New book examines struggle for civil rights in Pottstown

In his new book entitled “The Jim Crow North: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Pottstown, Pennsylvania” (2024, University Press of Kentucky), Pottstown native Matthew G. Washington, PhD, explores small-town racial discrimination, segregation, and the fight to achieve civil rights — not in the South but in the supposedly more enlightened North in a small industrial Pennsylvania community.

His book focuses on the period from before World War II when Blacks seeking a new start beyond the Jim Crow structures of the South were migrating to northern communities to the era of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s and 70s.

Contrary perhaps to public perception, pernicious Jim Crow-style racial discrimination was not limited to the southern United States. As practiced throughout the North — including Pottstown — widespread, but unwritten, discriminatory Jim Crow practices existed in housing, employment, educational opportunities, membership in social and civic organizations, bowling leagues, and even access to graveyard space.

White resistance to equal rights for Blacks, deeply embedded in the nation’s social fabric, was prevalent in large cities and small towns. Washington explains that the dynamism, courage, and commitment of local Black leadership in pursuit of civil rights made Pottstown significantly different from other similar-sized northern communities.

Local civil rights heroes included the Corum brothers (William, James, and Thomas, who became Pottstown’s first Black police officer), Reverend Heywood Butler of the Second Baptist Church, Dr. Daniel Lee, who helped start the Pottstown Civic League, and Newstell Marable, who for decades led the Pottstown chapter of the NAACP.

Another factor made Pottstown’s civil rights struggles different from other northern communities of similar size: Sustained advocacy on behalf of the Black community — almost unique among the nation’s non-Black print media — of the local newspaper, The Pottstown Mercury, under its founding publisher and editor, Shandy Hill. In its editorials, news articles, and “Readers Say” letters, Hill’s newspaper exposed Jim Crow discrimination and the area’s insidious racism.

The Pottstown Mercury literally gave voice to the Black community. Hill encouraged and empowered his journalists to conduct investigative reporting, almost unheard of in the print media of that day. Their reporting sparked national attention on events in Pottstown.

Washington depicts the effort for Black “equalization” or “internal improvement,” during and after World War II; the Alleghany Conference and its launch of the nearby Pine Forge Institute in the late 1940s; and later the establishment of nearby Fellowship House and Farm.

The Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision which struck down racial segregation in public schools, chiseled against the Jim Crow environment that prevented Black children from getting a quality education. The Brown decision helped accelerate civil rights activism in Pottstown; for example, in its aftermath community leaders formed the Pottstown Committee on Human Relations and created its “Pottstown Plan” for ending bias in the community.

“The Jim Crow North” concludes by addressing localized civil rights struggles at the end of the 1960s. These struggles targeted segregation in public accommodations, such as local swimming clubs; exclusion from fire companies; and employment “tokenism” in local industry. Washington winds down his story with the end of the 1960s; of course, the struggles did not end with that decade and continue well into the 21st century to this day.

Although I was born and raised in Pottstown during the 1950s and 60s, I knew little about the Black community’s civil rights struggles with Jim Crow in Pottstown. I was vaguely aware of, say, the historical presence of the KKK and controversies regarding Pottstown’s schools. But I knew nothing about the Corum brothers and Doctor Daniel Lee, The Mercury’s crusading journalism, or Pottstown’s ties to the national civil rights movement. For this reason alone, I found Washington’s book to be an invaluable educational experience.

Thanks to Washington’s book, I can better appreciate the challenges faced by Pottstown’s Black community and the leadership of people like Newstell Marable and the late James Rodgers Sr., Pottstown’s first Black police chief.

I do believe the author missed an opportunity to address one aspect to understanding Pottstown’s specific historical civil rights narrative, the existence of the Pottstown Firebirds (1968-1970) of the Atlantic Coast Football League — and league champions in 1969 and 1970. To try out for the Firebirds, players from all over the country both Black and white came to Pottstown. Their presence in the community, and success on and off the field, contributed to a heightened civic pride that, in part, transcended race.

This was perhaps exemplified by the Aug. 30, 1969, Brotherhood Bowl pre-season game to benefit the building fund of Reverend Heywood Butler’s Second Baptist Church.  The short existence of the Firebirds, I note, did not eliminate racism in the community, as demonstrated by the largely white make-up of the Firebelles, the team’s cheerleaders.

In addition, Washington does not address whether discriminatory behavior extended to Pottstown’s retail establishments, as was widely practiced throughout the South. High Street businesses, mostly Jewish-owned at the time, generally did not practice such discrimination. Based on my own research, it appears Pottstown’s Jewish lay and religious figures overwhelmingly supported the civil rights goals of Pottstown’s Black community.

Currently an assistant professor of history specializing in Black Studies at Prairie View A&M University in Texas, Dr. Washington, grew up in Stowe and attended the Pottsgrove school system. He is thus very familiar with his topic.

Although unable to speak directly with participants and witnesses to the events that took place more than half a century ago, Washington utilized already available witness interviews. He also took great advantage of published primary and secondary sources, especially Pottstown Mercury archives. The notes section alone is almost 70 pages.

Washington’s well-researched book is not light reading; it is clearly crafted for an academic audience. While “The Jim Crow North” can be appreciated by those seriously curious about Pottstown history and Black civil rights issues generally, it will not garner the mass appeal being generated by another, albeit fictional, recently-published book about the Black community of Pottstown, James McBride’s “Heaven and Earth Grocery Store.”

“The Jim Crow North” is available in softcover from various online outlets, including Amazon, and in bookstores.

Lawrence Cohen was born and raised in Pottstown and now resides in Schwenksville. He is retired from the foreign service of the US State Department.