The Great Migration

The Great American Migration was the movement of approximately 7 million African Americans from the Southern United States to the North, Midwest, and California from 1910 to 1970. Black southerners moved to escape racism, find employment, and to get a better education for their children. Some historians separate the period of 1910-1940 as the Great Migration and call the time frame from 1940-1970 as the second Great Migration. In the first migration, it is estimated that 1.6million people migrated and 5million people migrated in the second migration.

How It Began

The Emancipation Proclamation was signed in 1863. At that time less than 8% of Blacks lived in the North and Midwest. In 1900, approximately 90% resided in former slave holding states. Most African Americans migrated to New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, Minneapolis, Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and Cleveland.

Chicago got the most African Americans of all cities from 1940-1960. The Black population went from 278,000 to 813,000. The south side of Chicago became know as the Black Capital of America. Detroit, New York, and Cleveland saw major increases as well.

Reasons for Migrating

WWI created jobs as white men went to war leaving factory jobs open. Whites who were in the service industry took the factory jobs leaving all other occupations available for Blacks. The boll weevil, an insect in the beetle family, infestation of 1910 killed cotton fields leaving sharecroppers and laborers jobless. Jim Crow laws and terrorism from the Ku Klux Klan left African Americans no option other than escape. The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 left hundreds displaced. In the North, African American men had the right to vote and help decide the future for their families. Once again, the onslaught of WWII left Blacks behind to fill jobs that white men abandoned to fight in the war. This time, African Americans were allowed in the factories of Detroit and the steel mills of Cleveland, just to name a few.