Students in this course were offered a range of topics to choose from, but were encouraged to develop their interests as they saw fit and as their research took them. Over the course of one semester, the students researched, designed, and created the websites described below.
In The Reflector: An African-American Newspaper Depicting African-American Life in Charlottesville, VA During the Jim Crow Era, Adam Friedman, Sarah Jackson, Jamie Lathan, and David Nicholson closely investigated a previously unresearched African-American newspaper published in Charlottesville between 1933 and 1935. Discussing specifically social life and education for African Americans in Charlottesville, the students also discuss the life and philosophy of the paper's editor, Thomas J. Sellers, and place the newspaper's contents in the context of contemporary national events. An archive of two hundred articles from the paper is also accessible.
In Black Business on Vinegar Hill in Charlottesville, VA During the Jim Crow Era, 1900-1941, Vernida Chaney, Jason Chen, and Moses Miles researched an area of Charlottesville known as Vinegar Hill, which served as the primary African-American business district in the city throughout the Jim Crow period. Incorporating oral interviews, photographs, and maps, the students provide profiles of a number of black businesses and their owners and explore the neighborhood of the business district as well as a nearby African-American residential area. Also provided is a searchable database of African-American businesses in Charlottesville from the turn of the century through the 1920s.
In The Politics of Disfranchisement: White Supremacy and African-American Resistance in Charlottesville, Virginia, 1900-1925, Nicole Tucker describes the persistent struggles of African Americans in Charlottesville against disfranchisement in Virginia in the early-twentieth century. Individual profiles of black political leaders, political broadsides, private correspondence, newspaper articles, minutes of political meetings, and pieces of legislation are all available on the site, and may be read source-by-source, or through the use of a timeline describing the politics of disfranchisement at the state and local levels.