G-d Bless doctoral dissertations, gives people something to do, something to write and sometimes, it is of interest to people outside of academia.
The dissertation that may be of interest to y’all is “Changing Race, Changing Place: Racial, occupational, and residential patterns in Shaw, Washington, DC, 1880-1920” by Karl John Byrand, Doctor of Philosophy, Univ of Maryland, Department of Geography. Byrand does what I’m planning/ trying to do, but on a smaller scale. I didn’t photocopy all the pages (’cause that would violate copyright and I didn’t have enough cash to copy all I needed anyway), but he looks at the 1300 block of T, 1200 blk of 13th and the 900 blk of R, and if he looked at other blocks I don’t know. What I do know is that it was a small sample and he was mainly interested in alleys, and alley dwellers.
The abstract of this reads as such:
During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, increasing black migration from the South changed the social structure of border cities such as Washington, DC. Prior to 1880, many of the District’s black residents were confined to mini-ghettos within alleys; however, around the turn of the century, specific sections of the city underwent the process of racial concentration, forming large, predominantly black enclaves. Shaw, a neighborhood in northwest Washington, DC, was one of these areas.
The summary of this paper, just in case you never make it over to Hornbake Library, where this sits is:
The study area’s overall population had grown by 18.5 percent since 1910, as compared to the 32.2 percent increase by 24 percent, as compared to the District’s 16 percent growth between 1910 and 1920….. The data show increasing residential clustering based on skin tone, and perhaps ethnicity, over the previous periods with whites clustering together even more than previously, with more packing onto fewer blocks, perhaps in reaction to the other blocks becoming black/ mulatto dominated. Moreover, the rate of address sharing by white household heads had progressively increased from 12.7 percent in 1880 to 41.2 percent; now, a greater proportion of whites shared single residences than did blacks or mulattoes…. By 1920, Shaw had become the black business, entertainment, and residential community in Washington, DC. It would remain a lively center for black activity until after the Second World War, when many of Shaw’s middle-class black residents would seek housing further from the city’s core. After that, businesses and other services in the neighborhood would decline.