Reconstruction Newspaper Research

Reflection: 

Reading the actual 19th century newspaper is far different than reading a textbook. The textbook provides large events, amendments and governmental activity and doesn't go into extreme detail about what is occurring in different areas. The newspapers go into detail they provide the before, during and after of events. Newspapers also have the ability to be extremely opinionated whereas textbooks are created to educate centuries later. Their audiences initially are very different, newspapers are presenting information to the citizens in that time and in that moment and textbooks are delivering information to thousands of students over the course of many years. A prime example to show how a newspaper is different is the Memphis Daily Appeal published august 27th 1874. The newspaper is reporting of mob massacre that occurred in Gibson County and was an act of klan violence and ends with the murdering 16 blacks that were in the Trenton jail. What makes the newspaper article so interesting is that it provides other reports on the same incident from different newspapers in the state of Tennessee. The difference in the reports and the difference in how much the sources unveiled different information was surprising.(Library of Congress-Memphis Daily Appeal)

Memphis 1870