Podcast #35: Ida B. Wells

We’re back with Episode 35! In this program, we’re coming to you live, limited, and socially distant from the courtyard of our beloved Berlin venue ACUD! 

Also available on Spotify, Apple PodcastsRadioPublic, Pocket Casts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, and Acast. You can download the transcript here.

On this sultry September evening, DLS Podcast producer and host Susan Stone took the stage to present the life and times of the unstoppable Ida B. Wells! This pioneering African-American investigative journalist, suffragist and activist was a pint-sized powerhouse. Born into slavery in Mississippi in 1862, Ida’s world opened up with the Emancipation Proclamation, and she became a teacher, newspaper editor, and international lecturer, fighting injustice and racism all the way. Her hold-nothing-back editorials and books exposed and documented the horrific practice of lynching in the American South. On her steely path to justice, she accepted no compromises, making friends and enemies along the way. 

DLS co-founders Katy Derbyshire and Florian Duijsens take up the introductions as we get back into the podcast swing of things after a summer break.   

Show notes:

Ida B. Wells
The People’s Grocery in Memphis
And its historic marker, from https://lynchingsitesmem.org/
Handsome lawyer Ferdinand Lee Barnett
With her children: Charles , Herman , Ida and Alfreda. Archivio GBB
Wearing that button… Ida B. Wells Papers, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library (061.03.00)

To find out more, you can read Ida B. Well’s autobiography, Crusade for Justice, published by her daughter in 1970. Susan also recommends Paula J. Giddings’ Ida: A Sword among Lions. And watch out from January 2021 for Ida B. the Queen by her granddaughter Michelle Duster.

Our theme music is “Little Lily Swing” by Tri-Tachyon.

Thanks for listening! We’ll be back with a new episode next month. 

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