What was Ida B Wells fighting for?

What was Ida B Wells fighting for?

Ida B. Wells was an African American journalist, abolitionist and feminist who led an anti-lynching crusade in the United States in the 1890s. She went on to found and become integral in groups striving for African American justice.

What did Ida B Wells do when asked to move to the Jim Crow car?

Ida B. Wells became a prominent activist against Jim Crow laws after refusing to leave a first-class train car designated for white people only. A conductor forcibly removed her and she successfully sued the railroad, though that decision was later reversed by a higher court.

Why did Ida B Wells have to flee Memphis?

Wells Took on Lynching, Threats Forced Her to Leave Memphis. In 1892, Wells had left Memphis to attend a conference in Philadelphia, when the office of the newspaper she co-owned was destroyed and her co-editor was run out of town.

How long was Ida B Wells exiled from South?

30 years
She eventually moved to Memphis where she became a leading journalist and civil rights activist. When her newspaper office was destroyed in an angry response to her outspoken writings, Wells was exiled from Memphis, and stayed away from the South for over 30 years.

Why did Ida B Wells lose her case in the state Supreme Court?

The conductor asked Wells to move to a different car because of her race. When she refused, she was removed from the train and sued the railroad company in 1884. The state Supreme Court decided in favor of the railroad company, reversing the earlier decision. Transcript of Ida B.

What happened to Ida B Wells in Memphis?

After 16 years in Memphis, Wells left in 1892, forced to stay away from the city after threats were made on her life and her newspaper office was destroyed. The southeast corner of the intersection features more than just the statue.

Why did Ida B Wells leave Memphis?

When Ida B. Wells Took on Lynching, Threats Forced Her to Leave Memphis. Death threats drove Wells from Memphis, but she was not silenced and would find her home in Chicago. Journalist Ida B. Wells was already out of town when she realized that an editorial she’d written had caused a riot.

How did Ida B Wells investigate lynch mobs?

This was something lynch mobs frequently accused their victims of. “She starts investigating these accusations, she actually goes to scene of lynchings, she interviews witnesses—she becomes really one of first investigative reporters in this period.” Why Isn’t Puerto Rico a State? Ida B. Wells, 1920. (Credit: Chicago History Museum/Getty Images)

Why did Harriet Wells stay in the north?

She also found that in some cases, the “rape” black men were accused of was actually consensual sex with white women. These conclusions incited a riot while Wells was in Philadelphia. It was too dangerous for her to return to Memphis, so she decided to stay in the north.

What happened to Alice Wells-Barnett?

In July 2018, Chicago named a street after her. That same month, activists raised $300,000 to erect a monument to Wells-Barnett, who remained politically active in Chicago until she died in 1931. “At the very end, a year before her death, she runs for a [Illinois] State Senate seat as an Independent,” Giddings says.