Celebrate Black History 2021 - Robert Sengstacke Abbott

by Dick Mac

Robert Abbott was born in St. Simons, Georgia, on  November 24, 1870 and died of Bright's Disease on February 29,  1940. His parents were "freemen," having gained their freedom before the Civil War. When his father died, his mother married a German man, who added his own name "Sengstacke" to Robert Abbott's legal name to ensure he was known as part of his growing family. Abbott attended Hampton University, where he learned the publishing trade, and earned a law degree at the Kent College of Law.

In 1905, Robert Abbott founded The Chicago Defender which fought Jim Crow. The paper was instrumental in encouraging Southern blacks to migrate to the North, which was a catalyst for what is now known as the Great Migration. In some Southern states it was dangerous to distribute printed matter written and/or published by or for black people, and the newspaper relied on a surreptitious network of Pullman porters for distribution throughout the South. 

The goals of The Defender were published and were all imperatives that black Americans still work for today:

1. American race prejudice must be destroyed;
2. Opening up all trade unions to blacks as well as whites;
3. Representation in the President's Cabinet'
4. Hiring black engineers, firemen, and conductors on all American railroads, and to all jobs in government;
5. Gaining representation in all departments of the police forces over the entire United States;
6. Government schools giving preference to American citizens before foreigners;
7. Hiring black motormen and conductors on surface, elevated, and motor bus lines throughout America;
8. Federal legislation to abolish lynching; and
9. Full enfranchisement of all American citizens.

In 1919, Abbott was appointed to the Chicago Commission on Race Relations, which studied the impact of the Great Migration, which at one point saw 5,000 African Americans arriving in Chicago every week.  

He provided financial support to his stepfather's family and the descendants of Captain Charles Stevens, the former owner of his enslaved birth father before emancipation. 

Robert Abbott was a brilliant, forward-thinking intellectual whose efforts established a foundation for black publications that endures today. He was America's first black media mogul, one of the first black millionaires, a revolutionary figure of the twentieth century and an American hero.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Sengstacke_Abbott

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicago_Defender

Watch this: https://youtu.be/BgJYZY1KAeU

#blackhistorymonth #BlackLivesMatter #WorkForChange