This dissertation explores the impact of society on news publications and the value of the Black Press' perspective on the Massive Resistance movement in the 1950s and 1960s. It compares two Charlottesville, Virginia, newspapers during the height of this multifaceted campaign spawned by White politicians in response to the U.S. Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education ruling that racially desegregating schools were unconstitutional. The Daily Progress, a White-owned daily newspaper, offered a different picture of the issue than the Black-owned weekly, the Charlottesville-Albemarle Tribune. This research examined 306 front-page news stories and editorials from 1956 to 1960. Using qualitative content analysis, Reese and Shoemaker's (2016) Hierarchy of Influences Model helps unravel the way news was represented to audiences. The Hierarchy of Influences Model allows examination of the newspaper in the context of the social system it was created and published within. The social system frames the worldview of a time and allows for study of its impact on what is published within a newspaper's pages. The White newspaper focused on the state and federal political maneuvering, and the court battles waged not only in Charlottesville and municipalities across the state. Its editorials called for preservation of the status quo. The Black newspaper covered the intricacies of the local court battle, the plans of the local school board, the work of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and other community organizations seeking to desegregate schools. Its editorials called on Black people to vote, pushed for full citizenship benefits, pointed out political maneuvering and requested people from both sides work together to resolve their issues.This research sheds light on how society, the top level in Reese and Shoemaker's Hierarchy of Influences, penetrates through content shared in the news media in a historical context. It also offers a glimpse into the world of small Black newspapers, few of which survived more than 10 years. While studies have been created on large African American newspapers, little is known about the newspapers created in small urban and rural communities. The dissertation probes their historical significance through an analysis of what was published within their pages.
Read
