A Tale of Two Cities: The African American Struggle for Civil Rights in Babbitt and Hawthorne, Nevada

This paper examines the discriminatory racial policies in Babbitt and Hawthorne, Nevada, established as a consequence of the in-migration of large numbers of black and white civilian war workers from the South during World War Two. The leadership of these communities---military, civic, business---began segregation and black exclusion and maintained these policies due to the indifference of the existing white community. African Americans organized a local chapter of the NAACP in 1955 and successfully eliminated segregation in Babbitt housing and businesses by 1960. But the effort to end discriminatory policies in Hawthorne using pickets, sit-ins, outside media to publicize local incidents, and supplying evidence to federal and state civil rights commissions did little to foster change. Ultimately, the passage of the 1964 federal Civil Rights Act caused discriminatory policies to collapse virtually overnight. Working-class, middle-aged activists led the civil rights movement in Babbitt and Hawthorne. Women were prominent from its beginning. The sons and daughters of these activists did not maintain the undertaking of their parents and protest efforts dropped off significantly after 1964, the branch finally dissolving in the mid-1970s. The movement paralleled the national civil rights struggle in many ways but the reaction of local white citizens never reached the level of viciousness that prevailed in the South during this time. In the end, the efforts of the local NAACP chapter and the reaction of the existing moderate white community overcame the racial policies of the towns' military, civic, and business leadership and the racial intolerance of the in-migration white residents.