Colored Farmers' Alliance
United States 1886
Synopsis
Following the Civil War, some southern African Americans managed to acquire land and establish a degree of economic independence despite many obstacles. In response to Reconstruction Era economic crises, political disenfranchisement, and civil repression, African Americans organized distinctly black institutions including unions, towns, secret self-defense groups, mutual aid societies, businesses, and churches. The Colored Farmers' National Alliance and Cooperative Union (CFA) was founded in Houston County, Texas, on 11 December 1886 to protect African American farmers in the South from falling commodity prices, rising farm costs, and high interest rates. The Southern Farmers' Alliance was founded for similar concerns but barred blacks from joining.
Timeline
- 1866: The Winchester repeating rifle is introduced.
- 1871: Chicago fire causes 250 deaths and $196 million in damage.
- 1876: General George Armstrong Custer and 264 soldiers are killed by the Sioux at the Little Big Horn River.
- 1878: Thomas Edison develops a means of cheaply producing and transmitting electric current, which he succeeds in subdividing so as to make it adaptable to household use. The value of shares in gas companies plummets as news of his breakthrough reaches Wall Street.
- 1882: Agitation against English rule spreads throughout Ireland, culminating with the assassination of chief secretary for Ireland Lord Frederick Cavendish and permanent undersecretary Thomas Burke in Dublin's Phoenix Park.
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