User:Jrnevans2018/sandbox

Jeremy Nevans Locke and Joe Bodo

Webb's City and the Civil Rights Movement of St. Petersburg, Florida
Webb’s city was a St. Petersburg, Florida landmark business founded in 1926 by James Earl Webb (Doc), and remained in business till its closing in 1979. Over the span of years Webb’s City, which advertised itself as “the world’s most unusual drug store," grew from a humble 17’ x 38’ building to a multi-million-dollar empire that covered at least ten city blocks. Doc Webb's philosophy regarding to Webb City was "stack it high and sell it cheap." This similar philosophy years later led to the success of Sam Walton and his Walmart empire. Webb’s City peaked at over 1,700 employees and because of its location, sales, and low prices was able to have a shopping base primarily consisting of senior citizens and African Americans. However, although Webb’s city may have had a primary base of African American shoppers, and even hired from the African American community, the store was not without controversy when it came to the African American community, in particular, the NAACP.

Webb's City and Civil Rights
Before the civil rights movement eras of the 1960s and 1970s, Doc Webb’s business was unusual in that Doc would hire African Americans during the time when other businesses in St Petersburg would not. However, African Americans were only hired for positions that were less visible and considered suitable for persons of color, such as a barber or butcher. African Americans were never employed at Webb’s city in any positions of supervision, power, or decision making. Furthermore, African Americans made up the bulk of the shoppers at Webb’s City, yet, they were not permitted to eat at the lunch counter, or shop in the “ready to wear” or “men’s suits” departments.

Webb's City and the NAACP
By June 1960 the NAACP and members of the Black community began actively and publically picketing and staging “sit-ins” at Webb’s City. The chief complaints of the leadership of the St. Petersburg NAACP were that Doc Webb did not hire African Americans proportionate to the number of African Americans that spent money shopping at Webb’s City and lived in the neighboring community. Out of 1,700 employees, only 150 were African American and none of those employees were allowed positions for advancement within the business. Doc disagreed with the NAACP and began legal proceedings to halt the actions of the St. Petersburg NAACP. On December 7th, 1960, Doc successfully stopped NAACP protest actions at Webb’s City through a court-ordered temporary restraining order. However, the restraining order was not the end of the NAACP’s efforts in regards to Webb’s City.

The NAACP filed a motion to dismiss the order and Doc Webb continued his legal efforts ensure picketers stayed away from Webb’s City. The NAACP was fighting to defend what they believed was their constitutional right to picket businesses in St. Petersburg. On the other hand, Doc Webb continued to defend his business by citing his concern for the safety of his employees and that his business had lost a great deal of money because of the NAACP led protests; a comptroller for Webb’s City testified that Doc’s business had lost a total of $13,146. In 1961 Webb’s city removed its barriers that discriminated against race, nevertheless, the court case continued all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court until a final judgment was reached in 1964. The Supreme Court decided the case had been resolved by the lifting of racial barriers. However, it has been suggested that the Supreme Court would have sided with the NAACP.

Doc Webb’s issues with the NAACP did not end in 1964. In 1968, the NAACP supported a garbage workers strike in St. Petersburg by picketing a calling for a boycott of downtown St. Petersburg businesses. Unfortunately for Doc Webb, Webb’s City was included in the area of the boycott and picketing. This boycott was not as peaceful as the 1960 pickets. Six people of a large group of protesters were arrested at Webb’s City for “interfering with business” and were heard yelling threats such as, “Lets burn it down, we’ll start with Webb’s”; Doc Webb did not pursue a permanent injunction and peaceful small groups of protesters were allowed to continue picketing at Webb’s City.

Reflection

 * Webb City and the Civil Rights Movement of St. Petersburg, Florida is a suitable title because there was a previous article with the title "Webb City." Therefore, we did not want to plagiarize this existing article. The second part, "Civil Rights Movement..." summarizes the subject of our article. We want to improve our reference section and general formatting of the page using wikipedia.
 * This is a strong lead section. The last sentence efficiently leads readers into the rest of the article. Someone can read our article and know what Webb City is, will be lead into further discussion of the Civil Rights aspect.
 * We selected these topics and headings because the main source we found focused on these issues. A major section regarded topics of civil rights and justice. These sit-ins and NAACP involvement also made Webb City a newsworthy topic in it's time.
 * The sources you sent us via email will be included for the final draft. We simply did not have time for this draft, but will review your sources and add them in the future.
 * We will be looking at using photographs.

First Draft
-focus on the lead paragraph

-fill out details about what will be in other headings


 * 1) Nina Maruca Edits
 * 2) What does the article / draft do well? Is there anything from your review that impressed you? Any turn of phrase that described the subject in a clear way?
 * 3) The article is well put together. The structure makes sense and takes the reader through each topic clearly. The information is relevant. Each section is well organized and a good length. There is no section that was forgotten.
 * 4) What changes would you suggest the author apply to the article or draft? What would those changes be an improvement?
 * 5) I believe that you need more sources. This information is great but having another source to back up all of your information would be better.

Research notes, 9/25
Hi Jeremy and Joe! You have been assigned the article on Webb's City--specifically, to add coverage about the NAACP sponsored sit-in that took place there in the early 1960's. Here are your research notes from class on 9/25:


 * It would be really interesting to find coverage of the sit-in and see how people felt about it at the time. Would need reliable coverage of the sit-in.
 * Find historical information to create content.

-Prof. Hagood

Sources

https://fsu.digital.flvc.org/islandora/object/fsu:176309/datastream/PDF/view

Notes from 10/4/18

We will create a new wikipedia page regarding the Webb City Sit-in specifically. We will add a few sentences to the existing article linking it to the sit in.

Note to self and Jeremy to research permission to use photos.
AH Comments, 10/04/18: Good work today! I know your assignment just got a little bigger in scope, but I think you're taking it in the right direction. Don't forget that you'll need to find another independent source with "significant coverage" (i.e. more than a casual mention) in order to prove the notability. Here's at least one--and it's kind of a nice story to boot. Also, you may want to cross-check references with the person working on Enoch Douglas Davis (Dorothy), since he is part of this story too.

Note From Joe to Jeremy
Read the article and highlighted race related portions. Doc Webb was a very mysterious guy when it came to his honest feelings. Most sources for article are from court records which is going to make it a challenge to get secondary sources.