The causes, effects, and meaning of the Chicago race riots.

Carl Sandburg was not yet an internationally famous poet and author when he wrote a series of articles about contemporary race relations for the Chicago Daily News in 1919. The Great Migration of African Americans from the rural South to industrial centers like Chicago was well underway, having started in response to tens of thousands of new job opportunities created by the cessation of immigration from Europe during World War I. Jobs that would otherwise have been given to white immigrants had to be filled somehow.

     Chicago's Black population had approximately quadrupled since 1910. Perhaps needless to say, the new arrivals were not welcomed with open arms. Sandburg was one of the first journalists to perceptively explore the complex and potentially incendiary social, economic, and political forces that were at work. When Chicago erupted in interracial violence, Sandburg was viewed as a prophet. His articles for the Daily News were published in book form for posterity, and they are presented anew in this volume, a century after their first appearance.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) is widely recognized as one of the major figures in American literature. He won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1919 and 1951 and for his multi-volume biography of Abraham Lincoln in 1940.   
     "Carl Sandburg was more than the voice of America," President Lyndon B. Johnson said upon his passing, "more than the poet of its strength and genius.  He was America."