Black New Jersey : 1664 to the present day / Graham Russell Gao Hodges.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Winner of the 2019 Richard P. McCormick Prize from the New Jersey Historical Commission​



Black New Jersey tells the rich and complex story of the African American community's remarkable accomplishments and the colossal obstacles they faced along the way. Drawing from rare archives, historian Graham Russell Gao Hodges brings to life the courageous black men and women who fought for their freedom and eventually built a sturdy and substantial middle class. He explores how the state's unique mix of religious, artistic, and cultural traditions have helped to produce such world-renowned figures as Paul Robeson, Cory Booker, and Queen Latifah, as well as a host of lesser-known but equally influential New Jersey natives.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

"Because of the undeniable resurgence of white racism, Black New Jersey has no choice but to use the past to make the future better." Toward effectuating his clarion observation, Hodges (Colgate Univ.) provides an ambitious, 300-page sweep of African-American history in the Garden State. Building on the advocacy and scholarship of Lawrence Green, Marion Thompson Wright, Giles R. Wright, Jr., and Clement Alexander Price, the author chronologically organizes eight exploratory chapters tracing the persistent development of a strong black middle class in spite of enslavement, de jure racial discrimination followed by de facto segregation, and enduring urban poverty. Well documented are the ways in which black churches, civil rights organizations, and community activists pursued citizenship rights, using tactics from accommodation to strategic collaboration with whites and Latinos to spontaneous civil disobedience. While the breadth of topic and detail in this work are impressive, its underlying message promotes the need for more deep-dive histories on topics ranging from the story of Hagar--a slave executed in Salem County in 1717 for killing its high sheriff-- to the Newark-raised Noah W. Moore Jr., one of the first black bishops of the United Methodist Church. Summing Up: Recommended. Advanced undergraduates and above; general readers. --James Elton Johnson, Rowan University