This group assignment will focus on your use of a piece of material culture. In

This group assignment will focus on your use of a piece of material culture. In this case, your group will be looking at a resource used by African Americans to travel across the country during the Jim Crow era: The Negro Motorist Green Book or simply “The Green Book”.
For a brief discussion of the history of the Green Book, listen to this interview from the NPR program 1A or the program from BBC Radio 4:
https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2018/11/17/668307994/the-green-book-celebrating-the-bible-of-black-travel
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b083p88f
As you familiarize yourself with what the Green Book was, I will assign you to a group within your course section. Your group will be 4-6 students and will have a separate discussion board on Blackboard to talk about and plan your project.
Like thousands of African Americans throughout the 20th century, your group will trace a trip across the United States and the Jim Crow South using the Green Book. Pick a year from the Green Books available on the New York Public Library website here: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/the-green-book?tab=about#/?tab=about
Then, select a city boarding the demarcation line between “The North” and “The South”. For simplicity, it might be best to pick a city in the Midwest or just north of the Mason-Dixon Line. Once you have selected your Green Book and starting city, your group will map a journey from your starting city to a city in Florida. This will take you through the Deep South and will give you an idea of the options (or lack thereof) available to African Americans while travelling during this era.
It is unlikely you will make it more than 300 miles a day, considering many would be traveling before the Interstate Highway system has been completed, or anywhere near current speed limits. On average, you will make between four and six stops in as many cities and towns during this trip.
You can see a similar project from the NYPL website for the years 1947 and 1957 here: https://publicdomain.nypl.org/greenbook-map/index.html Note: Obviously, because such work has already been done for the 1947 and 1957 Green Books, you will need to pick another year.
Once you have mapped out your journey, each group member will be assigned at least one of the towns or cities along the way and will need to investigate at least two “stops” at that particular location. At each of these stops, you will answer a series of questions:
What were these locations/stops? Who owned them? Why would this have been an appealing town or city for African Americans travelling through this area? And finally, what are these locations now?
The answers to these questions will require some extensive research on your part, moving beyond a simple Google search and possibly leading you to local history websites or information available beyond the Green Book. A number of state and local historical societies have begun preserving their own Green Book locations. Make use of these resources. You might even want to consider contacting the present location and seeing if they are aware of the location’s history. A starting point for your research could be the US National Trust: https://savingplaces.org/green-book-sites
This assignment will be graded in three ways:
Your group will present your journey in a video recording, illustrating what stops you mapped out and what major difficulties travelers might have faced along the journey. The intention of this presentation is not to have you “roleplay” as the travelers, but instead to help highlight the possible paths individuals may have taken during this era. The presentation should have visual sources (including a map of the journey) and will be no more than 15 minutes in total. The recording can be done through any medium, but all group members should appear on camera and be able to speak with confidence and poise. The group will send me the link/file for your presentation, either as an attachment to your papers or in a separate email.
Each student will write a short essay on what they found regarding their particular stops, including answering all of the questions listed above. This essay will be individual in nature and will make up the majority of your grade. It should be between 600 and 800 words and include your sources, citations, and works cited page/bibliography. (Your list of sources, citations, and works cited page/bibliography do not apply to your word count). You should also include images of said locations (either today or during the years you are covering). Sources should preferably come from academic, public history, or archival sources and illustrate a level of intellectual rigor in your research. You must have a minimum of three sources beyond your selected Green Book. I would suggest starting with the FMU Library and Databases available to you.
You will turn in your essay online through the link on Blackboard. I will be using the anti-plagiarism software SafeAssign, so do be careful about quotations and material taken from other sources.
Students will submit a short “report card” on the work done by their fellow students. Each student’s final grade for this assignment will not be exclusively determined by this report, but it will ensure that students pull their weight for this group assignment.
Your presentation recording, short essay, and report card will be due on March 22nd.
A final note: This project will take some planning and preparation. It is not something that can be done at the last minute. You should begin working with your group and conducting your research early to ensure you have the sources you need and give yourself plenty of time to work through the material before you begin writing. Your paper should be edited, proofread, and corrected into a polished final product. If you have any questions or concerns about the process, please let me know as soon as possible.