The Grapevine of the Black South This page intentionally left blank SERIES EDITORS Sarah E. Gardner, Mercer University IN the Jonathan Daniel Wells, University of Michigan Print Culture in the South addresses the region’s literary and historical past from the colonial era to the near present. Rooted in archival research, series monographs embrace a wide range of analyses that, at their core, address engagement and interaction with print. Topics center on format/genre—novels, pamphlets, periodicals, broadsides, and illustrations; institutions such as libraries, literary societies, small presses, and the book industry; and/or habits and practices of readership and writing. This page intentionally left blank The Grapevine of the Black South The Scott Newspaper Syndicate in the Generation before the Civil Rights Movement Thomas Aiello The University of Georgia Press Athens Portions of chapter 2 appeared, in somewhat different form, as “The Malevolent Gods of Hatred: Race, Representation, and the Puryear Ax Murders,” in Tennessee Historical Quarterly. Portions of chapter 3 appeared, in somewhat different form, as “‘The Shot That Was Heard in Nearly Two Million Negro Homes’: The 1934 Murder of William Alexander Scott,” in Georgia Historical Quarterly 100, no. 4 (2016): 366–403, copyright 2016 by the Georgia Historical Society. Portions of chapter 4 appeared, in somewhat different form, as “‘Do We Have Any Men to Follow in Her Footsteps?’: The Black Southern Press and the Fight for Teacher Salary Equalization,” in History of Education Quarterly 58, no. 1 (2018): 94–121. Portions of chapter 6 appeared, in somewhat different form, as “Violently Amorous: The Jackson Advocate, the Atlanta Daily World, and the Limits Of Syndication,” in Journal of Mississippi History 76 (Fall/Winter 2014): 183–201. Por- tions of chapter 7 appeared, in somewhat different form, as “Editing a Paper in Hell: Davis Lee and the Exigencies of Smalltime Black Journalism,” in American Journalism 33, no. 2 (2016): 144–168. © 2018 by the University of Georgia Press Athens, Georgia 30602 www.ugapress.org All rights reserved Set in Century Old Style by Graphic Composition, Inc. Bogart, GA. Most University of Georgia Press titles are available from popular e- book vendors. Printed digitally Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data Names: Aiello, Thomas, 1977– author. Title: The grapevine of the black South : The Scott Newspaper Syndicate in the generation before the civil rights movement / Thomas Aiello. Other titles: Print culture in the South. Description: Athens : The University of Georgia Press, [2018] |  Series: Print culture in the South | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018019211| ISBN 9780820354460 (hardback : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780820354453 (pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780820354477 (ebook) Subjects, LCSH: Scott Newspaper Syndicate—History—20th century. | African American newspapers—Southern States— History—20th century. | African American newspapers— History—20th century. | Syndicates (Journalism)—Southern States—History—20th century. | Syndicates (Journalism)—United States—History—20th century. Classification: LCC PN4882.5 .A44 2018 | DDC 071.308996073— dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018019211 In memory of Fuzzy B. This page intentionally left blank The writing of the Afro- American is the stain in the literature of this country which seriously challenges the myth of American perfection. . . . It is a literature of oppression, it is a cry from the soul of oppressed people. It is also a literature of protest, a cry for redress. — Richard A. Long and Eugenia W. Collier, Afro- American Writing: An Anthology of Prose and Poetry Northern Negroes (including those who packed their handbags down in Dixie and got that way) may pass up the Northern Negro papers because white dailies print Negro news, or because they feel a certain guilt in reading [a] Negro medium. But the Southern Negro pores over Southern Newspaper Syndicate presentations. . . . While his northern brother is busily engaged in “getting white” and ruining racial consciousness, the Southerner has become more closely knit. The SNS goes into thousands of homes and carries unaltered facts with it. In view of this fact the SNS is forever expanding, pioneering, and improving these presentations which suddenly have aroused race consciousness. —Atlanta World, 1932