I
^fu..]V1 ONITOR
f NEBRASKA’S WEEKLY NEWSPAPER DEVOTED TO THE INTERESTS OF COLORED AMERICANS
» THE REV. JOHN ALBERT WILLIAMS, Editor
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$2 00 a Year—5c a Copy OMAHA, NEBRASKA, FRIDAY, DECEMBER 26, 1924 Whole Number 494 Vol. X—No. 26
NASHVILLE SEEKS
AFPREHENSIOH OF
RECEHT LVHCHERS
Southern City Feels Keenly Disgrace
of Murder of Fifteen-Year-Old
Boy by Blood-Thirsty
Mob
CHAMBER OF COMMERCE ACTS
Reward of $6,500 Is Offered for the
Arrest and Conviction of
Wounded Youth’s
Slayers.
(N. A. A. C. P. Press Service)
Nashville, Tenn., Dec. 26.—Unlike
Chicago, which permitted a Negro to
be lynched and then allowed the
alleged slayer to go free on a paltry
$10,000 bond, the better-minded cit
izens of this community, southern
though they are, have banded them
selves together and put a price on the
heads of the masked murderers who
took 15-year-old Sam Smith from his
bed in the General hospital, hanged
him to a tree and riddled his body
with bullets.
The boy had been wounded by Ike
Eastman, white grocer, after he is |
alleged to have shot the latter during |
a robbery of the grocery. Eastman
was only slightly wounded.
Practically every organization in
this city has condemned the murder
of Smith. Six thousand five hundred
dollars was pledged as a reward for
the capture of the slayers within two
days after the crime had been com
mitted. Public-spirited citizens and
lovers of law and order stood for
$5,000 of this amount and the state
offered the other.
Public officials have been unani
mous in their denunciation of the per
petrators of the deed. Mayor Hilary
E. Howse, Sheriff Briley of Davidson
county, and past and present law of
ficials of the county are as one in
their effort to see that the criminals
are brought to justice.
Nashville is pround of its good
name. Only four Negroes have been
lynched in or near the city since the
Civil war. The case of Snath is the
first for nearly thirty years. The
people of the city have a pride in
boasting of their fairness and they
are also afraid of the effect such
crimes may exert on the Negro resi
dents of the city and county who, by
migrating to the north, can produce
as hurtful results as they might be
fighting back and seeking reprisals.
The chamber of commerce passed
the following resolution:
“The board of governors of the
chamber of commerce of the city of
Nashville, having met on this, the
16th day of December, 1924, for the
purpose of considering conditions that
exist in the county of Davidson and
the city of Nashville in the observ
ance of tfte law, express our unqual
ified condemnation of the act of
lynching which took place on the night
of December 15, when the Negro,
Samuel Smith, was taken from the
city hospital in Nashville by an armed
mob and hanged.
“This act was done in defiance of
the law, without any measure of Jus
tification, and its perpetrators were
guilty of murder and are answerable
to the law as murderers. The Negro
lynched was in the custody of the
law, and while he had committed a
grave offense and deserved the limit
of the law in punishment, the law
should have been enforced against
him by its regular processes and not
by mob which acted in disregard and
defiance of all law.
“We pledge ourselves to assist in
every honorable way to bring to trial
the parties guilty of the murder of
this Negro, and believe that the ma
jesty of the law must and should be
upheld, and in no other way than by
the trial and conviction of the perpe
trators of this crime can the law be
vindicated.
“We, therefore, pledge ourselves to
raise a fund of at least $5,000, to be
used by the chamber of commerce for
the purposes (1) of offering a reward
for the arrest and conviction of tne
criminals, and (2) of employing de
tectives and attorneys for that pur
pose.”
COLORED EMPLOYEES
SAVE BANK DURING FIRE
Clarksville, Tenn., Dec. 26.—(By the
Associated Negro Press.)—Colored
workers employed on a tie boat at
Cumberland City were responsible for
the saving of the vault and much of
the furniture of the Cumberland City
bank and the Hatfield hotel Sunday
night during a fire which broke out
in the kitchen of the hostelry. The
Rev. J. W. Samuels was severely in
jured fighting the fire. Damages
amount to (7,000.
C. L. Curry, Sr., cobbler. Shop In
rear of 1630 North Twenty-sixth
street Work called for and delivered.
WDbster 3793.
SOUTH AFRICAN WHITES
ON QUI VIVE
Capetown, South Africa, Dec. 26.—
(By the Associated Negro Press.?—
Native protests against the annexation
of Premier Herzog, Unios of South
Africa, have reached the point where
they are viewed with much alarm.
It is said that the premier has his
eyes on Bechuanaland, Basutoland and
Southwest Africa. The first two pre
fer to live under British rule and in
the last-named on'e of the largest
native tribes, the Rebobths, is report
ed on the verge of rebellion.
LOOKS FOR GREAT
BLACK REPUBLIC
TO ARISE II AFRICA
Sir Harry Johnston, Explorer and
Empire Builder, Sees White
Control Imperilled On
Continent.
(N. A. A. C. P. Press Service)
London, England, Dec. 26.—In an
interview here recently, Sir Harry
Johnston, the empire builder who
carved out Rhodesia, Uganda and
Nyasa for Great Britian during his
forty years in Africa, told a corres
pondent for the Chicago Daily News,
that he visioned a vast republic of tne
colored races playing its part in the
balance of world power. In the com
ing clash of color which he envisions,
white control in Africa will be im
periled and the heart of the dark con
tinent will again belong to its own.
“I don't expect to see a black Af
rica in my time,” said Sir Henry who
is 66. “However, it is entirely pos
sible that within half a century all
of Africa from the Zambezi to the
Great Sahara may be one great black
republic.”
Points to Liberia as Example
“Many considerations go to indicate
the eventual success of a Iblack do
main throughout Africa. The deadly
climate in the central portions—the
Congo and the Cameroons—a climate
absolutely fatal to whites, is one fac
tor. The encouraging success of Li
beria in being able to maintain its
identity is another. The rising desire
for independence—the flowing tide of
color—is yet another. Many of the
Negro and Negroid tribes in Africa
are fully capable of independence and
unless their political instincts are de
praved by the ingress of whites they
should be able to take care of them
selves. The African type at its best
is a fine type of manhood.”
Sir Harry is usually considered the
greatest living authority on Africa.
He went out to the Congo in 1880,
worked with Stanley. His scientific
descoveries and researches have made
him even more signally known, hor
two decades he collected fauna, flora,
geology and made an especial study
of its language. He is the author of
the only available work in English on
the Bantu tongues.
KIHTOIt OF CENTURY
MAGAZINE ATTACKS
K. K. K. AS FANATICISM
(By N. A. A. C. P. PreBs Service.)
Glenn Frank, editor of the Century
Magazine (353 Fourth avenue, New
York City), in the December number
attacks the Ku Klux Klan as an at
tempt to “unite in one crusade Pro
testant Christiani’y and the cult of
racialism, welding the two together
in the fires of fanaticism.’’
After pointing out that the Klan
is anti-Negro, anti-Catholic and anti
Jew, Mr. Frank gays: “One of the dis
tinctive contributions Jesus made to
the spiritual future of mankind lay
in the fact that, in the higher realms
of the spirit, he wiped out the fron
tiers that divide races.’’
Mr. Frank states that the spirit of
Christianity and the spirit of racial
ism are opposed, and that “The Ku
Klux Klan has no right to celebrate
Christmas as long as it holds to its
dogma of racialism.’’
“The favored flaunting of the dogma
of race inferiority and race superior
ity,” he continues, “can have no other
end than a world staggering from one
blood-letting to another until civiliza
i tion itself goes down in a red sun
set.
“Here, as I see it, is the internation
al mission of modern biology. There
are superior and inferior men in all
races. Civilization will advance at
the rate we are able, throughout the
world and in all races, to breed away
from the inferior and toward the su
perior. The problem of modem states
manship and of modern science is not
to classify the races into defensive
groups. The problem of * ”*dern
statesmanship and of modem science
is this: To bring together the su
perior men of all races in a vast in
ternational conspiracy to breed all
races to a higher level.’’
Mias Lucile Bivens is home tor the
Christmas holidays from the Univer
sity of Nebraska.
-—----\
A Bright and Happy New Year
V______
OMAHA-* EAST MEETS WEST
By Montagu A. Tancock,
Manager Publicity Bureau, Omaha Chamber of Commerce.
_ t
“What was it the engines said
Pilots touching head to head,
Facing on a single track
Half a world behind each back.”
—Bret Harte.
Fifty-five years ago those engines met. It was the end of
one of the most exciting races ever staged.
Abraham Lincoln was the starter, the whole nation waited
breathlessly for the result and the prize was empire.
It was a race that brought the noise of i«»n and steel and
steam to deserts that knew only the creaking of covered wagons.
It was a race that joined East and West and out of that race
sprung one of America’s fairest cities, gateway to East and West
—Omaha.
President Lincoln fired the gun
that started the race, July 3, 1866,
when he signed an act authorizing the
Central Pacific Railroad to build
eastward from California and the
Union Pacific Railroad to build
westward from the site of Omaha,
until a junction of the two roads
should be effected and America’s first
transcontinental service established.
The act guaranteed to each railroad
the stretch of right-of-way that it
should build upon until the two roads
met. Naturally each railroad desired
to have as long a right of way as
possible. So the race started.
The enthusiasm of the contestants
was proved by the fact that they met
and passed—paralleling more than
200 miles of grading before officials
of the two companies agreed upon a
point of union, at Promotory, Utah.
At that point on May 10, 1860, was
driven the spike that welded together
the East and West. It was a golden
spike. It marked the end of the race
and the blows of the descending
sledge that drove it were reported by
telegraph to all parts of the United
States. It was there that the engines
met symbolizing the joining of the
East and West and at that moment
Omaha ceased to be the terminal of
covered wagon trains and became the
central point on America’s trans
continental railroad highway.
At that date, fifty-five years ago,
Omaha’s population was 14,000. Es
tablishment of the Eastern Terminal
of the Union Pacific at Omaha
brought additional railroads to Oma
ha to connect with the transcontinen
tal line. Population and agriculture
followed; industrial development kept
pace with railroad development; edu
cational and cultural growth advanced
with industrial growth until Omaha
today is fourth railroad center in the
nation, where manufactured products
are valued at $1,000,000 a day, where
distributing totals $1,310,000 a day
and where 60,000 children attend pub
lic schools.
Founded upon its railroads, Omaha
has developed primarily as a receiv
ing, distributing and manufacturing
center. Such development is natural
ly postulated upon the existence of a
desirable trade territory. Given a
strategic location and ample trans
portation advantages, commerce de
velops in proportion to the productive
ness of the territory. In this respect
Omaha is most fortunate.
States directly tributary to Omaha
represent one-fourth of the total
farm wealth of the United States.
This great region extends from a
point some 200 miles east of Omaha,
westward for 1,000 miles and takes in
a great oval shaped area including
western Iowa, Nebraska, southern
/
South Dakota, Wyoming, southern
Montana, eastern Idaho, northern
Utah, northern Colorado, northern
Kansas, northwestern Missouri and
Nevada. There are about 1,500 towns
in this territory and 310,000 farms
averaging 390 acres each.
The population of this area is made
up of the most desirable of native
American and foreign stock. The
high standard of education of this
population is shown by its extremely
low illiteracy rate. Less than two
people in one hundred are illiterate.
The average illiteracy in the United
States is six people in one hundred.
The population of the area is 66%
rural. Its percentage of foreign bom
is 11.
The latest national census estimat
ed the crop production of this terri
tory at about $2,000,000,000 and live
stock on farms as worth about $1,000,
000,000. There are 3,400 national and
state banks with deposits averaging
approximately $400 for each person.
Ten trunk and twenty-two branch
railroad lines, thirteen national and
interstate highways now lead from
Omaha into this territory. Hundreds
of interconnecting lines from a net
work of communication.
From this territory and beyond it,
Omaha receives annually approxim
ately 8,000,000 head of live stock and
68.000. 000 bushels of grain, in addi
tion to cream, poultry and other prod
ucts of the farm. The Omaha live
stock market, which is the third larg
est in the United States* pays ap
proximately $800,000 a day to stock
raisers for live stock received at
Omaha. Omaha’s packing plants in
turn produce food products valued at
$600,000 a day.
Omaha manufactures more butter
than any other city in the world. The
value of this product manufactured in
1923 was $23,000,000 and represented
65.000. 000 pounds of butter. Flour
and mill products produced in Omaha
annually are valued at more than
$12,000,000; alfalfa products add an
other $8,000,000 a year. Omaha’s
manufacturing, however, is not by
any means confined solely to agricul
tural products. In addition to fabri
cation of the products of the soil,
there are more than fifty manufac
tured articles which Omaha produces
on a scale of a million dollars a year
or more. Omaha refines more pig
lead than any other city in the United
States. Smelter production during
the past year totaled approximately
$40,000,000. The fabrication of auto
mobiles, trucks and accessories total
ed another $20,000,000.
Omaha wholesale houses distribute
throughout the United States and to
many foreign countries. However, a
large percentage of this distribution
is naturally absorbed in the territory
Dutlined above. Omaha’s 500 whole
<ale establishments distribute an
average of $1,300,000 worth of pred
icts every day of the year, totaling
5434.000. 000 annually. Among lead
ng products distributed from Omaha
ire groceries and provisions, oil, lum
ser, automobiles and trucks, commis
sion and produce and building ma
terial.
Omaha’s growth in manufacturing
ind wholesaling is evidenced by the
Fact that manufacturing increased
From $193,000,000 in 1913 to $382,
100,000 in 1923 and wholesaling from(
5161.000. 000 in 1913 to $484,000,000 in
L923. During the same period bank
■learings increased from $908,000,000
to approximately $2,000,000,000. Oma
la’s population as shown by the latest
government estimate is 204,000. With
in a fifty-mile radius of the city,
Omaha’s retail establishments trans
act a business of $150,000,000 annual
ly. Leading from Omaha into this
area are two interurban lines, fifteen
bus lines and the railroad lines al
ready mentioned. Mail is dispatched
from Omaha to points in this area on
an average of three times a day. The
high standard of living that main
tains among these 500,000 people is
shown by the fact that 118,000 tele
phones are in use and 122 newspapers
are published among them. Omaha is
the second city in the world ini the
number of telephones in use in pro
portion to population and third in
use of electric lights.
Indications of Omaha’s commercial
well being and development are am
ply furnished in the statement that
while Omaha has attained thirty
fourth place in population among ci
ties of the United States, it ranks
seventeenth in business as shown by
bank clearings. Omaha insurance
companies have a total premium in
come of $38,000,000 a year. Omaha is
the home of the largest building and
loan association in the United States.
Savings in banks and loan companies
average more than $800 for each res
ident. Omaha is headquarters for the
Federal Land Bank covering Nebras
ka, Iowa, South Dakota and Wyoming.
It has a branch bank of the federal
reserve system, twenty-three state
and national banks and ten building
and loan associations.
Keeping pace with commercial
growth, Omaha has concentrated upon
the health, happiness, education and
general well being of its citizens. En
rolled among the healthiest cities in
the United States, Omaha maintains
an efficient and effective Public
Health Department. The extent of
recreational facilities afforded by the
city is shown in the fact that Omaha
is third city in the United States in
park area in proportion to its popula
tion. Thirteen supervised public play
grounds are maintained at municipal
expense for Omaha children. Omaha’s
leading parks provide municipal golf
links where thousands indulge in this
healthful sport. There is also a
municipal bathing beach. Omaha has
twenty-three parks connected by thir
ty-five miles of boulevard and cover
ing 1,400 acres.
Omaha has fifty-six public grade
schools and five high schools. A re
cently completed Technical High
School is valued at $3,000,000 and is
considered the most modem school of
its kind in the United States. In the
Manual Training Department of this
great building it is possible to build
a six room house, which upon com
pletion can be moved bodily through
the main portal of the work room
and so transported from the building
(Continued on Page 2)
AUTHORITIES EXONERATE
NEGRO MAGISTRATE
Philadelphia, Pa., Dec. 26.— (By the
Associated Negro Press.)—Magistrate
Amos Scott, the first colored magis
trate of this city, whom some prej
udiced whites tried to get something
against several times, appeared before
the district attorney with hig books
for an investigation. After several
weeks he was given a clean bill of
health. It was found that he had been
conducting his office to the satisfac
tion of the police department and the
district attorney.
RACE ARCHITECT
WILL COMPETE FOR
$300,000 PRIZE
All California Architects to Enter
Contest—Race Enrtant Has
Been Successful Prize
Winner
(Pacific Coast News Service)
Los Angeles, Calif., Dec. 26.—Over
a quarter of a million dollars is the
price to be paid the successful archi
tect who is awarded the contract for
drawing up the plans for the new $5,
000,000 city hall.
With the assistance of an advising
architect, not residing in the state
and whose salary will be $5,000 plus
expenses, the city will select four
architects, not connected with the con
test, as jurors. They will each re
ceive a fee of $1,000, plus expenses.
All the architects of the state will be
invited to compete and the winning
architect will receive a contract on a
percentage basis estimated to be
worth $300,000.
Only Negro Member
Paul R. Williams, winner of the
Beaux Arts Institute of Design medal
for 1912 and the only Negro member
of the American Institute of Archi
tects, is one of the contestants. Wil
liams entry into the contest has
created great concern among his
many white competitors due to the
fact that he has a reputation of win
ning all competitions in which he en
ters. He has won three national and
four western architectural competi
tions; and recently his design for a
civic center was accepted by a west
ern city of 30,000 inhabitants.
TWENTY HOUSTON MARTYRS
RELEASED THIS YEAR BY
N. A. A. C. P. CAMPAIGN
The National Assocation for the
Advancement of Colored People an
nounces that four Houston martyrs
released on Sunday, December 14,
moda a total of 20 released from the
federal penitentiary at Leavenworth
during the year.
The list of men released is as fol
lows: Issac A. Deyo, Ben McDaniel,
Reuben W. Baxter, Douglas T. Bold
en, Gerald Dixon, Roy Tyler, Jos.
Williams, Jr., Albert T. Hunter, John
Ranier, Jas, E. Woodruff, J. H. Hud
son, Jr., John Geter, John H. Gould,
Jas. H. Mitchell, Edward Porter, Jr.,
Grant Anderson, William Burnett,
Chas. J. Hatton, Robert Tillman, Hez
ekiah J. Turner.
The reductions of sentence making
possible the release of the twenty
men paroled this year and the last
of the Houston martyrs by 1928, were
made as a result of an examination
of the men’s records by a board of
officers of the war department this
spring. At that time Secretary
Weeks informed the N. A. A. C. P.
that 18 men would be eligible for
parole during this year, but in addi
tion to that eighteen two more have
, been paroled.
SHOT DOWN IN COLD BLOOD
Franklin, Tenn., Dec. 26.—(By the
Associated Negro Press.—Geo. Hunt
er, 60, well-to-do owner of a barbecue
Btand in the public square of this
town, was called to the door of his
home recently by a group of white
men and shot before he could seek
cover. He died while being taken to
Nashville for aid. His assailants drove
off in an automobile. He had had his
business for more than 20 years.
GOES TO COURT AT 106 YEARS
Nashville, Tenn., Dec. 26.—(By the
Associated Negro Press.)—Mrs. Maria
Baker, 106 years old, who says she
was once employed by Gen. Andrew
Jackson, was oalled to Circuit court
here last week as one of the witnesses
In a will case.
Monitor—SIX....
JUMPS FROM HOSPITAL WINDOW
Baltimore, Md., Dec. 26.—(By the!
Associated Negro Press.)—Visualising
himself being cut and sawed, and de
ciding that the hospital wag no place
for him, Waverly Purnell, a patient
in the John Hopkins Hospital, wrap
ped himself in a red blanket and
Jumped out a second stflry window.
FAKE CO 1
FILM ECT
FLEECES VICTIMS
Sfick Scamp Promises to Star Colored
Investors in Movies and Rakes
In Considerable
Cash.
LEAVES IMPERTINENT NOTE
Film Organizations and California
State Bnrean of Labor Warn
Public of
Fakers.
(Pacific Coast News Service)
St. Louis, Mo., Dec. 26.—Visions of
moyie careers in which 400 colored in
vestors of St. Louis pictured them
selves riding in limousines and chat
ting intimately with the famous stars
of Hollywood, vanished recently when
Al. Edwards, a fake Negro promoter,
departed for parts unknown, leaving
his future movie stars the following
note:
“To all my movie stars and my
many colored friends of this most
splendid city, St. Louis, I wish to
thank you one and all, for generous
contributions. My only regret is that
I cannot appear before you each and
every one and thank you personally.
I couni, but I can’t, because I am
gone, just gone. You may sing this
to ‘He Come and Stole My Confidence,
etc.’ ”
According to “Variety” Edwards
arrived in the Black Belt and an
nounced he was general manager of
the greatest Negro moving picture
company in the world. Edwards
backed up his announcement with
loud clothes and a smooth tongue. He
opened up an office and sent out word
he needed 100 “beautiful Negroes”
for a film entitled “Jingle of the
Jungles.” A day or two later his of
fice was crowded with applicants.
Special Train for Hollywood
Edwards explained it would be ne
cessary to charge each $1.50 to as
sure their sincerity and that they
would show up when the special train
pulled out for Hollywood, California.
More money rolled in until Edwards
finally left word he would be waiting
for his future movie stars on the spe
cial train which departed at 7:16. On
his desk in the office he left the above
note for his secretary.
War On Fake Promoters
Enraged at the increased stock sell
ing activities of various fake pro
moters throughout the country, the
various film organizations, the Cal
ifornia state bureau of labor and the
Hollywood chamber of commerce are
continually sending out warnings to
the public. Last week Deputy Labor
Commissioner of California ordered
the Klan Kid Kodemy Co. to pay wage
claims of 212.50 for services of child
ren whose parents had bought stock
in the organization under an agree
ment that their little ones would be
employed.
Of the 25,000 persons who are listed
at the various studio employment
agencies in Los Angeles, only one
out of every 600 has a possible chance
of steady employment as a movie act
or. And out of this 25,000 there are
only 45 colored film actors who make
their entire living from employment
in pictures, and not one of them was
asked to invest in or own a single
share of stock in the companies in
which he is employed.
NEW EXTENSION
SECRETARY WITH
THE URBAN LEAGUE
Harriet Shadd Butcher, Who Has
Had Successful Career as a
Teacher, Takes New
Post
New York, Dec. 26.—The National
Urban League announces that Mrs.
Harriet Shadd Butcher, employed for
one year at Howard University and
for seventeen and a half years as
teacher in the Dunbar High School,
Washington, D. C., assumed her du
ties on December first as extension
secretary for the National Urban
League with headquarters at 127
East 23rd street, New York City.
Mrs. Butcher is the daughter of
the late Dr. Furmann J. Shadd, Wash
ington physician who was for many
years secretary-treasurer of the How
ard University medical school, and of
Mrs. Alice Parke Shadd, formerly a
teacher in the public schools of Wash
ington.
Mrs. Butcher is a graduate of
Smith college, A. B., 1906, and has
studied as a graduate student in the
Harvard Graduate School of Educa
tion. She has travelled extensively
in Europe, the West Indies and Amer
ica.
Mrs. Butcher will carry on an ed
ucational program in connection with
the League's activities for improving
the living and working conditions of
Negroes in cities and will assist in
spreading the Urban League idea by
personal interviews, in conferences
and at public meetings.
