Memphis has been an important city for African Americans in the South since the Civil War.
Historic black Memphians were railroad men, bricklayers, chauffeurs, dressmakers, headwait.
Images of America: African Americans in Memphis chronicles this regional experience from the 19th century to the 1950s.
They migrated from within Tennessee and from surrounding states to the urban crossroads in large numbers after emancipation, seeking freedom from the oppressive race relations of the rural South.
Memphis has been an important city for African Americans in the South since the Civil War