Establishment of an African American Press
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The front page of the June 13, 1868, issue of the Freemen's Standard, one of the earliest African American newspapers established during Reconstruction.
Courtesy of Georgia Newspaper Project, Georgia Historic Newspapers.
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The masthead from the April 8, 1876, issue of the Colored Tribune. The paper changed its name to the Savannah Tribune later that year and became the most influential African American newspaper in nineteenth century Georgia.
Courtesy of Georgia Newspaper Project, Georgia Historic Newspapers.
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An engraving of Savannah Tribune founder John H. Deveaux, who published and edited the paper from 1875 to 1909, despite resistance from white printers in the city.
Courtesy of the Savannah Tribune via New Georgia Encyclopedia.
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An obituary for Savannah Tribune founder John H. Deveaux printed in the June 11, 1909, issue of the Brunswick News. Solomon "Sol" C. Johnson purchased the paper upon Deveaux's passing and succesfully published the Tribune into the 1950s.
Courtesy of Georgia Newspaper Project, Georgia Historic Newspapers.
There is no evidence of an African American press in Georgia before the Civil War in Georgia. While papers like Frederick Douglass’ North Star were published in northern states during the antebellum period, Georgia thrived on slavery, and Black advocacy was deemed dangerous by its white citizenry. The end of the war and the implementation of Reconstruction policies in southern states, however, led to new freedoms for the formerly enslaved, including the ability to vote and serve in elected offices. It was in this environment that African Americans began establishing newspapers in Georgia. Among the earliest were the Colored American and the Loyal Georgian in Augusta and the Freemen’s Standard in Savannah. In 1875, John H. Deveaux established the most successful African American newspaper in nineteenth-century Georgia, the Colored Tribune. The paper, which became the Savannah Tribune in 1876, was established to promote "the rights of the colored people, and their elevation to the highest plane of citizenship…. [A]ll other considerations shall be secondary.” Nevertheless, the end of Reconstruction in 1877 allowed for increasing restrictions on African American rights, and the following year, the Tribune ceased publication after white printers in Savannah refused to produce it. Deveaux resumed publication in 1886, and the Savannah Tribune remained in publication into the twentieth century, when other African American newspapers began circulation in Atlanta, Columbus, Macon, and throughout Georgia.