Book description
In the 1920s, the South Side was looked on as the new Black
Metropolis, but by the turn of the decade that vision was already in
decline-a victim of the Depression. In this timely book, Christopher
Robert Reed explores early Depression-era politics on Chicago's South
Side. The economic crisis caused diverse responses from groups in the
black community, distinguished by their political ideologies and
stated goals. Some favored government intervention, others reform of
social services. Some found expression in mass street demonstrations,
militant advocacy of expanded civil rights, or revolutionary calls for
a complete overhaul of the capitalist economic system. Reed examines
the complex interactions among these various groups as they played out
within the community as it sought to find common ground to address the
economic stresses that threatened to tear the Black Metropolis apart.
"Touches on themes that are compelling for their relevance
nearly a century later. The story of economic downturn and its
effects-homelessness, joblessness, corruption-are clearly issues of
great interest today." -Kim Butler, Rutgers University
Christopher Robert Reed is Professor Emeritus of History at
Roosevelt University in Chicago and author of The Emergence of the
Black Metropolis, 1910-1933; Black Chicago's First Century, 1833-1900;
All the World Is Here: The Black Presence at White City (IUP, 2000);
and The Chicago NAACP and the Rise of Black Professional Leadership
(IUP, 1997).
