Robert Sengstacke Abbott
Encyclopedia
Robert Sengstacke Abbott (24 November 1870 - February 29, 1940) was an African American
lawyer and newspaper publisher.
, Georgia
(although some sources state Savannah, Georgia
) to former slave parents. Abbott was still a baby when his father, Thomas Abbott, died. Flora Abbott (née Butler), his mother, then met and married John Sengstacke, who came to Georgia from Germany in 1869. Sengstacke's background was remarkable: his father, Herman, was a wealthy German merchant immigrant who in 1847 had purchased the freedom of a slave woman, Tama, from the auction block and subsequently married her; John, their child, was sent to Germany to be raised there. John returned to the States and met the German speaking Flora, married, and raised Abbott with a large family background in cross-race successes. John was a Congregationalist missionary who wrote: "There is but one church, and all who are born of God are members of it. God made a church, man made denominations. God gave us a Holy Bible, disputing men made different kinds of disciples."
Abbott went on and studied the printing trade at Hampton Institute
(now Hampton University) from 1892 to 1896. At Hampton, he sang with the Hampton Quartet which traveled extensively. He received a law degree
from Kent College of Law, Chicago
in 1898, but because of race prejudice in the United States was unable to practice, despite attempts to establish law offices in Gary, Indiana
, Topeka, Kansas
, and Chicago
, Illinois
.
In 1905 he founded The Chicago Defender with an initial investment of $25 (around $600 in 2010 terms). The Defender, which became the most widely circulated black newspaper in the country, came to be known as "America's Black Newspaper" and made Abbott one of the first self-made millionaires of African-American descent. The unique point in history when the Chicago Defender was becoming popular allowed it to be successful. Tension was building in the years surrounding World War I. Blacks were migrating from the south to the industrial centers of the north that were in great need of workers to manufacture goods for the war. Also stories from previous migrants to the north were trickling down to the south and giving hope to the people of the south. Sengstacke, through his writings in the Chicago Defender captured those stories, encouraged people to leave the south for the north. In fact, he even set a date, May 15, 1917, for when The Great Northern Drive, a name he coined for the event, to occur. In his weekly, he showed pictures of Chicago and gave plenty of space for classifieds for housing and wrote how awful a place, the South was to live in comparison to the idealistic North, a place of prosperity and justice. This persuasive writing, “thereby made this journal probably the greatest stimulus that the migration had,”.
Sengstacke, was a fighter, a defender of rights. He had ideas and expectations of his race that he fought his whole life to help them become a reality. In fact, he created a list of nine goals, of which created the Defender's Bible:
The Chicago Defender not only encouraged people to migrate north for a better life, but to fight for an even better lifestyle once they got there. The slogan of the paper and number one of the Defender's bible, “American race prejudice must be destroyed,” is an excellent example of what he thought the paper was capable of and what the ideal experience of an African American or any American should be.
Using The Chicago Defender, Sengstacke fought for his cause. He remembered the history of his nation, especially in his arguments concerning interracial marriage. He wrote, "Miscegenation began as soon as the African slaves were introduced into the colonial population and continues unabated to this day. . . . What's more, the opposition to intermarriage has heightened the interest and solidified the feelings of those who resent the injunction of racial distinction in their private and personal affairs.". He believed that if laws were to restrict one's personal choice in a mate then in was in pure violations of the Constitution and the “decision of two intelligent people to mutual love and self-sacrifice should not be a matter of public concern.".
Abbott also published a short-lived periodical called Abbott's Monthly. The Defender actively promoted the northward migration of Black Southerners, particularly to Chicago; indeed, its columns not only reported on, but helped to bring about the Great Migration (African American)
. Defender circulation reached 50,000 by 1916; 125,000 by 1918; and more than 200,000 by the early 1920s. A key distribution network for the newspaper were the African-American railroad porters (who by 1925 came to organize as the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
).
Abbott met `Abdu'l-Bahá
, head of the Bahá'í Faith
, in 1912 covering a talk of his during his stay in Chicago during his journeys in the West
and was listed as a frequenter of Bahá'í events in Chicago with his wife in 1924.
After inventing the fictional character "Bud Billiken" with David Kellum, Abbott established the Bud Billiken Club
and in 1929 Abbott and Kellum founded the Bud Billiken Parade and Picnic.
After searching through several religious communities for an atmosphere free of race prejudice, even among "light skinned" African-Americans, Abbott officially joined the Bahá'í Faith in 1934 because of its freedom from such prejudice at the convention to elect its National Spiritual Assembly.
In 1919, Illinois Governor Frank Lowden appointed Abbott to the Race Relations Commission. The commission would go on to publish the book, The Negro in Chicago.
Though some of the Sengstacke family became Nazis, Abbott continued correspondence and economic aid to those that accepted his family history, and also assisted the owners of his birth father—the descendants of Captain Charles Stevens—whom Abbott was able to assist during the Depression
; even to paying for the education of children.
Abbott died of Bright's disease
in 1940 in Chicago, Illinois. He was buried in Lincoln Cemetery
in Blue Island, Illinois
. His will left the newspaper in the control of his nephew, John Henry Sengstacke
.
, became a National Historic Landmark
.
A biography was published in 1955: Roi Ottley, The Lonely Warrior: The Life and Times of Robert S. Abbott (Chicago: H. Regnery Co., 1955).
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
lawyer and newspaper publisher.
Biography
Born on November 24, 1870 in St. IslandSt. Simons, Georgia
St. Simons is a census-designated place located on St. Simons Island in Glynn County, Georgia, United States. Both the community and the island are commonly considered to be one location, known simply as "St. Simons Island", or locally as "The Island". St...
, Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
(although some sources state Savannah, Georgia
Savannah, Georgia
Savannah is the largest city and the county seat of Chatham County, in the U.S. state of Georgia. Established in 1733, the city of Savannah was the colonial capital of the Province of Georgia and later the first state capital of Georgia. Today Savannah is an industrial center and an important...
) to former slave parents. Abbott was still a baby when his father, Thomas Abbott, died. Flora Abbott (née Butler), his mother, then met and married John Sengstacke, who came to Georgia from Germany in 1869. Sengstacke's background was remarkable: his father, Herman, was a wealthy German merchant immigrant who in 1847 had purchased the freedom of a slave woman, Tama, from the auction block and subsequently married her; John, their child, was sent to Germany to be raised there. John returned to the States and met the German speaking Flora, married, and raised Abbott with a large family background in cross-race successes. John was a Congregationalist missionary who wrote: "There is but one church, and all who are born of God are members of it. God made a church, man made denominations. God gave us a Holy Bible, disputing men made different kinds of disciples."
Abbott went on and studied the printing trade at Hampton Institute
Hampton University
Hampton University is a historically black university located in Hampton, Virginia, United States. It was founded by black and white leaders of the American Missionary Association after the American Civil War to provide education to freedmen.-History:...
(now Hampton University) from 1892 to 1896. At Hampton, he sang with the Hampton Quartet which traveled extensively. He received a law degree
Law degree
A Law degree is an academic degree conferred for studies in law. Such degrees are generally preparation for legal careers; but while their curricula may be reviewed by legal authority, they do not themselves confer a license...
from Kent College of Law, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
in 1898, but because of race prejudice in the United States was unable to practice, despite attempts to establish law offices in Gary, Indiana
Gary, Indiana
Gary is a city in Lake County, Indiana, United States. The city is in the southeastern portion of the Chicago metropolitan area and is 25 miles from downtown Chicago. The population is 80,294 at the 2010 census, making it the seventh-largest city in the state. It borders Lake Michigan and is known...
, Topeka, Kansas
Topeka, Kansas
Topeka |Kansa]]: Tó Pee Kuh) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Kansas and the county seat of Shawnee County. It is situated along the Kansas River in the central part of Shawnee County, located in northeast Kansas, in the Central United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was...
, and Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
.
In 1905 he founded The Chicago Defender with an initial investment of $25 (around $600 in 2010 terms). The Defender, which became the most widely circulated black newspaper in the country, came to be known as "America's Black Newspaper" and made Abbott one of the first self-made millionaires of African-American descent. The unique point in history when the Chicago Defender was becoming popular allowed it to be successful. Tension was building in the years surrounding World War I. Blacks were migrating from the south to the industrial centers of the north that were in great need of workers to manufacture goods for the war. Also stories from previous migrants to the north were trickling down to the south and giving hope to the people of the south. Sengstacke, through his writings in the Chicago Defender captured those stories, encouraged people to leave the south for the north. In fact, he even set a date, May 15, 1917, for when The Great Northern Drive, a name he coined for the event, to occur. In his weekly, he showed pictures of Chicago and gave plenty of space for classifieds for housing and wrote how awful a place, the South was to live in comparison to the idealistic North, a place of prosperity and justice. This persuasive writing, “thereby made this journal probably the greatest stimulus that the migration had,”.
Sengstacke, was a fighter, a defender of rights. He had ideas and expectations of his race that he fought his whole life to help them become a reality. In fact, he created a list of nine goals, of which created the Defender's Bible:
- American race prejudice must be destroyed
- The opening up of all trade-unions to blacks as well as whites.
- Representation in the President's Cabinet
- Engineers, firemen, and conductors on all American railroads, and all jobs in government.
- Representation in all departments of the police forces over the entire United States
- Government schools open to all American citizens in preference to foreigners
- Motormen and conductors on surface, elevated and motor bus lines throughout America
- Federal legislation to abolish lynching.
- Full enfranchisement of all American citizens.
The Chicago Defender not only encouraged people to migrate north for a better life, but to fight for an even better lifestyle once they got there. The slogan of the paper and number one of the Defender's bible, “American race prejudice must be destroyed,” is an excellent example of what he thought the paper was capable of and what the ideal experience of an African American or any American should be.
Using The Chicago Defender, Sengstacke fought for his cause. He remembered the history of his nation, especially in his arguments concerning interracial marriage. He wrote, "Miscegenation began as soon as the African slaves were introduced into the colonial population and continues unabated to this day. . . . What's more, the opposition to intermarriage has heightened the interest and solidified the feelings of those who resent the injunction of racial distinction in their private and personal affairs.". He believed that if laws were to restrict one's personal choice in a mate then in was in pure violations of the Constitution and the “decision of two intelligent people to mutual love and self-sacrifice should not be a matter of public concern.".
Abbott also published a short-lived periodical called Abbott's Monthly. The Defender actively promoted the northward migration of Black Southerners, particularly to Chicago; indeed, its columns not only reported on, but helped to bring about the Great Migration (African American)
Great Migration (African American)
The Great Migration was the movement of 6 million blacks out of the Southern United States to the Northeast, Midwest, and West from 1910 to 1970. Some historians differentiate between a Great Migration , numbering about 1.6 million migrants, and a Second Great Migration , in which 5 million or more...
. Defender circulation reached 50,000 by 1916; 125,000 by 1918; and more than 200,000 by the early 1920s. A key distribution network for the newspaper were the African-American railroad porters (who by 1925 came to organize as the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters was, in 1925, the first labor organization led by blacks to receive a charter in the American Federation of Labor . It merged in 1978 with the Brotherhood of Railway and Airline Clerks , now known as the Transportation Communications International Union.The...
).
Abbott met `Abdu'l-Bahá
`Abdu'l-Bahá
‘Abdu’l-Bahá , born ‘Abbás Effendí, was the eldest son of Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the Bahá'í Faith. In 1892, `Abdu'l-Bahá was appointed in his father's will to be his successor and head of the Bahá'í Faith. `Abdu'l-Bahá was born in Tehran to an aristocratic family of the realm...
, head of the Bahá'í Faith
Bahá'í Faith
The Bahá'í Faith is a monotheistic religion founded by Bahá'u'lláh in 19th-century Persia, emphasizing the spiritual unity of all humankind. There are an estimated five to six million Bahá'ís around the world in more than 200 countries and territories....
, in 1912 covering a talk of his during his stay in Chicago during his journeys in the West
`Abdu'l-Bahá's journeys to the West
`Abdu'l-Bahá's journeys to the West were a series of trips `Abdu'l-Bahá undertook starting at the age of 67 from Palestine to the West from 1910 to 1913. `Abdu'l-Bahá was imprisoned at the age of 8 and suffered various degrees of privation most of his life...
and was listed as a frequenter of Bahá'í events in Chicago with his wife in 1924.
After inventing the fictional character "Bud Billiken" with David Kellum, Abbott established the Bud Billiken Club
Bud Billiken Club
The Bud Billiken Club was a club for black youths in Chicago founded by the Chicago Defender founder Robert Sengstacke Abbott and its editor, Lucius Harper, in 1923. The Club was formed as part of the paper’s children’s page, the Defender Junior, to encourage readership, appropriate conduct, and...
and in 1929 Abbott and Kellum founded the Bud Billiken Parade and Picnic.
After searching through several religious communities for an atmosphere free of race prejudice, even among "light skinned" African-Americans, Abbott officially joined the Bahá'í Faith in 1934 because of its freedom from such prejudice at the convention to elect its National Spiritual Assembly.
In 1919, Illinois Governor Frank Lowden appointed Abbott to the Race Relations Commission. The commission would go on to publish the book, The Negro in Chicago.
Though some of the Sengstacke family became Nazis, Abbott continued correspondence and economic aid to those that accepted his family history, and also assisted the owners of his birth father—the descendants of Captain Charles Stevens—whom Abbott was able to assist during the Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
; even to paying for the education of children.
Abbott died of Bright's disease
Bright's disease
Bright's disease is a historical classification of kidney diseases that would be described in modern medicine as acute or chronic nephritis. The term is no longer used, as diseases are now classified according to their more fully understood causes....
in 1940 in Chicago, Illinois. He was buried in Lincoln Cemetery
Lincoln Cemetery (Blue Island)
Lincoln Cemetery is a cemetery on Kedzie Avenue in Blue Island, Worth Township, Cook County, Illinois, United States. It is noteworthy for the number of famous African-American Chicagoans buried there, among them several blues and jazz musicians of note....
in Blue Island, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
. His will left the newspaper in the control of his nephew, John Henry Sengstacke
John H. Sengstacke
John Herman Henry Sengstacke was an African American newspaper publisher. He worked with President Franklin D. Roosevelt to have African American reporters in the White House and to create jobs in the United States Postal Service for African Americans. One of John’s biggest objectives was to...
.
Legacy
His home, the Robert S. Abbott HouseRobert S. Abbott House
The Robert S. Abbott House is the former home of Robert S. Abbott, founder of the Chicago Defender newspaper. Located at 4742 South Martin Luther King, Jr...
, became a National Historic Landmark
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
.
A biography was published in 1955: Roi Ottley, The Lonely Warrior: The Life and Times of Robert S. Abbott (Chicago: H. Regnery Co., 1955).
Further reading
- Boris, Joseph J., ed. Who's Who in Colored America (1928-1929), Who's Who in Colored America Corp., New York, 1929, p. 1
- Taitt, John, The Souvenir of Negro Progress, Chicago, 1779-1925, The De Saible Association, Inc., [Chicago, 1925?], p. 27
- Watkins, Sylvestre C., The Pocket Book of Negro Facts, Bookmark Press, Chicago, 1946, p. 1
- Blue, Jr., John T. "Review: The Black Mr. Hearst." The Journal of Negro Education 25.2 (1956): 149-51. JSTOR. Web. 17 Nov. 2009.
- Gebo, Dora R. "Review: [untitled]." The Journal of Negro History 41.1 (1956): 89-90. JSTOR. Web. 17 Nov. 2009.