In the aftermath of the 1898 Wilmington coup and massacre, the national media coverage of the event was shaped and carried forward in very specific, overtly discriminatory ways. That process began with a piece in the popular national magazine Collier’s by Alfred Waddell, one of the North Carolina white supremacists behind the Wilmington events. Waddell deemed those events a “race riot,” and his article, accompanied by H. Ditzler’s cover illustration of a rampaging mob of armed African Americans, became a definitive text in shaping national narratives and images of Wilmington. But even prior to the publication of Waddell’s article, the national media were more than willing to participate in creating those narratives, as exemplified by a November 5th New York Times article headlined “North Carolina Politics: The Combination of the White Voters to Resist the Possibility of Negro Domination.”
Media coverage of other 20th century riots followed a very similar pattern. In the months leading up to the horrific 1921 Tulsa massacre, the Tulsa Tribune published a series of inflammatory articles about the city’s supposed African American crime spree, arguing for example that “the people of Tulsa are becoming awake to conditions that are no longer tolerable” and noting casually that “Tulsa enjoyed a brief respite following the lynching of Roy Belton.” And the day after the controversial May 30th encounter between African American Dick Rowland and 17 year old white elevator operator Sarah Page, the Tribune ran a front-page story headlined “Nab Negro for Attacking Girl in Elevator.” When rampaging white mobs went far further, destroying the city’s African American community of Greenwood, the dominant media coverage—first in Tulsa, and then nationwide—once again framed the events as a “race riot,” a tragic but necessary response to African American violence and destructiveness.
The specific circumstances and histories that contributed to the current, unfolding events in Baltimore—like those in each of these past moments, and those in Ferguson half a year ago—are distinct, specific, and need their own attention and analysis. But the national media coverage of this latest round of “riots” has echoed and amplified such longstanding narratives. Peaceful protests, such as the gathering of more than 10,000 residents in the immediate aftermath of Freddie Gray’s funeral, have been overlooked or ignored in favor of a focus on violent actions. Unfounded rumors and allegations, such as the notion that Baltimore street gangs were uniting to attack police officers or that Freddie Gray broke his own spine prior to entering the police van, have been reported as reliable possibilities or even fact. The most shocking and extreme images have been used again and again as representations of days’ worth of events undertaken by tens of thousands of individuals. Terms like “thugs” have been thrown around by everyone from minor media pundits to the President.
Yet as illustrated by the viral video of Baltimore city councilman Carl Stokes pleading with CNN anchor Erin Burnett to stop using “thugs” to describe the young people on Baltimore’s streets, these media narratives have not gone unchallenged. Indeed, if the traditional mainstream media have in this contemporary moment largely repeated the simplifications and distortions of the past, online and digital sources have offered vital challenges and contrasts to those narratives. From collections of photographs of Baltimore residents protecting each other and the police and cleaning up the city to cell phone videos of police overreach and brutality, young people sharing their own voices with reporters to alternative news stories such as this one on NPR’s Codeswitch blog about a West Baltimore father and son, 21st century resources have been powerfully deployed to revise and reshape the evolving story of these Baltimore events.
While the 1898 Wilmington massacre was still unfolding, an anonymous African American woman wrote a desperate letter to President McKinley, begging for federal help. None came, and the letter itself disappeared from the public record for many decades. At times it can feel that little has changed from 1898 to 2015 when it comes to race, community, and collective narratives. But one thing is certain: We are far better able to hear and include such voices and perspectives, and perhaps can tell different and more layered and accurate stories as a result.
Ben Railton is an Associate Professor of English at Fitchburg State University and a member of the Scholars Strategy Network.
