THE FIRST TIME I went North was in 1924. My pal then was Hines, a young man about eighteen. He was from a farm in Texas. We were hoping we’d get to see the Mason-Dixon line. I thought in my mind that it would look like a row of trees with some kind of white mark like the mark in the middle of the highway....The train stopped in Covington, Kentucky just as the sun was rising. Someone said the bridge ahead was the Mason-Dixon line. We were North. We didn’t have to worry about sitting in the back, we felt good....
When we reached Detroit each of us had an address of the people where we would live. Mine was the Gordon house on 30th Street. I looked at that number so many times before leaving home I had it perfect....We got off the train and at that moment our memories snapped. Both Hines and I could remember the streets but not the numbers....We decided to take a cab and ride to the streets and look at the numbers. We thought the addresses might come to us this way. We thought if we asked someone on the street they would surely know our friends just like we knew everybody in the country.
We rode a cab to 30th and McGraw. The cabdriver said colored people lived north of McGraw. We walked slowly and spoke to people. They didn’t stop or look around at us. We were amazed. People speak back in the country. We started again at one end of 30th. We would knock on two or three doors on each block. The train arrived at five and we were still walking at nine. We began to get real worried. Would we sleep in the street? Were there any parks? One side of 30th was completely white. But hearing so much about equal rights and complete freedom, and that North was heaven, we didn’t realize any difference. One white woman said that our friends couldn’t possibly live on her block because no colored lived at that end of 30th. We walked off her porch wondering why. We didn’t want to believe in discrimination up North but it kept going around in our heads.
Someone advised us to call the police and spend the night at the station. We said to each other, “Hell, no, we aren't going to write home and say we spent our first night in the city in jail.” I had never been to jail at that time and I sure wasn't going to start then.
Students will  determine why so many African Americans "voted with their feet" and moved north between 1910 and 1920.  (Cause and Effect)
Students will be able to describe how the Great Migration changed individual lives and the broader experiences of African Americans. Â
The years between 1910 and 1920 marked the beginning of a major shift of the African-American population within the United States. Â The nation's African-American population was transformed from a predominantly rural and agricultural people to a largely urban and industrial people. Â It has been estimated that nearly 500,000 to one million African-American men, women and children left the South before, during and shortly after World War I to settle in areas such as New York, Chicago, Detroit, Pittsburgh and other areas in the North and Midwest. Â
Historians contend that this mass movement of sharecroppers and wage workers commonly referred to as "The Great Migration" was spurred on by economic and social factors. Â These factors include the decline of cotton production, an increase in lynchings and other forms of racial violence and discrimination, recruitment of African Americans by northern industries and the influence of African-American newspapers in the North.
The movement "up South" created a large African-American population in northern cities, who faced new social, economic and political dilemmas. Â These dilemmas inspired the creation of new social and political movements within the African-American population to confront the new structures of institutionalized racism in the North.
Step 1: Â Pass out the worksheet and project the map of the routes travelled by migrants during the Great Migration. Â Tell students that today they will be learning about the experiences of the men, women and children who left the South for better economic, political and social opportunities in the North between 1910 and 1920. Â They will be creating a character, a typical migrant, and a scrapbook for that character as they look through primary sources. Â Working individually or in pairs, students should fill out Part I of the worksheet. Â They should look at the map to determine where their characters are from and where their characters are headed. Â Students should make sure their characters' routes reflect historical reality (i.e., characters from Florida do not end up in Chicago). Â Discuss with students that migrants tended to follow routes set by railroads that connected urban areas. Â
Step 2: Hand out a pack of the documents to each student/pair. Â Project each of the documents and discuss them with students. For some documents, ask students to read aloud portions of the text. Â As they read and view the documents, students should make notes in the graphic organizer about how evidence from the documents reflects the experiences of their characters. Â
Step 3: (Optional) Before creating their scrapbooks, have students answer the questions in Part III of the worksheet. Â
Step 4: Distribute art supplies. Â Tell students to create a scrapbook about their characters' experiences during the Great Migration. Â
Scrapbooks must be at least 4 pages in length
Scrapbooks must include images and words that address why the person left the South and what happened to him or her in the North
Scrapbooks must include words and images that show what kind of work the person did in both places, what kind of community experiences he/she had in both places and how he/she was or was not able to exercise the rights of citizenship
Note: After analyzing documents in class, the teacher may assign the scrapbook-making activity as homework. Â
Step 5: (Optional) Ask students to trade their scrapbooks with another student/pair and discuss the differences between them. Ask students to present their scrapbooks to the entire class. Â
I can still remember the darkness and cold of those days. The winter wind in Chicago just takes your breath away and, while I was saving up to buy a warm coat, all I had to cut that wind was sweatshirts and sweaters. Shivering in that elevated train, watching the snow blow and swirl in the streetlights and the sun just starting to come up—those were the days when I was low and lonely and afraid in Chicago. The cold and the noise seemed to beat on me and the big buildings made me feel as if I'd come to live in a penitentiary. Oftentimes, I wished I could run away back home to New Orleans.
But after I got up to Chicago, I stuck. I didn't go back to New Orleans for fifteen years. And whatever I am today I owe to Chicago, because in Chicago the Negro found the open door.
In Chicago, our people were advancing. Not only were they making money they were active in clubs and all sorts of organizations. And I don't mean this was just organizations like the NAACP. There were all kinds of civic organizations and social clubs. The people were church people, but they were talking about different things than we ever did down South—things like getting educated and going into business. The Negro was doing more than just singing and praying, and I began to see a new world.
I'm wondering why your family decided to leave Mississippi. How was that decision made and why was it made?
Well, the North offered better opportunities for blacks…. I've heard that recruiters were often in danger in Mississippi if they came down to get workers for northern companies.
Do you recall him ever expressing any fear about this job that he was doing?
Yes. I know that many of the blacks would leave the farms at night and walk for miles. Many of them caught the train to come North…Usually they would leave with just the clothes on their backs. Maybe the day before they would be in the field working and the plantation owner wouldn't even know that they planned to go and the next day he would go and the little shanty would be empty. These people would have taken off and come up here.
Was there a fear that the plantation owner wouldn't let them go or that they couldn't leave?
That's very true. They wouldn't. Plantation owners had much to lose. [African-American farmers] were illiterate and they had to depend on the plantation owner. He would give them so much flour for use during the year, cornmeal or sugar or that sort of thing and then at the end of the year you would go to settle up with him and you would always be deeply in debt to him. That was his way of keeping people. You never got out of debt with him….
Now, as a young girl, did you agree with this decision to move North? Did you think it was a good idea?
Yes. I think I did. Because even as a child I think I was pretty sensitive to a lot of the inequalities that existed between blacks and whites, and I know that after we came here my mother and dad used to tell me that if I went back to Mississippi, they would hang me to the first tree.
What role did the church play in your early life in Mississippi?
Well, I think the church played a very important part in the life of all blacks in Mississippi because it was religious center as well as social. That was one place that they could go and meet and discuss their problems. Relax. So just the--their big picnics and big church meetings they used to have….
Given the opportunities that were available in the North, why did anyone decide to stay in Mississippi?
Well, I think that it was a lack of knowledge of about what the North had to offer until these agents came there to get them to come up here to work.
You were leaving at least a few of your relatives and friends behind. How did you feel about those people that you left behind and weren't ever going to see again?
Well, I think it comes back to a matter of trying to exist, really, and trying to improve your own lot.