1. Milwaukee Segregation
1950s-Today

2. Housing Segregation in Milwaukee: 1950s & 1960s
Discriminatory laws & lending practices (pre-1960s)
Most African Americans lived in a single neighborhood: North and Northwest of downtown
90% of subdivisions:
Laid out with covenants (rules)
No sale of property to people of color
Informal agreements with realtors, lenders, & landlords
Not illegal until 1968
Most cities were similar

4. Tried to Move... Landlords refused to rent to them
Suddenly rented to someone else
Rent would be higher than advertised
Banks refused to lend them money
“White flight” to the suburbs post Fair Housing Act
1960: 660,000 white residents
2000: 298,000 white residents
Left = less tax $ = less $ for schools, housing, etc.
QUESTION #1

5. Revision: 1962 Alderwoman Vel Phillips
Introduced to Milwaukee Common Council 1st ordinance to reverse housing discrimination
Defeated 18:1 (her’s was the “1”); similar votes 3Xs over 6 yrs
1967 & ‘68 Milwaukee’s NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) Youth Council demand fair housing law
Picketed alders
Marched for 200 nights
After Martin Luther King, Jr. assassination
Congress passed national Fair Housing Act
April 20, 1968 Milwaukee passes ordinance
Vel Phillips Clip QUESTION #2

6. March Across 16th Street Bridge
Menominee River industrial district (south of I-94) separated the African American neighborhood on the north from the white neighborhoods of South Milwaukee
16th St. Bridge connects 2 neighborhoods
August 29, 1967 Father Groppi led 250 protesters over bridge
Protesting segregation & demand fair housing laws
13,000 white residents met them at the south end
Carrying clubs, hurling bottles, shouting racial slurs, profanities
Police with tear gas
Returned to find NAACP Freedom House burned down
No weapons or shooters found
Believed that police caused it
Housing March QUESTIONS #3 & 4

7. Housing Groppi Clip QUESTION #5 & 6
Map of Milwaukee’s Black Neighborhood, 1940
Race Restrictive Covenants:
Mr. George Brawley, a Milwaukee attorney, has recently completed a study of the race restrictive covenants contained in plats filed with the Register of Deeds office of Milwaukee County. He estimates that 90% of subdivisions which have been platted in the City of Milwaukee since 1910 contain some type of covenant which has the effect of prohibiting the sale of the property to Negroes.
He states that in other parts of the city there are “gentlemen’s agreements” not to sell or rent property to Negroes except within the area bounded by W. North, W Juneau, N. 3rd, and N. 12th Streets.

8. School Segregation in Milwaukee: 1960s
After 1954 Brown v. Board decision = racial segregation illegal (question #7)
1960 Milwaukee survey found 90% of central city school students were Black
March 1964 attorney Lloyd Barbee, Vel Phillips, & Father Groppi organize Milwaukee United School Integration Committee (MUSIC)
May 1964 MUSIC organizes boycott of predominantly (mostly) Black schools
60% of Milwaukee’s Black inner-city students participated (11k)
8500 attended the Freedom Schools (free alternative school set up during boycotts)
Also picketing, demonstrations, and other direct actions
QUESTION #8 & 9

10. Reactions Parent reaction:
Upset by big differences between majority Black vs. majority White schools
“Intact busing” - transporting African American students to all-white schools but still in segregated classes, cafeterias, activities
Tracked into vocational classes instead of business or college prep
1965 Barbee filed lawsuit charging School Board w/practicing discrimination
14 years (including in the US Supreme Court)
1979 ruled in his favor

11. Young People Make a Difference
Milwaukee’s NAACP Youth Council
Local action while 1960s lunch counter sit-in were going on in the South
Campaigned against job discrimination at Marc’s Big Boy restaurants
Protested all-white Eagles Club
Demonstrated to support fair housing laws
Father James Groppi became their advisor 1965
Formed a security unit: Youth Council Commandos
Protect marchers (QUESTION #10 & 11)
Created separate social service agencies (till the 1980s)
1965 Bus Boycott Mary Arms oral history (QUESTION # 12)

12. Busing in Milwaukee Public Schools since 1979
Desegregation plan:
Redistricting
Creating specialty (“magnet”) schools
Busing
Most who chose integrated, speciality schools were White
80% bused OUT of their neighborhoods were Black
1987 court ruled that suburban districts had to participate
Thousands of urban Black student were bused to suburban schools
Late 1990s - abandoned
Charter schools
“School choice”
Vouchers (use tax dollars for private school tuition
Again, largely segregated
Busing Video QUESTION #13 & 14

13. Segregation in Milwaukee Today
50 yrs ago Mississippi was considered the most segregated place in the US
Today: Milwaukee, WI
Different conditions, though...
1964 Mississippi: government sponsored segregation was enforced
Laws, economics, public opinion
Races were separated
African American had much lower standards of living
Challenge the “system” = violence

14. De Facto Segregation Milwaukee today: De Facto Segregation
Laws LEGALLY prohibit racial segregation in housing, jobs, schools
Live in segregated communities
Black neighborhoods have much higher poverty rates than white ones
Created and maintained by ideas versus law
It’s still fact even if laws do not cause it

16. MAP 2: poverty neighborhood map
ia.edu/DotMap/index.html
MAP 2: poverty neighborhood map
QUESTION #15