On the second day of the new year in 1893, Frederick Douglass delivered two speeches in Chicago. His first speech was the keynote address for the dedication of the Haitian Pavilion at the World’s Columbian Exposition. The pavilion was one of dozens of exhibit buildings dedicated to U.S. states and foreign governments featured throughout the fairgrounds.
The 1893 World’s Fair offers us an opportunity to reflect on the meaning of Black history in the late 19th century before the inauguration of the first Negro History Week (the predecessor to Black History Month). In the midst of what is often called the nadir of American race relations — the intensification of white supremacist violence and segregation — African Americans used Black history as a tool of social justice and reconciliation.
For his first speech, Douglass stood before Chicagoans as the co-commissioner of the Haitian Pavilion. As the former U.S. minister and consul general to Haiti, Douglass was a natural choice for Haitian President Florvil Hyppolite. Before a small crowd, Douglass expressed his pride that the first Black republic had an exhibit building “to meet and welcome her friends.”
Later that evening, Douglass spoke at Quinn Chapel, a historically Black church established before the Civil War. Returning to themes from his address at the Haitian Pavilion, Douglass again underscored the historical importance of the Haitian revolution.
A scholar of rhetoric and writing, Glen McClish notes that Douglass’ oration at the chapel was more politically radical in tone. The seasoned statesman spoke unequivocally about race and the long legacy of racial injustice.
Two years before his death, Douglass’ residency in Chicago was also a moment to showcase the great accomplishments of African Americans one generation after the abolition of slavery.
African Americans were largely excluded from all national and state administrative bodies responsible for planning the international exposition. Besides “Colored American Day,” a special day of programming organized by African Americans in August, there were no formal U.S. exhibit spaces showcasing Black cultural or technological contributions.
Burdened by these injustices and other wrongs African Americans had to endure, Douglass joined with a new generation of activists. Ida B. Wells, her future spouse, Ferdinand Barnett, and I. Garland Penn. The three were all journalists, a fact that likely forged a bond between them and Douglass, who had once helmed one of the nation’s most important newspapers.
Together, the quartet wrote “The Reason Why: The Colored American is not in the Columbian Exposition” to protest African Americans’ glaring lack of representation in the planning and execution of the exposition. The pamphlet consisted mainly of previously published work including excerpts of Wells’ anti-lynching writing.
Black history, fully endowed, is also about maintaining a full account of the long history of white supremacy. Black activists in Chicago that year meticulously infused in their work this tradition of Black history. Of all the skeletons of white supremacy the group explored, slavery loomed the largest.
The lie of the 1890s persists today. Discussions of slavery and the lingering horrors of white supremacy are seen as divisive. States and communities across the country have rushed to prevent students from learning about how the racial legacy of slavery perverts our legal and social institutions. Infuriated by critical race theory, they denounce rigorous historical education like the one Wells and others practiced in the 1890s.
This vision of Black history as a part of American history is not about inflicting guilt on white people. Nineteenth-century activists’ vision of reconciliation wasn’t about shame. They were using history to produce a spirit of conviction that would make it possible for people to identify injustice and do something about it. Reconciliation was about building.
The refusal to acknowledge the inglorious chapters of American history at the World’s Fair dishonored the lives of a people whose blood soaks the soil of this country.
From the 1893 World’s Fair, we learn that Black history is about encouraging Americans to commemorate the truly praiseworthy aspects of American history. Just as the activist writers kept a rigorous account of the injustices of white supremacy, they celebrated the remarkable achievements of African Americans. Penn’s essay in “The Reason Why” joyously reported on the progress that African Americans had made in education, wealth and business in the decades following the end of slavery.
Today, some corners of American society still glorify the ugliest parts of itself.
No matter our race, we can revel in the achievements of African Americans. Black history represents the indomitable spirit of a people who have faced enormous systemic odds and have flourished in spite of racial hatred.
In December 1893, nearly one year after Douglass first arrived in Chicago, he prepared to leave. And he left in much the same fashion as he was welcomed to the city months earlier. Quinn Chapel, the site of one of his Jan. 2 speeches, hosted a farewell reception for the famed orator.
His farewell remarks left a startling warning for the country: “God still lives, and as a nation sows so shall it reap.” This was righteous indignation at the evils of bigotry and systemic racism.
More than a century later, we need this Black history lesson. Buying merchandise with Black and brown faces during Black History Month won’t be enough. History without loving critiques of American hypocrisy won’t produce the reconciliation this country desperately needs.
We need individuals empowered with a historical imagination that incisively explores the past’s connection to our present world.
Mikala Stokes is a Ph.D. candidate in American history at Northwestern University. Stokes is the author and co-author of two digital history exhibits about Black history in Chicago.
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