AP African American Studies Resource Archive | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

Cover of A Red Record, with the title written in red on a yellowed piece of paper.

“A Red Record”

1895

Read an excerpt from Ida B. Wells-Barnett’s analysis of lynchings in the US at the end of the nineteenth century.

Primary Source

Image of man sitting and posing for a black and white photograph.

“Hidden Practices”: Frederick Douglass on Segregation and Black Achievement, 1887

by Edward L. Ayers

Analyze a letter written by Frederick Douglass describing his feelings on Black progress.

Essay

A yellowed four-fold pamphlet featuring the photograph (at top left) of Stanley Dones, a Black man wearing a dark jacket, white shirt, and dark tie, placing his right hand upon his chin.

Black Land Ownership in the Jim Crow Era

with Alison Rose Jefferson and Sandra Trenholm

Explore the history of the Black-owned Eureka Villa housing development in 1920s California.

Video

Scan of FDR's letter to Joseph Curran, typewritten on White House stationery.

FDR on Racial Discrimination

1942

Read a transcription and a bit of historical context behind Franklin D. Roosevelt’s letter to Joseph Curran concerning Executive Order 8802 and discrimination against Black sailors.

Primary Source

Scan of the broadside, reading I AM A MAN in bold black letters with "AM" underlined.

Civil Rights Posters

1968

Explore the historical context behind two posters from the 1968 Memphis sanitation workers' strike.

Primary Source

A large stone building with "MUNICIPAL BUILDING" carved above the front doors and flags of North Carolina, the United States, and Wilson on poles above the entrance.

The Civil Rights Act and the Pursuit of Greater Freedom

by Charles W. McKinney

Read about civil rights protests in the small town of Wilson, North Carolina, in the 1960s.

Essay

Handwritten fragment of Abraham Lincoln's last Annual Message supporting the Thirteenth Amendment

Abraham Lincoln and the Passage of the Thirteenth Amendment

by Allen C. Guelzo

Explore Lincoln’s role in the abolition of slavery through the Thirteenth Amendment.

Essay

A handwritten copy of the Thirteenth Amendment

The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments

1865, 1868, and 1870

Read the three Reconstruction Amendments.

Primary Source

Title of Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) pamphlet on "Structure and Leadership."

“Women in the Movement”

1964

Read this anonymously written memo calling out gender inequality and tokenism in the SNCC.

Primary Source

The first page of sheet music for "Lift Every Voice and Sing."

“Lift Every Voice and Sing”

1900

Read the lyrics composed by James Weldon Johnson for what has become known as the Black National Anthem.

Primary Source

Cover of the Messenger magazine for March 1920, featuring two torches held by disembodied hands on either side of a wreath, within which features the contents of that month's issue.

“Negroes, Leave the South!”

1920

Read an anonymous editorial calling on African Americans to move north, east, and west for safety and opportunities.

Primary Source

Portrait of Paul Laurence Dunbar, a young Black man, wearing a dark suit and tie and white shirt.

“We Wear the Mask”

1895

Read Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poem, which poses a “mask” similar to Du Bois’s “veil.”

Primary Source