Documentary, talk to highlight work of black press

Pitt-Bradford will show the documentary “The Black Press: Soldiers Without Swords” April 8 in Room 161 of Swarts Hall.

Following the showing of the documentary at 6:30 p.m., Dr. Adam Cilli, assistant professor of history, will talk about his own research on Pittsburgh's black newspaper, the Pittsburgh Courier.

PBS made the documentary in the 1990s, while editors and reporters from the heyday of the great black newspapers that existed in most major cities since the 1800s. The papers provided a unique voice for an often-ignored population.

An article by Cilli, “Robert L. Vann and the Pittsburgh Courier in the 1932 Presidential Election: An Analysis of Black Reformism in Interwar America” will appear in the April issue of The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography.

The article provides a brief biography of Vann, a Pitt alumnus and one of the few African-American attorneys in Pittsburgh who founded the Courier in 1910. In 1932, he would use his position as editor and publisher of the Courier to encourage his black readers to turn their backs on the party of Lincoln, who had emancipated slaves, and vote for Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The article is a continuation of the work Cilli did for his doctoral dissertation at the University of Maine, which dealt with black reformers in Pittsburgh during the early 20th century. It will be published as a book next year.

This is Cilli's first year teaching at Pitt-Bradford. Previously, he has taught at the University of Maine, Gannon University and Texas A&M.