Shoe Shine Boys
1 media/othermiddle_102_medium_thumb.jpg 2023-02-03T22:02:31+00:00 Jim Connolly 46c7b502c79bde22331f06c832c764e9eca6a071 3 4 African American shoe shine boys in front of Ginty's Shoe Shine Parlor at 505 S. Walnut Street, circa 1924. Black job opportunities in Muncie were limited to certain kinds of work through the middle of the twentieth century. plain 2023-02-05T19:33:56+00:00 circa1924 Other Side of Middletown Photographs, Ball State Archives and Special Collections 505 S. Walnut St., Muncie, Indiana Jim Connolly 46c7b502c79bde22331f06c832c764e9eca6a071This page is referenced by:
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Invisible Experiences: Making a Living as a Minority in Muncie
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The fortunes of Muncie’s Black residents would rise and fall with the city’s economy, but they were never as prosperous as their White neighbors. During the Gas Boom of the late nineteenth century, Muncie would attract a large influx of migrants from across the United States. Although neglected by the Lynds, Black Americans would become the most significant minority in the city, drawn there because they found it to be a comparatively open community.[1] While racism might not have been as prominent in Middletown compared to the Southern communities many Black migrants came from, they still faced hostility and discrimination. Later, in the twentieth century, Blacks would gain more civil protection and an increase in their standard of living, through well-paid factory jobs, at companies such as Borg-Warner, and by becoming prominent union members. Despite this improvement, there remained large racial disparities in areas such as housing and education. The city’s industrial decline during the late twentieth century would be especially damaging for them, as they shifted into low paying service jobs. The effects of deindustrialization have made it very difficult for many Blacks in the city to achieve upward economic mobility.
The mass movement of African Americans to the industrial hubs in the north of the United States is often referred to as the Great Migration. Two spikes in this movement occurred between 1915-1930 and then again from 1940-1970. These influxes increased the Black population in urban areas, as migrants searched for work that was more difficult to find in the South.[2] The Great Migration continued its spread northward and its impact can be seen through the experiences of people such as Annie Rose Johnston, whose family moved from Georgia to New Jersey. This experience was common for the African-American community, as the father’s often chose to move so that they could best provide for their children and open up more opportunities than would have been possible had they stayed in the south.[3] Although Muncie was not as large as other Northern urban centers, it was still an attractive destination because of the economic opportunities it offered during and after the Gas Boom and its relatively calm racial atmosphere. As a result, the local Black population increased by 140% from 1890 to 1910, going from 418 to 1,005 Black members of the community.[4]Section by Kenny Deetz, Kane Guy, Samantha Kidder (editor), Colin Lacour-McGraw[1] Jack S. Blocker, “Black Migration to Muncie, 1860-1939,” Indiana Magazine of History 92: 4 (1996): 314-315.[2] Blocker, “Black Migration to Muncie,” 302.[3] Krueger-Scott Cultural Center of Newark, “Annie Rose Johnston Interview,” November 13, 1995. Retrieved from https://doi.org/doi:10.7282/T3DB83W6.[4] Blocker, “Black Migration to Muncie, 1860-1939,” 310, 318.
