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City is five-time host, but first since 1954 Tuesday, July 22, 2003 By Steve Levin, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Although the upcoming National Urban League conference is the first in Pittsburgh in 49 years, the city used to be a regular destination of the national gathering.
The National Urban League conference opens Thursday. Registration continues throughout the conference, with daily registration available, as are tickets for individual luncheons and galas. All events are at David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Downtown, unless noted. Conference highlights include:
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Other free events:
The city hosted conferences each decade from the 1920s to the '50s, including one in 1922, just four years after the local Urban League office was formed.
As a five-time host, Pittsburgh now ranks with Los Angeles behind Washington, D.C. (nine) and New York City (eight) in site popularity for the National Urban League's 93 annual gatherings.
A look back at each of the previous conferences provides a glimpse of the nation's racial climate and the kinds of obstacles Urban League leaders faced at the time. It also shows how the national gatherings progressed from sparsely attended affairs to ones attracting several thousand participants.
As a national conference participant noted in 1950: "The League's annual conference has become the one meeting at which Negro life is considered as a whole -- his work, his play, his neighborhood [and] his aspiration as a citizen in a democracy."
1922: 'Not Alms But Opportunity'
The early years of the Urban League of Pittsburgh were hard on Walter A. May, known as the "father" of the local organization.
In 1921, just before he handed over the presidency of the 3-year-old local chapter to Francis D. Tyson, he made a public appeal for funds, writing prospective contributors that the lack of employment opportunities for the large influx of blacks who had come to Pittsburgh to work in steel mills during World War I was creating an atmosphere that could result in the same "serious disturbances" that other cities around the country had experienced.
"These disturbances reflect on the prosperity and esteem of the community," May wrote, "and it is for this reason that a group in this city is making the problem of the Negro 'their business' ... the business of the Urban League of Pittsburgh.
"Now [that] the peak of [steel] production has passed, we have thousands of Negroes out of work ... over nine hundred applied at the Urban League for jobs in one week."
The fledgling group, whose motto was "Not Alms But Opportunity," charged no fees for finding employment opportunities or arranging for housing needs.
Possibly as a way to increase its visibility, Pittsburgh agreed to host the 1922 national conference.
Organizers desperately tried to line up speakers who would attract white people to the four-day conference in mid-October. Top on the list was then-Pa. Gov. Gifford Pinchot, who declined the invitation at the last minute.
White delegates booked rooms at Downtown hotels, but black delegates had to stay with local families or in black-owned hotels. Meals, too, were a problem.
A local Urban League official wrote to the owner of the Rittenhouse Hotel in early October, explaining that a small number of white and black delegates wished to lunch together at the hotel.
"We understand that you have a small private dining room that will accommodate about 16 and that can be approached through the office without any embarrassment to the hotel," the letter read. "We were wondering if such a group, a small portion of our Conference, could obtain lunches during the day in that room.
"I ... hesitated to take it up with you [earlier] because of the general attitude in the city towards our group."
The official reported at a later meeting that his efforts had failed.
Eighty-six delegates attended the conference. Daily sessions were at the East Liberty Carnegie Library while public meetings at night were held at Schenley High School, the Carnegie Lecture Hall and Bethel AME Church.
Discussion topics included "The Negro in Industry," "Race Relations," "Inter-Racial Cooperation" and "The Church in Social Work" while field trips were made to an area steel mill and to the H.J. Heinz Co.
The total cost of the conference was $330.47, with the single biggest expense $60 for extra stenographic service. After totaling up contributions, collections and registration fees, Executive Secretary John T. Clark was left with a $103.67 deficit.
Much of his time over the next several weeks was spent writing letters to groups such as the Violet Art Club to collect pledges of $4.50 or less.
1932: Up from the Depression
At that time, prospective host cities had to pay the National Urban League $600 to cover traveling expenses for officers and speakers, plus the cost of printed materials, clerical help, meeting locations and lodgings.
That year, R. Maurice Moss, the executive secretary of the Urban League of Pittsburgh, wrote the national office apologizing for sending just $300, explaining that two fund-raising ventures had gone poorly but that "we will forward you as much in addition to this ... as we can possibly squeeze."
The May conference drew 1,100 delegates. The theme, "After the Depression -- What?" featured sessions on the goals of the Urban League and ways to carry out its work.
Eugene Kinckle Jones, executive secretary of the national office, explained that the league's primary interest after race relations was "the industrial field in relation to the fields of health, housing, delinquency...and that the Urban League cannot afford to discontinue even for a moment emphasis on this important subject."
Most delegates stayed at the Center Avenue Branch YMCA ($1 per night for members; $1.50 for nonmembers the first night and $1 afterward), while delegates with cars found lodging in East Liberty, the Hill District and Homewood.
The success of the conference, and the fact that for the first time, several speakers had their talks broadcast on two local radio stations, prompted Jones to declare the conference "the greatest in its history."
1942: Wartime agenda
In September 1941, the first black student was admitted to the University of Pittsburgh Medical School. Local Urban League officials felt the time was right for a higher profile.
A special staff meeting the next May decided unanimously to host the national conference that fall.
"It is necessary for our program," read notes from that meeting, "in this speed-up economy since we are an organization dealing with man-power both in industry and in civilian life.
"Cannot someone convince the powers that be that this Conference is vital to Negro morale and should therefore receive priority rating?"
Because of the war, it was believed few delegates would attend the September conference. Organizers had to decide whether to have the conference in Pittsburgh or out of town. If the former, where would delegates meet, eat and sleep; if the latter, how would attendees be transported?
Ultimately, the four-day conference was held at the 150-acre Camp James Weldon Johnson in Beaver County, about 30 minutes west of Pittsburgh on Route 18, where delegates stayed in cabins.
1954: A growing profile
The conference came just four months after the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark May ruling abolishing segregation in pubic schools. By then, conference organizers already had worked out who would lead which workshops, the probable speakers and even plans for the cocktail party, including a limit of 3 1/2 drinks per attendee.
Guichard Parris, the National Urban League's conference secretary, visited Pittsburgh twice in June to meet with Mayor David L. Lawrence's office, a public relations company, local staffers and management at the Fort Pitt Hotel, which would be conference headquarters.
The extra attention apparently helped.
In the days leading up to the Sept. 6-10 conference, Patrick Fagan, president of the Urban League of Pittsburgh, and Alexander J. Allen, the executive director, were invited to discuss it on a WKJF-TV talk show. The mayor's office declared it "Urban League Week" and 15 different social and civic organizations had offered their help. Pittsburgh Railways Company got on board, painting a streetcar specifically for conference use.
When the conference opened on Sept. 6, U.S. Secretary of Labor Stephen P. Mitchell unveiled a new anti-discrimination poster to be displayed in all plants with government contracts and called for an end to the "waste of discrimination."
Other speakers during the week included the president of United Steelworkers, board chairman of the NAACP, the vice president of Radio Corp. of America and Pennsylvania Gov. John S. Fine.
Conference delegates reaffirmed the Urban League's opposition to all forms of segregation, but Lester B. Granger, the National Urban League's executive secretary, predicted in his closing comments that the future held widespread court battles over school segregation.
The number of such battles and their bitterness, he said, would depend on the willingness and vigor of blacks to press for their constitutional rights.
Steve Levin can be reached at slevin@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1919.
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