Health is a Human Right
Race & Place in America

African American Housing

Excerpt from The Negro American Family, edited by W.E.B. Du Bois, Atlanta University Press, 1908
Courtesy of HathiTrust Digital Collections, original from Harvard University

Published in conjunction with the 13th Annual Conference for the Study of Negro Problems held at Atlanta University in 1908, The Negro American Family describes both urban and rural housing where African Americans are living—most of which was sub-standard.  The report includes an indictment of alley housing in Atlanta, characterized by over-crowding, and poor construction and sanitation.

Negro children asleep. Southside of Chicago, IL. ca. 1940, photograph by Russell Lee
Courtesy of Library of Congress, Farm Security Administration Collection, LC-USF34- 038820-D
Documentation of African American housing in Atlanta, 1920
Courtesy of Kenan Research Center at the Atlanta History Center
Chandler, Maricopa County, Arizona. Cotton Pickers Improving Their Housing, From Santa Ana, Coleman County, Texas, photo by Dorthea Lange, 1940
Courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration
Housing. Richmond, Virginia. Twelve dollars a month for three rooms, photo by Dorthea Lange, 1938
Courtesy Library of Congress