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PROBE
Robert Meares
A rather remarkable monthly
"mini-newspaper" is entering its
second year of publication: 40
Arces and a Mule. This paper is
v/ritten and published by the students of nine predominantly
Negro schools in the ghetto sections of Harlem and Beford-Stuy-
vesant, New York City. Its unusual
name stems from the Freedman
Act, issued after the Civil War,
which promised all males of the
defeated Confederacy the right to
lease 40 acres of land and a mule.
The Negro never found his 40
acres.
At a glance, 40 Acres resembles
most any student attempt at having a try at journalism. News
articles are far from being polished
pieces of editing, the editorials are
not witty nor high brow intellectual, and typographical errors are
liberally sprinkled throughout its
copy. To be expected, many of the
subjects deal with what the "typical" American teenager day
dreams: fashions, sports, and the
next school dance. Yet, 40 Acres
and a Mule is quite unique from
the regular newspaper.
First, it is financially independent and receives no funds from
the school system nor from public
funds. Students solicit advertising
space and sell the newspaper itself
to the public. Second, the paper
has no censors nor "advisors" to
judge what may be printed and
what is "not nice to say." A panel
of 20 students from the nine schools
meet and judge the merits of the
articles submitted by their own
standards and not by the values
set by others. Quite a remarkabl
achievement for a group of "children" between the ages of 11 to
22.
"Better Than Black Tress"
Perhaps what puts 40 Acres and
a Mule in a class by itself is that
it has accomplished for the Negro
what even the "black press" has
failed. It has given the student a
vehicle to express himself and display his literary talent without accepting a set ideology. While the
"establishment press" of the Negro
has become more and more militant, it has left out the individual
expression and comment. 40 Acres
hopes to be different.
The subject matter of the newspaper itself reflects the ghetto environment of its young writers.
A fictional piece tells of a 12-year-
old Negro girl who gets pregnant
and is afraid to tell her mother. A
young man writes a descriptive
account of the extensive use of
dope in his neighborhood; "the
pushers call it Junkies Paradise."
Pro and con articles are presented
concerning the Negro paiticipation
in the Olympic games and in the
"white man's Sunday football." A
rather bitter editorial attacks the
gifts given through charity as degrading, and accuses them of being
bribes tti keep the Negro com-
(Continued on Page 3, Col. 5)
Object Description
| Title | Probe |
| Date | 1968-10-18 |
| Creator | Meares, Robert |
| Biographical/historical note | Robert Meares wrote for The Collegian, Greensboro College's student newspaper, in the late 1960s. |
| Subject headings | Segregation in education--United States;Race relations |
| Topics | General perspectives on race relations |
| Place | Greensboro (N.C.) |
| Description | In this October 18, 1968 article published in the Greensboro College student newspaper, The Collegian, Robert Meares describes a newspaper printed by black students from nine schools in New York ghettos called 40 Acres and a Mule . Meares admires the paper�s independence from both white and black presses, which allows black students to express themselves freely. |
| Type | text |
| Original format | clippings |
| Original dimensions | 4.7"x6.8" |
| Original publisher | Greensboro, N.C. : Greensboro College (N.C.) |
| Language | en |
| Contributing institution | Brock Museum, Greensboro College |
| Source collection | Collegian (Civil Rights Clippings) |
| Rights statement | http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/CNE/1.0/ |
| Additional rights information | COPYRIGHT NOT EVALUATED. The copyright status of this item has not been fully evaluated and may vary for different parts of the item. The user is responsible for determining actual copyright status for any reuse of the material. |
| Object ID | GC_CollegianCRG.0768 |
| Digital publisher | The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, University Libraries, PO Box 26170, Greensboro NC 27402-6170, 336.334.5305 -- http://library.uncg.edu/ |
| Sponsor | LSTA grant administered by the North Carolina State Library -- http://statelibrary.ncdcr.gov/ld/grants/lsta.html |
| OCLC number | 884367543 |
Page/Item Description
| Title | Page 1 |
| Full text | PROBE Robert Meares A rather remarkable monthly "mini-newspaper" is entering its second year of publication: 40 Arces and a Mule. This paper is v/ritten and published by the students of nine predominantly Negro schools in the ghetto sections of Harlem and Beford-Stuy- vesant, New York City. Its unusual name stems from the Freedman Act, issued after the Civil War, which promised all males of the defeated Confederacy the right to lease 40 acres of land and a mule. The Negro never found his 40 acres. At a glance, 40 Acres resembles most any student attempt at having a try at journalism. News articles are far from being polished pieces of editing, the editorials are not witty nor high brow intellectual, and typographical errors are liberally sprinkled throughout its copy. To be expected, many of the subjects deal with what the "typical" American teenager day dreams: fashions, sports, and the next school dance. Yet, 40 Acres and a Mule is quite unique from the regular newspaper. First, it is financially independent and receives no funds from the school system nor from public funds. Students solicit advertising space and sell the newspaper itself to the public. Second, the paper has no censors nor "advisors" to judge what may be printed and what is "not nice to say." A panel of 20 students from the nine schools meet and judge the merits of the articles submitted by their own standards and not by the values set by others. Quite a remarkabl achievement for a group of "children" between the ages of 11 to 22. "Better Than Black Tress" Perhaps what puts 40 Acres and a Mule in a class by itself is that it has accomplished for the Negro what even the "black press" has failed. It has given the student a vehicle to express himself and display his literary talent without accepting a set ideology. While the "establishment press" of the Negro has become more and more militant, it has left out the individual expression and comment. 40 Acres hopes to be different. The subject matter of the newspaper itself reflects the ghetto environment of its young writers. A fictional piece tells of a 12-year- old Negro girl who gets pregnant and is afraid to tell her mother. A young man writes a descriptive account of the extensive use of dope in his neighborhood; "the pushers call it Junkies Paradise." Pro and con articles are presented concerning the Negro paiticipation in the Olympic games and in the "white man's Sunday football." A rather bitter editorial attacks the gifts given through charity as degrading, and accuses them of being bribes tti keep the Negro com- (Continued on Page 3, Col. 5) |
