ETHNC 5900 Methodology: African Americans & Black Americans
Collections by or about African Americans and Black Americans
Contains transcripts of interviews with African Americans living in Utah. Topics include family life, work, religion, discrimination, the civil rights movement, and relations with the white, primarily Mormon, majority in Utah. Participants also discuss the 1980 murder of Theodore Fields and David Martin by a white supremacist serial killer and Ogden's notorious 25th Street. 90 transcripts have been digitized.
- MS 0473 Carbon County Coal Strike Records, 1906-1973 [finding aid]
Contains original documents and photocopies of transcripts, correspondence, flyers, articles, and other sources documenting the Carbon County Coal Strike of 1933. The conflict was primarily between 2 competing miners' unions, the National Miner's Union (NMU) and the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), fueled by the preexisting rivalry between the towns of Price and Helper. Helper, which had a large immigrant population, joined the NMU, while Price, which had a large American-born population, backed the UMWA in response. Violence exploded when the NMU workers went on strike and the UMWA did not. The collection also contains materials that focus on the 1925 lynching of Black coal miner Robert Marshall, supposedly in retaliation for the shooting of J. Milton Burns, by people from Price and the surrounding area. 19 documents have been digitized.
- P0160 Blacks in Utah Photograph Collection, 1950-1960 [finding aid]
Consists of 10 photographs of the first African Americans in Utah and several generations of their descendants. Included are a photograph of Don Freeman Bankhead, the first free Black man born in Utah, and relatives of Green Flake, an enslaved Black man from North Carolina who traveled to Nauvoo, Illinois, and later the Salt Lake Valley with James Flake. All 10 photographs have been digitized.
- P0858 Fort Douglas Photograph Collection, 1859-1991 [finding aid]
Contains 275 images reflecting the history of Fort Douglas. Some photographs depict Black troops, including members of the 24th Infantry Regiment which consisted of Black enlisted soldiers and white officers and fought in the Spanish American War. The entire collection has been digitized.
