CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY SAN MARCOS
THESIS SIGNATURE PAGE
THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE
MASTER OF ARTS
IN
HISTORY
THESIS TITLE: Illustrating Ourselves: Lorenzo Harris and Historical Memory in The Crisis, 1913-1922
AUTHOR: Joy Noel Aezerlee Miller
DATE OF SUCCESSFUL DEFENSE: December 14, 2017
THE THESIS HAS BEEN ACCEPTED BY THE THESIS COMMITTEE IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS IN HISTORY.
Jill Watts U-, oc,;- - 6 ~ - 2..t> I fs -THE-S-IS_C_O_MMI__TT_E_E_C_HAIR ______JAN ~ ~NATURE~ DATE
Jeffrey Charles \, (lJ o ~ -o 3-- GO /9, THESIS COMMITTEE MEMBER DATE
Kimber Quinney ~tg THESIS COMMITTEE MEMBER DATE Illustrating Ourselves: Lorenzo Harris and Historical Memory in The Crisis, 1913-1922
Joy Miller
California State University, San Marcos Department of History © 2018 Miller 1
Table of Contents Abstract
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: Illustrating Ourselves: Lorenzo Harris and Historical Memory in The Crisis, 1913-
1922.
Chapter 3: Conclusion
Bibliography Miller 2
Abstract Lorenzo Harris, John Henry Adams, Albert A. Smith, and Laura Wheeler-Waring were illustrators for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s (NAACP) publication The Crisis during the early part of the twentieth-century. The illustrators of The
Crisis came from a variety of backgrounds and different African American communities. Their political cartoons and illustrations between 1913 and 1922 are historically significant because these artists fought against the false and racists imagery that was printed in white media. Their contributions to the publication were instrumental in creating a visual political statement that spoke to the multiple experiences of African Americans. While W.E.B. Du Bois was editor of
The Crisis, the artists seemingly had agency over the work they produced. Their illustrations commented on gender, politics, the judicial system, and lynching. They also challenged racist stereotyped caricatures of African Americans and reflected on contemporary issues.
Significantly, their political cartoons reflected their individual backgrounds and the historical memory that was woven throughout their respective communities. Whether it was intentional or unintentional to incorporate historical memory into their work these artists were affected by it and historical memory was integrated into their illustrations. They used their illustrations to protest against racial, economic and social inequality that African American communities faced in the United States during this period. Their powerful illustrations were both socially conscious and politically active.
Miller 3
Acknowledgements I would like to thank California State University, San Marcos History Department for their support in creating this website and the support of my overall thesis. I would like to thank my Masters of Arts in History Committee Dr. Jill Watts, Dr. Jeffrey Charles, and Dr. Kimber
Quinney for their incredible support, time, and guidance in helping complete this thesis. I would also like to thank my mother, Melenia Simon, for her encouragement throughout the process of me attending school. I would also like to thank each reader of this thesis for taking the time to read it. By reading this thesis, you are participating and sharing an important history that needs to continue living. I hope that you will take a moment and share what you have learned. So, with my deepest gratitude, thank you to everyone.
Miller 4
Chapter One: Introduction During the early twentieth-century political cartoons were used by various newspapers across the United States as a means to create meaningful but concise visual messages that would address politics and social conditions of the day. Many papers featured political cartoons to also address racial issues. In this period, white newspapers depicted African Americans in political cartoons using stereotypes that reinforced racist ideology. The illustrations showed African
Americans as inferior, unintelligent and idle. Despite the reality that African Americans historically provided the backbone of the nation’s labor force and there was a successful and educated black middle-class, white newspaper cartoons perpetuated negative stereotypes and riterated a narrative that maintained white society’s dominance.
In response to white newspapers’ false and racist imagery, African American newspapers strove to combat visual representations implying black “inferiority.” Specifically, during this period, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s magazine, The Crisis, used art from illustrators to fight against these racial stereotypes. African American art is political; both its content as well as the very act of creating it is and was a political statement. As
Belinda Edmondson wrote:
Recently some African American scholars have been arguing very persuasively that the
very genesis of African American arts was itself political. According to bell hooks,
whatever African Americans created music, dance, poetry, or painting, it was regarded as
testimony, challenging racist beliefs that blacks were uncivilized and that the measure of
their savagery was their collective failure to create “great” art. Furthermore, [hooks]
states, African slaves brought with them an aesthetic that art should emphasize kinship
ties and help to ensure the survival of the community. These ideas formed the basis of Miller 5
African American aesthetics, since cultural production and artistic expressiveness were
also ways for displaced African people to maintain connections with the past.1
Several African American publications carried cartoons and illustrations, but The Crisis, which was edited by NAACP founder and leader W.E. B. Du Bois, was one of the most important and widely circulated during its time. Historical memories of African American communities influenced The Crisis’s illustrators as they created political cartoons and illustrations that challenged racist stereotyped caricatures and reflected on the contemporary issues of African
Americans. The artists created political cartoons that showed African Americans from diverse socioeconomic classes fighting for their rights as citizens. Illustrators also depicted African
Americans engaging with the government. Cartoons criticized the actions of the White House and the federal government’s failure to create policy. In their drawings, The Crisis cartoonists analyzed the longer history of racism and its effect on African Americans in American politics and society.
The illustrators of The Crisis came from a variety of backgrounds and different African
American communities. Their contributions to the publication were instrumental in creating a visual political statement that spoke to the multiple experiences of African Americans. Their political cartoons reflected their individual backgrounds and the historical memory of their respective communities. Historical memory is defined as a group or an individual using memories from the past to challenge a narrative that is used by a rival group or individual to gain agency or establish domination. Whether the artists’ use of historical memory was intentional or unintentional, the influence of historical memories was prevalent in their illustrations. The artists
1 Belinda Edmondson, Making Men: Gender, Literary Authority, and Women’s Writing in Caribbean Narrative (Durham: Duke University Press, 1999), 87. Miller 6 of The Crisis used their illustrations as a political tool to challenge the white racist narrative that demeaned and suppressed African Americans. Hence it is important to study the individual biographies of the various artists to understand how their experiences affected their illustrations.
The thesis that follows is divided into two parts. First, a digital history project in the form of a website focuses on the lives and illustrations of four of The Crisis’ artists between 1913 and
1922. The time frame for this study starts with Woodrow Wilson’s administration and ends with the early development of the Harlem Renaissance movement. These artists are John Henry
Adams, Lorenzo Harris, Albert A. Smith, and Laura Wheeler-Waring. Although other artists contributed visual images to The Crisis during this period, these particular artists contributed most often. Interestingly, political cartooning was reserved for male artists and Laurel Wheeler-
Waring was confined to contributing portraits and illustrations that complemented poems and stories. Nonetheless, she was one of the first female artists to work for the publication and her illustrations are important to analyze. Her illustrations were created during a period when women were not allowed to vote. Even when women received the right to vote in 1920, most African
American women lived in the south and remained disenfranchised. By restricting Wheeler-
Waring to non- political cartoons, Du Bois practiced the sexism common in American society.
But the fact that Wheeler-Waring created art that reflected the beauty and the humanity in
African American communities was just as much of a political challenge to stereotypes as was provided by her male counterparts. Additionally, her work carried a rebellion against the constraint of sexism. The website will offer a comparative thematic study of the four artists’ illustrations by analyzing their work across the categories of gender, justice system, lynching, and politics. The website, in addition, will have a link to a section that will include the illustrations and newspaper articles related to the illustrators. Miller 7
The second part of this thesis is an in-depth essay on Lorenzo Harris who was the most prolific illustrator for The Crisis between the years 1913 to 1922. These years are a short period in Harris’s artistic career, yet they marked a period of rapid change that affected African
Americans in the United States. Harris was raised in two distinct African American communities in the United States. He was raised first in Richmond, Virginia, until the age of ten-years-old and then moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he resided until his early twenties. He was fostered in distinctive African American communities that held different memories and were shaped differently by their histories. As a young adult, Harris attended the Pennsylvania
Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) and had the opportunity to learn from three renowned artists.
His education provided the groundwork for his illustrations to become a tool for his activism, where he could counter the misrepresentation of African Americans.
The essay portion of this thesis will argue that Harris’s personal life, schooling, and political activism shaped his illustrations and led him to produce images that promoted positive black representations. His political cartoons offered visual challenges to racism through the use of historical memory. Additionally, his work presented a perspective of what African Americans faced in the United States.
Historiography The historiography on political cartooning in The Crisis is limited. Very little has been written on Harris except for a few paragraphs in non-scholarly works related to tourism and local celebrities in Asbury Park, New Jersey which eventually became his home base. Furthermore, investigations of the political cartoons produced by African American newspapers and the illustrators themselves are largely missing from historical scholarship. A few studies have focused on late nineteenth century African American newspapers and magazines. These studies have examined cartoons that discussed political figures and the attempt to counter racist rhetoric. Miller 8
Other scholars have examined on cartoons and illustrations from the mid-twentieth century onward, focusing on black heroism and African American self-identity.
The origins of African American cartooning and illustrations is explored by Andreà
Williams’ in her (2015) article “Cultivating Black Visually: The Controversy over Cartoons in the Indianapolis Freeman.” Williams explores cartoons produced in the newspaper from 1889-
1891. She argues that the use of cartoons promoted racial uplift. Significantly the Freeman’s cartoons used many of the visual stereotypes that could be found in the white press. Williams argues that showing African Americans as caricatures of themselves allowed “viewers to negotiate the power and meaning of images” based on the viewers’ political taste.2
The Freeman along with the Richmond Planet and Cleveland Gazette are explored by
Amanda K. Frisken in her 2012 article “‘A Song Without Words’: Anti-Lynching Imagery in the
African American Press, 1889-1898.” Frisken argues that African American newspapers in the
1890s used anti-lynching cartoons to fight against lynching, and as a tool to contest “mainstream interpretations of the practice.”3 While Williams and Frisken examine the nineteenth century and do not focus on The Crisis, they add to the longer history of African American political cartooning and black self-representation. Both agree that political cartoons were used by newspapers as tools to fight against oppression.
While cartooning is not the central theme for Jacqueline Goldsby’s book, A Spectacular
Secret: Lynching in American Life and Literature, she makes an important point about how prominent authors dealt with lynching in their work. She argues that lynching was not an issue
2 Andreà Williams, “Cultivating Visuality: The Controversy over Cartoons in the Indianapolis Freeman,” American Periodicals: A Journal of History and Criticism 25 (2015): 127. 3 Amanda K. Frisken, “‘A Song Without Words’: Anti-Lynching Imagery in the African American Press 1889-1898,” The Journal of African American History 97 (2012): 241. Miller 9 reserved to southern states; rather lynching, according to Goldsby, had become ingrained in the consciousness of America and was an important part of shaping the modern United States.
Although her focus is on literature, Goldsby examines political cartoons from the Indianapolis
Freeman and The Crisis. In the cartoon “The Ways of the Heathern” (1905) from the
Indianapolis Freeman she shows how the publication used the anti-lynching political cartoon to draw a connection between the rise in international violence and lynching in the United States.4
African Americans’ lives were in danger in the nation as the lynching imagery showed.5
Goldsby also examines Lorenzo Harris’s cartoon “The Next Colored Delegation to the
White House” (1915) in relation to James Weldon Johnson.6 Goldsby discusses how the cartoon echoes Johnson’s problems with the U.S. Consular Service. Harris’s cartoon demonstrated that the treatment of African American federal workers in government was well-covered in the black press and how “African Americans regarded government protocols to be as brutal in method as much as in intent and effects.”7 In 1906, during Theodore Roosevelt’s presidency, Johnson was named U.S. consul to Venezuela and Nicaragua. Johnson saw other, more desirable political positions repeatedly given to his white counterparts. In 1912, after his attempts to secure a post in Europe were rejected, he resigned. Discrimination against African Americans within the federal government continued into Woodrow Wilson’s presidency with the policy of blocking
African Americans from positions of power in government, and firing them from the positions they already held. Wilson’s policy both discriminated against blacks and brutalized them.8
4 Jacqueline Goldsby, A Spectacular Secret: Lynching in American Life and Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), 67-68. 5 Ibid,. 67. 6 Ibid.,177-178. 7 Ibid., 177. 8 Ibid., 178. Miller 10
While Goldsby discusses African American political cartoons, she does not make them the primary focus of her book. But Goldsby’s conclusion about political cartoons and the depictions of lynchings provides important analysis about the relationship between the cartoonist and the illustrations. She argues that political cartoons and photographs of lynchings were decisively different from each other. Illustrators used “the drawing techniques of line, proportion, and point of view to determine what and how the viewer experienced the scenes staged in the cartoon’s visual field. The inexplicable smiles and unseemly calm that often charge lynching photographs turn into curdled sneers and frenzied excitement in anti-lynching political cartoons.” Unlike photographs, black artists determined for themselves the importance of the illustrations rather than if they interacted with a captioned lynching photograph. 9 Goldsby makes an important point about artists being able to shape the images. By having agency over the cartoons they created, artists are able to draw from their communities and past to provide multiple layers and context to the argument presented in the illustrations.
An important study that focuses on African American cartooning and a specific illustrator is Nancy Goldstein’s book Jackie Ormes: The First African American Woman Cartoonist. The book is an illustrated biography about Jackie Ormes who was an African American woman cartoonist during the mid-twentieth century.10 Goldstein’s book is important in that it contributes to the historiography of African American cartoonists---and, in particular a woman cartoonist--- but her work focuses on the 1930s through the 1950s. Goldstein analyzes how Ormes created positive representations of African Americans in opposition to the negative stereotypes like
9 Ibid., 252. 10Nancy Goldstein, Jackie Ormes: The First African American Woman Cartoonist (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2008). Miller 11
Amos ‘n’ Andy, which were being produced by white society.11 Goldstein argues that Ormes created comic strips that produced beautiful, socially conscious female and male characters.12
Black Comics: Politics of Race and Representation, edited by Shenna C. Howard and
Ronald L. Jackson II, is an additional study that concentrates on African American representation in cartooning.13 It is a collection of scholarly essays that examines black comic strips in the twentieth-century. Black comic strips have preserved historical memories and have produced black representations that construct, specifically for children, black heroism. This collection shows how illustrations are used to embrace historical memories that remind African
American communities of their past. Jackie Ormes and Black Comics demonstrate how cartoons rejected racist stereotypes and embraced positive imagery of black men and women into the twentieth century.
General scholarship on images and African American artists includes Cheryl A. Alston’s
Master’s Thesis African American Artists of the Visual Arts: Champions of the Anti-Lynching
Movement (2008). Alston argues that illustrators were supporters in the anti-lynching campaign by creating profound art that focused on the victims of lynching and treating them with humanity.14 She contends that artists took a brave stance with their illustrations and risked their
11 “Brudder Bones: The New Acceptability of Ridiculing Black People,” The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education 17 (1997): 91-93; Mack Scott, “From Blackface to Beulah: Subtle Subversion in Early Black Sitcoms,” Journal of Contemporary History 49 (2014): 743-769. Amos ‘n’ Andy was an American radio show that premiered in the late 1920s and lasted until 1960. It was created, written, and performed by two white men Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll. The show than moved to television from 1951 to 1953. The show was controversial because it showed African Americans as simple and ignorant, and relied on racist stereotypes. 12 Goldstein, Jackie Ormes, 1-177. 13 Shenna C. Howard and Ronald Jackson II, eds. Black Comics: Politics of Race and Representation (New York: Bloomsbury, 2013). 14 Cheryl A. Alston, "African American Artists of the Visual Arts: Champions of the Anti- Lynching Movement," (master’s thesis, Wayne State University, 2008), IV. Miller 12 personal and professional lives. Alston analyzes lynching and the visual imagery produced against it from the 1890s until the 1930s. One chapter of the thesis is dedicated to The Crisis. In particular, Alston examines the work of Albert A. Smith and Lorenzo Harris. She argues that
Harris and Smith’s art “visually supported the message of The Crisis.”15 Their art was thought provoking and took appalling scenes of African Americans being lynched and humanized it to allow the viewer of the cartoon to feel concern for the victims. However, Alston’s thesis does not explore Harris’s life story. Harris’s biography is important because he was the prolific illustrator for The Crisis between 1913 to 1922 and because it offers context for the art he produced.
Anne Elizabeth Carroll’s chapter, “Protest and Affirmation: Composite Texts in The
Crisis” in Word, Image, and The New Negro: Representation and Identity in the Harlem
Renaissance, examines how the structure of The Crisis was a form of protest and affirmation.
She argues that composite texts on the pages were both convincing and compelling to readers of articles on the issues and achievements of African Americans. The composite text was a mixture of elements such as articles, photographs, and drawings.16 Readers were not only able to read about the problems and successes of African Americans but could see images of the issues, such as real visual evidence of race riots. Carroll looks at John Henry Adams’ cartoon “The National
Pastime” (1911) from The Crisis. She emphasizes that the cartoon does not express one meaning, but rather multiple messages of the challenges African Americans faced. The cartoon examines the emotional toll of lynching, the false representations of black men as brutes, and questions the rationale that lynching was needed to protect white women from sexual assault.17 Carroll
15 Ibid., 38. 16 Anne Elizabeth Carroll, “Protest and Affirmation: Composite Texts in The Crisis,” in Word, Image, and The New Negro: Representation and Identity in the Harlem Renaissance (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005), 20-21. 17 Ibid., 31-32. Miller 13 contributes an important insight into the study of images by arguing that cartoons in The Crisis cannot be observed on the surface. They should be studied for deeper context by looking for the multiple meanings and the interrelationships between text and image.18
The only scholar who focuses specifically on the subject of political cartoons in The
Crisis is Amy Helene Kirschke. Her article “Du Bois and The Crisis Magazine: Imaging Women and Family” argues that African American children in the illustrations reinforced pride and equality and that women’s portrayal as mothers strengthened the idea of women’s positions as caregivers.19 She expands these ideas in her book Art in Crisis: W.E.B. Du Bois and the Struggle for African American Identity and Memory. In it she argues that Du Bois used the imagery in The
Crisis to create a “‘visual vocabulary’ to define a new collective memory and historical identity for African-Americans.”20 She argues that whites were able to remember their past and reconstruct their past but that opportunity had been denied to African Americans. Kirschke gives
Du Bois complete agency over The Crisis. She argues that it was under his editorship that The
Crisis redefined black historical memory and brought it forward though a new memory. Kirschke contends that Du Bois was able to accomplish this by employing illustrations as a tool to persuade African American readers to be proud of their cultural contributions and their collective experiences.
I disagree with Kirschke that a new collective memory was built. Kirschke’s description of a unified collective memory depicts a homogenization of African American communities. She is arguing that Du Bois is generating a new historical memory to contribute to a new collective
18 Ibid., 29. 19 Amy Helene Kirschke, “DuBois and “The Crisis” Magazine: Imaging Women and Family,” Source: Notes in the History of Art 24 (2005): 35-45. 20 Amy Helene Kirschke, Art in Crisis: W.E.B. Du Bois and the Struggle for African-American Identity and Memory (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007), 3. Miller 14 identity. There was already an old historical memory in place, and in my study, I will show how that memory impacted the work of Harris particularly, and other black Crisis illustrators generally. Kirschke argues that Du Bois was the editor of the publication, he therefore had complete authority over it. However evidence indicates that the artists also had some agency over their work. The illustrators of The Crisis came from black communities that already had long established historical memories. As Kirschke contends, African American’s “history of oppression was part of who they were, and they needed to remember the past if they were to change the future.”21 The illustrators came from communities that maintained recollections of white oppression and slavery. It was a part of who they were as black artists. The stories of the past would have been woven into their communities and throughout family memories. Their illustrations draw from African American historical memory and meanings of the past as they comment on the problems African Americans faced during the period. Whether it was intentional or unintentional, the artists’ illustrations incorporated historical memories because it was ingrained throughout their communities.
The Illustrators and Historical Memory The content of The Crisis’ cartoons reflects an active remembrance of African
Americans’ history. African Americans’ past was shaped by the history of slavery, reconstruction, voter suppresion, the terror of lynching, and white oppression. The political cartoons printed in The Crisis reflected the historical memory of what African Americans had experienced. As Robert O’Meally and Geneviève Fabre argue in History and Memory in African-
American Culture, the experiences and history of African Americans and whites are vastly different. African Americans are unable to escape the legacy of slavery and racism that existed in
21 Ibid., 17. Miller 15 the United States. White Americans are able to live in the present and create a new narrative, a new future for themselves. African Americans are “a people of long memory” who remember the oppression they lived under. Historians find it important to view the African American past through history and memory. African Americans’ memories are an important part of their history and cannot be discounted.22
From the nineteenth century into the twentieth century, the white media created a mythology and imagery of African American history that perpetuated white control over African
Americans. The brutality of slavery, the treasonous nature of the Confederacy, and the failures of
Reconstruction to extend equality to African Americans increasingly denied their humanity within the white narrative of the U.S. historical story. Illustrators from The Crisis fought against the dominant white narrative and made public the historical memory of slavery, oppression, resistance, and the betrayal of African American people with the end of Reconstruction. As black artists exposed African Americans historical memory and Du Bois disseminated it to white audiences, it became new stories for white readership but for African American communities it was memories that had been handed down through generations. These historical memories impacted and were embedded within the cartoonists’ commentaries on current affairs.
The NAACP, The Crisis, and Political Cartooning The NAACP was founded in 1909 as a multi-racial group that was concerned with advancing the rights of African Americans. The Crisis was first published in November 1910.
The Crisis addressed black and white middle class audiences. As editor, Du Bois wanted to show positive representations of African Americans and he built readership’s interest by adding articles such as “Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Personal Knowledge of the Negro Character.” Du Bois
22Ibid., 3-16. Miller 16 also expressed his ideas in a “provocative fashion” and discussed the trials that African
Americans encountered in the United States. By 1913, “there were 30,000 paying readers, and about three-fourths of the copies during this period were sold” to African Americans.23 While it is unclear if the early cartoons in the publication were solicited or contributed, later letters between Du Bois and two of the illustrators, Harris and Adams, show that artists were paid for their work. In January of 1931, Harris wrote Du Bois regarding two of his illustrations that were published in The Crisis in 1929, noting that he had not receive payment for them.24
Significantly the letters between the artists and Du Bois show that the illustrators had agency over the work they created. In February of 1931, Harris wrote Du Bois, “In reply to your request I forward to you the cartoon which you evinced an interest in while you were in Asbury
Park.”25 Adams also showed that he had control over his cartoons in a1925 letter to Du Bois:
I was a long time trying to make up my mind to part from the pictures I am now
sending to you under separate cover. You may use any of these that may appeal to you
but I earnestly desire the return of all of the pictures (6) I am forwarding in this mail.
23 Elliott M. Rudwick, “W.E.B. Du Bois in the Role of Crisis Editor,” The Journal of Negro History 43 (1958): 214-240. 24 Letter from Lorenzo Harris to W. E. B. Du Bois, January 12, 1931. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries. 25 Letter from Lorenzo Harris to W. E. B. Du Bois, February 2, 1931. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries
Miller 17
From time to time, I shall be glad to furnish pictures built up on your own
suggestion suitable for cover or inside double page in black and white or in color. I have
always been at your service.26
Although Adams is volunteering to create political cartoons at Du Bois’s suggestion, his letter indicates that Du Bois was not in charge of the images produced. This suggests that the artists for
The Crisis had agency over what was created.
In taking Lorenzo Harris as a case study and digging deeper into his life, the essay portion of this thesis argues that Harris’s specific personal experiences inspired his artistic activism. His background propelled his attempts to incorporate African American historical memory in his work in The Crisis. His political cartoons fought against the negative representations of the African American people through the production of positive black representations that already existed within the community with illustrations and text. Harris’s work reflects the social and political issues impacting African Americans from 1913 to 1922. His work also often offered multiple messages. The biography of Harris adds to deeper historical understanding of African American political cartoons and how an illustrator participated in creating positive black representations.
26 Letter from John Henry Adams to W. E. B. Du Bois, November 20, 1925. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries
Miller 18
Chapter Two Early Life On a summer day in early July 1916, Asbury Park tourists and residents stopped to stare at a man, dressed in flowing and colorful robes and a fez, who was steadily digging, piling, and shaping sand on the beach. This was not the first time Harris had visited Asbury Park’s beach and created an intricate sand sculpture that would engage the crowd; nor would it be the last time he would create art that attracted viewers. As people passed, they might have wondered about this man, who only had one arm, making a sculpture from small specks of sand. Who was this stranger who appeared in Middle Eastern dress? Where did he come from? Unknown to the public, this man in the sand was Lorenzo Harris, and he was steadily working on his mammoth sand sculpture called “Neptune’s Court.”27
What these passersby did not know about Harris was that he was not only a preeminent sand sculptor of his time, one of the first to participate in this art form, but that he was also an illustrator for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s publication The
Crisis. He was a recognized artist in his community and people, particularly children, were inspired by his sand sculpting. These tourists and residents who passed the man digging in the sand were passing an artist whose sand sculptures reflected traditional forms that drew on classical themes. Harris created intricate and “massive sand tableaux ranging from King Neptune surrounded by a bevy of beguiling mermaids, to the Statue of Liberty, to an alcove depicting
‘The Remorse of Judas’.”28 But as an illustrator for The Crisis, Harris used his talents to challenge the representation of African Americans.
27 “Sand Artist is in Asbury Again: Lorenzo Harris, One-Arm Sculptor, Working on ‘Neptune’s Court’ Near Natatorium,” Asbury Park Evening Press, July 8, 1916, 10. 28 Mellina,“Asbury’s,” A11. Miller 19
Born April 2, 1888, in Richmond, Virginia, Lorenzo Wilbur Harris was the son of John
B. and Sarah Harris.29 Census records indicate that John B. Harris was born in Virginia roughly in 1845 and his wife was also born there in 1850 or 1855. Records from the 1880 census show
John B. Harris working in a livery stable and Sarah working as a housekeeper. By the 1890s,
John B. Harris had become a prominent funeral director and embalmer in Richmond as well as a livery stable owner. This allowed the family to become part of the black middle-class. John B.
Harris’s business was notable around the Richmond area. The funeral parlor advertised in the
African American newspaper Richmond Planet and he offered “Spacious halls for Societies, etc.
Halls and Parlors for Private Parties. Carriages for Hire, Prompt Attention given to Telegraph or
Telephone Messages Night or Day.”30 His middle-class standing allowed John B. Harris to be more politically active in the Richmond area. He would permit groups pushing for change to use his establishment as a meeting place. An 1887 Alexandria Gazette article states, “Yesterday, at noon, fire was discovered in the establishment of John B. Harris, a colored man, on Third street between Marshall and Clay, Richmond. The building, which was badly damaged, has been given notoriety under the name of Harris’ Hall as the lodging place of District Assembly No. 49 of
New York, when attending the Knights of Labor Convention, in October.”31 While the article does not state that John B. Harris was a part of the Knights of Labor, it is significant that he
29 Census records for Lorenzo Harris’s exact date of birth are unclear. The records indicate that Harris was born between the years 1888 and 1889. Harris date of birth for this thesis is taken from his World War I draft card. In a 2015 Asbury Park Press newspaper article, Harris’s birth year is stated as 1888 and records suggest that is most likely the year he was born. “U.S., World War II Draft Registration Cards, 1942,” digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com: accessed 22 September 2016), Lorenzo Wilbur Harris registration, serial number U178, City of Asbury Park, New Jersey; citing World War II Selective Service System Draft Registration Cards, 1942. 30 “John B. Harris, Funeral Director and Embalmer,” Richmond Planet, December 31, 1898, 3. 31 “Virginia News,” Alexandria Gazette, March 19, 1887, 2. Miller 20 would allow the group to use his building, even if it was in exchange for payment. The Knights of Labor was a labor organization that was founded in the late 1860s. The group’s goal was to create better working conditions for workers in multiple industries. Unlike other labor unions during this period the Knights of Labor was inclusive of African American workers, although they were segregated into separate chapters. It shows that Lorenzo Harris may have been exposed to political activism and raised in a civic minded family.
While it is unclear if before emancipation Lorenzo Harris’s parents were enslaved or free, slavery certainly touched the family.32 Outside of their Virginia birthplace, it is unclear where
John and Sarah Harris spent their early life. But we do know they were residents of Richmond by
1870. Virginia was a slave state, and in particular the city of Richmond had been one of the biggest slave markets in the United States during the 1840s and 1850s. This industry in
Richmond was lucrative for slave traders, and the selling and moving of bodies generated millions of dollars in human flesh. Slaves were continually relocated across the American south and the slave markets that existed continued into the Civil War. The Harris family most likely experienced and saw the personal devastation the slave markets could cause. This could have included neighbors or possibly family members. Simply living in the area would have familiarized them with the historical memories of slavery and the slave trade as well as the brutal
32 While it is unclear if John and Sarah Harris were born in Richmond, Virginia, and if they were born enslaved, census records indicate that they were both born in Virginia during the era of slavery. John Harris was born in approximately in the year 1845 and Sarah Harris was born in either approximately the early 1852 or 1861, according to 1880 and 1910 United States census records. 1880 U.S. census, Richmond, Henrico, Virginia, population schedule, p. 122B, enumeration district 082, dwelling 49, John B. Harris; NARA microfilm publication T9, 1371. 1910 U.S. census, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, population schedule, p. 9A, enumeration district 0090, dwelling 157, family number 163, Sarah E. Harris; NARA microfilm publication T624, 1389.
Miller 21 conditions African Americans experienced. Harris most certainly would have heard first-hand or second-hand accounts of slavery and its effects on family and the community that surrounded him. He was raised in the aftermath of slavery, experiencing the effects of the failures of
Reconstruction and the spread of Jim Crow during the early years of his youth. John B. Harris lived through Reconstruction and would have voted or had the right until it was abandoned in
Virginia. African Americans were still being elected to office in the 1880s. But by the 1890s, this process had stopped and political opportunities declined in Virginia.33 Harris likely saw his father participate politically.
By 1900, census records show the Harris family had moved and settled in Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania. Harris’s father sold Harris Hall to the Women’s League that trained domestic servants. John B. Harris re-established his undertaking business in Philadelphia, and was joined by his son John S. Harris. The Harris family was most likely drawn into the strong African
American community that had developed in Philadelphia. That city’s black community had developed during the American colonial era and consisted of free African Americans and those who were fugitives from slavery. Philadelphia was a city that had the experiences of both the
North and the South. From the 1820s to the 1840s the black population in the city grew, those free and enslaved came to the area, which caused racial tensions to grow. Although the city still had a racist history, African Americans in Philadelphia had a longer history of liberties than
Richmond. When whites attempted to take away rights, like voting, free blacks fought back. In
1832, the Legislature in Philadelphia aimed to stop African Americans’ liberties. In protest
African Americans held a meeting and argued that all African Americans in Philadelphia were
33 Hampton D. Carey, New Voices in the Old Dominion: Black Politics in the Virginia Southside Region and the city of Richmond, 1867-1902 (New York: Columbia University, 2000), 243-299. Miller 22 not vagrants and criminals. They showed through “tax receipts…that Negroes held at least
$350,000 of taxable property in the city.” 34 During the antebellum era, those in a higher socioeconomic class formed strong communities through schools, churches, societies, and public meetings to promote political activism and racial uplift. After the Civil War, many free from slavery flocked to Philadelphia because of the political freedom the city offered.35 While the city presented significant issues (economic, social and political) for African Americans to navigate it still offered a chance for trade and industry and political opportunities that were not present in the South. These possibilities may have drawn the Harris family to Philadelphia as they saw opportunities decline in Virginia with the rise of Jim Crow.
As a result, Harris was raised in two distinct African American communities that shaped his political views and how he would use his artistic activism. Harris came from a community that had the vote, saw it taken away from African Americans, and then moved to Philadelphia where blacks had access to the vote. Harris would spend his formative years and grow to adulthood in Philadelphia. It would be a place where he cultivated his artistic talent and gained his education. Harris attended Philadelphia grade schools, went to Philadelphia Central High
School, and most importantly, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.36 Philadelphia was the place where Harris would learn to refine his artistic talent.
Lorenzo Harris and Art School In 1904, at the age of sixteen, Harris won a four-year scholarship to the Pennsylvania
Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA).37 Not only was this a significant award financially, but it
34 W.E. Burghardt Du Bois, The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study (Philadelphia: University of Philadelphia, 1899), 31. 35 Ibid., 25-45. 36 “Lorenzo Harris,” Asbury Park Sunday Press, April 29, 1945, 3. 37 “Jersey Pioneers,” Asbury Park Sunday Press, January 3, 1971, 13. Miller 23 indicated Harris’s artistic talent was notable. While attending PAFA, Harris sand sculpted in
Atlantic City, earning tips from tourists. The scholarship did not cover all his expenses and this extra income helped him pay his way through school.38 The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine
Arts was a more inclusive institution than other schools during the tweniteth-century. African
American students were able to attend the school by the 1880s. While Harris was not the first
African American to attend the school, Harris was among “the first Negroes to attend that institution,” indicating that he was a significant part of integrating the school.39 At PAFA Harris would learn to take his talent and sharpen it into a tool that would help further his political activism. Harris learned how to work in multiple mediums. Later in Harris’s career, he would create art that reflected his identity as an African American man and the historical memory of the communities he came from.
Harris attended PAFA between the years 1904 to 1907. During his schooling Harris worked with three renowned artists. Later, Harris recalled that he was taught by painter William
Chase and illustrator Henry McCarter who were instructors at PAFA. Outside of school, he apprenticed with sculptor Gisuseppe Donato.40 It is important to note that Harris specified these names, as Harris would have been under the guidance of other instructors while at the school.
These three are important because of their fame and the significant impact they had on Harris and his work.
38 “Sand Artist is in Asbury Again,” Asbury Park Evening Press, July 8, 1916, 10. 39 “Jersey Pioneers,” 13; Anna O. Marley, curator, “Henry Osswa Tanner: Modern Spirit,” 2012, https://www.pafa.org/exhibitions/henry-ossawa-tanner-modern-spirit. This exhibition examines the artwork of Henry Osswa Tanner who attended PAFA from 1879 to 1885. Harris winning a scholarship to the Philadelphia Academy of the Fine Arts is also discussed in August 1916 edition of The Crisis, 191. 40 “Lorenzo Harris,” Asbury Park Sunday Press, April 29, 1945, 3. Painter William Chase and illustrator Henry McCarter were both instructors at PAFA. The article also states that during this period Harris apprenticed for the sculptor Giuseppe Donato Miller 24
The school catalogs for the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts school, from 1904 through 1907, show Harris received an education that would later serve him in his career. He must have taken “Illustration” classes under Henry McCarter, as well as “Drawing and Painting from Figure” and “Drawing and Painting from Head” from William Chase. These classes aided him when he later drew illustrations for The Crisis. It would impact all of his drawings of human form. His apprenticeship under Giuseppe Donato facilitated Harris’s ability to use sand to build massive sculptures on the beach.
The Sand Man In 1908, after attending PAFA for three years, Harris headed to New York to work in the construction business.41 Harris went to New York on the advice of a friend who insisted there were good wages for those who worked as laborers on subway construction.42 Because limited opportunities existed for black artists during this period, Harris’s goal was to save enough money while working in construction to open his own studio. New York played a pivotal role in his life.
Harris arrived in New York at the age of twenty and soon found a job with the construction firm of S. Pearson and Son. The firm was building a tunnel from Manhattan to Long
Island. As part of the construction design process, at the beginning of the tunnel, two men, called lock tenders, were stationed at the doors of the airlock at the base of the shaft. If one of the doors was to lock and trap a man by accident, then his partner would be able to manually open the doors to free him. However, the company decided to cut expenses and dispense with two operators at each door, leaving only one. In February 1908, Harris, working as a lock tender, was
41 PAFA records indicate that Harris attended the school from 1905 to 1907. There are limited records of his art work and school records. There is no record that he graduated only that he attended the institution. Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts school records, 1904-1907, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Museum Archive. 42 “Jersey Pioneers,” Asbury Park Sunday Press, January 3, 1971, 13. Miller 25 opening and closing the doors to allow muck cars to pass in and out. According to local news reports, while he was working, Harris’s left arm got caught in the “cogs of the big wheel outside the lock and between the doors [.]” The “arm was torn from his shoulder, a large area of flesh and muscle was torn from his chest and four of his ribs were broken.” Harris lay on the ground, unconscious, and bleeding profusely. The incident caused the machinery to clog and stop the electricity. The stalled machinery alerted another worker that something was amiss. Upon finding Harris’s body, an ambulance was called, and he was rushed to the hospital. When Harris arrived, he was so badly injured that doctors predicted his chances of survival were slim.43
The accident was horrific, but Harris survived. Certainly it took a while for Harris to recover from his losing his arm, but he did not let the accident stop him from his artistic pursuits.
For a brief period, Harris worked as a real estate agent in Philadelphia, but ultimately he would continue to pursue his art.44 After he had healed, Harris returned to sand sculpting in Atlantic
City and later in Asbury Park, New Jersey. During this time he would also open a studio in
Philadelphia. Harris would also be an illustrator for the National Urban League’s publication
Opportunity: A Journal of Negro Life.
An Asbury Park article from 1916 described Harris as being a sand sculptor for eight years and as one of the most prominent sand artists in the field. There are conflicting reports about when Harris started sand sculpting, but this article claims that Harris was one of the first artist to participate in the art form. Harris was a preeminent artist in the sand field. His sand work
43 “Mangled By Big Cog Wheel: Lorenzo Harris, a Tunnel Employe[e], Had Had His Left Arm Torn Out, and Nearly Bled To Death,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, February 23, 1908, 1. 44 1910 U.S. census, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, population schedule, p. 9A, enumeration district 0090, dwelling 157, family number 163, Sarah E. Harris; NARA microfilm publication T624, 1389. Miller 26 was copied and displayed in art journals in the United States as well as in Germany.45 Sand sculpting had become a popular activity by the twentieth-century. Sand artists, amateur and professional, came to beaches not only to participate in the creative process but to also earn money. Harris, with his schooling at PAFA, was able to take easily to sand sculpting. But Harris, like other African American residents and tourists, was excluded from the main Atlantic City beaches. Harris found that the “resort was hostile to him as a Negro, his work was repeatedly destroyed… finally he was driven out.”46 A 1982 Asbury Park article also states:
Harris went to Atlantic City, set himself up in a studio on the Boardwalk and worked as
a sand sculptor. But he was met with racial hostility, left and came to Asbury Park in
1916. ‘He was treated so badly in Atlantic City because of his color so he decided he
would disguise himself,’ says Mrs. Harris [his wife]. ‘He wore a fez and his artist’s robe
and he refused to speak to anyone.’47
Harris did not let prejudice and segregation in Atlantic City stop him. He invented a way that would allow him to enter all the beaches. Since Harris was excluded from the beaches because he was African American, he decided to fix this problem; he changed his race.48 By “passing” as a person of Arabic descent, Harris was able to do his art and support himself.
Dressed in colorful flowing robes and a fez, described as speaking an unfamiliar language, Harris began to pass as a Middle Eastern or South Asian man. Harris kept up this
45 Records indicate that Harris had begun sand sculpting before he went to New York and then resume the activity after he recovered from his injury. “Sand Artist is in Asbury Again,” Asbury Park Evening Press, July 8, 1916, 10. 46 “Jersey Pioneers,” 13. 47 Erlinda Villamor, “Civil Rights Her Way of Life,” Asbury Park Press, September 12, 1982, 72-73. 48 Kate Mellina, “Asbury’s mysterious sand sculptor,” Asbury Park Press, September 13, 2015, A11. Miller 27 charade for over a decade. Newspaper reports describe him as the “one-arm Arab,” the “East
Indian sand sculptor,” and the “one-arm Hindoo.”49 Pretending to be another race allowed Harris to freely sculpt on the beaches of Asbury Park. Reports reflected on how remarkable his work was to see, and tourists came to view his mastery of the craft. Harris would become a known figure to tourists and residents in Asbury Park for almost thirty years, a place where he would make his permanent residence.50 Harris would be widely recognized in Asbury Park and the surrounding areas. “People came from far and wide to see his work…and stayed to throw money on the canvas he had stretched on the sand to catch it. In the last few years before World War II that canvas was divided into small squares, [e]ach of which contained a prediction for the future.
The number who threw coins on the squares to discover what their ‘fortune’ was to be made the
[sculptor famous].”51 Additionally, Harris’s performances of race and his entertainment of tourists reinforced a stereotype of either East Asian or Middle Eastern mysticism.
At times, Harris’s given name was mentioned in newspaper articles, and he gained more notoriety with his work, but for the most part, he was able to hide his identity until he decided to rid himself of his disguise which probably occurred in the late 1910s. Harris continued being a significant tourist attraction because of his sand art until the mid-1940s when a massive hurricane affected the beach. The “storm---which devastated seaside resorts all along the Jersey coast---marked the end of sand sculpture as a beachfront tradition.”52 Despite the loss of his arm
Harris did not stop from pursuing his dream of being an artist, nor did he allow his disability to
49 Description of Harris are found in The Courier-News, August 20, 1920, 1., The Courier-News, July 13, 1917, 1., and the Asbury Park Press, September 13, 2015, A11. 50 Mellina,“Asbury’s,” A11. 51 “Jersey Pioneers,” 13. 52 Ibid., A11. Miller 28 let him be taken advantage of in business. Harris would become well known for several of his artistic talents including sculpting, sand art, Papier-mâché, and his illustrations.
In 1913 State Representative Harry W. Bass, who was the first elected African American member of the Pennsylvania Legislature, commissioned Harris to design two statues for the
Emancipation Commission. In 1913, black Philadelphians received state funding to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation. This money was for an “exposition, constructed exhibit buildings, invited delegations from around the country, and staged a massive parade, professional and religious congresses, and an athletics festivals.”53 The Emancipation
Commission was appointed by Governor John K. Tener to organize the event. Bass was the only
African American member on the Commission. He was the main organizer of the event and had multiple smaller committees under him made of “civic and religious leaders.”54Harris was to create two statues, one of Abraham Lincoln and the other of Frederick Douglass. Harris received
$500 as a down payment along with his contract. He was promised $2,500 for the completed project. However, Bass told Harris that there was a clerical error in the contract and insisted
Harris return the contract and the money.55 Harris complied and later requested Bass pay him and return the contract. Bass refused and a fight ensued. As an African American Salt Lake City,
Utah newspaper, The Broad Ax, reported: “Harris, who has only one arm, proceeded to do Bass
53 Charlene Mires, “Race, Place, and the Pennsylvania Emancipation Exposition of 1913,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 128 (2004): 257. 54 Ibid., 262. During the planning of the event racial and political tensions were prevalent in Philadelphia and newspapers attacked the commission. The newspaper North American claimed that the Republican Party used the exposition as a way to gain money. The exposition overran its budget and Harris, as well as other exposition workers, complained that Bass had not paid them. 55 “Sculptor Accuses Bass; Asserts Colored Legislator Retained Check for Work,” The Philadelphia Inquirer, August 15, 1913, 6. Miller 29 up in the style that Jack Johnson finished Jefferies.”56 The case went to court, but it was dropped with both parties agreeing that it belonged in civil court and not criminal court.57 There is no indication that the court case was ever settled, nor is there a record of the statues.
This incident, in particular, shows important aspects of Harris. It demonstrates that by
1913 Harris had established himself as a recognized and respected artist. It also shows another side to Harris. Harris was not a man who was going to be taken advantage of and despite his disability, he did not shy away from expressing his aggravation through physical violence. It was significant that he went against Bass who was a respected African American politician. African
American newspapers and magazines, The Crisis included, expressed pride over Bass being the first African American Pennsylvania representative. Although Bass was a respected member of the African American community, it did not deter Harris from confronting Bass. To have the determination to obtain what was owed to him and go against Bass, who held influence and power, demonstrates Harris was a strong, bold individual. This strength would be shown continually when it came to dealing with racism. Harris did not let prejudice stand in his way.
As an illustrator for The Crisis, Harris explored the problems African American communities faced and brought them to light in his illustrations. In his professional career, Harris continually fought against racial injustice, using his art as political activism. Passing as another race allowed Harris to rebel against the social restrictions that kept him from working as a black artist. In one venue he was able to fight against racism and segregation and in another he was
56 “Bass Must Face Charge; Philadelphia Politician Charged With Larceny of Five Hundred Dollars,” The Broad Ax, September 27, 1913, 1; Theresa Runstedtler, “White Anglo-Saxon Hopes and Black Americans’ Atlantic Dreams: Jack Johnson and the British Boxing Colour Bar,” Journal of World History 21 (2010): 657-670. Jack Johnson, a black boxer, fought James J. Jefferies, a white boxer, in 1910 in Reno, Nevada. The fight caused race riots across the United States when Johnson beat Jefferies. 57 “Bass Indicated on Larceny Charge,” The New York Age, September 18, 1913, 1. Miller 30 able to embrace his black identity. Harris was able to advance in his career through passing as other than black but he also created art that addressed the issues that faced African American communities. Whether it was through his illustrations, or passing as another race, Harris used his art to be socially conscious and politically active. Harris was a man who resisted and used art to protest before his association with The Crisis.
Illustrating Political Cartoons for The Crisis Lorenzo Harris began to illustrate political cartoons for The Crisis in March 1913.
Between that time and 1922, Harris contributed sixteen political cartoons to the publication. He drew more illustrations than any other artist in this period. Harris did not always agree with the opinion of Du Bois and created visuals that sometimes offered a different interpretation of the problems African Americans faced during the decade. Harris’s political cartoons showed that he was, at least on occasion, more skeptical and critical regarding some issues than Du Bois. In his illustrations he explored American racism through the topics of lynching, gender, police brutality, World War I, and the struggle for civil and voting rights among African Americans.
Harris’s cartoons offer insight into the historical memories of African Americans living in the
United States during this period. These historical memories are not new memories but ones that are a part of African Americans’ history and traditions. Harris drew from the experiences of slavery and bondage, the aftermath of the failure of Reconstruction, and the realities of Jim
Crow. At a time when white Americans increasingly accepted the white southern version of history, Harris reminded readers of The Crisis of the African American narrative. Harris applied the African American past to understand and interpret the current events of the era in which he was living and illustrating.
The year 1913, when Harris contributed his first cartoon to The Crisis, was a precarious time for African Americans. Woodrow Wilson had won the presidency, and the Democratic Miller 31
Party had won a majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. While some
African Americans, including W.E.B. Du Bois had crossed over and voted for Wilson, the majority did not. Since Reconstruction, most African Americans voted Republican. During
Reconstruction African Americans gained more political rights and were able to attain government positions. Radical Republicans pushed for legislative reforms and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments were intended to guarantee African Americans political rights. By
1877, once the federal government had abandoned Reconstruction, Conservative Democrats regained power in the white south. They ignored African American voters and created laws that would block African Americans from voting. The end of Reconstruction meant the post-bellum white south was victorious over Congressional Reconstruction. Southern Democrats were able to recoup their political seats and over time disenfranchise African Americans in the region. As a result, African Americans stayed loyal to the Republican Party and most African Americans believed the Republicans were the only option. The southern Democratic Party was a political party that openly promoted racism, stopping African Americans from voting in elections through intimidation and violence. Poll taxes, literacy tests, threats from employers, and the Ku Klux
Klan’s use of violence were all forms of voter suppression. Large numbers of white voters in the
South voted for the Democratic Party to gain political offices in order for white supremacy to stay in place. 58
When the election of 1913 came around, African Americans were faced with a new choice. While African Americans voted Republican for decades, in 1912 the party had fractured.
One faction, the Progressive Party, broke away from the Republicans and nominated Theodore
58 Glenn Feldman, The Irony of the Solid South: Democrats, Republicans, and Race, 1865-1944. (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2013), 1-24. Miller 32
Roosevelt. The Republican Party selected the incumbent president William Howard Taft. Many
African American voters were frustrated with President Taft because he supported black voter restrictions and removed a number of African American workers from their federal jobs. Black voters were also alienated from the Progressive party because black delegates were denied entry to the Progressive Party’s convention. With a Republican Party and Progressive Party that did not encourage African American voter participation, a few black voters began to look at the
Democratic Party as a viable option to support in the upcoming election. On the campaign trail,
Woodrow Wilson made promises that he would improve conditions for African American communities, such as fair treatment in federal posts and hinted that he would reign in discrimination against African Americans.59
W.E.B. Du Bois, as well as other black leaders, endorsed Wilson despite the fact that there were concerns that he would not keep his campaign promises. Wilson was a Southerner who publically argued that Reconstruction was a mistake because it provided African Americans too much agency. Du Bois and African American leaders decided to endorse Wilson because
Roosevelt and Taft were not the best candidates for black Americans.60
In 1913 The Crisis wrote an open letter to Woodrow Wilson who was newly inaugurated.61 The letter expresses the concerns and hopes regarding Wilson’s presidency. It discussed how the plight of the Negro was the most serious problem in the United States and that there was hope that Wilson would fix this problem in his presidency. Although he was from the
59 Darlene Clark Hine, William C. Hine, and Stanley Harold, The African-American Odyssey (Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2003), 378-381. 60 W.E. Burghardt Du Bois, “My Impression of Woodrow Wilson,” The Journal of Negro History 58 (1973): 453-459; Kathleen Long Wolgemuth, “Woodrow Wilson’s Appointment Policy and the Negro,” The Journal of Southern History (1958): 457-471. 61 The Crisis: A Record of the Darker Races, March 1913, 236. This open letter was the main editorial in the publication that month. Miller 33
South, there was the belief that Wilson had rejected white Southern racism when he took over the presidency of Princeton, a northern university.62 The letter expressed the desire for African
Americans as a whole to gain rights, for the brutality against them to end, and for African
Americans to be treated as equal citizens in the country:
We want to be treated as men. We want to vote. We want our children educated. We want
lynching stopped. We want no longer to be herded as cattle on street cars and railroads.
We want the right to earn a living, to own our own property and to spend our income
unhindered and uncursed. Your power is limited? We know that, but the power of the
American people is unlimited. To-day you embody that power, you typify its ideals. In
the name then of the common country for which your fathers and ours have bled and
toiled, be not untrue, President Wilson, to the highest ideals of American Democracy.63
The letter demonstrated The Crisis hoped the new administration would bring change to the country. Wilson had the power to affect change and the editorial board demanded that he use it to promote equal rights for all citizens.
After Wilson took office, disillusion set in for W.E.B. Du Bois and other black leaders.
The change and hope for improved conditions that they sought from Wilson was denied. African
Americans continued to suffer under social, economic, and political oppression under Wilson.
African Americans were blocked from federal jobs, President Wilson ignored black leaders who protested for change, and African Americans continued to face the threat of lynching in the country. These were issues that Harris attempted to address in his political cartoons.
62 Ibid., 236. 63 Ibid., 237. Miller 34
Politic
Figure 1. "The New Porter..." by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, March 1913, p. 249.
Between 1913 and 1922 Lorenzo Harris produced four cartoons that discussed American electoral politics and how they impacted African American people. Harris’s political cartoons indicate that he did not share Du Bois’s early optimism for the progress under the Wilson
Administration. The political cartoon “The New Porter” (figure 1) was published in the March
1913 edition of The Crisis and speaks to the new administration entering the White House. The cartoon shows a porter, wearing a cap marked “negro voter,” accepting a bundle of packages that are stacked on top of another and marked “Democrat President,” “Democratic Senate,” and
“Democratic House.” Captioned at the bottom of the cartoon is the porter remarking, “Somehow,
Ah Cain’t Hep Feelin’ ‘Spicious O’ Dem Bun’els!”64 Harris’s cartoon is important because his
64 The Crisis, March 1913, 249. Miller 35 cartoon analyzed the incoming administration using a working class character. He shows the porter being wary of Wilson and the Democratic Party. The broken vernacular used by the porter could have been used as a way to incorporate the word “Dem,” a play on the word Democratic.
In contrast to Du Bois’s early optimism, Harris’s cartoon expresses an outright distrust that the
Democratic Party and the Wilson administration would guarantee the rights of all citizens.
The Crisis was geared toward a particular socioeconomic readership, middle-class and upper-class African Americans along with their sympathetic white counterparts. In “The New
Porter,” by using the porter, Harris depicts how the working-class voter perceived of the change in government. In her work, Art in Crisis: W.E.B. Du Bois and the Struggle for African American
Identity and Memory, Amy Helene Kirschke asserts that the use of common vernacular and the porter as the central character in the illustration is a significant motif because it relies on a black stereotype.65
Kirschke’s analysis is one way of viewing the cartoon but given Harris’s background and the realities of his life, there could be a second message. Although he came from a middle-class background, Harris had working-class experiences while employed in construction in New York.
The broken vernacular and the figure of the porter may not necessarily show a black stereotype.
In American culture generally there is a stereotype of African American men as being simple and ignorant. Often in cartooning that is applied to black porters. Harris depicts the porter in this manner in his art, so it does show a stereotype. However he reverses it by making the porter smarter than those who were following Wilson. Harris’s cartoon grants agency by dispelling the myth that working class Africana Americans are ignorant voters and shows that they were sharply aware of the political happenings in the United States. In fact, the cartoons shows the
65 Kirschke, Art in Crisis, 175. Miller 36
Figure 2 In the Saddle!" by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, January 1914, p. 119. working class as being more politically astute than the black elite. The political cartoon shows a diverse African American voting population. For the working class, a population outside of the
African American intellectual set, the cartoon expresses concern over the change from a
Republican to a Democratic administration and how it would affect African American political rights. With Harris’s past experiences, he taps into the African American grassroots, to express what might be their honest impression of Wilson.
In addition, it shows a different viewpoint from the open letter written to President
Wilson in The Crisis. While the letter expressed hope that Wilson would take the opportunity to Miller 37 change social conditions for the better, the illustration shows a skepticism that President Wilson would create a better environment for blacks. Harris’s illustration was a reminder of an important historical memory that existed in African American communities. The political cartoon echoes the traditional black distrust of the Democrats which went all the way back to secession. The
Democratic Party had repeatedly attacked African Americans’ rights and Harris evokes this memory as a reminder to viewers that they should not trust the incoming party, one that historically blocked African Americans rights and supported slavery.
Harris’s illustrations that dealt with politics speak to the continual exclusion of African
Americans from government and the racism that was within the Wilson administration. His cartoons incorporate historical memory that voices how African Americans had repeatedly faced these issues when participating in politics. Harris’s next illustration for The Crisis was entitled
“In the Saddle!”(figure 2) and was published in the January 1914 edition.66 The illustration has an ape-like creature, with the word prejudice across his chest, sitting on a donkey. A sign around the donkey’s neck says “National Democratic Party” and the ape figure is holding a club marked with the word “Discrimination.” The cartoon was in response to Woodrow Wilson’s administration and its discriminatory practices against African Americans. The illustrations shows that the party was driven by bigots. They are in the saddle with the Democratic Party acting as the harness.
African American leaders who had voted for Wilson hoped that he would bring change for African Americans in his administration. But the first year of Wilson’s presidency indicated that he would discontinue African Americans’ participation in the federal government. In the
66 The Crisis, January 1914, 119. Miller 38 first two months in office, President Wilson did not appoint any African Americans to his administration:
It began with the dismissal of two Negroes from the important posts of assistant attorney
general and auditor for the Navy. This might have been explainable on the grounds that
the Negroes holding these jobs were Republicans, but less explainable was the
appointment of whites to replace them. A fear rose in the minds of many Negroes who
until now had held that Wilson would soon begin awarding posts to colored people. Who
would succeed to all the other federal positions now held by Negro Republicans?67
Federal posts that were formally held by African Americans were given to white Democrats. In
April 1913, President Wilson told his cabinet “that he had made no particular promises to
Negroes except to do them justice, and said that he desired to avoid friction.”68 By the end of
President Wilson’s first year in office it was evident that Wilson would not be a crusader for
African American rights but not only block but set back black progress.
Also published in the January 1914 edition of The Crisis was a letter written by
Archibald H. Grimke, who was a member of the Washington, D.C. branch of the NAACP.
Grimke wrote regarding newspaper reports that representatives of civic organizations had been invited to the White House to discuss community developments within the District of Columbia.
While the letter is separate from the illustration, the letter is important as Grimke was protesting the exclusion of African American representatives from the meeting.69 Harris’s first cartoon on the Wilson administration based in historical memory predicted that the president and the
Democratic Party would be detrimental to African American communities. After a year in office,
67 Wolgemuth, “Woodrow Wilson’s,” 461. 68 Ibid., 461-462. 69 Ibid., 142. Miller 39
Harris’s prediction about Wilson and the Democratic Party had come true. As the letter shows, the editorship of The Crisis was now more in agreement with Harris. The Wilson administration was not inclusive of African Americans, and different communities did not feel represented because they were excluded from their country’s politics. Harris’s cartoon speaks to a history that had long been prominent in African American communities.
By creating “In the Saddle!” Harris invoked the historical memory of how the Democratic
Party, such as under the Wilson administration, had continually used violence and prejudice to harm voters in African American communities in the aftermath of Reconstruction into the twentieth century.70 In his illustration, Harris uses the memories of nightriders who had terrorized African American communities as a way historically to gain power. He shows that bigotry was still being used by the Democratic Party in the present day. Harris employed the technique of inversion to show racism as the true animal. In newspaper cartoons and illustrations,
African Americans were often depicted as having exaggerated ape-like features; it was common in white ideology to animalize black people. African American newspapers and cartoonists began to take these animal depictions and turn them into images that would instead depict racism, or whites, as animals. Doing this showed that African Americans were not animals, but that white prejudice was the true brute terrorizing the United States. The Democratic Party used forms of intimidation and harassment to stop African Americans from participating in government. The party was firmly seated in keeping white men in charge of the south and ignoring the voices of African Americans. Harris’s political cartoon shows that prejudice was
70 Bruce A. Glasrud, “Beginning the Trek: Douglass, Bruce, Black Conventions, Independent Political Parties,” in African Americans and the Presidency: The Road to the White House, ed. Bruce A. Glasrud et al. (New York: Routledge, 2010), 21-22. Miller 40 firmly seated in the Democratic Party, which had turned its back on African Americans, and was viciously suppressing communities with discrimination.
Harris’s cartoons addressing the Democratic Party were never optimistic. The cartoons showed skepticism about a party that practiced prejudice against African Americans. The historical memory of the Democratic Party’s treatment of African Americans was a memory that remained in African American communities.
President Wilson’s discriminatory practices against African Americans was a continual issue addressed by Harris. His third political cartoon for The Crisis, published in June 1915, focused on the larger issue of African American representatives not being allowed to participate equally in government. Drawn in a six-panel illustration, the cartoon, “The Next Colored
Delegation to the White House,” (figure 3) shows three African American delegates stripped of their belongings and their voices effectively are taken away in order for Wilson to have a meeting with them. Harris drew three ape-like creatures, identified as “Prejudice,” “Judge
Lynch,” and “Discrimination,” to personify racism, greeting and stripping three African
American delegates of their office. The delegates are stripped of their clothing, backbones, and protest petitions. In the third panel, their arms are positioned in the same manner as the beseeching slave that was used in abolitionist literature. After the black representatives’ political voices are taken away they are presented as “A ‘sound and sensible’ delegation your excellency.” to Wilson, who is sitting on a throne.71
71 The Crisis, June 1915, 96. Miller 41
Figure 3. "The Next Colored Delegation to the White House," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, June 1915, p. 96. Harris’s illustration is a recreation of an important meeting between William Monroe
Trotter and President Wilson. Trotter, a black civil rights activist and founder of the Boston
Guardian, was one of the leaders who supported Wilson’s candidacy for president.72 Trotter was a passionate advocate for African Americans’ rights. He was blunt when it came to speaking about the problems of the period. In a November 1913 meeting with the President, Trotter pleaded with Wilson to keep his campaign promises. But Wilson ignored these demands. By
1914, Trotter had become disillusioned with Wilson. That year, as a representative of the
National Independent Political League, an organization that fought for the social and political rights of African Americans, he confronted Woodrow Wilson about segregation again in a
72 Wolgemuth, “Woodrow Wilson’s,” 459-460. Miller 42 meeting, this time at the White House. Wilson was offended by Trotter and Trotter was frustrated that the president would not budge on the issue. The argument between Trotter and
Wilson became well-publicized in the media.73 The incident showed an important problem
African Americans historically had with the federal government, made worse by Wilson’s presidency. To not have an active voice in government is a precarious position for any minority group. Segregation and discrimination meant that African Americans’ political voices were ignored and communities did not have agency. African American political representatives were of vital importance for African Americans to gain rights in the United States.
Harris also showed that the appointments African American delegates were able to attain with Wilson were a charade. Meeting with Wilson did not mean that their political ideas would be heard but instead African Americans would be put through a process that would farther impede their progress and degrade them. Dividing the political cartoon into six panels demonstrates the continual process African American delegates from across the country had to endure while deprived of their political rights in government. Delegates’ intentions were to come into government with active voices that objected to the problems experienced in African
American communities. Instead delegates found only disappointment from the administration.
Some black leaders, including Trotter, had told African American communities to vote for
Wilson, but this support for Wilson did not gain them favor. It eliminated any hope delegates had of going farther in gaining political progress. They were repeatedly told what it would take to participate in a Wilson administration, which effectively meant they would have to be silent.
73 Charles W. Putkammer and Ruth Worthy, “William Monroe Trotter, 1872-1934,” The Journal of Negro History 43 (1958): 306-307. Miller 43
In this cartoon, Harris is bringing forward the historical memory of how African
American voices were silenced when Reconstruction ended. He also relates to the historical memories of slaves fighting for equality. The fourth panel of his drawing, the delegates’ hands clasped together in a pleading position, is reminiscent of Josiah Wedgwood’s antislavery medallion “Am I Not a Man and a Brother?”74 By using these historical memories Harris gains agency and shows the importance of African Americans gaining their political voice. The right to political protest for rights was being suppressed which had repeatedly occurred in the past.
Figure 4. "The Election, " by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, December 1916, p. 59. Harris’s next political cartoon Harris was published in the December 1916 edition of The
Crisis. The illustration, titled “The Election,” (figure 4) is a post-election commentary after
Woodrow Wilson was reelected.75 The illustration shows an African American man, dressed in a
74 Mary Guyatt, “The Wedgwood Slave Medallion: Values in Eighteenth-Century Design,” Journal of Design History 13 (2000):93-105. 75 The Crisis, December 1916, 59. Miller 44 suit, with a tag attached to him identifying him as “Negro Voter” contemplating a balance scale.
On one scale sits Wilson holding a rolled paper with the words “Democratic Administration.”
The other scale shows a block with the words written “A Square Deal.” Harris shows through his illustration that the 1916 presidential election was a difficult decision for African American voters. The editorial in the publication discussed how both the Democratic candidate and the
Republican candidate were not ideal choices for African Americans:
This has been a distracting and unsatisfactory campaign, both to black and to white
people. Few men could vote according to their consciences, because neither candidate
represented their consciences. Mr. Wilson was satisfactory as a reducer of the tariff, a
promoter of currency reform, and as a man of Peace. But he was still the representative of
southern Negro-hating oligarchy, and acknowledged its leadership. Mr. Hughes was the
author of several of the best decisions in favor of the Negro that the reluctant Supreme
Court has ever handed down. At the same time, on specific Negro problems he was
curiously dumb.76
African American communities were repeatedly faced with politicians that were not progressive on African American social and political rights. Harris’s illustration shows a dignified, educated black man who has to make a decision between two candidates, neither one a good choice. The illustrations show Wilson was less problematic compared to Theodore Roosevelt’s Square Deal.
But the cartoon with the editorial also suggests that Hughes falls short too. The illustration intimates that Theodore Roosevelt and the Square Deal was unequal in racial issues. The cartoon evokes a deeper historical memory. Traditionally African American voters, in different
76 Ibid., 59. Miller 45 communities, had to elect candidates who were not ideal but in theory would cause the least harm to African Americans as a whole. Voters had to choose between candidates who would be harmful to African Americans or ignore the problems facing African Americans. The illustration is reminiscent of Thomas Nast’s political cartoon “The Ignorant Vote --- Honors Are Easy,” which was on Harper’s Weekly, and shows a black man and an Irish man each sitting on balancing scales.77 Nast’s cartoon shows African Americans and Irish as being ignorant voters.
The illustration is used to criticize the inferior voting population in the 1876 presidential election. Harris’s cartoon takes the memories of African Americans being stereotyped as ignorant and gives African American communities agency by showing an intellectual black voter now weighing the scales. Taken together, Harris illustrations on politics demonstrate a lingering distrust of the Democratic Party.
77Fiona Deans Halloran, Thomas Nast: The Father of Modern Political Cartoons, (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2012), 205-206. Miller 46
Racism and Racial Violence
Figure 5. "American Logic," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, June 1913, p. 80. Harris created six illustrations between 1913 and 1922 that discussed racism and racial violence. When looking at African American men, Harris’s June 1913 illustration for The Crisis,
“American Logic,” (figure 5) confronted the irrationality of one member of a particular race being seen as representative of the entire group. The political cartoon shows a well-dressed white gentleman standing next to, but facing away from, a lower class white man. The caption reads
“THIS MAN is not responsible for THIS MAN even if they do belong to the same race.” The other half of the cartoon shows a well-dressed African American man, standing next to a lower- class African American man, both of them facing the same direction. Underneath this section of the illustration is the caption “THIS MAN is responsible for all that THIS MAN does because they belong to the same race.”78 Harris confronts how during this period African Americans were
78 The Crisis, June 1913, 80. Miller 47 seen not as individuals but as a collective group. If one committed a crime or some act seen as unforgivable by societal standards, racist ideology dictated that the entire group was held responsible. The position of the figures shows that whites were allowed to turn their backs away from any negativity associated with their racial group because they were not seen as one homogenous group. Harris demonstrates that for white communities, the poor or criminal element was seen as separate. But for African American communities, racist ideology insisted that all blacks were identical and criminality could not be separated despite class differences. Du
Bois’s idea of the Talented Tenth relates to this concept of African Americans not being seen as a homogenized group. But instead to differentiate between those who were helping to advance
African American communities. Du Bois believed that ten percent of the African American population would become leaders of their race through higher education, writings, and becoming advocates for social change. By having this foundation, the “talented tenth” would be able to help the African American population.79
Figure 6. "The Verdict," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, October 1915, p. 295.
79 Dan S. Green, “W.E.B. Du Bois’ Talented Tenth: A Strategy for Racial Advancement,” The Journal of Negro Education (1977): 358-366. Miller 48
Harris’s political cartoons became important tools of activism because they not only examined politics and discrimination but also the significance of race and gender. In the October
1915 edition of the publication, Harris’s illustration, “The Verdict” (figure 6) criticizes the writer of The Birth of a Nation, Thomas Dixon.80 The illustration shows Dixon on trial, judged by a
“Jury of Fair Minded Americans” and one member of the jury is holding a sign that reads “As a historian we find the defendant a pretty good liar.” The sentiment of fighting with an active voice continued into 1915 as the NAACP fought against the film The Birth of a Nation. The film portrayed African Americans in stereotypical depictions and showed white Americans, specifically the Ku Klux Klan, as the saviors of the nation. The film glorified the Ku Klux Klan, lynching, and the triumph of the white south over Congressional Reconstruction. In glorifying these depictions, the film was erasing historical realities and attacking black historical memory.
The NAACP fought to prevent The Birth of a Nation from being shown across the country. It was a young organization, only roughly five years established by this point, but had proven itself as formidable organization. The NAACP was aware that there would be hardship in objecting the film:
[The NAACP had] to turn away from its preferred methods in favor of others. Although
the judicial system had been and would continue to be the association's most reliable and
effective means of obtaining recourse, it was not an option in this situation. The
leadership believed that the courts would not be sympathetic to its claims that the film
heightened racial tensions and therefore constituted a threat to the social order. Unlike
lynching or housing segregation, Griffith's film did not violate any laws or constitutional
80 The Crisis, October 1915, 295. Miller 49
principles. Indeed, one of the great ironies of this struggle is that it would be Griffith who
turned to the courts for protection against the association.81
In 1915, branches of the organization in Tacoma, Oakland, Portland, and Ohio protested vehemently. Eventually areas of the country like Oakland won by having parts of the film removed, but overall the NAACP failed to stop the film from being shown completely.82 In the years following, the film continued to be tremendously successful and was viewed around the country in its complete form.
One of the most important aspects of Harris’s cartoon is that the jury is made up of only white men. The cartoon shows two possible messages that the viewer can take away. In one interpretation, the cartoon shows that it was not a matter of race in this instance but a matter of truth. In drawing a white jury, Harris is showing that being a “fair-minded American” means not standing by to let fictionalized, unrealistic representations of African Americans continue, but to instead stand by the truth of history. The jury is unable to accept the film because it is ahistorical and perpetuates false stereotypes of African Americans. In addition, the cartoon is showing how
African Americans have been historically excluded from the justice system. African Americans were not allowed to participate in the justice system in the south, so the only way Dixon could be convicted is by an all-white jury. By showing Dixon found guilty by a white jury and judge,
Harris underscores the African Americans’ exclusion and uses white privilege to emphasize his argument that all right thinking people would condemn the film. Harris’s cartoon is accompanied by an article in The Crisis discussing the NAACP’s successful campaign, although temporary, against the Birth of a Nation.
81 Stephen Weinberger, “ ‘The Birth of a Nation’ and the Making of the NAACP,” Journal of American Studies 45 (2011): 84. 82 The Crisis, October 1915, 295-296. Miller 50
Harris demonstrates a significant point about historical memory and the importance of not manipulating history. Viewers of the cartoon would have been familiar with the NAACP’s campaign to have the movie censored. Harris’s cartoon not only incorporated historical memory but also corrected the false memory that was portrayed in white mass media. Harris is showing the importance of preserving the reality of what happened during Reconstruction and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. One of many problem with The Birth of a Nation, was that the movie manipulated historical facts and thus challenged historical memory. It presented a history of the
African American community that was false and stereotyped. Instead of showing what happened during slavery and Reconstruction, it allowed white Southerners to turn the evolution of the Ku
Klux Klan into a romanticized memory and continued to distort the history of African American people.83 Harris recasts the narrative presented in the movie by condemning the film and motivating African Americans to fight.
Harris’s illustration, “Our Brave Policemen,” (1916) (figure 7) criticizes the assertion that
African American men were brutes who had to be subdued by “brave white policemen.”84 The cartoon shows two white police officers arresting an African American man who appears both young and significantly smaller than the officers. He is positioned between two mammoth policemen and staggers as they lead him away, seeming to have been beaten. Underneath the caption reads, “After a terrific struggle the burly Negro was finally subdued.” The continual false representations of African Americans described in newspapers and American society during the early twentieth century was a perception Harris fought against in his cartoons. Harris’s cartoon shows the historical relationship between African American communities and the police.
83 Dick Lehr, The Birth of a Nation: How a Legendary Filmmaker and a Crusading Editor Reignited America’s Civil War (New York: Public Affairs, 2014), 278. 84 The Crisis, June 1916, 96. Miller 51
Figure 7. "Our Brave Policemen," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, June 1916, p. 96. Often an African American man accused of crimes was depicted as “a big, burly negro.”
African American families and African American men would be harassed, brutalized, and jailed based on false accusations. An article in this issue of The Crisis discussed an incident where a white-woman, bruised and injured, told her husband and her friends that “a big, burly negro had mistreated her.” A mob gathered, and an African American man who was passing through the town was arrested and jailed for the harm done to her. As The Crisis reported the incident was Miller 52 resolved when the woman’s friend convinced the police that the woman had injured herself.85
Newspapers repeatedly described African Americans as criminals who were miscreants, ravishers, and as having brute strength.86 From the mid-nineteenth century into the twentieth century, lynching and mob violence were a form of social control that existed throughout the country. The violence against African Americans reinforced the idea that African Americans, no matter their social position, were second-class citizens.87 Newspapers became a significant business in the late nineteenth century, and the goal was to generate revenue. The description of lynched African Americans became sensationalized stories that drew readers. 88 While there were some publications that tried to stand against the lynching of African Americans many newspapers still described African Americans as guilty of the crime. This reinforced the concept in the white public sphere that African Americans, as a whole, were criminals guilty of the crime they were accused of and deserved to be lynched.89
Harris’s cartoon draws attention to the falsified testimony that was used against African
Americans in newspaper articles and in courtrooms by white Americans. Because African
Americans were treated as second-class citizens, and their political and judicial rights ignored,
African Americans, men in particular, were used as scapegoats. Crime, varying from petty to
85 Ibid., 95. 86 Richard M. Perloff, “The Press and Lynchings of African Americans,” Journal of Black Studies 30 (2000): 315-330. 87 Michael J. Pfeifer, “The Northern United States and the Genesis of Racial Lynching: The Lynching of African Americans in the Civil War Era,” The Journal of American History 97 (2010): 621-625. Although the article discusses racial violence in the urban North during the Civil War and its relationship with the Irish-Catholic Americans in the North, the article provides insight into the genesis of lynching. 88 In this section, I am specifically discussing white publications. During this period, there were African American publications who spoke against lynching and aimed to show that African Americans were not guilty of the crimes accused. 89 Perloff, “The Press and Lynchings,” 315-330. Miller 53 serious, committed by a white individual could be blamed on African Americans, specifically
African American men. Within this cartoon, Harris is showing a deeper historical memory that existed in African American communities. This was a memory of African Americans, men in particular, described in terminology to portray them as fearsome figures to justify the lynchings and the murders of African Americans. Harris is demonstrating that black communities rejected the descriptions of black men as brutes. Harris is showing this narrative has roots in continued in the past and was a version of history that African Americans had to continue to combat.
Figure 8. "Christmas in Georgia, A.D., 1916," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, December 1916, pp. 78-79. Harris’s illustration “Christmas in Georgia, A.D., 1916,” (figure 8) was printed in the
December 1916 edition of The Crisis.90 The cartoon continues to examine the violence against
African Americans. The cartoon shows a mob lynching a black man, throwing rocks and shooting at his body. Embracing the lynched man’s body is Christ and next to the body are the
90 The Crisis, December 1916, 78-79. Miller 54 words, “Inasmuch as ye did it unto the least of these, My brethren, ye did it unto Me.” Harris’s cartoon was an impactful cartoon, published in the holiday edition of The Crisis for that year.
The illustration shows how the United States, and in particular the South, was hypocritical in continually reinforcing the idea that it was based on Christian values. The illustration also speaks to African American viewers because it links the imagery to Christ. For African Americans,
Christianity held historical meaning. It was a religion that had been a catalyst for resistance.
Religion, in this case, is used to elevate the African American community and equate the victims of lynching with Christ. Harris depicts the whites in the illustration more realistically than in his other political cartoons. He allows their faces to be seen and not disguised. The realism Harris uses in the cartoon causes it to be more impactful.
The illustration was accompanied by several articles that spoke about lynching in the
American South. An article titled “The Lynching Fund” discusses how African Americans in communities would surely be willing to raise money to fight against lynching. As the article states:
[A] correspondent from Greenfield, Mass., no doubt voices the thought of many
of our friends when he asks in regard to lynching: " Do you really think it possible to put
a stop to such lawless actions throughout the South? " and "In what way do you think it
can be done? " There are, indeed, many persons who would be willing to help us raise not
$10,000, but $100,000, if they saw clearly a method of stopping lynchings. We may
answer frankly that there is no royal road to social reform. The methods which we have
in mind for the elimination of this savagery in the South are neither new, spectacular, nor
sudden. They are the old and well-worn paths of: (1) Publicity; (2 ) The better
administration of present laws; (3 ) Court actions in all possible instances; (4 ) New Miller 55
legislation; (5 ) Federal' interference. We place frankly our greatest reliance in publicity.
We propose to let the facts concerning lynching be known. Today, they are not fully
known; they are partially suppressed; they are lied about and twisted.
We propose, then, first of all, to let the people of the United States, and of the
world, know WHA T is taking place. Then we shall try to convict lynchers in the courts;
we shall endeavor to get better sheriffs and pledged governors; we shall seek to push laws
which will fix the responsibility for mob outbreaks, or for the failure to suppress them;
and we shall ask the national government to take cognizance of this national crime.
KEEP HIM IN HIS PLACE91
The article shows that the actual motivation of lynchings is known in black communities and had been passed down through generations. It was important to bring this historical memory to the forefront, into broader public knowledge, to challenge the rival version presented in white media.
These depiction in white media showed African American men as “brutes” who harmed white communities. This inadequate version of history was a source of frustration for African
American communities. Harris takes this frustration and gains power by showing that African
Americans are victims and equates them with Christ.
His cartoon “The Funny Page,” (figure 9) published in March 1918 further discusses what African American communities faced when their political rights were denied.92 Although the Fourteenth Amendment was created to protect African Americans’ citizenship rights and protect them under the law; and the Fifteenth Amendment was created to give African
Americans the right to vote, neither amendment was guaranteed because they carried no
91 Ibid., 61-62. 92 The Crisis, March 1918, 241. Miller 56 enforcement provision. Before states had autonomy over themselves, with these new amendments added, and with Reconstruction itself, the United States government now had the power to intercede and protect citizens’ rights. However, with the abandonment of
Reconstruction, during the 1870s, came the desertion of protecting African American citizens.93
Figure 9. "The Funny Page," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, March 1918, p.241. In his cartoon, Harris shows three white figures have the words “Lynch Law,”
“Prejudice,” and “Discrimination” written across their backs. The figures are reading the
Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution and are laughing at the pages. The figures are dressed as cavemen and the figure “Lynch Law” has a rope over its shoulder. Harris uses the technique of inversion to show the three figures as being representations of white racism. The cartoon implies that it is whites, not blacks who are
93 Eric Foner, “The Supreme Court and The History of Reconstruction ---And Vice Versa,” Columbia Law Review 112 (2012): 1587-1588. Miller 57 ignorant, backward, and violent. Harris created this visual statement after Woodrow Wilson was reelected and the social and political environment for African Americans became worse. During this period The Crisis includes a notice that states “A proposed amendment to the Constitution of the United States to appeal or modify the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the
Constitution has been introduced into the Mississippi Legislature.”94 The announcement demonstrates that African American communities continually had to fight for their political rights because there were repeated attempts to take them away. Protecting social and political rights was a priority but it did not mean that these amendments stopped African Americans from being harmed. The cartoon addresses the accumulation of crimes against African Americans who, despite the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, remained unprotected by the federal government.
In illustrating the three figures laughing at the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments,
Harris is pulling from the historical memory of the broken promises made to African Americans during Reconstruction and its aftermath. From Reconstruction onward, African Americans who asserted their rights or were falsely accused of crimes, constantly faced the threat of lynching.
Lynching was a means of social and political control over African Americans.95 Harris is using the historical memory to challenge the idea that the amendments gave African Americans’ rights.
As the notice in The Crisis shows, during the period African Americans as a whole, repeatedly tried to gain their rights politically and as citizens but found difficulty progressing when faced with constant discrimination. In Harris’s personal life, and in the communities he came from, he
94 The Crisis, March 1918, 249. 95 African Americans were faced with lynching before Reconstruction, but in this part of the paper I specifically discuss after Reconstruction because constitutional amendments were put into place to protect their rights. Miller 58 would have seen and experienced the constant frustration with the lack of equal rights and protection under the law. He would have witnessed the limitations placed on African American communities through Jim Crow. By creating this cartoon, Harris was protesting against the fact that the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments claimed to protect African Americans’ rights but in actuality lynch law and discrimination made a mockery of these amendments.
Harris used the inversion technique repeatedly in his illustrations. He drew ape-like figures or distorted human-like figures to represent white racism, and its relationship to lynching.
His cartoon “On Certain Advantages of Being a Large, Well-Developed Devil,” (figure 10) published in April 1918, used this technique to depict white racism.96 The cartoon shows the then famous preacher, William “Billy” Sunday running around, knocking down “devils,” labeled with words such as alcohol and gambling, but ignoring the large lynch devil in the middle.
Figure 10. "On Certain Advantages in Being a Large, Well-Developed Devil," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, April 1918, p. 285.
96 The Crisis, April 1918, 285. Miller 59
During the early twentieth-century Billy Sunday was a popular evangelical preacher who preached against sins like drinking and gambling. Harris’s cartoon is referencing an incident in
November 1917 when Sunday came to Atlanta, Georgia to preach. This was Sunday’s first time preaching in the South where Jim Crow ruled. He chose to hold segregated meetings where he preached to blacks and whites separately. Sunday had long history of practicing racial segregation during his campaigns. On November 19, a large congregation of over 10,000 African
Americans came to hear Sunday speak. He called for more cooperation between blacks and whites, noting that blacks had made progress since Emancipation and that they should stay in the south. He also insisted that alcohol was the source of the southern racial problems. 97
In this cartoon, Harris shows the hypocrisy of sermons that are being preached. They focus on certain specific sins but never address prejudice against African Americans or the lynching of African Americans. Ku Klux Klan members during this period were in favor of
Prohibition, the organization based itself on purported “Christian” values. To preach against lynching in the south, would have made Sunday unpopular with whites.98
The illustration addressed the disparity between what African Americans were promised and the reality of what was happening in the country. Harris demonstrates in this illustration that prejudice, racism and lynch law were a prevalent and well-established in the United States, continuing to grow, in part because white Christian churches refused to address it. Harris’s cartoon evokes a historical memory of how since slavery white Christians preached one idea, the teachings of Jesus, while harming African Americans. Harris brings the past together with the
97 Roger A. Burns, Preacher: Billy Sunday and Big-time American Evangelism (New: York: W.W. Norton, 1992), 225-247. 98 Kirschke, Art in Crisis, 79. Miller 60 present by showing that preachers, such as “Billy” Sunday, argued against certain kinds of moral corruption but refused to preach against others like lynch law and racism. This double standard of white Christianity would continue to plague African Americans’ communities.
Figure 11. "Uncle Sam is Tremendously Interested in Disarmament," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, January 1922, p.124. Harris also explored white racism in his cartoon “Uncle Sam is Tremendously Interested in Disarmament,” (figure 11) published in The Crisis in 1922.99 The cartoon was originally published in March 1916, entitled “Uncle Sam Speaks: ‘Barbarous Unchristian Europe!’ In the illustration, Harris characterizes Europe as Mars and shows the United States, depicted as Uncle
Sam, watching European countries’ movements. At the same time, Uncle Sam is ignoring a large beast, represented as Lynch Law, viciously striking and dominating the American South. The
99 The Crisis, January 1922, 124. Miller 61 depiction of Lynch Law dominates the right side of the page facing away from Uncle Sam. The cartoon was later reprinted after the International Conference on Naval Limitation. During this conference, the United States positioned itself into a leadership position, claiming ethical high ground, and called for European nations to reduce the number of naval arms they possessed.100
Harris and The Crisis argued the problem of disarmament from two different positions. The
Crisis claimed that the cost of the war affected every citizen and that the problem of race become apparent from a global perspective. As the periodical stated:
Most of us may think that we have little personal interest in disarmament. We have only
to remember that in the last fifty years, the United States Government has spent thirty-
four billion dollars for war and only ten [billion] for everything else. This means that
every American family contributes two hundred and fourteen dollars a year to pay the
1921 taxes, where the same family paid thirty-three dollars a year to pay the 1913 taxes.
The burden of this cost of war has become intolerable, and it falls heaviest on the poor
and the black.
The world is meeting to try and throw it off but no sooner does it meet than the race
problem appears. We can disarm only because of faith in each other. The white world is
asking how much faith they can have in Japan; but Japan and India and Africa and even
the wise ones in China,---in fact, the majority of men--- are asking seriously, in view of
the past, how much faith we can have in the white world.101
The Crisis examines the global effect that disarmament has caused for people of color. White nations kept their advantages while characterizing nations of color as enemies who needed to be
100 Kirschke, Art in Crisis, 86-87. 101 The Crisis, January 1922, 103. Miller 62 disarmed. The Crisis argues that if nations opened their doors to people of color and released occupied territories, then the East would willingly give up arms and seek peace.
The Crisis argues this point in text and Harris extends the argument by examining the
United States and disarmament from another perspective. Harris criticizes the United States government for denouncing the actions of European nations after World War I while, at the same time, ignoring the problems affecting African Americans in the south. Instead of exploring disarmament thorough a global perspective, Harris focuses on how the United States operates on the pretense of high moral standards judging the actions of other nations but allowing the continual murders of African Americans in the nation. He shows that this was a problem that had repeatedly occurred in United States’ history and lived in African American historical memories.
He is displaying agency through his cartoon by showing a large lynching figure overwhelming the south, Harris is demonstrating how the crime has continually grown and had become dominate because it was disregarded.
Gender
Figure 12. "The New Education in the South: 'Domestic Science for Colored Girls Only'," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, September 1913, p. 247. Miller 63
During this period there is only one illustration by Harris, “The New Education in the
South: Domestic Science for Colored Girls Only,” (figure 12) published in September 1913, that directly speaks to the experiences of African American women in the United States. 102 While literacy had continually risen in African American communities after Reconstruction, African
American women were still restricted. African American women found work as domestic servants because they had limited educational opportunities, and job prospects that could elevate their socioeconomic status were reserved for white women. Even in their own communities
African American women were placed in subordinate positions to African American men. This was a restrictive period for black women, and women in general. During the time this illustration was produced women were not allowed to vote. Additionally, The Crisis did not include political cartoons by African American women.
Harris’s cartoon commented on African American women whose educational opportunities were limited to domestic servitude. This cartoon tackled the problems African
American women faced as domestic servants. It shows an African American domestic servant in the kitchen. The servant looks frightened as her arm is violently grabbed by her white male employer. Harris shows his opinion on African American women working as domestic servants.
During this period opinions differed between black leaders on how African Americans should proceed with education. Most notable was the split between Du Bois and Booker T.
Washington. Du Bois believed that African Americans needed to be fully educated in the liberal arts tradition. Those who were educated, the “talented tenth,” would return to communities to teach others and be leaders. However Washington believed that African Americans should not focus on liberal education but instead blacks should learn a trade. His school, Tuskegee Institute
102 The Crisis, September 1913, 247. Miller 64 offered training for men in education, agriculture, and mechanical skills. Although some women were trained to become teachers, overall women who attended received an education in home and child care. Many were prepared to become domestic servants. 103
However, the working conditions for domestic servants were far from ideal. Low wages, strenuous labor, and abiding by the whims of their employer left domestic servants in stressful positions. As the cartoon shows, women were subjected to their employers’ actions, including those of a sexual nature. In some instances, domestic workers were chosen for their beauty and faced sexual assault from their employer. Harris’s cartoon draws attention to domestic servants in the south who were forced to work in conditions equivalent to slavery and under harsh conditions or face the possibility of economic instability.104
By creating this cartoon, Harris was using his art as political activism to speak out against the economic and societal difficulties black women faced in the United States during the period.
The title combined with the illustration draws attention to how important education was for black women. Without broad educational opportunities, black women were left to employers who had control over their movements and physical bodies. The political cartoon demonstrated that black women were left with little options for gainful employment. During this period newspapers, The
Crisis included, advertised vocational schools that offered training in domestic science. Lorenzo
Harris may have had firsthand knowledge about the struggle to establish black schools. In 1900, his father, John B. Harris sold the building that held his funeral business to the Woman’s Central
League in Richmond for the sum of $60,000.105 The Woman’s Central League was a technical
103 Rose Dorothy Greco, “The Educational Views of Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois: A Critical Comparison,” (dissertaion, Loyal University Chicago, 1984), 65-77. 104 Elizabeth Clark-Lewis and Stanley Nelson, Freedom Bags. Stanley Nelson. Washington D.C.: Abena Productions, 1990. [Film]. 105 “The Woman’s League,” Richmond Dispatch, July 15, 1900, 15. Miller 65 school, started by Dr. R.E. Jones, an African American doctor. The school educated black women in the separate fields of cooking, sewing, and nursing. In one way, Harris’s cartoon showed being a domestic servant would not allow black women to have social or economic upward mobility, nor would it guarantee their rights to protect their physical bodies. Harris’s cartoon invokes the historical memory of what black women faced during slavery. African
American women were forced into labor, had limited educational opportunities, and they were physically attacked and many times raped. Rival narratives of black women as domestic servants presented it as beneficial for African American women. But the cartoon shows an issue that faced black women in the early part of the twentieth century had not changed since the days of slavery.
World War I The perpetuation of racial problems from the past was a theme that continued when
Harris drew illustrations about World War I. He created three illustrations that spoke of African
Americans and their participation in war. As Harris showed in his illustrations, the same struggles experienced by earlier generations was a challenge that would not be easy to overcome.
During this period African American newspapers, in particular, debated the merits of fighting in
World War I. Black leaders, and newspapers were divided over the war. Leaders who argued for
African Americans to join the war effort were Du Bois, Kelly Miller and Emmett J. Scott. These leaders argued that participation in the war would better African Americans’ position in society.
At the beginning of the war Du Bois showed support for Allied forces. By 1915, he defined his position which had a more pan-African concept. As Matthew Jeremy Yates wrote in “‘Who march to war with visions in their eyes’: W.E.B. Du Bois and African American intellectuals during the Great War,” Du Bois presents his idea in a 1915 Crisis article titled “African roots of Miller 66 war” that showed “a community of Africans of which African Americans were a part.” 106Du
Bois felt that through participating African American could wield power. However, the leaders
Marcus Garvey, Hubert Harrison and William Monroe Trotter argued that it was an error to join in a war for a country that continually denied political, social, and judicial rights.107 Leaders like
Harrison argued that the “Army did not need the extra three-hundred thousand troops. Instead, it needed the US industry that was supporting the war effort with food, weapons, and other goods required African American labor. [Harrison] reasoned that if African Americans refused to work they might wield great influence and be able to demand change.”108Leaders like Du Bois were also drawn to the war because the Wilson administration framed the involvement of the United
States as the country fighting for democracy for the world. But the democracy Wilson discussed,
“the principles of freedom, self-determination, personal liberty, and peace” applied to white
Americans not African Americans in the United States who would still face white oppression.109
In these illustrations, Harris diverges from Du Bois on the subject of African American involvement in World War I. Du Bois supported African American men going to war, theorizing that it would bring social and political advancement for African Americans if they showed their support for the country. He stated this in his July 1918 editorial that the African American community needed to “Close Ranks.”110 Harris disagreed with Du Bois’s opinion that African
Americans joining the war would lead to equal rights. He argued that despite the best intentions
106 Matthew Jeremy Yates, "“Who March to War with Visions in their Eyes”: W.E.B. Du Bois and African American Intellectuals during the Great War," (master’s thesis, University of Wyoming, 2010), 10-34. 107 Ibid., 10-11. 108 Ibid., 50. 109 Chad L. Williams, The John Hope Franklin Series in African American History and Culture: Torchbearers of Democracy: African American Soldiers in the World War I Era (North Carolina: The University of North Carolina Press, 2010), 15-25. 110 The Crisis, July 1918, 111. Miller 67 of African Americans who fought in the war, the problems that had persisted in the past would continue to effect black soldiers in the present.
Figure 13."In Spite of Submarines," by Lorenzo Harris. Reprinted from The Crisis, June 1917, p. 74. Harris’s first political cartoon about World War I, entitled “In Spite of Submarines!,”
(figure 13) was published in June 1917.111 In the illustration a large submarine, with the words
“U.S.S. Negro Patriotism and Loyalty” on the side, has three underwater divers drilling holes into the bottom of the ship. The three divers are titled “Prejudice,” “Lynch Law,” and
“Segregation.” Harris’s cartoon invokes the memory of the numerous wars African Americans
111 The Crisis, June 1917, 74. Miller 68 had fought and died in, and the repeated racism that African Americans faced while trying to participate. Harris’s illustration directly speaks to this issue. The racism and segregation that had existed in the United States was too deeply intertwined into the fabric of society. Social obstructions had caused difficulties for African American soldiers in the past and continued into the future. There were editorials in the June 1917 edition of The Crisis that stated African
Americans should fight in the war. The editorials are following Du Bois’ opinion and expressed hope that equality would result from African Americans’ loyalty to the country. Harris’s illustration took a different tone from the editorials that discussed equality through participation.
He showed that despite African American patriotism and loyalty, the racial prejudice that was within the United States would continue to interfere and ignore African Americans’ rights.
Despite the fact that African Americans had been patriotic and fought in every war the
United States had fought in, had died and shed blood, the racism that existed in the country impeded the progression of African Americans as a whole. Harris shows that these memories from the past should not be forgotten and African Americans should be politically active and fight against oppression. During the period, segregation was prevalent and steadfast in all parts of the United States. When the Selective Service Act of May 1917 was implemented it raised many questions in black and white communities. African Americans in different communities felt that:
First, they could encourage in whites an even stronger respect for the outstanding record
of black soldiers in America's wars, especially the recent Spanish-American War.
Second, a loyal, cooperative attitude by African-Americans in fighting Germany could
encourage whites to accept the notion that those who fight for their country are entitled to
all its privileges. And third, if significant numbers of African-Americans served their Miller 69
country in time of war, through this legislation, it was bound to raise African-American
estimates of their own value to the nation and encourage them to demand more of
American society. 112
White southern leaders like Senator James Vardaman of Mississippi, who debated the Selective
Service Bill, did not want the bill to be implemented because they did not want African
Americans to be armed with weapons.113 The racial tensions that existed in the United States were compounded by African Americans’ participation in World War I. There would be several racial riots during this period. The East St. Louis and Houston riots that occurred during 1917 and the “Red Summer” of 1919.114
A month later, Harris illustrated the July 1917 cover of The Crisis.115 In it he shows four
African American soldiers bravely fighting in the war. Harris would continue this same theme in his illustration for the May 1919 cover of The Crisis.116 He shows an African American soldier, engraving a crest shaped monument, his bayonet to the side of the monument. The monument decorated with the United States’ flag and an eagle, has the words “The American Negro’s
Record in the Great World War.” The soldier is carving the words “Loyalty,” “Valor,” and
“Achievement” into the monument. Black soldiers had repeatedly achieved these accomplishments in each war, acknowledged or unacknowledged. The Crisis used Harris’s work to promote African American participation in the war and to remind their readership and the nation what it owed to African American soldiers. Although Harris’s art began as more skeptical
112 James Mennell, "African-Americans and the Selective Service Act of 1917," The Journal of Negro History 84 (1999): 275. 113 Ibid., 276. 114 Ibid., 278-284. 115 The Crisis, July 1917, cover page. 116 The Crisis, May 1919, cover page. Miller 70 than Du Bois’s position, by 1919 the artist’s work and Du Bois’s position aligned more closely.
Harris is arguing through his illustrations that despite the hope that loyalty and patriotic duty would inspire African American social, economic, and political advancement, the longer historical memory that existed in black communities showed that “Prejudice,” “Lynch law,” and
“Segregation” were the historical reality they received in the end.
Chapter Three Conclusion The twentieth-century presented challenges for African Americans. Political cartoons appearing in the white media depicted African Americans as inferior because of their race and this helped reinforce a white racist ideology. To counter these images, African American newspapers and magazines employed illustrators that created positive representations of blacks that showed realistic figures of African American men and women. White media continued to perpetuate a southern white narrative that tried to erase the history of African Americans and assert their dominance over these communities. Whether intentional or unintentional, African
American illustrators created images that brought forward the historical memory that had existed in their respective communities and used it as reminders for black communities. Black illustrators used memories from the past that challenged a white version of history in the present to gain agency when examining the contemporary issues. The black media was showing that a memory of African American history had always existed and could be used as motivation to fight for the future. It was a history that could not be eliminated. It was historical memories that were woven into family histories, communities and individuals. The past lived on and was often passed down through oral history in African American communities.
The illustrators of The Crisis were critical components of conveying historical memory through their political cartoons. While Du Bois was important as the editor of the publication, he Miller 71 did not always choose cartoons that completely reflected his position. The illustrators had agency over their work and Du Bois disseminated it to the masses. They came from communities that had historical memories that inspired their illustrations. These were not new memories and the artists played a role in incorporating them into the NAACP’s magazine.
As the two elements of this thesis show, the website and the essay on Harris, it is important to study the lives of these illustrators for a better understanding of the images produced. African American periodicals, like The Crisis, were important contributors to countering the white southern narrative that persisted into the twentieth-century. But the artists’ agency and displaying historical memories in their illustrations was important in fighting white oppression also.
The artists John Henry Adams, Lorenzo Harris, Albert A. Smith, and Laura Wheeler-
Waring took the memories of slavery, the betrayal and aftermath of Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the resistance to oppression and preserved them within their illustrations. These artists took historical memories from their respective communities and discussed the challenges of the early twentieth-century by intertwining them within their political cartoons. By doing this, these illustrators used their art as political activism to challenge the oppression of African Americans during the era. They encouraged African Americans to combat white supremacy by remembering the past.
Lorenzo Harris becomes an important case study for showing how essential it is to study the illustrators of The Crisis lives. His family background, his experiences, and the two communities he came from inspired his art and he used his art as a form of political activism.
Between the years 1913 and 1922, Harris created more illustrations than any other artist during this period. In addition, he was the key illustrator who criticized the Wilson administration and Miller 72 the Democratic Party. Harris’s cartoons were bold, formidable, and showed the resilience of
African Americans. He not only created illustrations that disapproved of the Wilson administration but also condemned racism, police brutality, discrimination, gender, lynching, and the falsification of historical memory. Harris used his art to protest against the negative images of African Americans and to create positive black representations.
Harris dedicated his life to fighting for African American rights. Harris carried his politically active voice to his permanent residence, Asbury Park. While sculpting on the segregated beach in Asbury Park, Harris met his wife Karhryn Garris. She also pretended to be another race, in her case she passed for white, because it allowed for better economic opportunities and less racial hostilities. Similar to Harris, she was tired of the racial injustices that surrounded African Americans. The couple married on April 21, 1921 in Manhattan, New
York, and had three children. Together they embraced their race and fought for the equality of
African Americans in Asbury Park. A 1982 Asbury Park Press article wrote:
Harris became increasingly intolerant of the racial discrimination he saw around him. He
shed his disguises and silence and became a vocal critic of inequality, speaking to groups
and youths and writing letters to newspapers. He organized Asbury Park’s black
businessmen, formed a youth group of the local NAACP… .[.]117
The local chapter of the NAACP Harris and his wife founded became a civil rights staple in
Asbury Park that still exists. As Kathryn Harris stated in the article, it was important for Harris to keep historical memory alive. “My husband was in charge of the youth group and he concentrated on Negro history to make the young aware of their roots. He wrote and produced
117 Villamor, “Civil Rights,” 73. Miller 73 plays which we staged in Asbury Park and other parts of the state.”118 He had an active political voice that appeared before he illustrated for The Crisis and continued after working with the publication.
Lorenzo Harris would run for Asbury Park city commission in 1945.119 Harris lost the election but his son, Dr. Lorenzo Harris Jr., continued Harris’s political legacy and became the first African American to serve on the city commission. Lorenzo Harris Sr. passed away from cancer on June 26, 1946, at the age of fifty-eight.120 But he left a lasting impression with his illustrations for The Crisis and his sand art. As the website and the essay show, the artists of The
Crisis created illustrations that spoke to the challenges African American communities faced.
Whether it was intentional or unintentional, they produced art that showed historical memories as they discussed contemporary issues making their political cartoons socially conscious and politically active.
118 Ibid., 73. 119 Mellina,“Asbury’s,” A11. 120 Mellina,“Asbury’s,” A11. Miller 75
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