Huntington, OR - 1920s Racism

1920s RACISM

Huntington, Oregon

All White Help

(Click on Photo For Larger Image)
    © 2014 Leon Jackson

This racist café sign (circa 1920s) is on the side of a brick building in the tiny eastern Oregon town of Huntington. Photo taken July 30, 2012. I did a little online research, and was able to find another example of racist restaurant advertising. In the 1926 version of the Old Oregon Trail Highway Guide Book, the Rainbow Café in Ontario, Oregon advertised “good food", “popular prices" and “all white help”. Ontario is approximately 30 miles southeast of Huntington. The Old Oregon Trail Highway was an automobile route roughly following the Oregon Trail from Missouri to Astoria, Oregon. 

Brief Bit of Oregon History:
Oregon has a reputation as a progressive state, but it has a racist past that affects the makeup of the state today. During the 1840s and 1850s, Oregon passed exclusion laws against African Americans. The first exclusion law, passed in 1844 by the provisional government of Oregon, included a ban on slavery and a requirement that slave owners free their slaves. However, African Americans who remained in Oregon after their freedom was granted would be whiplashed and expelled. If they were caught again in the territory within six months, the punishment would be repeated. 

In 1857, when the state constitution was written in anticipation of statehood, an exclusion clause was inserted, prohibiting new immigration of African Americans, as well as making illegal their ownership of real estate and entering into contracts. Oregon was the only free state admitted to the Union with an exclusion clause in its constitution.

During the 1920s, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) blossomed in Oregon. KKK membership per capita in Oregon was greater than anywhere in the nation. Governor Walter Pierce, who took office in 1923, was a card-carrying member of the KKK. Oregon was known for its "sundown towns" that allowed Black people to pass through towns, but required them to leave by sundown. These purposely all-white towns had signs that were posted stating that people of color had to leave the town by sundown. Partly due to such prejudice and exclusion, Blacks are only about two percent of the Oregon population, compared with thirteen percent nationwide. 

Why Aren't There More Black People in Oregon?
Walidah Imarisha is an adjunct professor of history at Portland State University and Oregon State University. I was fortunate to experience Ms. Imarisha's excellent presentation: A Hidden History: Why Aren't There More Black People in Oregon?