Friday, June 15, 2012

Earl Ijames - Black North Carolina in the 1930s

Earl Ijames is a good friend of the SCV. He spoke at the Whitehall Memorial Park Dedication Service and is visible in the second and fourth pictures.


Colored Confederates? Earl L. Ijames NC Archivist

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Ijames is best known for his thorough work documenting the service of Black Confederates. This talk (see link below) is quite interesting as Ijames discusses how entrepreneurship and innovation allowed many blacks in NC to not only survive the Great Depression, but to also thrive - despite tremendous odds. Note his point about how the South was better able to weather the Great Depression and why. Some of those same reasons apply to our current economic conditions.

Ijames also discusses the "Rosenwald Schools." I attended one of these schools right after our local schools in Virginia were integrated in the 1960's.

There are some lessons here for us all. Well worth the time to watch and listen.

VIDEO

Black Issues Forum on UNC-TV with Mitchell Lewis is joined by guest Earl Ijames to discuss African American life in our state around the period of the Great Depression. The stock market crash of 1929 devastated many Americans, but there were some ironies in social and economic outcomes for Southerners. Watch Black North Carolina in the 1930's and discover how African Americans were able to maintain economic stability and a vibrant social culture.

Guest:

Earl Ijames
Curator of the North Carolina Museum of History.

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