Introduction; PART I: THE MEDIUM AND THE MESSAGE: THE DORSEY COLLECTION AND THE BLACK PORTRAIT IN THE POPULAR PRESS; PART II: OCCUPATIONS AND MAKING A LIVING; PART III: THE WEB OF ORGANIZATION: RELIGION, RACE, CLASS, AND RECREATION; PART IV: WILLIAM DORSEY'S CITY AND OURS; APPENDIX I. The William Henry Dorsey Collection at Cheyney State University; APPENDIX II. Sources for William Dorsey and His Family; APPENDIX III. Philadelphians Most Noted in the Dorsey Collection; APPENDIX IV. "Elite" Philadelphians, 1860s and 1890s; Notes; Index.
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Lane here illuminates the African-American experience through a close look at a single city, once the metropolitan headquarters of black America, now typical of many. He recognizes that urban history offers more clues, both to modern accomplishments and to modern problems, than the dead past of rural slavery. The book's historical section is based on hundreds of newly discovered scrapbooks kept by William Henry Dorsey, Philadelphia's first black historian. These provide an intimate and comprehensive view of the critical period between the Civil War and about 1900, when African-Americans, forma.