Ida B. Wells
The Woman Who Took on a Nation with her Words
"Your opinion does not impeach the facts." – Ida B. Wells (1862-1931)
Ida B. Wells, a petite, African American woman, was born a slave in 1862, in Holly Springs, Mississippi, three years before slavery ended. She started her career as a teacher and went on to become a powerful journalist, civil rights activist, women’s suffragist, community activist and one of the founders of the NAACP. She used journalism to highlight inequality and impact social change.
Even though her life was in danger, she wouldn’t let anything or anyone stop her from telling about the horrific ways that former slaves were being treated at the turn of the 20th century. After three of her good friends, who were upstanding citizens in the Memphis community were brutally murdered by a mob, Ida convinced thousands to boycott white-owned businesses, including the streetcars. She realized that one source of power that African Americans had was economically based, and she also influenced an unprecedented number of disenfranchised African Americans to move from Memphis, Tennessee to Oklahoma in order to enjoy a more equitable life.
In order to expose the atrocities that were raging through the South, she meticulously collected facts about the reasons for the torture and brutal murders of hundreds of innocent victims. Through her investigative journalism she exposed the fact that community leaders, business people, petty thieves, innocent bystanders and random victims were murdered with no repercussions from authorities. There was no value placed on the lives of African Americans and they could be eliminated with impunity.
Her newspaper articles hit the nerves of the “establishment” and a price was put on her head in addition to her press being destroyed. Exiled from the southern part of the United States, Ida B. Wells made a new life for herself in the North and stepped up her writing efforts.
As she continued writing newspaper articles and pamphlets, as well as giving speeches, her audience grew. The breadth of her influence increased and she went to the United Kingdom to expose the atrocities of the United States.
Ida B. Wells became an international figure who fought for equality of African Americans and women throughout her entire lifetime. She died over 80 years ago in 1931, but her words live on. She showed how it is possible to take on an entire system, an entire nation, and an entire world by using words to expose the truth and move people to action.
— Michelle Duster, great-granddaughter of Ida B. Wells and author of
Ida In Her Own Words (BW Publishing, 2008) and Ida From Abroad
(BW Publishing, 2010)
 |
Women of the African Diaspora ProjectDr. Claudia D. Nelson and Dr. Uraina N. Pack, Co-directors |
