American writer and journalist
Douglas A. Blackmon
(born 1964) is an American writer and journalist who won a
Pulitzer Prize
in 2009 for his book,
Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II
.
[1]
Early life and education
[
edit
]
Blackmon was born in
Stuttgart, Arkansas
, and grew up in
Leland, Mississippi
, in the
Mississippi Delta
. He has said that the small town of 6,000 was evenly split between blacks and whites; the county and area, one of plantations, was majority black.
[2]
It was the site of a plantation
strike
among black laborers, leading to extensive
civil rights
activity in the mid-twentieth century.
[2]
He graduated from
Hendrix College
.
[3]
Career
[
edit
]
Blackmon first worked as a reporter for the
Arkansas Democrat
and he later worked as the managing editor of the
Daily Record
, both in
Little Rock
. He later moved to
Atlanta
, where he worked as a reporter at
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
.
[3]
In 1995, he began working for
The Wall Street Journal
and in 2012 became its Atlanta bureau chief.
[3]
While there, he shared the 2011
Gerald Loeb Award
for Large Newspapers for the story "Deep Trouble".
[4]
In 2008, Blackmon published
Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the
Civil War
to
World War II
,
which explored the history of
peonage
and
convict lease
labor in the
South
after the
American Civil War
. He revealed the stories of tens of thousands of slaves and their descendants who journeyed into freedom after
Abraham Lincoln
issued the
Emancipation Proclamation
and then journeyed back into the shadow of
involuntary servitude
, which lasted into the 20th century.
[5]
In 2009, Blackmon was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction for
Slavery by Another Name
.
[1]
[6]
A documentary film which is based on Blackmon's book and also titled
Slavery by Another Name,
was aired on February 13, 2012, on
PBS
stations.
[5]
The film can be viewed in its entirety on the PBS website.
[7]
From 2012 until 2018 Blackmon was the host and executive producer of
American Forum
, a weekly public-affairs program that was broadcast on more than 250 PBS stations in the United States. It was produced in conjunction with the
University of Virginia
's
Miller Center of Public Affairs
, where Blackmon was a senior fellow and the Director of Public Programs.
[8]
[9]
Since 2018, Blackmon has taught at Georgia State University in Atlanta, and leads a major research project in conjunction with the National Center for Civil and Human Rights to identify thousands of forced laborers compelled into involuntary servitude by the criminal justice system under horrific conditions at early 20th Century work camps, such as the notorious Chattahoochee Brick Company in Atlanta.
[10]
In 2023, Blackmon accepted an appointment to a mayoral task force examining issues surrounding a proposed police and emergency personnel training center, dubbed “Cop City” by critics. The 38 members of the group included both supporters and opponents of the training center, as well as members who said they had not yet taken a position on the controversy.
[11]
Blackmon served on a committee focused on memorialization of past victims of mass incarceration at the site, and recommended preservation of ruins of an earlier city jail as an educational installation portraying the history of racial abuse by Atlanta police, memorializing citizens who were unjustly victimized, and honoring the history of protest in Atlanta against police abuse?including demonstrations by
Black Lives Matter
and opponents of the “Cop City” training facility. In the final presentation of the task force findings, Blackmon called the report a call for a “the most sweeping reexamination ever of policing in Atlanta.”
[12]
In the fall of 2023, Blackmon and his creative partner, filmmaker
Sam Pollard
, completed
The Harvest
, a deeply personal two-hour documentary examining the consequences of the failed integration of public school’s in Blackmon’s Mississippi hometown. Written and narrated by Blackmon, and co-produced with Pollard, the film was first broadcast on PBS on September 12, 2023.
[13]
The Harvest
was announced in July 2023 as one of six finalist for the Library of Congress/Ken Burns Prize, one of the highest honors for documentary film.
[14]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
"General Nonfiction"
.
The Pulitzer Prizes
. Retrieved
23 November
2014
.
- ^
a
b
Bo Emerson, "Douglas A. Blackmon discusses African-American labor"
Archived
2013-01-16 at
archive.today
,
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
, 3 September 2009, accessed 17 October 2012
- ^
a
b
c
"Douglas A. Blackmon"
. PBS. 2008-05-01. Archived from
the original
on 2009-04-23
. Retrieved
2009-04-23
.
- ^
"Loeb Award Winners"
.
UCLA Anderson School of Management
. June 28, 2011. Archived from
the original
on March 21, 2019
. Retrieved
February 2,
2019
.
- ^
a
b
"Slavery by Another Name"
. Retrieved
30 December
2011
.
Official website
- ^
Brett, Jennifer (April 21, 2009).
"The Pulitzer Prizes: Ex-AJC reporter wins book award"
.
'The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
. Archived from
the original
on 2011-06-22.
- ^
"Slavery by Another Name"
, PBS, accessed 22 August 2022
- ^
"Douglas Blackmon"
, Miller Center, accessed August 17, 2017
- ^
Larimer, Sarah (2018-10-07).
"
'Our ships are traveling on very different bearings': Writer leaves embattled U-Va. center"
.
Washington Post
.
ISSN
0190-8286
. Retrieved
2021-08-12
.
- ^
https://news.gsu.edu/magazine/crusader-by-another-name+
accessed August 28, 2023
- ^
https://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta-news/mayor-dickens-training-center-task-force-finalizes-recommendations/NAXVFKOP35GYJDOBAOZJY6OTZI/
Accessed August 28, 2023
- ^
"Meet Some of the Black Voices on Dickens' 'Cop City' Community Task Force"
. 12 April 2023.
- ^
"The Harvest: Integrating Mississippi's Schools | American Experience | PBS"
.
PBS
.
- ^
https://newsroom.loc.gov/news/the-better-angels-society-announces-finalists-for-fifth-annual-library-of-congress-lavine-ken-burns-/s/b314cc5d-b4fc-49e3-9e2a-c5b614bf04e6
Accessed August 28, 2023
|
---|
(1974?1979)
| |
---|
(1980?1989)
|
- 1980:
Cathleen Decker
,
William J. Eaton
,
Norman Kempster
,
Penelope McMillan
,
Larry Pryor
,
Tom Redburn
,
William C. Rempel
,
Gaylord Shaw
,
Bill Stall
- 1981:
Jonathan Neumann
,
Ted Gup
- 1982:
Linda Grant
,
Karen Tumulty
- 1983:
Robert Frump
- 1984:
Dan Morgan
- 1984 (HM):
Ted Gup
- 1985:
Paul Blustein
- 1985 (HM):
Jane Applegate
,
Patrick Boyle
,
James Flanigan
,
Linda Grant
,
Michael Hiltzik
,
John Lawrence
,
Paul Richter
,
Nancy Rivera
,
Debra Whitefield
- 1986:
Ken Auletta
- 1987:
Kimberly Greer
- 1988:
Daniel Hertzberg
,
James B. Stewart
- 1989:
Donald L. Barlett
,
James B. Steele
|
---|
(1990?1999)
| |
---|
(2000?2009)
|
- 2000:
Ellen E. Schultz
- 2001:
Ronald Campbell
,
William Heisel
,
Mark Katches
- 2002:
David Heath
,
Duff Wilson
- 2003:
Alec Klein
- 2004:
David B. Ottaway
,
Joe Stephens
- 2005:
Walt Bogdanich
- 2006:
Ann Hardie
,
Alan Judd
,
Carrie Teegardin
- 2007:
James Bandler
,
Charles Forelle
,
Mark Maremont
,
Steve Stecklow
- 2008:
David Barboza
,
Walt Bogdanich
,
Jake Hooker
,
Andrew W. Lehren
- 2009:
Jo Becker
,
Julie Creswell
,
Eric Dash
,
Carter Dougherty
,
Charles Duhigg
,
Peter S. Goodman
,
Stephen Labaton
,
Gretchen Morgenson
,
Sheryl Gay Stolberg
|
---|
(2010?2014)
|
- 2010:
Andrew Martin
,
Michael Moss
- 2011:
Alexandra Berzon
,
Douglas A. Blackmon
,
Ana Campoy
,
Ben Casselman
,
Russell Gold
,
Vanessa O'Connell
- 2012:
Ken Bensinger
- 2013:
Patricia Callahan
,
Michael Hawthorne
,
Sam Roe
- 2014:
Barton Gellman
,
Ellen Nakashima
,
Laura Poitras
,
Steven Rich
,
Ashkan Soltani
,
Craig Timberg
|
---|
|
---|
International
| |
---|
National
| |
---|
Other
| |
---|