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39 CHAPTER TWO The Advocate: It Is Your Mouthpiece There are many reliable subscribers who do all they can to support us both morally and financially, for they realize what a terrible calamity it would be for the colored people not to have a mouthpiece in the community. — “Is It Fair?” the Advocate, September 12, 1931, 2 Enclosed herewith you will find [a] money order for $2.50 for one year’s subscription to The Advocate …. I am making this subscription because I do not feel that I can any longer do without the intelligence of the valuable columns of this enterprising Paper. With every best wish for your continued success in this field, and otherwise, I am, yours respectfully, Phil Reynolds. — “We Thank You,” the Advocate, March 19, 1927, 11 Portland resident Phil Reynolds and his wife, Elise, weren’t the only ones who felt they could no longer do without the Advocate in 1927.2 That year, Lincoln High School took out a one-year subscription for its library and the Baldwin restaurant began offering the paper to its customers.3 James Botts, who had relocated to Chicago with his wife, Martha, to work as comptroller of the Pullman Porters Benefit Association of America, asked to have the Advocate sent to him there.4 And George B. Durham of Brooklyn, New York, began subscribing after seeing an Advocate editorial in the New York Age, which he read while in Boston.5 “So on my return home I decided to have you send me the paper—The Defender of our race in the West,” he wrote in a note to Beatrice Cannady. “I congratulate you on your success which I hope you will continue to have.”6 TheAdvocatefosteredanextended,imaginedcommunitythatwascritical for individuals who continued to be excluded from society.7 Cannady also used the newspaper to create a real community for Oregonians who were socially or physically isolated. Only 2,144 Negroes lived in the entire state in 1920.8 In Portland, Negroes constituted approximately 0.6 percent of the total population of 258,288.9 A longtime resident recalled being able to walk around for hours without ever encountering another black person. Desperate to see someone who looked like her, she would go to Union Depot and sit, just watching the “colored waiters.”10 The small population made it difficult to effect reform, recalled Portland native Otto Rutherford: A Force for Change 40 “It wasn’t that we lacked unity, it was just that we lacked numbers.”11 It also was a factor in the pervasive discrimination of black Oregonians, because the lack of contact between races contributed to the stereotypes and biases many white people held. Lee C.Anderson observed in 1925, “We are surrounded by a prejudice which you do not find in our neighboring states. There is no colored district in Portland. Our people are scattered throughout the city.” However, he admitted that might have its advantages: “This scattered population gives a better chance for first-hand acquaintance between the races, for prejudice is the off-spring of ignorance. Removal of racial obsessions will in time make a better citizen of black and white.”12 The isolation that many black people felt, whether in Portland or elsewhere, became blurred upon receipt of one or more favorite weekly papers.As Mr. Ballard, a co-founder of the Advocate who moved to Norfolk, Virginia, observed: “When I receive The Advocate every week I feel as if I am having a talk with my old friends in Portland.”13 For an hour or two, readers could peruse hometown news, learn about race relations across the country, participate in a lively editorial debate about civil rights and liberties, and, as George Durham did, engage in a long-distance exchange with new friends. Cannady encouraged these conversations by publishing letters regularly in the Advocate, nicknamed “old reliable.”14 In the process, she created a strong community and left clues that yield a striking amount of information about culture, migration, employment opportunities, social networks, and civil rights leaders who interacted with Cannady. B Texans Nat Q. Henderson and his wife, Mamie, took out a two-year subscription to the paper in 1930 after spending “a glorious summer on the Pacific Coast” as well as a long weekend with “time honored” friend Beatrice Cannady. She told readers they wanted to stay in touch with “friends and acquaintances in Portland,” and called their attention to the fact that Henderson was principal of one of...

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