Turning Points
in Wisconsin History
Desegregation and Civil Rights
African Americans in Wisconsin had been struggling for their civil rights for more than a century before the movement began to attract headlines in the 1960s. In 1866, for example, Milwaukee's Ezekiel Gillespie successfully sued for the right to vote, and in the 1930s, William Kelley of the Milwaukee Urban League began to fight for the rights of black teachers to work in the public schools. These early efforts were especially difficult because African Americans made up only a very small percentage of the state's residents before the middle of the 20th century. For information about early civil rights history... more...
Original Documents and Other Primary Sources
 | Wisconsin voting and civil rights legislation, 1846-1929. |
| The KKK parades through Madison in 1924 |
| African American housing conditions in Milwaukee in 1955 |
| Former slaves who settled in Madison and Racine |
 | A block-print wall hanging from the Milwaukee Handicraft Project |
 | A survey of black families in rural Wisconsin, 1959 |
| The effects of Milwaukee school desegregation efforts, 1992 |
| Milwaukee residents discuss the city's racial problems, 1965 |
| Wisconsin's African American population from statehood through 1910 |
| A 1950 guide to African American businesses |
| A survey of African Americans in Madison, 1966 |
| Interviews with residents of South Madison |
| A survey of African American housing in Madison, 1959 |
| A survey of socio-economic conditions for African Americans in Madison, 1966 |
| The results of the 1968 survey on employment opportunities for minorities and women |
 | Milwaukee civil rights leader, Lloyd Barbee |
| Fr. James Groppi leading Milwaukee civil rights demonstrations, 1966-1969. |
| Photograph of attorney Byron Paine, ca. 1860 |
 | A detailed look at Milwaukee's black community in 1946 |
| William Rasche advocates on behalf of African American workers |
| An African American woman describes her migration to Wisconsin in 1917 |
| Wisconsin passes the country's first gay rights law, 1982 |
 | The newsletter of the Madison Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. |
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