The Black Press in Rhode Island – TONIGHT

The Black Press in Rhode Island will be held tonight, Friday, October 28th at 5pm at the Redwood Library & Athenaeum, 50 Bellevue Avenue, in Newport. The event is free and open to the public.

The Black Press in Rhode Island is a remarkable, yet virtually unknown history.

In 1857 we find Alexander P. Niger, an accomplished typesetter, in the Providence print shop of A. C. Greene. In 1860, the first African American newspaper, Rev. George W. Hamblin’s L’Overture, begins publication.

In 1906, John Carter Minkins becomes the nation’s first Black editor of an all-white newspaper, the News-Democrat, starting what will become a seventy-year career in Rhode Island media.

In 1950, the Providence Journal hires its first Black reporter, James N. Rhea, who remains for thirty-three challenging years, writing on the plight of African Americans locally and nationally, and winning a Pulitzer for doing so.

1968 through 2018 is the longest stretch of Black publications in the state, with six different newspapers coming and going, and for the most part creating a continuous pipeline of information for and about the Black community.

This event is funded by the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities and the Herman H. Rose Media Access Fund.

For further information visit stagesoffreedom.org/riblackpress.