Omaha is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nebraska and the county seat of Douglas County. Omaha is in the Midwestern United States on the Missouri River, about 10 mi (15 km) north of the mouth of the Platte River. The nation's 40th-most populous city, Omaha's 2020 census population was 486,051.
North Omaha is a community area in Omaha, Nebraska, in the United States. It is bordered by Cuming and Dodge Streets on the south, Interstate 680 on the north, North 72nd Street on the west and the Missouri River and Carter Lake, Iowa on the east, as defined by the University of Nebraska at Omaha and the Omaha Chamber of Commerce.
The civil rights movement in Omaha, Nebraska, has roots that extend back until at least 1912. With a history of racial tension that starts before the founding of the city, Omaha has been the home of numerous overt efforts related to securing civil rights for African Americans since at least the 1870s.
The Webster Telephone Exchange Building is located in North Omaha, Nebraska. It was designed by the well-known Omaha architect Thomas Rogers Kimball. After the Easter Sunday Tornado of 1913, the building was used as the center of recovery operations. In 1933, American Bell donated the building to the Omaha Urban League.
Mildred D. Brown was an African-American journalist, newspaper publisher and leader in the Civil Rights Movement in Omaha, Nebraska. Part of the Great Migration, she travelled from Alabama via New York and Des Moines, Iowa. In Omaha, she and her husband founded and ran the Omaha Star, a newspaper of the African-American community.
The timeline of racial tension in Omaha, Nebraska lists events in African-American history in Omaha. These included racial violence, but also include many firsts as the black community built its institutions. Omaha has been a major industrial city on the edge of what was a rural, agricultural state. It has attracted a more diverse population than the rest of the state. Its issues were common to other major industrial cities of the early 20th century, as it was a destination for 19th and 20th century European immigrants, and internal white and black migrants from the South in the Great Migration. Many early 20th-century conflicts arose out of labor struggles, postwar social tensions and economic problems, and hiring of later immigrants and black migrants as strikebreakers in the meatpacking and stockyard industries. Massive job losses starting in the 1960s with the restructuring of the railroad, stockyards and meatpacking industries contributed to economic and social problems for workers in the city.
The DePorres Club was an early pioneer organization in the Civil Rights Movement in Omaha, Nebraska, whose "goals and tactics foreshadowed the efforts of civil rights activists throughout the nation in the 1960s." The club was an affiliate of CORE.
Racial tension in Omaha, Nebraska occurred mostly because of the city's volatile mixture of high numbers of new immigrants from southern and eastern Europe and African-American migrants from the Deep South. While racial discrimination existed at several levels, the violent outbreaks were within working classes. Irish Americans, the largest and earliest immigrant group in the 19th century, established the first neighborhoods in South Omaha. All were attracted by new industrial jobs, and most were from rural areas. There was competition among ethnic Irish, newer European immigrants, and African-American migrants from the South, for industrial jobs and housing. They all had difficulty adjusting to industrial demands, which were unmitigated by organized labor in the early years. Some of the early labor organizing resulted in increasing tensions between groups, as later arrivals to the city were used as strikebreakers. In Omaha as in other major cities, racial tension has erupted at times of social and economic strife, often taking the form of mob violence as different groups tried to assert power. Much of the early violence came out of labor struggles in early 20th century industries: between working class ethnic whites and immigrants, and blacks of the Great Migration. Meatpacking companies had used the latter for strikebreakers in 1917 as workers were trying to organize. As veterans returned from World War I, both groups competed for jobs. By the late 1930s, however, interracial teams worked together to organize the meatpacking industry under the United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA). Unlike the AFL and some other industrial unions in the CIO, UPWA was progressive. It used its power to help end segregation in restaurants and stores in Omaha, and supported the civil rights movement in the 1960s. Women labor organizers such as Tillie Olsen and Rowena Moore were active in the meatpacking industry in the 1930s and 1940s, respectively.
Holy Family Church was built in 1883 at 1715 Izard Street, at the intersections of 18th and Izard Streets in North Omaha, Nebraska within the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Omaha. It is the oldest existing Catholic Church in Omaha, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The Near North Side of Omaha, Nebraska is the neighborhood immediately north of downtown. It forms the nucleus of the city's historic African-American community, and its name is often synonymous with the entire North Omaha area. Originally established immediately after Omaha was founded in 1854, the Near North Side was once confined to the area around Dodge Street and North 7th Street. Eventually, it gravitated west and north, and today it is bordered by Cuming Street on the south, 30th on the west, 16th on the east, and Locust Street to the north. Countless momentous events in Omaha's African American community happened in the Near North Side, including the 1865 establishment of the first Black church in Omaha, St. John's AME; the 1892 election of the first African American state legislator, Dr. Matthew Ricketts; the 1897 hiring of the first Black teacher in Omaha, Ms. Lucy Gamble, the 1910 Jack Johnson riots, the Omaha race riot of 1919 that almost demolished the neighborhood and many other events.
African Americans in Omaha, Nebraska are central to the development and growth of the 43rd largest city in the United States. Black people are first recorded arriving in the area that became the city when York came through in 1804 with the Lewis and Clark expedition and the residence of Jean Baptiste Point du Sable who lived at Fort Lisa for an extended period in 1810. There were also enslaved Black people at the Church of Latter Day Saints Winter Quarters in 1846. The first free Black settler in the city arrived in 1854, the year the city was incorporated.
Downtown Omaha is the central business, government and social core of the Omaha–Council Bluffs metropolitan area, U.S. state of Nebraska. The boundaries are Omaha's 20th Street on the west to the Missouri River on the east and the centerline of Leavenworth Street on the south to the centerline of Chicago Street on the north, also including the CHI Health Center Omaha. Downtown sits on the Missouri River, with commanding views from the tallest skyscrapers.
Christianity in Omaha, Nebraska has been integral to the growth and development of the city since its founding in 1854. In addition to providing Christian religious and social leadership, individually and collectively the city's churches have also led a variety of political campaigns throughout the city's history.
Dr. Susan LaFlesche Picotte Memorial Hospital, also known as Walthill Hospital or Dr. Susan Picotte Memorial Hospital, is a former hospital building at 505 Matthewson Street in Walthill, Nebraska, on the Omaha Indian Reservation. The hospital was developed by Dr. Susan LaFlesche Picotte (1865–1915), the first female Native American medical doctor. Built with money raised by Picotte from various sources, it was the first hospital for any Indian reservation not funded by government money. It served the community as a hospital until the 1940s, and has had a variety of other uses since. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1993.
North 24th Street is a two-way street that runs south–north in the North Omaha area of Omaha, Nebraska, United States. With the street beginning at Dodge Street, the historically significant section of the street runs from Cuming Street to Ames Avenue. A portion of North 24th near Lake Street is considered the "Main Street" of the Near North Side, and was historically referred to as "The Street of Dreams." The corridor is widely considered the heart of Omaha's African-American community.
Bertha Calloway was an African-American community activist and historian in North Omaha, Nebraska. The founder of the Negro History Society and the Great Plains Black History Museum, Calloway won awards from several organizations for her activism in the community and Nebraska. "I Love Black History" was the former website for the Bertha W. Calloway Center for the Research and Study of African and African-American History, Art, and Culture and the Great Plains Black History Museum before it.
Hospitals in Omaha, Nebraska have been integral to the city's growth since its founding in 1857. The city has a number of hospitals that were founded by religious groups, and has many medical centers resultant from the mergers of various hospitals. Nebraska is also home to a VA facility that was the only hospital in the United States with a nuclear reactor.
Fair Deal Cafe was a historically significant diner for the African American community in North Omaha, Nebraska. Once known as the "Black City Hall", Fair Deal was located at North 24th & Burdette in the Near North Omaha neighborhood from 1954 - 2003.
TheOmaha Star is a newspaper founded in 1938 in North Omaha, Nebraska, by Mildred Brown and her husband S. Edward Gilbert. Housed in the historic Omaha Star building in the Near North Side neighborhood, today the Omaha Star is the only remaining African-American newspaper in Omaha. It may be the only newspaper in the United States started by an African-American woman.
