Vigo County Historical Society

1947-48 Business Guide Showcases "People Proud of Their Heritage"

One of the most recent additions to the Vigo County Historical Society’s collection arrived just in time to be featured during Black History Month.

While attending a local auction, past board president Kathy Brentlinger acquired a copy of the "Indiana Negro Business and Professional Pictorial Guide," which she donated to the society.

The guide was published by Hilbert L. Bradley and covers the years 1947-48..

It include information from 12 Indiana communities and sold for $1. Bradley is described as "a historian of the backbone of the Indiana Negro."

His book is dedicated to "the better understanding among all races to the Negro’s social and economical status of this state."

The forward states that the purpose of the book was to "point with pride, to educate, to advertise and to promote the thousands of enterprises of a people proud of their heritage."

The cover photographs include Terre Haute author Evangeline Harris Merriweather and Dr. George Washington Carver as they peruse her book, "Stories for Little Tots."

The Terre Haute section of the publication is a wonderful guide for the business, churches and educators of the black community in the late 1940s.

Also included is a "History of Our Colored Citizens" written by Grace Wilson Evans.

Our thanks to Brentlinger for this addition to the museum’s archives of information and artifacts on the black history of Terre Haute.