John Mitchell Jr.: Difference between revisions

| occupation = [[journalist]], [[politician]]

'''John Mitchell Jr. ''' (July 11, 1863 –– December 3, 1929) was an American [[businessman]], [[newspaper editor]], African American [[civil rights]] [[activist]], and [[politician]] in Richmond, Virginia, particularly in Richmond's [[Jackson Ward]], which became known as the “Black"Black Wall Street of America.”" As editor of the ''[[Richmond Planet]]'', he frequently published articles in favor of racial equality. In 1904, he organized a black boycott of the city's segregated trolley system.

He founded and served as president of the [[Mechanics Savings Bank]]. It had anAn impressive building was constructed for the Bank on Clay Street and rannewspaper ads featuringfeatured Mitchell Jr.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/mitchell/bank.htm|title=Mechanics Savings Bank}}</ref> He also served as a city alderman for two terms, and was active in fraternal and professional organizations. He ran unsuccessfully as a [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican Party]] candidate for governor in 1921.

Mitchell was born a [[Slavery in the United States|slave]] in [[Richmond, Virginia]] in 1863, shortly before the end of the [[American Civil War]] and of slavery.<ref name="mitchell">[http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/mitchell/index.htm ''Born in the Wake of Freedom: John Mitchell Jr.''], Virginia Newspaper Project, Library of Virginia, 1996,. accessed 5Retrieved February 5, 2013</ref> His mother taught him to read and later he worked as a newsboy while attending school. He then became a carriage boy for [[James Lyons (Virginia politician)|James Lyons]], an aristocratic lawyer. Lyons opposed Mitchell's education, but Mitchell's mother persisted, and Mitchell attended the school taught by Rev. A. Binga Jr. In 1876, he entered the [[Richmond Normal High School,]] and in 1877 he received a silver medal for being first in his class. In May 1878, he joined the first Baptist Church, and he would bebecame an active member of the church throughout his life, even at one time serving as chairman of the executive board of the Virginia Baptist State Sunday school convention. In 1881, he would createcreated a map to show tofor his classmates and teacher which attracted the attention toof minister to Austria A. M. Riley, who gave him anothera medal for his efforts. He won yet another medal in an oration contest, and he continued drawing maps. His maps eventually secured him an apprenticeship in the [[Bureau of Engraving and Printing]] in [[Washington, D.C.]] at the recommendation of [[John Wesley Cromwell]]. He started his apprenticeship with encouragement and support from a number of prominent figures, including [[Blanche Bruce]], [[John A. Logan]], and [[Frederick Douglass]].<ref name="Simmons1887">Simmons, William J., and Henry McNeal Turner. Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive and Rising. GM Rewell & Company, 1887. p314-320</ref>

In 1883 and 1884, he served as Richmond correspondent of the ''[[New York Freeman]]''. On December 5, 1884, at the age of 21, Mitchell joined the ''[[Richmond Planet]]'', a newly founded black newspaper, and was made an editor.<ref name="Simmons1887"/> He had been a teacher in the local schools. "It was under his tenure that the ''Planet'' gained its well-deserved reputation as a proponent of racial equality and of rights for the African-American community."<ref name="planet">[http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/mitchell/ajax.htm#a_list "John Mitchell Jr. and the 'Richmond Planet'"], ''Born in the Wake of Freedom: John Mitchell Jr.''], Virginia Newspaper Project, Library of Virginia, 1996, Library of Virginia,. accessed 5Retrieved February 5, 2013</ref> He was also a teacher in the local schools.

Mitchell reported fearlessly and campaigned against racist [[Lynching in the United States|lynching]], which increased in the late nineteenth century as whites worked to re-establish [[white supremacy]] and [[Jim Crow]] after the end of the [[Reconstruction era]]. Like [[Ida B. Wells]], he reported lynchings.<ref>{{cite andnews|last=Staples|first=Brent|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/10/opinion/sunday/white-newspapers-african-americans.html|title=How wasthe sometimesWhite endangered.Press Wrote Off Black America|work=The New York Times|date=July 10, 2021|access-date=April 1, 2022}}</ref> Mitchell's condemnation of the lynching of Richard Walker in [[Charlotte County, Virginia]] resulted in his receiving death threats:<ref name="Simmons1887"/>

<{{blockquote> "|Mitchell himself was threatened with hanging at the hands of a Charlotte County mob angered by his reporting of the lynching, there, of Richard Walker in May 1886. Mitchell was sent a rope with a note attached warning him that he would be lynched himself if he ever set foot in the county. In reply, and borrowing a line from [[Shakespeare]], Mitchell had this to say : “There'There are no terrors, Cassius, in your threats, for I am so strong in honesty that they pass by me like the idle wind, which I respect not.”' Then, armed with two [[Smith & Wesson]] pistols, he boarded a train for [[Smithville, Virginia|Smithville]] and undeterred, walked the five miles from the station to the site of the hanging." [|Maurice Duke and Daniel P. Jordan, eds., ''A Richmond Reader: 1733-19831733–1983,'' (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1983), pp. 327-328327–328]<ref>Cited at [http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/mitchell/lynch1.htm "Lynch Law Must Go!"], ''Born in the Wake of Freedom: John Mitchell Jr.'', Library of Virginia</ref></blockquote>}}

In 1896, together with local clergy including [[James H. Holmes]], Mitchell appealed on the behalf of the widow of Solomon Marable for the return of his body after his execution and partial dissection by students at the Medical College of Virginia.<ref>Man and Barrel, Richmond Planet (Richmond, Virginia) August 1, 1896, page 1,. accessedRetrieved November 16, 2016 at https://www.newspapers.com/clip/7474861/httpswwwnewspaperscomclip7474762/</ref> The body had been legally seized by the College's janitor, Chris Baker. Mitchell investigated the case for the ''Richmond Planet'' and included grisly sketches by Mitchell of the events on its pages.<ref>Brooks, Vince. Chris Baker: "Cheerful Among Corpses", OutThe ofUncommonWealth: the Box, NotesVoices from the ArchivesLibrary of Virginia @ the Library of Virginia, October 27, 2010,. accessedRetrieved NovemberDecember 1602, 20162020 at [https://uncommonwealth.virginiamemory.com/blog/2010/10/27/chris-baker-cheerful-among-corpses/ http://www.virginiamemory.com/blogs/out_of_the_box/2010/10/27/chris-baker-cheerful-among-corpses/]</ref>

[[File:Mechanics Savings Bank Board.jpg|thumb|Mechanics Savings Bank Boardboard of Directorsdirectors printed in 1902. Mitchell is fourth from the left in the front row.]]

Mitchell was gregarious and active; he became a leader of the [[Knights of Pythias of North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia]], a black fraternal organization, both locally and on the state level, where he led it into the 1920s.<ref name="planet"/> He was also president of the National Afro-American Press Association.<ref name="planet"/> Mitchell was the founder and president of the [[Mechanics Savings Bank]] in Richmond.<ref>[http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/mitchell/bank.htm "Mechanics Savings Bank" (with image of Mitchell)], ''Born in the Wake of Freedom: John Mitchell Jr.'', Library of Virginia</ref> It was part of the rise of black-owned businesses in the city. Among the bank's board of directors was photographer [[James C. Farley]], who also worked with Mitchell at the ''Planet''.

In a more ambitious move, in 1921, Mitchell [[Virginia gubernatorial election, 1921|ran for governor]], on what was called a "Lily Black" ([[Black-and-tan faction]]) Republican Party ticket (an all African American party offshoot). His campaign was considered controversial and opposed by some Black newspapers, such as the ''Journal and Guide of Norfolk''; editors believed his run would split the Black vote and cost them influence with the [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]] candidate who won the office.<ref name="planet"/> Mitchell finished third behind the Democrat and the "Lily White" Republican candidate.

*In 1996, the [[Library of Virginia]] had an extensive exhibit about John Mitchell Jr. and his contributions to the ''Richmond Planet'' and the community in his public life.

*[[The Valentine]], a museum and educational center exclusively concerned with Richmond, VA's history, exhibits a woodcut portrait of himMitchell with an informational plaque about his life.

*{{cite book|last1=Alexander|first1=Ann Field|title=Race Man: The Rise and Fall of the "Fighting Editor," John Mitchell Jr.|date=2002|publisher=University of Virginia Press|isbn=9780813924397|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YK2TcY7FelcC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false}}