The Black Metropolis: Race, Segregation and the Urban Environment in Chicago in the Early Twentieth Century

Early twentieth century Chicago was a city of turbulent change.  A shortage of labour supply caused by World War I alongside growing discontent from southern African Americans caused by extreme racial inequity led to a substantial influx in the African American population in the northern areas of the United States, particularly in cities.   This period has now been coined the Great Migration and saw the African American population explode from 30,150 in 1900 to 337,000 in 1944 (Clayton, 1946). The effect of this huge increase of population had a considerable impact on housing, labour and cultural life that can still be felt in Chicago today. 

Unlike the blatantly racist Jim Crowe laws found in Southern states, the Northern states used a more subtle form of discrimination and informal segregation by the early twentieth century.  In Illinois, segregation in public accommodation was first outlawed in 1885, but restrictive covenants between white real estate agents and owners to prevent the renting or sale of housing to nonwhites as well as racial violence limited the areas available to African Americans (Baldwin, 2007).  This caused the formation of the ‘Black Metropolis’ or Black Belt now known as Bronzeville, in the South Side of Chicago. 

The Black Metropolis was a narrow strip of land stretched across 30 blocks along State Street and was rarely more than seven blocks wide (Manning, 2005).  The area contained aging, dilapidated housing and there was a constant shortage of accommodation, forcing African Americans to pay high rents for shoddy housing.  Because of the aforementioned restrictive covenants, the neighbourhood was diverse in terms of class, with poor, middle and upper class blacks living side by side (Reed, 2011).  This gave rise to a city within a city, with a distinctive political, economic and cultural life.  

At the centre of this city, was the Stroll which became the best known street in African America in the early twentieth century (White, 2005.) The Stroll was a meeting place for the community, with infamous jazz clubs and gambling parlours fuelling the nightlife while acting as a meeting place during the day.  Pictured below, is a painting called “The Black Belt” by Archibald Motley, painted in 1934 and giving an indication of the atmosphere present on the stroll.  

Figure 1: Archibald Motley, The Black Belt, 1934

The Stroll had a stigma associated with it, in particular white conservatives pointed at it as an area full of  “vice,” presenting African Americans as a race predisposed to unruly behaviour (Clayton, 1946).  Interestingly enough, even the Vice Commissioner of Chicago made clear that the link between black life and immorality was not a racial characteristic but the result of intentional municipal rezoning to put Chicago’s red light district in the African American community yet the stigma persisted (Baldwin 2007). 

Despite having to deal with these issues,  the Black Metropolis gave rise to a thriving cultural centre. The rise of popular publications such as the Chicago Defender gave the African American community a voice that resonated with African Americans nationwide.  Campaigns such as the “spend your money where you can work” ones were made possible through the publicity and easy coordination granted by the Chicago Defender.  Most newcomers got their first glimpse of life in Chicago in its pages, gaining guidance and support through it (Clayton, 1946).

Figure 2: PBS (n.d.)

The development of the Black Metropolis bears a striking resemblance to the process of western colonisation. Segregation based on sanitary and moral grounds, the attention paid to the organisation of African Americans as workers and the reservation of the best housing for the white population mirrors the actions taken by western colonisers in Africa and Asia.  This is particularly interesting in the American context when compared to how immigrants in general assimilated in large, metropolitan areas. Clayton (1946) points out that as European immigrants arrived they would congregate in colonies based upon commonalities such as language and national origin in a similar way the Black Metropolis involved individuals joining together based on race.  But their experience differed in the longer term, as individuals learned to speak English, acquired an economic stake in and lost their foreign habits and manners, they steadily moved away from these areas they inhabited initially into more desirable areas.  Later their children would merge with the general population causing the colonies to dissolve in the much famed American “melting pot.” The Black experience was different, as white colonies disintegrated, the Black Metropolis grew stronger.

Racially restrictive covenants were deemed unconstitutional in 1948 by the Supreme Court, with surprising consequences for the Black Metropolis.  Bronzeville fell into decline as a result as upper and middle class families moved away.  Policies were put in place by Richard Daley, former Mayor of Chicago, which arguably made the race divide even more prominent.  Under Daley, 28 massive towers that house 27,000 poor, black residents were constructed in the 1950s as well as the Dan Ryan Expressway in the early 1960s, which many have argued, including the Chicago Defender, was strategically placed to act as a physical barrier between white and black neighbourhoods (Smith, 2012).  

Present day Bronzeville is one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in America.  According to the 2000 U.S. census, more than 35% of Bronzeville residents live below the poverty line and roughly 25% are unemployed. Crime is a serious problem with McKinsey & Company reporting that violent crime occurs five times more frequently than in the rest of Illinois.  The tide may be turning – the Chicago Housing Authority under its Plan for Transformation is demolishing all of its galley-style, family-focused high-rise housing developments and is investing roughly a billion dollars in Bronzeville.

Figure 3: Abbot (1934), Figure 4: Frankel (2013)

Though the Black Belt has grown in size, as the comparison of figures 3 and 4 illustrate, it shows no signs of disappearing and is still plagued by considerably more poverty and crime than the surrounding neighbourhoods (McArdle, 2002).  Access to housing and space in the urban environment is imperative to any kind of community within a city.  In the case of Chicago, century old policies have shaped the face of the continually racially divided urban landscape of today.

Reference List:

Abbott, E. (1936) Census Tracts of Chicago 1934: Per Cent Total Population Negro. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Retrieved on April 02, 2015 from http://dcc.newberry.org/items/census-tracts-of-chicago-1934-per-cent-total-population-negro.

Baldwin, D.L. (2007). “Mapping the black Metropolis” in Chicago’s New Negroes. Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 2007 pp. 21-52.

Clayton, H.R. & Drake. S. C. (1946). Black Metropolis. London: Jonathan Cape.

Frankel, S. (2013). African American Population by Census Tract In Chicago. Retrieved on April 01, 2015 from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:African_American_Population_by_Census_Tract_in_Chicago,_IL_(2011).svg.

Manning, C. (2005). African American. In Encyclopedia of Chicago. Retrieved April 02, 2015, from http://www.easybib.com/reference/guide/apa/encyclopedia.

McArdle, N. (2002). Race, Place and opportunity: Racial Change and Segregation in the Chicago Metropolitain Area, 1990-2000. Boston: Harvard University Press.

Motley, A. (1934). Black Belt [oil on canvas]. Retrived April 01, 2015 from http://nasher.duke.edu/motley/.

PBS (n.d.). The Chicago Defender. Retrieved April 01, 2015 from http://www.pbs.org/blackpress/news_bios/defender.html.

Reed, C. R. (2011). New Black Studies: Rise of Chicago’s Black Metropolis, 1920-1929. University of Illinois Press.

Smith, P. H. (2012). Racial Democracy and the Black Metropolis: Housing Policy in Postwar Chicago. University of Minnesota Press.

Spear, A. H. (1967). Black Chicago: The Making of a Negro Ghetto, 1890-1920. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

White, S. (2005). The Stroll. In Encycolpedia of Chicago. Retrieved April 02, 2015, from http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/1212.html.