The Jim Crow South

In the early twentieth century, central Arkansas found itself in the depths of the Jim Crow south. The Pulaski Heights area in Little Rock advertised as a “no negroes” neighborhood.

Daily Arkansas Gazette. “Pulaski Heights: No Negroes and No Shanties” Advertisement. Sunday, February 19, 1905, page 2.

Little Rock wasn’t the only area in central Arkansas experiencing racial disparagement. Faulkner County (present-day Conway) practiced what was known as whitecapping.[1]This practice consisted of whites posting notices on the houses of African Americans advising them to “sell out, rent out, skin out or leave out” by a certain time because “Negroes are getting too thick around here.” If they did not leave, the notices advised that the next time “we ask you it will be with powder and shot and about forty feet of rope. Signed by twenty white citizens.” On the reverse side of the notice, the following inscription appeared: “Always room for one more. Be wise: don’t try to fool with us.” Underneath the words, a menacing pen and ink sketch of “a negro hanging from a tree with a number of men standing around pointing guns at the dangling body” completed the notice. The intimidation did not stop at posted notices as for several weeks, “negro churches and school houses north and east of Conway” were burned.[2]

[1] Daily Arkansas Gazette. “Try to Drive Negroes Away.” Wednesday, March 14, 1906, page 6.

[2] Daily Arkansas Gazette, “Whitecapping in Faulkner County.” Thursday, March 15, 1906, page 4.

[2] Daily Arkansas Gazette, “Whitecapping in Faulkner County.” Thursday, March 15, 1906, page 4.

Daily Arkansas Gazette. “Try to Drive Negroes Away.” Wednesday, March 14, 1906, page 6.