African Americans in San Francisco and Oakland
There are stacks of tomes about the Second Great Migration of African Americans who trekked from southern and northern U.S. cities to California in the early 1940s. Isabel Wilkerson’s exhaustively-researched book, The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration, is arguably the best. The Golden State held promise for these explorers, who sought better weather climates and refuge from southern racism and northern segregation. Blacks migrating North thought that escaping the cotton-picking industry and lynchings would be better, but instead found discriminatory housing laws and meager weekly wages from jobs as cooks, dishwashers, maids, janitors and railroad porters. The California sun drew them to better paying unskilled and skilled jobs in the U.S. defense industry in the Bay Area. In the 1960s many blacks with degrees from mostly historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) found white-collar employment with companies like IBM and other tech companies in the fledgling Silicon Valley. Fast forward to the 21st century. African Americans in San Francisco and Oakland are now challenged by high housing costs that are driving them in droves from their homes, culture, neighborhoods, and businesses to less expensive parts of the state, or out of California altogether. The African American population in San Francisco is below 6 percent and Oakland’s black population has dropped 25 percent in recent years. If current trends continue, according to an article in the Guardian newspaper, the black population in Oakland could fall to 16 percent over the next decade. In this photo essay, the author samples a few African American institutions that are emblematic of the state of African Americans in San Francisco and Oakland.
Featured Articles
The following entries have been selected to help guide readers who want to understand more about African Americans in San Francisco and Oakland. (Access to the following articles is available only to subscribers.)
Subject Entries
- Second Great Migration
- Historically Black Colleges and Universities
- African-Americans in California, to 1895
- African-Americans in California, 1890-Present
- San Francisco and Oakland, California
- Gentrification in San Francisco, 1940s-1970s
- The History of Black San Francisco
- The Black Church
- Gospel Music
Biographies
- Isabel Wilkerson
- Howard Thurman
- Edwin Hawkins
- Malcolm X
- Maya Angelou
- Amiri Baraka
- Terry McMillan
- Toni Morrison
- Oprah Winfrey
- Hugh Masekela
Links to Digital Materials
- The Loneliness of Being Black in San Francisco
- Data Prove the Truth of "The Last Black Man in San Francisco"
- The Dream vs. Reality: On Being Black in San Francisco
- 'We're being pushed out': the displacement of black Oakland
- The East Bay's Changing Demographics
- New Map Shows the Decline of San Francisco's Black Population
- Racial Segregation in the San Francisco Bay Area
- Third Baptist Church of San Francisco
- The Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples
- 'A force of love': Remembering beloved Oakland priest Father Jay Matthews
- The Story of the Edwin Hawkins Singers' 'Oh Happy Day'
- Sam Jordan's, San Francisco's oldest black-owned bar, to close after more than 60 years in business
- Charles Blades Barber Spa
- Marcus Books, the Nation's Oldest Black-Centric Bookstore, Lands New Fillmore Location
- Mixx Collection
- Fillmore Heritage Center Equity Partners