Responding to the prospect of decent jobs in the booming railroad, manufacturing and meatpacking industries, many Black Southerners migrated north at the start of the 20th century, hoping to escape Jim Crow — only to see a Midwestern mutation of that racist system take hold. Between 1910 to 1950, Black Hawk County’s Black population grew […]
Racial Segregation
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MAGA goes harder on Nixonian politics than Tricky Dick ever did. Can democracy be ‘saved’ for another 50 years?
“A week is a long time in politics.” It’s a phrase both politicians and journalists like to use when they want to avoid giving a firm answer to a question, but still want to sound smart. But this year there really was a week that fit that description. On Saturday, July 20, President Joe Biden […]
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Before I-235, Des Moines’ Center Street district was a bastion of Black commerce and culture
By the time its final section opened to traffic in late 1968, I-235 was already part of the fabric of Des Moines. Cutting across the city and running just north of downtown, it’s the most traveled roadway in Iowa. But like many stretches of highway built through cities, the construction of I-235 did damage that […]
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The hidden history of black nuns in America will be explored at Mount Mercy on Thursday night
Ask people what a nun looks like and the picture that probably jumps to mind is a woman in a black habit — and it’s also likely that woman will be white. In part, that’s because black women seeking to enter holy orders in the United States have traditionally been discriminated against, either deliberately or unthinkingly, by the Catholic Church.
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Uncovering the forgotten history of black businesses in Iowa City
The state of Iowa has a well-worn reputation for racial progressivism. As any left-of-center, Iowa-centric political group will remind you, Iowa has long been ahead of the game on legislative victories over racism: It banned slavery in 1839, legalized interracial marriages before the Civil War, struck down segregated schooling in 1868 and did away with […]
