Harlem riot of 1935

This article is about the Harlem riot of 1935. For other incidents in Harlem, see Harlem riot.

The Harlem riot of 1935 was Harlem's first race riot, sparked by rumors of the beating of a teenage shoplifter. Three died, hundreds were wounded and an estimated $2 million in damages were sustained to properties throughout the district, with African-American-owned homes and businesses spared the worst of the destruction.

Riot

Inciting incident

At 2:30 in the afternoon on March 19, 1935, an employee at the Kress Five and Ten store at 256 W. 125th Street (just across the street from the Apollo Theater) caught 16-year-old black Puerto Rican Lino Rivera shoplifting a 10-cent penknife. When his captor threatened to take Rivera into the store's basement and "beat the hell out of him," Rivera bit the employee's hand. The manager intervened and the police were called, but Rivera was eventually released. In the meantime, a crowd had begun to gather outside around a woman who had witnessed Rivera's apprehension and was shouting that Rivera was being beaten. When an ambulance showed up to treat the wounds of the employee who had been bitten, it appeared to confirm the woman's story, and when the crowd took notice of a hearse parked outside of the store, the rumor began to circulate that Rivera had been beaten to death. The woman who had raised the alarm was arrested for disorderly conduct, the Kress Five and Ten store was closed early, and the crowd was dispersed.

Outbreak

In the early evening, a group called the Young Liberators started a demonstration outside the store, quickly drawing thousands of people. Handbills were distributed: One was headlined "CHILD BRUTALLY BEATEN". Another denounced "the brutal beating of the 12 year old boy [...] for taking a piece of candy."

At some point, someone threw a rock, shattering the window of the Kress Five and Ten store, and the destruction and looting began to spread east and west on 125th Street, targeting white-owned businesses between Fifth and Eighth Avenues. Some stores posted signs that read "COLORED STORE" or "COLORED HELP EMPLOYED HERE". In the early hours of the morning, as the rioting spread north and south, Lino Rivera was picked up from his mother's apartment and photographed with a police officer. The photographs were distributed in order to prove that Rivera had not been harmed. New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia also had posters drawn up urging a return to peace.

Aftermath and investigation

By the end of the next day, the streets of Harlem were returned to order. District Attorney William C. Dodge blamed Communist incitement. Mayor LaGuardia ordered a multi-racial Mayor's Commission on Conditions in Harlem headed by African-American sociologist E. Franklin Frazier and included Judge Hubert Thomas Delany, Countee Cullen, and A. Philip Randolph to investigate the causes of the riot. The committee issued a report, "The Negro in Harlem: A Report on Social and Economic Conditions Responsible for the Outbreak of March 19, 1935," which described the rioting as "spontaneous" with "no evidence of any program or leadership of the rioters." The report identified "injustices of discrimination in employment, the aggressions of the police, and the racial segregation" as conditions which led to the outbreak of rioting. The report congratulated the Communist organizations as deserving "more credit than any other element in Harlem for preventing a physical conflict between whites and blacks." Alain Locke was appointed to implement the report's findings.

Historical analysis

Jeffrey Stewart, professor of History at George Mason University, described the Harlem Riot of 1935 as "the first modern race riot," adding that it "symbolized that the optimism and hopefulness that had fueled the Harlem Renaissance was dead."

Sociologist Allen D. Grimshaw called the Harlem Riot of 1935 "the first manifestation of a 'modern' form of racial rioting," citing three criteria:

1. "violence directed almost entirely against property"
2. "the absence of clashes between racial groups"
3. "struggles between the lower-class Negro population and the police forces"

Whereas previous race riots had been characterized by violent clashes between groups of black and white rioters, subsequent riots would resemble the riot in Harlem.

See also

• Harlem riot of 1943 – disturbance after a policeman shot and wounded a black U.S. Army soldier.
• Harlem riot of 1964 – six days of civil disorder that occurred after an African-American teenager was shot and killed by an NYPD lieutenant.

References

General

Specific