Before the Ghetto: Black Detroit in the Nineteenth Century

by David M. Katzman

In one of the first volumes to explore a nineteenth-century urban black community in depth, David Katzman shows that although slavery was abolished in Michigan in 1837, racial distinctions remained in the law and a caste-like social system locked most blacks into an inferior status. By analyzing the life-styles, occupations, institutions, residential patterns, class structure, and politics of the people and their community, he helps fill the gap between slavery and the ghetto in both urban and black history.

255 pages, Paperback

First published June 28, 1973

About the author

David Katzman has been a professor of History and American Studies at the University of Kansas (KU).

Reviews

[Laurie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very useful and very informative. I wish the author had mentioned something of the surrounding area of Detroit, but it is still a very valuable tool for the pre-Civil War period.