Olon Dotson

This is the second of two special features on the racial history of America’s industrial heartland.

INTRODUCTION: IN MEMORY OF JOHN THADIS DOTSON


Leake County Courthouse, Carthage, MS.

Only one storefront shows signs of activity on the square surrounding the Leake County Courthouse in Carthage, Mississippi. Once a thriving block of retail establishments, institutions and offices, all that remains is the stately courthouse which was erected in 19351, and a bridal shop. The balance of the buildings are vacant, boarded, or inactive. A country mile to the west, on State Highway 16, a Super Wal-Mart bustles with patrons, crushes its remaining competition, and serves as the center for the limited physical and social interaction among African Americans, Native Americans (Choctaws), and White Americans for the entire county.

One of my fondest memories as a child was “goin’ to town” with my grandfather, Olon Dotson. After feeding the chickens and cows at the crack of dawn, driving through what were at times, virtually impassable dirt and graveled roads to collect the children (some who came to school only in a pair of overalls with no shoes, living on ‘commodities,’ residing in clapboard shacks resting on brick or block crawl spaces, with rolled tar or rusted tin roofs, potbelly stoves, wells, pumps, and outhouses) he would drop them off at the Harmony Community Center. He would then park the yellow Head Start bus, which was covered in red clay dust, and transfer belongings to his pick-up truck. On occasions, we would ride in his sister’s 1965 Plymouth Belvedere II; however, I was always more excited when we rode to town in the pick-up.


Olon and Clara (on right) Dotson’s 50th Anniversary

“Can I ride in the back Daddy Olon?” “Why sure little Freddy” he would reply, “But you gotta sit down back there and be still.” During the journey to town, I would inhale the fragrance of the Mississippi pines, admire the beauty of the flowering mimosa, contemplate the impressive dust cloud generated by the speeding truck, study the peculiar erosion patterns in the moist stark red clay formations on the side of the road, count fence posts, try to visualize who might live at the end of each long driveway, and gaze toward the ridges and valleys in the distance at the fine new brick ranch homes with carports – and the shacks behind the new homes still standing as a reminder of what was. Often, I noticed that the residents of the new homes, would sit on the porch of their old shacks, for the new modern ranch homes did not have porches. About half way to town, Daddy Olon would stop at a general store – slash – gas station in the heart of the community of Freeny. Through the store’s wooden screen entrance door, I would observe his humble and polite mannerisms with the white store clerk. The Freeny clerk would always engage in small talk. “Who’s that little fella yo got there Olon?” “This here is Freddy. He’s Cloice C’s second boy,” as he handed me a vanilla ice cream sandwich. “He lives way up yonder there in Indian-napolis. My other two boys live up in Gary, Indiana and work with my brother Thadis . . . well, he retired from the steel plant.” “He’s a cute little rascal.” Our journey to town continued. I observed a family perched on the sandy banks of the Pearl River, fishing with cane poles as we slowly passed over the bridge. I waved, and they all waved back. Suddenly, the pick-up came to a stop on the side of the road. Daddy Olon slowly walked along the side of the truck, lifted me over the t-gate, and gently placed me on the road side. He removed his hat, tossed it into the cab, and held my hand without saying a word. After the funeral procession passed, I climbed into the cab of the truck and rode into town next to my grandfather. I was familiar with the degree of respect commonly shown upon encountering a funeral procession; however, never had I experienced such a demonstration of the esteemed southern tradition as exhibited by ‘Daddy Olon’. I recall the local Piggly Wiggly, Myricks’s haberdasheries, buying bags of feed from an unremarkable establishment on Highway 35, the Carthage Bank, and “The Rag Shop,” a fabric store where customers would travel from great distances to rummage through miscellaneous textiles, threads, yarn and patterns for clothing, and quilt making. In “The Rag Shop,” I was mesmerized with the large tins of buttons of all shapes, sizes, and colors and enjoyed the feel of inserting my hands deep into the depths of ‘buttonland.’ My imagination soared while in “The Rag Shop.” Upon finishing our business at the Carthage bank, and strolling through a quaint park with a gazebo and toward the town square, an older white gentleman approached us. “Hey here Olon! Who you got there witchya?” “Oh, this here is my grandson.” “Young man,” he said, bending over and tapping my upper arm with his trembling, wrinkled hands, “your grand pappy is one of the finest darkies this community has ever known.”


Clara Dotson

At the age of seven, I was incapable of understanding the gravity of such a statement. Nor could I begin to comprehend the depths of the racial antagonism, hatred and violence which had recently occurred in and near the community. Under direction of Medgar Evers, my grandmother, Clara Dotson, served as first President of the NAACP in Leake County in 1961 (Mississippi Harmony 58). Freedom Summer had occurred only six years prior to my encounter in the courthouse square. I was not aware of the fact that members of my family had hosted James Cheney and Michael Schwerner2 along with eleven other activists during that fateful season. I was protected, insulated from the ills of disenfranchisement, institutional segregation and the widespread vehemence toward African Americans throughout the communities in Leake County, in Mississippi, and the entire nation. As I stood in the courthouse square, I was unaware of the fact that my family’s resistance resulted in one of the first U.S. Justice Department investigations into voting irregularities.

“So we kept going to the NAACP meetings and telling about how we was being harassed, and testifying about the bad voting problems for black people in Leake County, and we were reporting to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and finally, in 1962, the Justice Department sent down lawyers Bob Owen and Frank Schewlb. We met with them several times and after that Frank met with the circuit clerk and some other officials in Carthage. Then, Frank told us to go and try to register again. We went and there wasn’t no Klansmen around, and this time, the circuit clerk gave us the form about interpreting an article of the constitution, and I wrote down the article that he gave me, and then when it came to interpret it, I said, “It said what it meant and it meant what it said.” The next day I went back and they told me, “Winson you passed,” and Dovie passed too (Anger Winson & Gates Hudson in Mississippi Harmony 44 )”.


Luella Sanders, George Jackson, and Olon Dotson

Nearly one hundred years after emancipation and subsequent reconstruction, the struggle for legal emancipation and reconstruction continued. The principles of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the United States Constitution, which were ratified in 1865, 1868, and 1870 respectively3 had limited consequence relative to the oppressive environment in the southern slave and later sharecropping states. Thus, a century of circumscribed progress from emancipation to the failures of reconstruction, subsequent Jim Crow ‘laws’, lynching, and institutional segregation clearly demonstrates that the ratifications were not enforceable. Notwithstanding atrocities including genocide against the indigenous, gender discrimination, and international imperialism, this lengthy sequence calls to question the structural integrity of the entire existence of the United States of America and its Constitution. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 should not have been necessary. Nevertheless, in Leake County Mississippi, as in thousands of other counties throughout the South, Black folk endured and endeavored while thousands logically and rationally chose exit rather than voice. As Arna Bontemps and Jack Conroy poetically chronicle in their publication, Anyplace But Here: “Old people too tired to move, young ones who enjoyed a favor or two in the South, and others who were just plain scared to leave stayed at home, watched their friends slip away, and tried to understand the thing they saw before their eyes. The impulse to go, as it appeared to them, seemed to work like a fever. It had progressive symptoms. The first might be anger, disappointment, hope, or just a tendency to dream, but the second was always discontent and restlessness. Then eyes that swept the horizon. Finally flight.”(Bontemps 3)

The above-quoted Freedom Fighter Winson with her husband Cleo Hudson chose, on two occasions during the 1940s, to exercise exit to the Black Metropolis; however, and as with many, she ultimately returned to the battlefields of Mississippi. My great-uncle John Thadis Dotson, along with tens of thousands of African American dreamers, arrived in Gary, Indiana in 1918. He had been born to Robert and Callie Dotson in the Harmony Community near Carthage, Mississippi, on June 18, 18904 and enlisted in the military during WWI along with his younger brother Herbert who was killed in action and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Upon his arrival in Gary, he labored in the foundries of United States Steel for more than 40 years until his retirement in the early 1960’s. During his tenure at U.S. Steel, he earned comfortable wages and often returned “home” to Carthage, Mississippi to visit family and friends. Thadis was known for even during casual and informal visits, always dressing in suit and tie. His sense of style, professionalism, and fine cars inspired his nephews, Robert, Cloice’ and later, James Wendell Dotson to pursue formal education, exercise exit, and ultimately relocate to Gary, Indiana. Upon their arrival, Uncle Thadis assisted them with employment at United States Steel Corporation. John Thadis Dotson died in June of 1971 at the age of eighty-one. He was survived by his wife Fannie Dotson (b. August 6, 1895, d. September 1976).5 The couple had no children.

JOURNEY TO THE FUNERAL OF UNCLE THADIS

During June of the year following my aforementioned encounter at the Carthage Town Square, our family received notice of the death of Daddy Olon’s older brother, Uncle Thadis. Early on a beautiful, sunny Saturday morning, we crowded in the family vehicle and began our two and one-half hour drive from Indianapolis to Gary for the memorial services. Gazing through the passenger rear window at the endless fields of corn and soybeans, I fixed my eyes on the glimpses of soil between each row of plantings which appeared to flicker like a film reel at the instant when my cone of vision was perpendicular to the row. After crossing the Wabash River, I began to doze as the landscape returned to flat monotony. I was awakened by the odorous stench of industry and noticed that the beautiful clear blue sky had been filtered by a deep gray haze of smoke. In the distance, I saw a sweeping skyline in a complex composition of vertical stacks billowing white, gray and black clouds of foulness into the air. As we exited toward Broadway, I observed a large billboard ironically proclaiming, “Welcome to Gary • ‘City on the Move’ • Richard Hatcher, Mayor.” We proceeded onto Broadway, the primary north-south thoroughfare and commercial corridor through the city. Retail establishments were present and active, but appeared to be in various states of disrepair and distress. Lee’s Chicken Shack was a visible, active establishment. On my right, I noticed a Burger Chef sign which had been modified to read, “Dotson’s Auto Repair.” Automobiles and automobile parts littered the front of what had once been a family friendly fast food establishment. As we approached the central business district, the streets became crowded with black people everywhere. The brick buildings and their large windows appeared to be covered in a light coat of soot. I could not determine if the Sears Department Store was open or closed; however, J.C. Penney and Goldblachs had clearly been vacated. “What is that smell Daddy? It is getting worser and worser.” I complained. “First of all, its ‘worse’ boy,” my father replied as he passed the Gary National Bank building. “They used to tell me that it was the ‘smell of money.’” As we neared the northern terminus of Broadway, I discovered two virtually identical, domed neoclassical buildings flanking either side of the street, an abandoned train station, and a statue of the city’s fonder, Elbert H. Gary6 saluting the source of the odor. Our founding father, who art in New York City, “Not Louisiana, Paris, France or Rome.” And definitely not in the city we call home! Elbert be thy name. Thy mill has come. And thy will has been done, On the southern shore of Lake Michigan; Upon both the wilds of nature and the laboring man. Just as you have ordained. Give us this day our daily wage, And forgive us our transgressions, Just as we forgive Superintendent Gleason and the other bosses, Who transgress against us daily. Lead us not into “The Patch,” and temptation, But do deliver us from evil. And keep us on the straight and narrow path, For thine is the company, U. S. Steel, glorious U. S. Steel, forever and ever — A Steelworkers Prayer (Gary Bio)

THE SOURCE OF THE ODOR

As the nineteenth century drew to a close, a new principle of industrial organization began to become prevalent. The principle of “integration” emerged. Prior to the emergence of integration, “function” was the primary organizational structure of industry. Integration involved consolidation of multiple functions, absorptions and consolidations as a means to improve efficiency, manipulate capital markets, dominate competition, maximize profit and most importantly, achieve all of the above while operating in a manner which skirts around antitrust challenges. In the case of the competitive struggle in the steel industry, four groups of men, J.P. Morgan, the Rockefellers, the Moore brothers of Chicago, and Andrew Carnegie7 led the charge. “The key men working with Morgan were George Perkins and Judge Elbert H. Gary. Gary, a Chicago lawyer had gained fame and fortune as counsel for the Illinois Steel Company and the partner of the daring and unscrupulous promoter, “Bet-a-Million” Gates, in the organization of the American Steel and Wire Company. In 1898 he had persuaded Morgan to finance and organize the Federal Steel Company, merging ore, railroad, steamship, and iron and steel manufacturing interests. Then at Morgan’s request, Gary became president of Federal Steel and moved to New York City where he was known as a major leader in the steel industry and one of J.P. Morgan’s most trusted men.”(Quillen 7) On the other side of the competitive equation was Andrew Carnegie of Pittsburgh and his confidants Henry Frick, Charles Schwab, and Henry Phipps. “Frick continued as an enemy of union labor to the end of his life and developed the policy of employing southern European immigrants in the steel mills, partly in an effort to break the unions. Charles Schwab was the brilliant young production man who reorganized the Homestead plant after the strike and later became president of Carnegie Steel Company at a reported salary of a million dollars a year when only thirty-eight years old”.(ibid p.8) Ultimately, and in the spirit of integration, these men and their organizations joined forces in 1901 to establish the largest corporation ever created, United States Steel Corporation. Its capitalization of well over a billion dollars constituted a significant percentage of the total value of American manufacturing and a notable percentage of manufacturing for the entire planet. “The list of the original twenty-four members of the Board of Directors read like a roll of honor of the business leaders of the day: John D. Rockefeller, Senior and Junior, H. H Rodgers, J. P. Morgan, W. H. Moore, P.A.B. Widener, H.C. Frick, G.W. Perkins, Marshall Field, Robert Bacon, Abram Hewitt were among those included. Judge Gary was chairman of the Finance Committee, and Charles Schwab was president.” (ibid 19) Under the consolidation effort, it was ultimately determined that a physical consolidation of production facilities was also in order. With Elbert H. Gary at the helm, the company began an aggressive campaign to find a desirable site for a new plant. The officials of United States Steel who searched for a site for the new steel plant had certain minimum requirements set for them. Among these were: 1. The new factory was to be in the northern interior or (mid-west) of the country where raw materials could be easily assembled and the great western market was at hand. 2. A moderately priced, compact area of land either flat or capable of being leveled was required so that factories could be most strategically located for efficient production. 3. There was a need for adequate transportation facilities, including a lake harbor deep enough to accommodate the largest lake vessels in one fleet and railways connecting with the coal fields and markets. 4. There must be a large supply of clean, soft, water for steam, cooling, and gas washing. 5. The factory must be located where adequate labor could be secured or attracted.(ibid 50) In essence, the minimum requirements above limited the site search to the Chicago region and after exhaustive considerations and negotiations, a site at the southern tip of Lake Michigan in northwest Indiana was selected. Not only did the site selection meet all of the criteria above, but it also featured relatively inexpensive land acquisition costs, lower taxes, and a general lack of municipal regulation. Thus, in 1905, U.S. Steel Corporation quietly began acquiring property. Within twelve months, A. F. Knots, working on behalf of U.S. Steel, “had purchased about 12,000 acres of land along the lake front from the Buffington plant on the west almost to Miller on the East, a distance of seven miles.”(ibid 84) The lake front property acquired by U.S. Steel consisted of sandy beaches, dramatic swale and dune topography interwoven with marsh lands, bogs (wetlands), fens, prairies, oak savannas, and woodland forests. The natural environment featured one of the most diverse plant communities of any location in the United States with over a thousand vascular plant species including many which were obliterated. The site was particularly unique in that it contained both “Arctic and boreal plants such as the bearberry alongside desert plants such as the prickly pear cactus.”8 Thriving wildlife on land included white-tailed deer, fox, raccoons, opossums, cottontail rabbits, Canadian Geese, seagulls, indigenous squirrels, hawks, Turkey Vultures, mallards, and Great Blue Herons. Local porcupines and river otters became extinct shortly after the development of the U.S. Steel plant. Remnant species from past climatic changes have managed to survive in sheltered habitats. The moderating effect of Lake Michigan, along with the great variety of habitats within a small area, explains much of the plant and animal diversity (Indiana Dunes). Nevertheless, and with absolutely no regard for environmental implications, the locations for the harbor and blast furnaces were determined, a grading contractor arrived with his “working crew to start to cut down the scrubby trees and tangled vines, level the dunes, fill the sloughs, excavate for the foundations of the harbor and blast furnaces, and fill in the shore of the lake out to the limit allowed by law.”(Quillen 99) A.F. Knots was originally commissioned to purchase land specifically for the factory site;9 however, after assembling over fifteen-hundred acres, he approached Judge Gary with a proposal. “With the money you plan to set aside for this proposed great plant, and with the talent you have at your command, you can make it a model plant, and a model plant ought to have a model city nearby for its employees.” (ibid 88) Recent memory and fear of a similar labor uprising in reaction by wage earners to the paternalistic model city program established by Pullman in which the houses, infrastructure, and retail establishments were owned by the corporation, generated reluctance. “Knotts suggested that a town could be constructed by United States Steel where workmen could be encouraged to buy their own homes and where retail business would be privately owned: in short, a town of free men” (ibid 89). Gary agreed and ultimately the Gary Land Company, a subsidiary of U.S. Steel, was organized under Knotts with its mission to develop a new city, Gary, Indiana in 1906. David Harvey states that accumulation of capital requires “the creation of a physical landscape conducive to the organization of production in all of its aspects (including the specialized functions of exchange, banking, administration, planning and coordination, and the like, which typically possess a hierarchical structure and a particular form of spacial rationality).” (Harvey 81) As a corporate town, developed entirely on capital, Gary constructed more than five hundred homes, a forty-room hotel, a post office and a school house within the first year. Stratification and hierarchical structures based on race and class were incorporated into the master plan from the conception. Initially, Gary was populated primarily by the skilled and unskilled construction workers hired to build the plant and the community. Many of the workers were transient in nature and the population had a relatively high turnover rate. A significant percentage of the construction workforce remained in Gary to work for U.S. Steel in the mill. On June 1, 1906, the population was 334; by January 1, 1907, it was 5,550; by January 1, 1908, it was about 8,000; and by November 23, 1908, it was 10,246. The population figures for November 23, 1908 are based on a rough census taken by the Gary Land Company.(Quillen 162) TABLE I GARY LAND COMPANY CENSUS IN 1908 Nationality Number Irish, Scotch, English, Canadians and Americans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,500 Poles (German and Russian). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,100 Servians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,000 Croatians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 950 Montenegrans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 375 Italians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350 Hungarians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325 Slavonians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300 Negroes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250 Russians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Germans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Jews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150 Swedes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125 Bohemians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125 Macedonians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 Norwegians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 Welsh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 Greeks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Turks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Armenians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 Finns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Belgians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Danes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Japanese . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 French . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Total 10,246 The heterogeneity of the city of Gary resulted in ethnic stratification and at times, violence. Nevertheless, the city’s growth continued to parallel with the expansion of U.S. Steel’s operations. A significant economic slowdown occurred during the years of 1913 and 1914. Many of the workers’ hours were substantially reduced or laid-off from the factory. During this recession, referred to in many sources as a depression, many workers were forced to leave Gary and seek opportunities elsewhere as a means to provide for themselves and their families. Evidence of severe distress was abundant and optimism for the future of the city had eroded. Sentiments that Gary was merely a failed capitalist experiment were becoming increasingly prevalent. However, as the United States entered the war in Europe in 1914, production in U.S. Steel was reinvigorated and increased to unprecedented levels. Sentiments that Gary was merely a failed capitalist experiment were becoming increasingly prevalent. However, as the United States entered the war in Europe in 1914, production in U.S. Steel was reinvigorated and increased to unprecedented levels. “The increased employment in the Gary mills came at a time when many workers had left Gary during the depression of 1913 to 1915 and when prosperity extended through practically all the industrial cities of the nation. With European immigration cut off by the war, the leaders of United States Steel had to find a new labor supply. They turned to the Negro from the agricultural South who was already coming to northern cities in large numbers. Negro workers had been employed on the first construction gangs in Gary, but most of these were transients. A few Negroes were employed when Gary Works opened in 1909, and this number rose slowly, but because of the depression, there was a sharp drop in 1914 and 1915. Following these years, due to the need for a new labor supply, every effort was made to attract Negroes, and they came in large numbers as indicated by the employment figures at Gary Works shown in Table III (267)”.10 TABLE II EMPLOYMENT OF NEGROES AT GARY WORKS, 1909-1918 Year Number Employed 1909 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 1910 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 1911 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 1912 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287 1913 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316 1914 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220 1915 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 1916 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 407 1917 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1072 1918 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1295 Of the Negroes migrating from the South to work at United States Steel, John Thadis Dotson was added to the workforce in 1918. He had just lost his brother, Herbert in the European War, and for what? Thadis chose to exercise exit, and be anyplace but Mississippi. As Sparrell Scott wrote in the Chicago Defender:11 WHEN I RETURN TO THE SOUTHLAND IT WILL BE When lions eat grass like oxen, And an angleworm swallows a whale, And a terrapin knits a woolen sock, And a hare is outrun by a snail. When serpents walk like men, And doodle-bugs leap like frogs, When grasshoppers feed on the hens, And feathers grow on hogs. When Tom cats swim in the air, And elephants roost in the trees, When insects in summer are rare, And snuff can’t make you sneeze. When fish live on dry land, When mules on velocipedes ride, And foxes lay eggs in the sand, And women in dress take no pride. WHEN I RETURN TO THE SOUTHLAND IT WILL BE When a German drinks no beer, And girls deck in plumes for a dime, When billy goats buck from the rear, And treason is no longer a crime. When the mockingbird brays like an ass, And limburger smells like cologne, When plowshares are made of glass, And the hearts of true lovers are stone. When ideas grow on trees. And wool on cast-iron rams, I then may return to the South, But I’ll travel there in a box. Sparrell Scott, in the Chicago Defender Quillen observed.. that the “increased employment of Negroes meant that another large cultural group was added to those already in Gary and separated from them by color, prejudice, and custom. Between 1910 and 1920, the yearly average gain of Negroes in the city was about 500, with the gains in 1917 and 1918 being much greater.” He adds that the “number of Negroes in Gary increased from 393 in 1910 to 5,299 in 1920; this was an increase in percentage of Negroes from 2.3 to 9.6 percent.12 Considering the racially stratified configuration, which had been inherently designed into the master plan of the city, such a significant increase population by an ostracized group presented particular challenges to the social order of the city. For example, when the first schools opened in Gary in 1908 the “thirty or so black children, except for two in high school . . .by year’s end were to be transferred to rented facilities in a Baptist Church.”(Cohen p.8 )


From Children of the Mill, by Ronald Cohen

“This move, of the school board, which has always been included in its plans has met with the favor and better element of the negro residents of this city,” noted the Gary Daily Tribune, although there was some opposition to segregation. What bothered the “better element” was the church’s proximity to Dave Johnson’s saloon. Within a year, a segregated portable was erected a discreet distance from the evil influence, and a black teacher was hired. For Wirt (Gary’s first Superintendent), “we believe that it is only in justice to the Negro children that they be segregated. There is naturally a feeling between the negroes and the whites in the lower grades and we are sure the colored children will be better cared for in schools of their own, and they will take pride in their work and will consequently get better grades . . . it is certain that as soon as they become accustomed to the new situation the [black] school children will become friendly rivals of the other children in their school work.”

Therefore, the die had been cast for “separate but equal” education in the new city.13 As indicated by the above Negro subdivision example, the city of Gary had also developed its residential neighborhood in a context of “separate but equal.” What is clearly apparent by physical example, and in the case of the school and the saloon, is that in Gary, as in the balance to the United States, “separate but equal” is not equal. As Aristotle coined, Jefferson stole, and Slotkin cited, “There is nothing more unequal than the equal treatment of unequals.”

GAININ’ ON YA

In the powerful and compelling introduction to the original 1945 publication of Black Metropolis, by Richard Wright, he explores the contradictions of institutional segregation as he proceeds to plant the seeds of discourse on racial stratification. “Lodged in the innermost heart of America is the fatal division of being, a war of impulses. America knows that a split is in her, and that the split might cause her death; but she is powerless to pull the dangling ends together. An uneasiness haunts her conscience, taints her moral preachments, leading an air of uncertainty to her actions, and rendering ineffectual the good deeds she feels compelled to do in the world. America is a nation of a riven consciousness. But from where did the split, division come?” (Drake xxi) Exiting the Jim Crow segregated South, migrating to a “separate but equal” North, the physical infrastructure of the city of Gary could not maintain the form of institutional segregation and racial stratification designed into its existence. Andrew Hurley, in his publication, Environmental Inequalities: Class, Race, and Industrial Pollution in Gary, Indiana, 1945 – 1980 states that between “1920 and 1930, more than 15,000 migrants, most from Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Georgia arrived in Gary to work on the mammoth lakefront factories . . . the following decade, another 20,000 African Americans came to the Steel City to fill industrial positions created by the wartime boom” (Hurley 112 – 113). Purdue Sociology Professor, Sandra Barnes in her publication, The Cost of Being Poor: Comparative study of Life in Poor Urban Neighborhoods in Gary, Indiana suggests that by 1950, about 75 percent of African American men in Gary worked in the industrial sector. She references the perceived benefit to African Americans by quoting Hurley: “The continued availability of manufacturing jobs through the 1950’s and the 1960’s made Gary somewhat of a mecca for blacks. In 1956 Ebony magazine ranked Gary as the best place in the country for African Americans; by 1969, Gary’s blacks had a higher median income than their counterparts in any other U.S. city.”(Barnes 21) With a 1,213.614 percent growth rate of the African American population during the WWI decade followed by decades of comparable population explosions, the discriminatory practices woven into the fabric of Gary became increasingly threatened by the massive presence of skilled and unskilled African American industrial workers and their families. As demonstrated in the previous section and as Mohl and Betten state: “Like Gary’s white immigrants, the black newcomer arrived in the steel city hoping to fulfill economic aspirations and to achieve a new and better life for themselves and their children . . . But because they were black, they faced persistent problems of discrimination and segregation which white immigrants did not have to contend with. . . The segregation of Gary’s population did not develop accidentally out of housing patterns. Rather, discrimination and segregation in education, housing, employment, public services, and recreation was established and carried out by the city’s white elite – businessmen, bankers, realtors, educators, steel company officials, and local government leaders. Indeed, the history of Gary provides an illuminating case study for analyzing the evolution of racism against a background of working-class ethnic and racial conflict (26)”. During the latter half of the twentieth century, two simultaneous developments occurred in Gary which led to its devolution and to what can be classified as a Fourth World city. The national out-migration of steel production at U.S. Steel rendered Gary as what Saskia Sassen refers to as “peripheralized.” Thus, in a city boasting more than 70,000 steel manufacturing jobs in 1970 and only 6,000 by 1980, a former transnational distribution center which now operates outside of the global system, and has become a struggling manufacturing, production, and financial center, paints a portrait for the city of Gary. In addition, Gary’s historic structural inequalities demonstrate that the city, which was founded on such principles, is apparently incapable of reconciling social stratification based primarily on the construction of race as a vehicle for physical separation and institutional abandonment. Therefore, the severe physical distress and institutional abandonment present throughout the entire city proper, resulting from de-industrialization, historic segregation and discrimination patterns, erosion of a viable tax base, racism, inability to embrace the concept of desegregation and civil rights legislation by choosing ‘exit’ over ‘voice’, fear, despair, crumbling infrastructure systems, disinvestment in urban school systems, and environmental justice issues, qualify Gary, Indiana as model Fourth World city.


Memories and artifacts define the physical and cultural landscape of Gary, Indiana

Notes

1 According to the City of Carthage Chamber of Commerce, the first courthouse was built in 1836 and, after forty-one years, was replaced by a brick structure. In 1910, an new courthouse was erected. After a fire during the early 1930’s, the current Leake County Courthouse was constructed in 1935. 2 In the early sixties, civil rights groups in Mississippi formed the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO) and organized Freedom Summer. Student workers included Annie Pearl Clay, Pam Gerould, Jane Adams, and Carole Grosse Michael Schwerner, and James Chaney. In June, at the beginning of the project, three of the workers, Schwerner, Chaney, and Andrew Goodman were murdered in Neshoba County, thirteen miles from Harmony. Source: Mississippi, Harmony. 3 Three new Constitutional amendments, known as the Reconstruction Amendments, were adopted. The 13th Amendment abolished slavery and was ratified in 1865. The 14th Amendment was proposed in 1866 and ratified in 1868, guaranteeing United States citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States (except Native Americans), and granting them federal civil rights. The 15th Amendment, proposed in late February 1869 and passed in early February 1870, decreeing that the right to vote could not be denied because of “race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” Source: A Political History of the United States During the Period of Reconstruction. 4 Birth and death records for John Thadis Dotson were collected through family oral histories, verified through FamilySearch.org, and will be confirmed through the Office of Vital Statistics of the City of Gary, Indiana. 5 Birth and death records for Fannie Dotson were collected through family oral histories, verified through FamilySearch.org, and will be confirmed through the Office of Vital Statistics of the City of Gary, Indiana. 6 Elbert H. Gary was the principal founder of the United States Steel Corporation in 1901. His major partners included J. Pierpont Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, and Charles M. Schwab. The city of Gary, Indiana, a steel town, was named in his honor when it was founded in 1906. As Chairman of the Board, United States Steel Corporation, initiated what contemporaries called “the industrial wonder of the world.” U.S. Steel’s Gary Works was, indeed, a monumental achievement. Along with building the world’s largest integrated steelmaking complex, the Corporation also saw an opportunity to build a model company-built town. Thirty-seven local residents approved a petition to incorporate the Town of Gary on July 14, 1906. Two years and $42,000,000 later, Gary became known as the “Magic City” and the “City of the Century”. Source: E. H. Gary Bibliography – http://gdynets.webng.com/bio.htm. 7 In 1942, Issac James Quillen submitted a dissertation to the faculty of the Graduate School of Yale University entitled, Industrial City: A History of Gary, Indiana to 1929. The first portion of the dissertation outlines, in great detail, the industrial climate in the late 1890’s which led to the formation of U.S. Steel and ultimately, the founding of the city of Gary, Indiana. 8 To the East of the U.S. Steel Gary Works plant, the National Park Service maintains the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. In addition, the Indiana Dunes State Park features protected dune land and pristine beach front. The descriptions of the lands acquired by U.S. Steel as described in Issac Quillen’s Industrial City are consistent with the literature and references for the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore and Indiana Dunes State Park. www.nps.gov/indu/index.htm 9 The entire construction process of the U.S. Steel Gary works was well documented and photographed with over two-thousand high-resolution images and can be found under the Indiana University The Digital Library Program is proud to present the U.S. Steel Gary Works Photograph Collection at http://www.dlib.indiana.edu/collections/steel 10 Information compiled by Quillen from “A History of the growth of the Negro Population of Gary, Indiana” (unpublished Cornell Master’s Thesis) by John F. Potts. 11 This poignant poem appears in the chapter, “The Exodus Train” in Arna Bontemps and Jack Conroy’s Anyplace But Here. Chicago’s Negro Population: 1910-44,103 1920-109,438. 12 Quillen, whose parents served as teachers in the first schools opened in Gary, Indiana, obtained statistical information from the Bureau of the Census, Negroes in the United States 1920-1932, Washington D.C., 1935, p. 49. 13 Ronald Cohen, in the publication, “Children of the Mill: Schooling and Society in Gary, Indiana, 1906-1960 writes that “Hereinafter, black and white would be separate in the Gary Schools, but hardly ‘friendly rivals.’ While legal under the ‘separate but equal’ laws then comment in Indiana (adopted in 1877) and other northern states, school segregation was not automatic. Northern cities experienced various degrees of racial separation at the time, although most were moving in the direction of explicit segregation. Gary, somewhat early in joining the movement, was hardly different.” Cohen cites numerous sources for this position including, but not limited to: The Separate Problem: Case Studies of Black Education in the North, 1900-1930 by Judy Jolley Mohraz. 14 Sandra Barnes cites the statistical data and research by Raymond Mohl and Neil Betton in, Steel City: Urban and Ethnic Patterns in Gary, Indiana, 1906-1950 to support her position that discrimination combined with de-industrialization ultimately led to the rapid decline of Gary, Indiana.

Olon F. Dotson serves an Associate Professor at the Ball State University, College of Architecture and Planning. Formerly, he was Vice-President for the Indianapolis-based urban Design and Program Management firm ARMONICS, Inc., designing and guiding the implementation of inner-city revitalization efforts throughout the United States. In addition to teaching, Mr. Dotson is currently enrolled in the PhD Program in American Studies at Purdue University.