Ida b wells children
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Ida B. Wells
(1862-1931)
Who Was Ida B. Wells?
Ida B. Wells was an African American journalist, abolitionist and feminist who led an anti-lynching crusade in the United States in the 1890s. She went on to found and become integral in groups striving for African American justice.
Early Life, Family and Education
Born an enslaved person in Holly Springs, Mississippi, on July 16, 1862, Wells was the oldest daughter of James and Lizzie Wells. The Wells family, as well as the rest of the enslaved people of the Confederate states, were decreed free by the Union thanks to the Emancipation Proclamation about six months after Ida's birth.
Living in Mississippi as African Americans, they faced racial prejudices and were restricted by discriminatory rules and practices.
Wells' parents were active in the Republican Party during Reconstruction. Her father, James, was involved with the Freedman’s Aid Society and helped start Shaw University, a school for the newly freed enslaved people (now Rust College), and served on the first board of trustees.
It was at Shaw University that Well
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Ida B. Wells
American journalist and civil rights activist (1862–1931)
For the American lawyer, see Ida V. Wells.
Ida Bell Wells-Barnett (July 16, 1862 – March 25, 1931) was an American investigative journalist, sociologist, educator, and early leader in the civil rights movement. She was one of the founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Wells dedicated her career to combating prejudice and violence, and advocating for African-American equality—especially that of women.
Throughout the 1890s, Wells documented lynching of African-Americans in the United States in articles and through pamphlets such as Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in all its Phases and The Red Record, which debunked the fallacy frequently voiced by whites at the time that all Black lynching victims were guilty of crimes. Wells exposed the brutality of lynching, and analyzed its sociology, arguing that whites used lynching to terrorize African Americans in the South because they represented economic and political competition—and thus a threat of loss of power—for
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Biography of Ida B. Wells
The Center for Women's History and Leadership
Center for Women's History and Leadership
1730 Chicago Avenue
Evanston, IL 60201
info@franceswillardhouse.org12018-11-08T21:12:21-08:00The Center for Women's History and Leadership396bd2bebf501b08ca215cf721fbba097eb2e1a2304258image_header2019-03-07T19:09:13-08:00The Center for Women's History and Leadership396bd2bebf501b08ca215cf721fbba097eb2e1a2
Ida B. Wells
Ida B. Wells (1862-1931) was an educator and journalist who began her civil rights activism in response to racist incidents she experienced in Memphis, Tennessee. Born into slavery in Mississippi, Wells had moved to Memphis in 1883 to further her teaching career, working to support herself and her siblings after her parents died in a yellow fever epidemic.In 1884, Wells was forcibly removed from a train car because of her race. She sued the railr
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