Black Veteran John T. Walker and the Burning of His Redwood City Home, Communist Party Protest Broadside, 1946

African American Activism

Broadside

Defend Democratic Rights! Handbill Calling for Justice After the Arson of Black WWII Veteran John T. Walker’s Home in Redwood City, California, 1946

Redwood City, CA: Communist Party, San Mateo County, [1946]. 8.5 x 11 in. Mimeographed leaflet.

Handbill issued by the Communist Party of San Mateo County after the nearly completed home of Black World War II veteran John T. Walker was burned to the ground in Redwood City, California, on December 6, 1946. The attack belonged to a wider postwar wave of violence against Black veterans whose military service had not protected them from white intimidation, housing exclusion, police violence, or racial terror after their return home. In 1946, Sergeant Isaac Woodard was blinded by police in South Carolina shortly after his discharge, and violence against returning Black servicemen helped push civil rights demands onto President Truman’s national agenda.

Item #16276

Price: $350.00