.), an organization that honors Black theater. The Extra Mile – Points of Light Volunteer Pathway, a memorial adjacent to the White House in Washington, D.C., selected Wells as one of its 37 honorees. [57] Its founding members included many notables such as the Duke of Argyll, Sir John Gorst, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lady Henry Somerset and some twenty Members of Parliament,[58] with activist Florence Balgarnie as the honorary secretary.[59]. [71][72] In 1914, she served as president of NERL's Chicago bureau. Wells Receives Pulitzer Prize Citation: 'The Only Thing She Really Had Was the Truth, "Letter to the Editor: Ida Wells an inspiring heroine for International Women's Day", "Protesters Hang an 'Ida B. Wells died on March 25, 1931. Wells Looks to Erect Memorial", "Issues Honor Ida B. In 1928, she tried to become a delegate to the Republican National Convention but lost to Oscar De Priest. The Memphis Appeal-Avalanche reports: – Frederick Douglass (October 25, 1892)[21], Just before he was killed, Moss said to the mob: "Tell my people to go west, there is no justice here."[20]. About two years after Wells' grandmother, Peggy, had a stroke and her sister, Eugenia, died, Wells, at the invitation of an aunt in Memphis, Fanny Butler (née Fanny Wells; 1837–1908), with her two youngest sisters, moved in with her in 1883. In his autobiography Dusk of Dawn, Du Bois implied that Wells chose not to be included. By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. She was active in women's rights and the women's suffrage movement, establishing several notable women's organizations. Frederick Douglass had written an article noting three eras of "Southern barbarism" and the excuses that Whites claimed in each period. [11] Memphis is about 56 miles (90 km) from Holly Springs. [142]The marker was donated by the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation. [45][46], Despite Wells-Barnett's attempt to garner support among White Americans against lynching, she believed that her campaign could not overturn the economic interests Whites had in using lynching as an instrument to maintain Southern order and discourage Black economic ventures. Together with Frederick Douglass and other Black leaders, Wells organized a Black boycott of the fair, for its exclusion of African Americans from the exhibits. Wells-Barnett gave 14 pages of statistics related to lynching cases committed from 1892 to 1895; she also included pages of graphic accounts detailing specific lynchings. [82][83], Wells' role in the U.S. suffrage movement was inextricably linked to her lifelong crusade against racism, violence and discrimination towards African Americans. Wells Gets Her Street—City Council Approves Renaming Congress in Her Honor", "Great-Granddaughter of Ida B. Wells, Lynching, and Transatlantic Activism. Wells had been invited for her first British speaking tour by Catherine Impey and Isabella Fyvie Mayo. [36] The phrase, instrument of vengeance was also referenced in the 1831 work, The Confessions of Nat Turner, published by Thomas Ruffin Gray, wherein Turner explains how he saw the divine signs – God's will to eradicate the evil of slavery – that (a) vindicated him as an instrument of vengeance and (b) established his prophetic status. Wells: A Passion for Justice. She died as a result of kidney failure on March 25, 1931 in Chicago, at the age of 68. However, these struggles didn’t cause Wells to give up on her beliefs, she worked through them and stood up for what was right. [42], According to the Equal Justice Initiative, 4084 African Americans were lynched in the South, alone, between 1877 and 1950,[43] of which, 25 percent were accused of sexual assault and nearly 30 percent, murder. Wells and Barnett had met in 1893, working together on a pamphlet protesting the lack of Black representation at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. A white mob destroyed her newspaper office and presses as her investigative reporting was carried nationally in Black-owned newspapers. She began to interview people associated with lynchings, including a lynching in Tunica, Mississippi, in 1892 where she concluded that the father of a young White woman had implored a lynch mob to kill a Black man with whom his daughter was having a sexual relationship, under a pretense "to save the reputation of his daughter". While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. Ida Wells also went to school, and recently, she also asked by her father to read him a newspaper. Activist and journalist Ida B. Wells-Barnett was an early proponent of civil rights. It concluded: "We think it is evident that the purpose of the defendant in error was to harass with a view to this suit, and that her persistence was not in good faith to obtain a comfortable seat for the short ride. A story broke January 16, 1892, in the Cleveland Gazette, describing a wrongful conviction of a sexual affair between a married White woman, Julia Underwood (née Julie Caroline Wells), and a single Black man, William Offet (1854–1914) of Elyria, Ohio. Miss Barnett helped edit her mother's autobiography, Crusade for Justice: the Autobiography of Ida B. Because her parents were slaves, that meant Ida was born enslaved, too. Omissions? he way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them. She died March 25, 1931. Ida Bell Wells-Barnett (July 16, 1862 – March 25, 1931) was an American investigative journalist, educator, and early leader in the civil rights movement. In 1930, Wells unsuccessfully sought elective office, running as an Independent for a seat in the Illinois Senate, against the Republican Party candidate, Adelbert Roberts. Wells Memorial Foundation, Ida B. Wells-Barnett - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Ida B. Wells-Barnett - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up), National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. What is Ida B. [58] Thompson's play explores Wells as "a seminal figure in Post-Reconstruction America". Wells Forced Out of Memphis (1892)", Jean Blackwell Hutson Research and Reference Division, "Gendered Literacy in Black and White: Turn-of-the-Century African-American and European-American Club Women's Printed Texts", "One Teacher's Struggle to Overcome Bigotry", "Ida B. Wells-Barnett (1862–1931) and Her Passion for Justice", "Illinois During the Gilded Age, 1866–1896", A Red Record: Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynchings in the United States, 1892–1893–1894, "The Anti-Lynching Pamphlets of Ida B. This article was most recently revised and updated by, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ida-B-Wells-Barnett, National Park Service - Biography of Ida B. [41] The Red Record had far-reaching influence in the debate about lynching. As the Black youth Harris began to win the fight, the father of Cornelius Hurst intervened and began to "thrash" Harris. Southern Horrors and The Red Record's documentation of lynchings captured the attention of Northerners who knew little about lynching or accepted the common explanation that Black men deserved this fate. Wells was driven out of Memphis in 1892. Wells was close to Moss and his family, having stood as godmother to his first child, Maurine E. Moss (1891–1971). Wells and 'American Atrocities" in Britain", "Great Grandson of Influential Civil Rights Pioneer Ida B. Mayo was a well-known writer and poet who wrote under the name of Edward Garrett. By portraying the horrors of lynching, she worked to show that racial and gender discrimination are linked, furthering the Black feminist cause. Wells With Chicago's First Monument to an African American Woman", "Jewish Group Helps Dedicate Ida Wells-Barnett Marker", "Ida B. Writing to the president of the association, Mary Terrell, Chicago organizers of the event stated that they would not cooperate in the meeting if it included Wells. National Women's Rights Convention (1850–1869), Women's suffrage organizations and publications, Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst Memorial, Centenary of Women's Suffrage Commemorative Fountain, List of lynching victims in the United States, William "Froggie" James and Henry Salzner, Thomas Moss, Henry Stewart, Calvin McDowell (TN), Thomas Harold Thurmond and John M. Holmes, Henry Hezekiah Dee and Charles Eddie Moore, Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching, Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, "The United States of Lyncherdom" (Twain), Timeline of women's legal rights (other than voting), Pulitzer Prize Special Citations and Awards, American Heritage Picture History of the Civil War, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ida_B._Wells&oldid=1023185201, Activists for African-American civil rights, Articles with unsourced statements from October 2020, Wikipedia articles needing page number citations from October 2020, Articles with dead external links from October 2020, Pages using Sister project links with hidden wikidata, Wikipedia articles with CANTIC identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers, Wikipedia articles with Trove identifiers, Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers, Wikipedia articles with multiple identifiers, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, During slavery time, she noted that Whites worked to "repress and stamp out alleged 'race riots, She noted that Whites frequently claimed that Black men had "to be killed to avenge their assaults upon women". 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