Washington, DC

Riots of 1968

Notes, History 390-003, The Digital Past, Lee Ann Cafferata, Department of History and Art History, George Mason University

Points of view

History is written from different schools of thought and different subfields.

• Political history: the story of government, political leaders, electoral activities, the making of policy, and the interaction of branches of government

• Diplomatic history: the study of the relations between nations, diplomats, and ideas of diplomacy

• Social history: the study of ways and customs, of family, education, children, demography (population change), and voluntary institutions (churches, for example)

• Cultural history: the study of language and its uses, of the arts and literature, sport, and entertainment, in constructing cultural categories

• Economic history: the study of how an entire system of production and consumption (or of any of its parts) works, of markets, industry, credit, and working people at all levels of the system

• Intellectual history: the study of ideology and epistemology, analyzing how ideas affect human actions and how the material world affects human ideas

What subfields can you think of?

April 1968

Martin Luther King is assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.

Washington, DC in 1968

• In April, 1968, news of the assassination of Martin Luther King set off riots in Washington, DC. For three days, rioters damaged and lootd stores and other public properties. Police and National Guard moved to riot zones. Downtown, commuters arrived at their jobs and the Cherry Blossom festival continued as scheduled.

Aftermath Statistics

• In the end, more than 1,200 fires burned, damages reached more than $13m.

• 1968 Riots, Washington, DC: http://youtu.be/OMXVfDnIH-8

• “A City in Turmoil.” Washington Post Maps the aftermath: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/metro/specials/mlk40/map/

14th and U Streets, NW

Stokely Carmichael, SNCC

Stokely Carmichael in 1966. Carmichael was head of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, an architect of Black Power, and framed the statement, “Black is beautiful.

On the Mall, April 4

Yale University Lmanian Alexander Collection

Northeast DC, April 7, 1968

Yale University, Alexander Lmanian collection

Riot damage

D.C. riot. April '68. Aftermath. Forms part of: U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection (Library of Congress).