“You never forget the Bracero experience,” former bracero Aurelio Marin commented, perfectly summarizing the triumphs, tribulations, and turbulence of America’s highly-controversial and highly-impactful Mexican Farm Labor Program Program, commonly known as the Bracero Program, which started in 1942 to supply able-bodied Mexican laborers to U.S. industries suffering shortages at the outset of World War II. […]
Tag Archives | Jim Crow
Camp Logan 1917
By Matthew Crow Few of Houston’s residents today realize that during World War I Houston had a military base just west of downtown. Camp Logan, one of sixteen auxiliary military training camps established during the era, sprawled across much of the area that is now Memorial Park, south from Washington Avenue and across the bayou […]
The Life and Legacy of Overseer R. L. Braziel
On November 9, 2005, Ruby Lee Braziel, my grandmother, suffered a mild stroke in her home and was rushed to Houston’s St. Luke’s Hospital. When I returned home from school, my father, Darwin Allen Sr., told me what had happened – sad news that any grandson would hate to hear.
In the Name of Decency and Progress: The Response of Houston’s Civic Leaders to the Lynching of Robert Powell in 1928
By Dwight Watson Click here to read a pdf of the full article.
Carter Wesley and the Making of Houston’s Civic Culture
By Amilcar Shabazz Click here to read a pdf of the full article.
8-F and Many More: Business and Civic Leadership in Houston
By Joe Pratt To click here to read the pdf of the full article.
We’ve Come This Far by Faith: Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church
Tomiko Meeks chronicles Rev. Lawson’s work at TSU and the birth of a neighborhood church that led to the formation of Wheeler Avenue Baptist.
We’re Sticking by Our Union: The Battle for Baytown
Between June 1942, and November 1943, Baytown, Texas, became the backdrop to one of the most dramatic labor confrontations to rock the upper Texas Gulf Coast during World War II.
Zinetta Burney: Crossing Alabama St.
One of the most significant socio-economic impacts resulting from white supremacy, and its attending corollary of Black inferiority, was the use of race as a determinant of residential housing patterns which forced African American families into isolation in segregated neighborhoods. For Zinetta Burney and her African American neighbors in Houston’s Third Ward, Alabama Street was […]
UH & TSU Perpetuating “Separate but Equal”
In 1927, the Houston Independent School District (HISD) created two colleges during a local economic boom: Houston Junior College, and a “separate but equal” branch, Houston Colored Junior College. Eventually, they were designated the University of Houston and Texas Southern University respectively. What became TSU only admitted black applicants until 1956, and UH only admitted […]