Southern Newcomers to Chicago, 1960- 1970

Southern Newcomers to Chicago, 1960- 1970

These primary sources are two graphs, mapping Census data from 1960 to 1970. The data demonstrates large amounts of Southern migration to Uptown, a neighborhood in Chicago, Illinois. For instance, up to 85.1% of newcomers to Uptown were from the South at census tract 320 in 1960. People, women, men and children, were migrating out of the South following what was coined by musician Steven Earle as “hillbilly highway.” Hillbilly highway is Route 23 and Highway 75, both of these routes run North and South providing the opportunity for Southerners, particularly Appalachians, to move to the North for more jobs (Fraser 2023). Economic and living conditions in the South were at an all-time low, especially for the area's large population of miners (Guy, 2001). These families went North to places like Uptown in search of jobs; however, when they arrived, they found themselves in struggling economic conditions once again (Guy, 2007). While families had different modes of transportation to get to Uptown, most families utilized the growing railroad as it was the most affordable option (Guy, 2007).

The numbers provided by the table complicate a dominant narrative of the Great Migration where only Black people moved out of the South (Fraser, 2023). The moving of Southerners to Uptown changed the landscape and culture of the city. The common oppression of all “hillbillies” in Uptown led to a solidarity movement and the creation of the Young Patriots Organization (YPO). The YPO set up free health clinics, created a police watch force, served children and families free food, and organized protests against class brutality (Young Patriots Organization, 2025). They worked in conjunction with the Black Panther Party and the Young Lords forming the Rainbow Coalition. Without the forced migration of Appalachians to Uptown, history may not have seen a strong coalition of working-class people fighting against class discrimination. Questions for further exploration include: Can a researcher track one individual who followed the Hillbilly Highway and joined the YPO, what were the conditions on the sojourn from the South to Uptown like, how can, what made Southerners believe the conditions in Uptown were going to be better than those in the South? 

References 

Fraser, Max. Hillbilly Highway: The Transappalachian Migration and the Making of a White Working Class. 2018.

Guy, Roger. From Diversity to Unity: Southern and Appalachian Migrants in Uptown, 1955-1975. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2007.

Guy, Roger. "Identity, Pride, and a Paycheck: Appalachian and Other Southern Women in Uptown, Chicago, 1950-1970." Journal of Appalachian Studies 7, no. 1 (2001): 46–63. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43664390.

Young Patriots Organization. Young Patriots Organization and the Original Rainbow Coalition. Accessed February 19, 2025.

census.gov

census.gov

Photo download of a graph.