The Great Migration

Video voiced by Dr. Allen Ballard.

ONE-TENTH [800,000+] OF THE COUNTRY’S BLACK POPULATION MOVED NORTH [BETWEEN 1910-1930]

In the spring of 1916, the attention of the American press and public was focused on the Great War in Europe. Few noticed the tiny stream of Southern black men brought north by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company to work on the rail lines. But following this experiment, between 1916 and 1918 alone, nearly 400,000 African Americans - five hundred each day - took what they hoped was a journey into freedom.

The migration was a watershed in the history of African Americans. It lessened their overwhelming concentration in the South, opened up industrial jobs to people who had mostly been farmers, and gave the first significant impetus to their urbanization.

In 1910, seven million of the nation's eight million African Americans resided below the Cotton Curtain. But over the next fifteen years, more than one-tenth of the country's black population would voluntarily move north. The Great Migration, which lasted until 1930, was the first step in the full nationalization of the African American population.

©Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

The Great Migration

The Great Migration was a grassroots movement of people who left the South by selling all they had; land, household goods, clothes anything that could be translated into cash. They were encouraged by northern business, labor agents, the black press, family and friends, but most of all, by their own understanding of "an opportunity whose time had come." They laid the foundations for an even larger movement, the Second Great Migration, which was to propel five million of their kin, friends, and neighbors like these two men, north and west between the Second World War and 1970.

©Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

Photo:Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, FSA/OWI Collection, [reproduction number, LC-USF34-040827-D]

Waiting for the Train to go North

In 1918, it would have cost $22.52 for one adult to travel from New Orleans to Chicago, or over $90 for a family of six. A relatively short trip of 600 miles, from Norfolk to Pittsburgh, would have cost $8 for one adult or $48 for a family of six. It was not easy to get to "the Promised Land." Because of the expense of the journey, migrants usually traveled alone. After settling in the north, men would often send money home to help the family left behind. Women migrants, more often than not, would have to leave their young children with family members. Some waited years to be reunited. Families that were able to travel together were privileged. Single men, women, and families were waiting for the train north at the Union Railroad Depot in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1921.

©Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

Photo: Courtesy of The Florida State Archives

Arriving North

Railway lines often dictated who would migrate where. Chicago was a preferred destination for migrants from Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas because the railroads had direct lines to the Windy City. The Illinois Central Railroad was nicknamed the "Fried Chicken Special" because of the packed lunches the migrants brought along with them for the trip. Although some migrants were offered free transportation by their future employers, the majority paid their own fares. Railway companies offered special rates for groups of ten to fifty, thus reducing expenses and at the same time stimulating demand.

©Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

 Photo: University of Illinois at Chicago Library, Image# CULR_01_0001_0008_01_p8_0

Coal Miners

The occupations of the migrants were varied.  Although many had worked in agriculture, a large percentage had held other jobs. Miners from Alabama, for example, headed for the coal mines of Pennsylvania. According to surveys done in Chicago and Pittsburgh, only about one-quarter of migrants came from the agriculture sector.

©Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

Photo: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, FSA/OWI Collection, [reproduction number, LC-USF34-02542-D]

Past to the Present

During the Great Migration, thousands of African Americans rode the train to venture north in search of freedom and new opportunities. Today, trains continue to play a vital role for many in the African American community.

Please click here to download The Great Migration of African Americans Exhibit