In the month of February, the nation reflects on African American history, the Riley County Historical Museum however sheds light on the historical impacts locally with their own self-guided driving tour.
Director Cheryl Collins says this self-guided tour allows the community to start anywhere along the route, and go at their own pace, to visit locations instrumental to this community and beyond like the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, built on the corner of 4th and Yuma St., in 1879.
Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church Courtesy of Kansas Historical Society
Collins points out that this was an extremely important date in Riley County history, because that’s the year that the Exodites came.
“Exodites were African Americans that came out of the South in 1879-1880 and came to Kansas. There were around 20,000 people that just picked up and left and came to Kansas, they first hit St. Louis, and overwhelmed that city. So that city made arrangements to have steamboats take folks to Atchison, and Wyandotte and pretty much overwhelm those cities,” Collins said. “Then the governor, Governor St. John of Kansas, established a committee to try to figure out how they could help these folks and how they could get them moved to homes in Kansas where they could establish homes and jobs.”
Collins continued to say that he then talked with the railroad into allowing them to go to any Kansas town that would accept them. With Manhattan being one of the first towns that said yes, the city accepted about 150 people to Manhattan, and about doubled the population of African Americans in the community.
“A lot of the descendants of those families that came in 1879 and 1880, are still here in Manhattan today. So it really is an important date. Quickly, after those folks came to Manhattan, they established the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church,” Collins said. “The building that’s there now, at 4th and Yuma was built in 1927, and it is on the National Register of Historic Places.”
Of note is the fact that one of the founding creators of the AME Church was Henry McDaniel, father of Hattie McDaniel, the first African American to receive an Oscar for her 1939 roll as “Mammy” in Gone with the Wind.
Collins recounted that Henry McDaniel was born into slavery in Virginia, and he was sold to a family in Tennessee when he was about 10 years old. There in Tennessee that he met and married Susan Hulbert, soon to have their first son Hosea. Their family joined the Exodites out of the South in 1879 and moved to Manhattan in the spring 1880.
“Times were really hard in Kansas for jobs, and especially so for Henry McDaniel because he’d been injured serving in the Civil War, and so he was unable to work some of the time because of his injuries. So jobs were scarce and then if you had an injury that made it even harder, there was also a lot of sickness, and their oldest son Hosea died and was buried in the potter’s field in Manhattan Sunset Cemetery about 1885,” Collins said. “McDaniel decided to move to a place that would would give them better employment opportunities, and first moved briefly to Baxter Springs, then to Wichita, Kansas, and of course, Wichita in the 1880s was a Boomtown, so job opportunities were there.”
Hattie McDaniel
Hattie McDaniel was born in Wichita in 1893, just five years prior to the family moving to Denver, Colorado where Hattie and her siblings first got into show business. Performing in Colorado, Kansas City, and Chicago, Hattie maintained roots in Kansas when she married Howard Hickman, who died in 1915. By 1931, Hattie’s sister and brother were working in Hollywood, and convinced her to join them, where she had success in radio and film, before receiving an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, and was the first African American to receive an Oscar.
“I think it’s interesting that in January 2006, the United States Postal Service issued a stamp in honor of Hattie McDaniel, who almost wasn’t a Manhattanite,” Collins said. “It’s too bad for us that her family moved to Wichita before she was born, then we could’ve claimed her for a Manhattanite. But there’s strong family ties between her family and here.”
Collins says the events of Riley County’s past are fascinating and the impact of Washington Marlatt, a “conductor” or guide on the Underground Railroad, is still felt at his original home in town. The house that he lived in, while he was helping the enslaved up north to get away from slavery, is the oldest house in its original location in Manhattan.
“Built in 1856 by Davies Wilson, a Cincinnati man connected with the Cincinnati and Kansas Land company, came out as a surveyor and was a big property owner in a lot of places, eventually went back to Cincinnati. And when he died, his widow left a sizable bequest to Kansas State, and that money was eventually used to build the K-state president’s house,” Collins said. “That’s why the president’s house is on Wilson court.”
Another connection Collins made was with the Marlatt Barn, built of the stone that was salvaged from the original Bluemont Central College building, located at the Claflin and College Rd Central National Bank, marked by a large red stone commemorating where the original building was.
Marlatt House/Barn
Courtesy of KMAN Photographer Bill Bernard
“They tore it down in the 1880s, and Washington Marlatt salvaged that stone to build his barn. Originally, the letters said Bluemont Central College on the barn. But eventually K-state salvaged those from Marlatt’s property, and I think originally put them in the Farrell Library,” Collins said. “Today, those letters are in the K State Alumni building on Anderson, and folks are allowed to go in and take a look at them.”
Drawing upon the full extent of history in Manhattan, Collins highlights Yuma Street and communities south of Colorado Street, were the original African American neighborhoods descended from the original African American Exodites from the South, and came about primarily through social conventions, and racism.
“Well, I guess from the beginning, and of course, racism is not gone today, but it was blatant during a number of periods that really restricted African Americans from buying homes outside of that traditionally African American neighborhood. There were even a few of the additions in Manhattan that actually had legal covenants that restricted African Americans out of those neighborhoods,” Collins said. “So there was some legal restrictions, but mostly those restrictions were social, and it was strictly done to not sell homes outside of that neighborhood to African Americans, which became kind of the heart of the African American community when Douglass School was built.”
Utilized as the segregated school in Manhattan, and built in 1903. The school’s tenure lasted until the 1961-62 school year, and Collins remarks that the school had excellent teachers, “because the competition for getting a position as a teacher was really intense” and “were very highly educated”. Holding school and social events, this facility became the heart of the community. With Brown v Topeka in 1955, Collins states the way Manhattan handled this was by making it evident anyone could go to Douglass school.
“Eventually, by 1961-62, Douglass school was closed as a separate school, and the served as a maintenance building for the school district for a while. The city of Manhattan bought it and used it as an annex for the Douglass Recreation Center,” Collins said. “That’s how it continues to be used today, and has a wonderful tutoring program that’s housed in that building and lots of activities. It’ll be interesting to see with the brand new Douglass Recreation building, as well as the Douglass school, and the Douglass Center, right across the street, how all those things will be available for recreation purposes in Manhattan. So that’s pretty exciting to see how that all unfolds.”
As it continues to be important in Manhattan today, the Douglass Center at 900 Yuma was built as a temporary center for African American soldiers during World War One. Collins recounted how the City of Manhattan then bought the lots in October of 1941, and dedicated the building in January of 1942.
“The governor came, it was a big thing that the ninth cavalry band played, and course that was the Buffalo Soldier group. So I think it had a really interesting connection here, and of course, Fort Riley brought all kinds of celebrities, to Fort Riley, and then the communities around it during World War Two, and if those folks were African Americans, they came to the Douglass Center,” Collins said. “Some of the folks that did come there were Joe Lewis, who was heavyweight champion of the world in 1937, and Jackie Robinson, the first African American to play in the modern League of the American Major Leagues. So some really important people came through there, and it continues to be a really important social center for all of Manhattan today. With the new building, that’ll be even more important.”
Collins said this location made quite a splash with a swimming pool built right beside the Douglass school, originally built at the same time the city built the Depression-era new Manhattan city pool, as African Americans were not allowed to swim there.
“That pool, I believe, was built in 1938, and then was used for many, many years. Recent memory, says it was removed in 2005,” Collins said. “It was not a segregated swimming pool for many, many years before it closed, and it was interesting to see in the late 50s, and 60s, that change.”
As many African American soldiers came back from World War Two, having fought and died in large order to fight for American Freedom, Collins states these soldiers simply would not accept not having that freedom extended to themselves and their families.
“Change began to occur, and in that period the swimming pools were desegregated, and African Americans could swim in Manhattan city pool,” Collins said. “The movie theaters, African Americans no longer had to sit in the balcony. At the barber shops they were accepting all people whereas before, African Americans were not allowed in some barber shops. And all along the line, those things changed. So I think American life changed for the better in that period, and that the freedoms of life were extended to all people.”
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