‘It Was Ugly’

Summary

Ghost of a Chance: Episode ‘It Was Ugly’ - Detailed Summary

Introduction

In the gripping episode titled "It Was Ugly" from the Minnesota Star Tribune's podcast Ghost of a Chance, host Eric Roper delves deep into the tumultuous history surrounding his 113-year-old Minneapolis home. This episode, released on January 20, 2025, uncovers the intense racial struggles of the early 20th century, focusing on the lives of Harry and Clementine Robinson, a pioneering Black couple whose quest for stability and community faced vehement opposition.

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Historical Background: Minneapolis in the 1920s

Eric Roper sets the stage by painting a vivid picture of Minneapolis during the 1920s, a period marked by racial tension and segregation. Despite Minnesota's laws against racial discrimination, Black residents like the Robinsons encountered systemic barriers.

• Melissa Townsend notes, “Their life spread across the pages of the Appeal newspaper was the picture of middle class black excellence” (00:30), highlighting the Robinsons' esteemed position in the community.
• Yahuru Williams emphasizes the national context: “There are as many as 40 cities that saw race riots throughout the nation” (00:41), situating Minneapolis within a broader pattern of racial unrest.

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The Robinsons' Struggle for Homeownership

Harry and Clementine Robinson's decision to purchase a home was more than a personal milestone; it was a statement against the prevailing racial norms.

• Eric Roper reflects on their financial stability, stating, “Clearly it allowed Clementine and Harry to have enough financial stability to say, okay, we're actually going to buy a house” (00:23).
• This determination is juxtaposed with the community's resistance. As Clementine Robinson declares, “The colored people promptly resented the unwarranted action in very strong terms” (03:21), showcasing the backlash they faced.

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Community Opposition and Racial Covenants

The Robinsons' establishment in their neighborhood ignited resistance from white residents who sought to maintain racial homogeneity.

• A protest meeting titled “Negro Question causes Protest” underscores the community's hostility: “Residents of 13th Ward object to members of race as neighbors” (00:47).
• Melissa Townsend describes the subtlety of this racism as “Minnesota nice," a veneer masking deep-seated prejudices (06:25).
• Kirsten Delegarde elaborates, “Minnesota nice I like to think of as Minnesota invisible. It's kind of like, you know, it's here. We're just not going to acknowledge it” (06:44), emphasizing the covert nature of discrimination.
• The use of racial covenants is explored, with Bill Greene stating, “Like, wouldn't it be great if there was some kind of legal way so that we didn't have to stand on a lawn and threaten people?” (07:39), illustrating the legal maneuvers to enforce segregation.

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Civil Rights Involvement and NAACP's Role

Determined to resist the oppressive tactics, the Robinsons garnered support from the NAACP, highlighting the intersection of local struggles with national civil rights movements.

• Eric Roper uncovers that Harry was a member of the Minneapolis NAACP chapter in 1918, connecting local efforts to broader civil rights advocacy.
• Melissa Townsend shares pivotal exchanges, such as when James Weldon Johnson, leader of the national NAACP, intervened by writing to Pierce Atwater of the Civic and Commerce Association: “I can thoroughly appreciate the feeling of the homeowners in the 13th Ward. But...attempts to prevent such purchasing of property is not only illegal” (17:20).
• Yahuru Williams contextualizes, “It's not unusual to see that kind of subtle and complicated nuance at a time where you're outnumbered... trying to move forward in that stream” (25:02), reflecting the complexities civil rights leaders faced.

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The Little Dixie Sandwich Shop: A Bold Statement

Harry Robinson's entrepreneurial venture, the Little Dixie Sandwich Shop, symbolizes both economic ambition and a subtle protest against racial constraints.

• Melissa Townsend describes the shop: “It was advertised as a place that was open all night from dusk until dawn” (21:30), indicating its prominence and modernity.
• Eric Roper speculates on the shop's name, considering its possible double meaning tied to Southern heritage and a covert challenge to Minneapolis's racial dynamics: “Maybe he's really sort of thinking about the hidden messages that he could be sending with the name of this business” (23:39).
• Bill Greene praises the boldness of the endeavor: “I think it's extraordinary that he opened a restaurant at that corner in what was thought of as a very white neighborhood” (21:00).

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The Shooting Incident: Unraveling the Mystery

The narrative takes a dark turn with the tragic shooting at Little Dixie, raising questions about racial biases and media portrayal.

• On February 16, 1926, a man named Roy Mattis was shot in the restaurant, with Harold Robinson, identified as a cook, being arrested but not charged (29:50).
• Eric Roper finds inconsistencies and biases in the reporting: “Neither one had Harry's side of the story” (31:25), pointing to flawed journalism that marginalized Black voices.
• Kirsten Delegarde critiques the reporting, noting the lack of follow-up: “It's like throwing you under the bus” (31:37), highlighting systemic racism in media practices.

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Conclusion: The Enduring Legacy of the Robinsons

Despite the challenges and violent opposition, the Robinsons and their community allies laid foundational work for future civil rights advancements in Minneapolis.

• By 1940, the Robinsons had moved out, but their legacy endured through their businesses and the networks they helped establish.
• Melissa Townsend underscores the Robinsons' role in building a resilient Black community: “...making a black community in Minneapolis” (28:56).
• The episode concludes on a contemplative note, as Eric Roper ponders the significance of uncovering these historical truths and their relevance to contemporary racial dynamics.

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Notable Quotes and Insights

• Clementine Robinson: “If you can just maintain the veneer of respectability, things will get better” (02:07), reflecting the constrained strategies Black families employed to navigate systemic racism.
• Pierce Atwater: “Property owners would be very opposed to an influx of black people moving into that area. But it shouldn't be a problem for the black people” (15:05), illustrating the patronizing attitudes held by some white allies.
• Yahuru Williams: “Some people refer to as Minnesota nice... it's worse than Birmingham because... we just do it differently” (07:00), comparing subtle racism in Minneapolis to overt racism elsewhere.

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Final Thoughts

"It Was Ugly" masterfully intertwines personal narratives with historical analysis, shedding light on the Robinsons' courageous stand against racial discrimination. Through meticulous research and poignant storytelling, Eric Roper not only uncovers a forgotten chapter of Minneapolis's history but also invites listeners to reflect on the persistent echoes of these struggles in today's society.

Transcript

[Eric Roper]

Lemonade.

[Melissa Townsend]

Previously on Ghost of a Chance.

[Yahuru Williams]

Blacks couldn't go into hotels, couldn't go into restaurants. Despite the fact that Minnesota had a law banning that kind of behavior.

[Clementine Robinson]

Madam C.H. robinson has been appointed body massourist at the St. Barnabas Hospital under Dr. Farr.

[Eric Roper]

Clearly it allowed Clementine and Harry to have enough financial stability to say, okay, were actually going to buy a house.

[Melissa Townsend]

Their life spread across the pages of the Appeal newspaper was the picture of middle class black excellence. But we know that the next year things would begin to change.

[Yahuru Williams]

I believe there are as many as 40 cities that saw race riots throughout the nation.

[Clementine Robinson]

The headline Negro Question causes Protest. Residents of 13th Ward object to members of race as neighbors.

[Eric Roper]

So these folks are getting together in a big hall and saying we want to get rid of this handful of black families who live in southwest Minneapolis.

[Melissa Townsend]

The meeting was just five blocks from the Robinsons house.

[Yahuru Williams]

The notion of walking on ice is very real here. You have to be careful where you step.

[Eric Roper]

You're listening to Ghost of a Chance from the Minnesota Star Tribune. This is the story of my search to find out what happened to Harry and Clementine Robinson. I'm Eric Roper.

[Melissa Townsend]

I'm Melissa Townsend.

[Eric Roper]

This is episode three.

[Melissa Townsend]

It seems that for decades Clementine, Harry and much of their generation embraced respectability politics. The hope was that if you acted respectably, you would be treated with respect. There was an overwhelming pressure to look the part and play the part. We asked a man named Yahoo Williams about this. He's an historian based in St. Paul, Minnesota. That's right across the river from Minneapolis.

[Kirsten Delegarde]

Don't make noise and everything will be okay. If you can just maintain the veneer of respectability, things will get better. And you see that in a very famous Urban League flyer that's posted in Detroit in the 1920s, which they have a list of do's or don'ts for migrants. And all of them are about don't do your kids hairs up in cornrows, wear clean clothes, go to church on Sunday, don't challenge what your teachers say about your kids. And the last part of it is if anything bad happens, it'll be partly your fault.

[Melissa Townsend]

So in 1920, when 200 white people met five blocks from Harry Ann Clementine's house to protest the black men and women living in that neighborhood, it must have been difficult for them to figure out how to react to that. Eric scoured the newspapers for any reaction from the black community.

[Eric Roper]

I looked around for a while to figure out, you know, what's the response. And the first one That I found was actually came from the Booker T. Washington Study Club, and that is a group of primarily black women. And the Appeal newspaper summarized the feeling of the Booker T. Washington Study Club.

[Clementine Robinson]

The colored people promptly resented the unwarranted action in very strong terms, claiming that they are law abiding citizens and that there is no good reason why they should be considered undesirable neighbors. And it is hoped that they will continue to fight for their rights as taxpayers of Minneapolis.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric told historian Kirsten Delegarde about the article.

[Bill Greene]

Oh, gosh, it just is so poignant, right? Like we were told, if we played by the rules and we did all the right things, we would be okay. You just get the sense that people are like, oh my gosh. We are facing, not that racism is new, but we're facing this new front, this new campaign.

[Melissa Townsend]

But what could they do?

[Eric Roper]

You know, there's nine black families, and I imagine that maybe these families are coming together to talk about this issue and sort of whether they can hold on in this neighborhood. And for the Robinsons, to me, the most obvious people that they could be talking to are the Bryant family, who actually live just a block down the street. I can imagine that they're getting together and talking about, you know, what are we going to say when the people from this group come to our door?

[Melissa Townsend]

Just a few days later, there was another article about that protest meeting. This one was in the Sunday edition of the Minneapolis Tribune. The headline is Committee Appointed to Count Negroes.

[Eric Roper]

This is where it sort of goes from this abstraction about, oh, we don't want black neighbors to who are these people? Where did they get these homes and how do we get them out of here?

[Melissa Townsend]

After that article in the Sunday Tribune, a whole week went by with no news.

[Eric Roper]

And then on a Tuesday, November 30, there's this kind of troubling follow up article in the Minneapolis Tribune. And a spokesman for the protest group says in this article that this group's not going to have any more meetings. Okay? There's just been too much publicity around this whole issue and it's attracting basically bad publicity to the district. And it's troubling because here's a moment where this racism is very much out in the open. There's accountability, it's being covered in the press. And now when the group was saying there will be no more meetings, this whole effort becomes invisible.

[Melissa Townsend]

There's a way of behaving in Minnesota that people refer to as Minnesota nice. It's when people here are polite and smile at you but they don't go further than that. They don't engage with you. After George Floyd was murdered in 2020, there were a number of people who were calling out the way Minnesota Nice can be a polite cover for deep seated racism. And that's what I think of when I think about the crowd at this protest meeting. They didn't want black people living near them. That is racist. But they didn't want to be seen as impolite. It's a version of Minnesota Nice. And when I brought this up with historian Yahiru Williams, he had the same thought.

[Kirsten Delegarde]

Minnesota nice I like to think of as Minnesota invisible. It's kind of like, you know, it's here. We're just not going to acknowledge it. And we don't acknowledge it by dealing with the issue in ways that allow us to maintain our sense of pride in the fact that we're not Birmingham.

[Melissa Townsend]

Birmingham, Alabama has a long history of blatant racial discrimination and violence. And when Yoharu said that in Minnesota discrimination is invisible, he meant to some people. But it's very clear to black residents underneath the surface.

[Kirsten Delegarde]

Folks that live here go, this is worse than Birmingham. How could this be worse than Birmingham? Because here the majority of the population buys into the belief that somehow we're different. We're not different at all. We just do it differently.

[Melissa Townsend]

This protest meeting in southwest Minneapolis in 1920 came dangerously close to looking a little too much like Birmingham.

[Bill Greene]

It was ugly, right? KIRSTEN delegarde People knew it was ugly, and we know that. It's this desire to avoid this kind of outright confrontation that leads to the proliferation of covenants.

[Melissa Townsend]

When Kirsten said covenants, she meant racial covenants. That's language that real estate developers could quietly include in a property deed. And it said the property could not be sold to or even occupied by anyone who was not white. In some ways, it was the opposite of a public protest. It was a bureaucratic legal maneuver.

[Bill Greene]

That's the way people talk about them. Like, wouldn't it be great if there was some kind of legal way so that we didn't have to stand on a lawn and threaten people? If we could just keep our neighborhoods all white, then none of this would be would be necessary.

[Melissa Townsend]

Kirsten's organization is called Mapping Prejudice, and they have discovered more than 31,000 properties across the region that have racial covenants in their deeds. Most of those were put in place in the first half of the 1900s. These covenants were ruled unenforceable in 1948, but they show us what was happening when Clementine and Harry were trying to build a life here. So In November of 1920, the people who were part of the Southwest Minneapolis protest meeting decided they didn't want to make a scene. But a racial covenant wasn't an option. Those older homes, like the Robinsons, didn't have racial covenants. So this is when the public protest ended. But Eric found that a struggle behind the scenes continued. That's after the break.

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[Melissa Townsend]

In the last article that Eric found about the protest meeting in southwest Minneapolis, the protesters said they weren't going to hold any more public meetings. Instead, they were going to turn the issue over to the Real Estate Board and the Civic and Commerce Association. So Eric did some digging into those.

[Eric Roper]

Two groups, and the Real Estate Board is basically an association of Realtors. And we know that there are realtors on this board who have a policy not to sell to black people in areas where it's objectionable to white residents. But the group that really stood out to me in looking into this was the Civic and Commerce Association. This is an incredibly powerful organization in the city. A couple years after this, there's an NAACP leader who says that its membership includes the biggest and most prominent businessmen in Minneapolis.

[Melissa Townsend]

You can imagine the neighborhood group called on these powerful organizations as backup. The neighbors were bringing in the Big guns, so to speak, to somehow quietly overpower the black families. But these families had a powerful ally of their own. The national association for the Advancement of Colored People, the naacp.

[Eric Roper]

We know that Harry was a member of the Minneapolis chapter of the NAACP in 1918.

[Melissa Townsend]

Now, Uhuru Williams told us something interesting about the NAACP back then. They wouldn't help just anyone.

[Kirsten Delegarde]

You know, they champion the rights of colored people, but respectable colored people.

[Melissa Townsend]

And lucky for them, the nine middle class black homeowners in southwest Minneapolis were just the kind of respectable black people that the NAACP could get behind. And they did. Eric pieced together this part of the story from a handful of old letters.

[Eric Roper]

To me, this is really a treasure trove of letters because it really helped me understand how this little thing in my neighborhood actually reached the highest levels of the civil rights community in America.

[Melissa Townsend]

These letters are an incredible window into how black leaders in the 1920s were trying to demand their rights and how the city's white elites were, well, being Minnesota. Nice.

[Eric Roper]

So first, the head of the local naacp, Charles Sumner Smith, he gets wind of what's going on in the papers. You know, he's reading it like everybody else is. But then Sumner Smith, he's getting in touch with the national office and he's trying to reach James Weldon Johnson. Now, James Weldon Johnson was the leader of the national NAACP at that point.

[Melissa Townsend]

James Weldon Johnson actually wrote the black national anthem, like Lift Every Voice and Sing. He is quite a big deal.

[Eric Roper]

And so Smith is asking Johnson to get in touch with a guy here in Minneapolis named Pierce Atwater, who's with the Civic and Commerce Association. So why Pierce Atwater? Well, Atwater is a member of the naacp. He's considered an ally. They call him a friend at court. Okay? So they're thinking, well, if we're gonna have any sway at the Civic Ecommerce association, we're probably gonna be able to do it through Pierce Atwater.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric ran this whole exchange by historian Bill Greene, and he said reaching out to the national NAACP office was a savvy move. The local NAACP chapter probably wasn't powerful enough to take this on.

[Yahuru Williams]

When you're a black leader back then and you're aspiring for more than just a wretched state, you have to assess how large is the community. Can you be insulated? Can you find protection? And in a place like Minneapolis, the numbers weren't there. So you didn't have money. You couldn't snap a finger, and the rooms would be filled with supporters. You didn't have anonymity. If you needed it.

[Melissa Townsend]

In other words, the famous James Weldon Johnson could stand up to Pierce Atwater in a way that Sumner Smith in Minneapolis probably couldn't.

[Eric Roper]

So Johnson writes a letter from New York to here in Minneapolis, to Pierce Atwater. And he's saying, you know, I got wind that there is an effort to block black people from living in a certain part of town. And he's sort of, you know, asking for more details and noting that this would be a very bad thing. So Atwater writes back saying, I'm gonna check it out, you know, don't worry, I'll look into that. And eventually he writes back with a, you know, a page and a half or so long letter.

[Melissa Townsend]

And there are two passages in this letter that really stood out to Eric.

[Eric Roper]

First, Atwater, he calls the protest meeting a small meeting and really tries to downplay that there's really any there there as far as what's going on in southwest Minneapolis. And the second thing, he says very explicitly that property owners would be very opposed to an influx of black people moving into that area. But he says this shouldn't be a problem for the black people. It's a problem for the white people who might be selling their property to black people, because that's who is going to sort of face the heat here.

[Melissa Townsend]

He thought black people weren't facing the heat. Eric asked historian Bill Greene what he thought about this so called ally, Pierce Atwater.

[Yahuru Williams]

I think it's an illustration of how the friends of African Americans are really concerned about keeping peace. And the way that you keep peace is to know your place. And there's even the kind of irritation of blacks who would create a situation in which a problem could arise. And it's, and they say it's for the good of the black folks, but it's, you know, kind of more complicated than that or nuanced than that.

[Melissa Townsend]

At first this looked like the Minnesota nice response that has drawn so much criticism recently. It keeps the peace, but ignores the problem. But Eric learned at the time this was actually a common way of thinking among many people across the country, even those who considered themselves allies to the black community.

[Eric Roper]

There were a lot of progressives at the time who are pro civil rights or they say a lot of things about black rights and all these things, but when it comes to neighborhood mixing of the races, that's like another level that's a step too far.

[Melissa Townsend]

So Pierce Atwater had sent his letter basically saying he wasn't gonna do anything. And the ball was back in James Weldon Johnson's Court again. He's the head of the national naacp. And Eric has the final letter that he wrote back to Pierce Atwater. Here is the main point that he.

[Eric Roper]

I can thoroughly appreciate the feeling of the homeowners in the 13th Ward. But at the same time, if colored citizens wish to purchase property in that ward and are able to do so, it is the opinion of the association that attempts to prevent such purchasing of property is not only illegal, but will lead to disturbances from which the city of Minneapolis has happily been free.

[Melissa Townsend]

In other words, the status quo is not going to last.

[Eric Roper]

And as far as I can tell, that was the end of it. By 1921, they had sort of come to this very polite standoff.

[Melissa Townsend]

We know that by 1940, the Robinsons have left this neighborhood, but this is not when they go. And Eric says with this threat behind them, the Robinsons didn't waste much time getting into bigger and better things. Harry started his own business. He was running a catering company out of his kitchen now, Eric's kitchen.

[Eric Roper]

And I've kind of imagined over time, you know, like maybe there's stacks of chicken or cakes or vegetables or, you know, any sorts of things that he's preparing as part of his catering business.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric found that during the 1920s, three more Black families moved into southwest Minneapolis. One family, the Jacksons, moved in right next door to the Robinsons. And Clementine was back in the Appeal newspaper.

[Clementine Robinson]

On last Saturday evening, February 26, a group of women of Minneapolis organized a business women's club and elected officers as follows. President, Ms. L O Smith, our most efficient real estate dealer. Treasurer, Madam Clementine Robinson, masseuse. This bids fair to be one of the strongest organizations in Minneapolis.

[Eric Roper]

The very nature of this club just seems to be like we are entrepreneurial women, and we're sort of staking our claim and creating an organization just devoted to that idea.

[Melissa Townsend]

And as these black women were stepping into their place in history, Eric found Harry Robinson was also about to take a big step. That's after the break.

[Eric Roper]

So during this research process, I'm digging, I'm digging. I'm looking for things in the old papers, and suddenly I find notice in the Northwestern Bulletin Appeal newspaper, which is a black newspaper in the Twin Cities and a descendant of the Appeal newspaper and was dated May 2, 1925. What's up with that date? That is Harry and Clementine's shared birthday. Again, they were turning 44.

[Clementine Robinson]

Mr. Harry Robinson has opened the Little Dixie sandwich shop at 608 West Lake. Mr. Robinson is a property owner of this city and his wife, Madam Robinson, stands very high with the leading citizens in her profession. Mr. Robinson is a race man and has given freely of his work to the race.

[Melissa Townsend]

So this is a small clip, but it actually contains a lot of very interesting information.

[Eric Roper]

The first is, okay, so he spent 25 years as a waiter, a cook, a caterer, and now he's opening his own restaurant. That's a big deal. He's a race man, which means that people sort of see him as being a civil rights person. And the location of the restaurant, 608 W. Lake St. This is not in the black neighborhood. This is in a very prominent business district in Minneapolis that is now known as Lynn Lake.

[Bill Greene]

I think it's extraordinary that he opened a restaurant at that corner in what was thought of as a very white neighborhood. It's really a bold move.

[Melissa Townsend]

Historian Kirsten delegarde.

[Bill Greene]

I can just imagine the conversations where he goes to rent the space. You know, like what? How did he do that?

[Melissa Townsend]

It turns out Harry had rented the restaurant from a landlord who lived in Connecticut. So you can imagine that he was immune to any local backlash for renting a space to a black man.

[Eric Roper]

This kind of restaurant is also known as a chicken shack. And this is where you go to get a fried chicken sandwich, which is actually how he advertised it at one point. It was also advertised as a place that was open all night from dusk until dawn.

[Melissa Townsend]

In this old recording, a woman named Nellie Stone Johnson talks about chicken shacks that were around during this time. She was living in St. Paul at the time. That's just across the Mississippi river from Minneapolis.

[Eric Roper]

I know that the people coming into.

[Yahuru Williams]

Those places at that time were very mixed.

[Melissa Townsend]

By mixed, she meant racially mixed, particularly barbecue and chicken shacks.

[Bill Greene]

That was always a heavy mix.

[Eric Roper]

Clientele.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric and I both like to imagine the restaurant full of customers with Harry hustling between the grill and the cash register.

[Eric Roper]

In my mind's eye, I think it's a sort of a narrow storefront. You walk in, if there's a bunch of people in there, you probably feel it because there's not a lot of seats at the table. I imagine a long counter that kind of wraps around the front, and you have a bunch of stools on there, kind of like a diner. And then maybe you have Harry and one other person working there, or maybe it's just Harriet. I mean, and you have a big grill set up, right? There's probably that sizzle of the chicken cooking all the time.

[Melissa Townsend]

Right now. I want to take a second and focus on the Name of Harry's Chicken Shack, Little Dixie. From the beginning, Eric had a feeling that the name might have some special meaning.

[Eric Roper]

On the one hand, Little Dixie sounds like Southern food, and it was. So if you have a hankering for some good Southern food, here you go. It's a no brainer.

[Melissa Townsend]

But then Eric found out that there are different regions in the country that are known as Little Dixie. And one of those areas is very close to where Clementine grew up in Missouri. Eric saw an article about it. He was there talking with people at the Clinton County Historical Society.

[Eric Roper]

Look at this. Little Dixie, huh? What's that about? There's that word again.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric was with a man named Mike Shaver. He's a volunteer at the Historical Society.

[Yahuru Williams]

I don't know.

[Eric Roper]

Descendants of landowners, Slaves make Little Dixie tick. Plattsburgh, Missouri.

[Melissa Townsend]

And maybe that's where he got his name. I don't know.

[Eric Roper]

I know that's what I'm thinking. Maybe there is something to that. That today, 122 years later, descendants of the wealthy Southerners and the grandchildren of their slaves live within this two square mile agricultural community and county seat of about 2,000, which some residents dub Little Dixie because of the Southern influence. Huh? The descendants of landowners and slaves make Little Dixie. So when he named his sandwich shop Little Dixie, was Harry trying to make this really biting statement about Minneapolis, where white people are sort of expecting black people to remain in their place? What if both things are true? I mean, maybe he's calling in the white folks to eat this delicious Southern fried chicken and at the same time he's sort of covertly calling them out on racism. Maybe he's really sort of thinking about the hidden messages that he could be sending with the name of this business.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric asked historian Bill Greene what he thought about this possible double meaning of Little Dixie.

[Yahuru Williams]

It's not unusual to see that kind of subtle and complicated nuance at a time where you're outnumbered, out financed, out powered to make up a word and you're trying to move forward in that, in that stream.

[Melissa Townsend]

A few months after the article announcing the restaurant's opening, there was another article in the black newspaper. This one was about a celebration at the Chicken shack. It's dated August 1925.

[Clementine Robinson]

Mr. J.R. wilson entertained a group of 16 Sunday evening at the Little Dixie Sandwich Shop. The party met at the home of Madame Robinson and from there went to the shop and had a delightful lunch. The dinner room was decorated with wonderful flowers.

[Eric Roper]

They met at Harry and Clementine's house. I mean, picture it, there's 19 black people gathered in this neighborhood where white people were trying to get rid of them. And they're all headed over to the Chicken Shack. And this is like a star studded affair.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric looked into each person on the guest list and they are the movers and shakers of their time. First you have the woman who brings the celebrity factor, the glitz and glamour.

[Eric Roper]

Internationally famous dancer Mrs. Dora Dean Johnson. And Dora Dean Johnson had traveled the world popularizing the cakewalk dance in the early 1900s. And her Minneapolis connection was her husband grew up here.

[Melissa Townsend]

And then you have some prominent black professionals.

[Eric Roper]

You have a dentist, Dr. Leander Hill. You have former NAACP leader George DeVaughn and his wife Bessie, who was a schoolteacher. You also have cafe owner Robert Van Hook and his wife Elizabeth, who was a dressmaker and also involved in the women's club movement. Their son in law, Hobart Mitchell was also there. He later became a mayoral Aiden.

[Melissa Townsend]

You also have a few of the most notable civil rights leaders in the.

[Eric Roper]

City, Mr. And Mrs. Abram Harris. Now, Abram Harris was the first executive secretary of the Minneapolis Urban League and that had just been founded that year to improve employment and social conditions for black residents in the city.

[Melissa Townsend]

And last but not least, you have a woman named Willie Gertrude Brown.

[Eric Roper]

She often went by W. Gertrude Brown and she was the first head resident of the Phillis Wheatley City Settlement House in north Minneapolis. And this would become one of the most important organizations in the city's black community.

[Melissa Townsend]

It's worth sharing a little story here to give you a picture of W. Gertrude Brown. In this old interview, Ethel Nance talked about her. You might remember Ethel Nance from episode two. She grew up in Duluth, but she lived in Minneapolis for a period of her life. And she remembered this one time the Minneapolis police were looking for a black man who might have been involved in a crime. And she said it looked like the police might put his life in danger. And that's when W. Gertrude Brown got involved. And Ms. Brown sent out the word that if he was in danger of his life, he could come to Phyllis Reedy house and she would assure him safety there. She was from the south and she was militant. You had the impression that she would be sitting at the top of the steps when you opened that front door with a rifle, waiting for the authorities to and try to take someone out of Phyllis Ree house. I think they would have had trouble, though. When Eric was telling me about this incredible party with these incredible people, he kind of paused for a minute.

[Eric Roper]

I wonder whether they Felt like I am in the middle of a very important period for my race. Harry's a member of the naacp. They're hanging out with people who are on the vanguard of civil rights in Minneapolis. So I think that would have been.

[Melissa Townsend]

Probably clear when we brought this up with Kirsten delegarde. She agreed.

[Bill Greene]

And to me, this is just an example of the way the Robinsons were part of this network of people who are all making a beachhead, making a life, making a black community in Minneapolis.

[Melissa Townsend]

So far in our story, each time Harry and Clementine achieve some level of success, and it looks like they're going to break through the ceiling that's been built over their heads, something bad happens. The scholarship was revoked. 200 people organized to oust them from their home. And now we've reached the point in this episode where that's about to happen again.

[Eric Roper]

I was trying to find anything I could about this Chicken Shack. I mean, this is Harry's business, after all. And so I'm looking around. I mean, little Dixie, Little Dixie Chicken Shack, all these different searches, and eventually I decided, okay, let me look up the address of The Chicken Shack. 608 West. Look, Lake street and this leads me to a clip that I, like, haven't stopped thinking about ever since. It's dated February 16, 1926. And there's actually articles in the Star and the Tribune, and those are both predecessors of this paper, the Star Tribune. This is from the Tribune. Man shot and seriously wounded in restaurant. Negro cook under arrest. Roy Mattis, 32 years old, was shot and seriously wounded Monday night in a chicken shack at 608 W. Lake St. Harold Robinson, a Negro, said by police to have been employed as a cook in the restaurant, was held at the 5th Precinct Police Station without charge. Mattis was taken to General Hospital, where an examination disclosed that a bullet had passed through his neck. Mattis told police that he had entered the place to buy a sandwich and. And that his assailant involved him in a dispute and shot him without any warning.

[Melissa Townsend]

Eric said he couldn't believe what he was reading. And the more he thought about it, the less sense it made.

[Eric Roper]

And the way the paper portrays it, it's like this cook is just shooting customers or something. I mean, that's a wild thing to do. And we know on its face that that doesn't make a ton of sense. You know, owners of businesses don't just shoot people for no reason. It's not helpful to your business to do that.

[Melissa Townsend]

But the two newspaper articles were nearly identical, and neither one had Harry's side of the story. So Eric went to Kirsten Delegarde and asked her, what do you make of this?

[Eric Roper]

We have his race is in the headline. He's identified as a cook. He's not charged. There's no follow up story. So if you're hairy like, it's kind of throwing you under the bus in a sense especially. Oh yeah.

[Bill Greene]

I mean, if black people are almost only in the newspaper when they commit crimes and they're always identified by race, those articles show that the reporter was just basically taking verbatim whatever the police.

[Eric Roper]

Told him, right to the point where the address is wrong in the same way in both. And his name is also spelled wrong with two Bs in both. So they took something verbatim from the police records without questioning or talking to anyone. Yeah, just used it straight up, which is just.

[Melissa Townsend]

Yeah, I mean, so there's a faulty police report that was used to write two faulty articles in two different newspapers, and they both make Harry look reckless at best. So it's at this point that Eric decided he needed to do his own investigation. That's next time.

[Eric Roper]

Why would someone shoot Roy Mattis, who seems to have everything to lose by shooting Roy Mattis? Well, maybe Roy Mattis did something to him.

[Melissa Townsend]

This is Ghost of a Chance. Our website is startribune.com ghostofachance there you can see pictures and documents from the podcast and you can also sign up to receive news about discussion guides and events. Our email is ghostofachancetartribune.com get in touch if you have a question or feedback or a tip related to the Robinson story. We'd also love to know if this story motivated you to do something in your community. So let us know. You can help pay for this incredible story and others like it with a subscription to the Minnesota Star Tribune. Go to our website, startribune.com Ghost of a Chance is reported by Eric Roper and written and produced by me, Melissa Townsend. Our executive producer is Jenny Pinkley. Our editor is Mary Jo Webster. Fact checking by Eric Roper and Mary Jo Webster. Sound design by Marcel Malakeboo. Our contributing editors are Star Tribune Managing Editor Maria Reeve and Star Tribune Editor and Senior Vice President Suki Dardarian. Legal review from Randy Lebedoff. The art for our show comes from Anna Boone and Brock Kaplan. Special thanks to Kendall Harkness, Zoe Jackson, Laura McCollum, James Schiffer, Nancy Yang, Casey Darnell, Laura Yuen, Tame Danger, and members of the local community who served as our advisors.

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