Boll Weevil Not Responsible for Negro Exodus

Boll Weevil Not Responsible for Negro Exodus

Boll Weevil, John Hope, Atlanta, Georgia, Cotton, Great Migration

This article argues that the Boll Weevil is not responsible for the Black Exodus from the south but rather, people came up north for economic reasons, including better wages, better hours, and a better education.

WCU, HIS 601/ HON 452 Great Migration and Digital Storytelling, 2014

July 12, 1924

William Horstmann, Erica Knorr

Used by permission of the Philadelphia Tribune Company, Inc. All rights reserved. The Philadelphia Tribune, with 130 years of continuous publication, is the oldest newspaper in the United States serving the African-American community.

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Following[???] the Friends' General Conference Sunday[???], John Hope, president of the Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia, speaking of Negro migration to the North, amid many blame the migration on the boll weevil in the cotton fields but the Negro oved out at the beginning of the World War and came North to improve his condition. "Up in 1914 all colored peopole in the South were thought by the North to be a happy lot, but this is a great mistake," said Mr. Hope. "They left the South because they wanted shorter working hours, better wages, more opportunity to enjoy life, and married couples sought better educational advantage for their children.
"The Negro question is tremendous, appealing to people. The little nations that started the world war did not amount to as much as those people. Negroes have been an asset to this country, not a liability, since the time they were brought here. Negroes were brought North by agents during the war. They found things so attractive that agents are no longer required to induce them to leave the South. A number of industries were helped and saved by the Negroes during the war." He made a plea that Christian Americans admit the Negro into brotherhood.

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