WHAT'S HAPPENING IN HARLEM?
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Year Published: 1949
Description: This 1949 film “What’s Happening in Harlem?” was produced by the Communist Party USA as a sort of campaign film for council member Benjamin Davis. (Davis was one of the few communists ever to hold city office in New York. Later the same year the film was made, Smith was prosecuted for violating the Smith Act and sentenced to five years in prison.) "What's Happening in Harlem?" is a hard-hitting political short that discusses the economic exploitation of and police violence against African American and Puerto Rican residents of Harlem. The film depicts the ongoing effects of the second wave of the Great Migration. This print is incomplete, and it's unclear how much of the film is missing -- but it seems likely it was originally 11 minutes long. Harlem apartment tenement buildings (0:09). Residents go about their daily lives while surrounded by run-down conditions that some might characterize as a ghetto (0:16). Police lead horses down the street (0:21). Children playing in the alley way (0:47). African American mother caring for her children (0:57). Smiling black baby (1:12). Room displaying poor living standards with black triplet babies (1:17). Five black boys sleeping in the same small bed (1:50). Black girl enters a bathroom in poor condition (1:55). Man reads the paper while sitting outside of his window (2:02). White man, presumably a landlord, struts about the streets and collects money from black tenants (2:07). Tenement building that housed more than 100 people in late 1940s Harlem burns down (2:23). High-pressured water treats the fire (2:30). Luxurious new buildings in Manhattan with fountains in front (2:36). White children playing in the fountains (2:47). African American children playing in building scraps (2:55). Cop rides a horse down the street (3:00). Butcher storefront with ham displayed and black children reflected in the glass (3:04). Close up of meat and its price (3:11). Black woman carrying a paper bag out of the butcher (3:13). Empire restaurant / diner sign shown, along with a sign advertising a 95¢ special (3:16). Cops from the 28th Precinct patrol the streets in their Chrysler Corporation Plymouth radio cars (3:25). Men put their feet up and rest on a city street (3:33). Children / teenagers sit in shambles (3:36). Advertisement for Chevrolet, depicting white upper-class people sitting in a car's back seat (3:41). African Americans lined up in front of a storefront called “Checks 290 Cash,” waiting for relief / welfare checks (3:50). Sign for Manufacturers Trust Company (4:09). Storefront of Corn Exchange Bank (4:12). Police officer walks alongside white woman (4:14). Chrysler Corporation Plymouth radio cars (4:20). Close up on Lexington Ave. E. 109 St sign that points out the direction to the police department (4:23). Puerto Rican Travel Agency (Agencia De Pasajes) storefront (4:24). La Placita Productos Tropicales sign (4:29). Nice car passing in front of people loitering on a street corner (4:34). Puerto Rican / Latin American women and children (4:37). Multi-racial protest calling for equal rights for all Americans (4:46). Sign featuring A&P grocery store (4:51). Woman carrying groceries in front of a protest (4:52). Series of signs protesting the A&P store: sign calling for the rights of Italian Americans (4:58), sign in Spanish (5:00), sign calling A&P a “Jim Crow store” (5:02), series of signs in Spanish (5:08). Cops standing and riding horses down the street (5:12). Black young men and boys playing checkers in front of a building entrance (5:22). Cop scolds the young men for loitering and points to a sign that says private property (5:33). Cop violently interrupts the checkers game and physically forces the young men to move (5:57). Man speaks about the cops’ murder of Mr. Bernice Barber, a black man, in the neighborhood of 122nd St and Lexington Ave. (6:00). Mr. Barber’s aunt speaks about the killing of her nephew (6:49). Photo of the widow and children of Richard T. Brown, another black man who was murdered by the police (7:10). Interview with Joseph Bogman as well as his friend, Joe Jackson, and wife about his encounter with police brutality (7:19). New York Amsterdam News newspaper (8:08). Series of cartoons featuring wealthy bankers and capitalists (8:32). White landlord writes a check (8:38). Photo of politician Earl Brown (9:18). Series of scenes with multi-racial working people (9:29). This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com Transcript Follow along using the transcript. Show transcript PeriscopeFilm 759K subscribers Videos About Support Us on Patreon "SCHLEY RIDE TO HAWAII" 1952 TRAVELOGUE HANA-MAUI RESORT VOLCANOES NATIONAL PARK REEL 2 XD52384 by PeriscopeFilm
Complete Record: This 1949 film “What’s Happening in Harlem?” was produced by the Communist Party USA as a sort of campaign film for council member Benjamin Davis. (Davis was one of the few communists ever to hold city office in New York. Later the same year the film was made, Smith was prosecuted for violating the Smith Act and sentenced to five years in prison.) "What's Happening in Harlem?" is a hard-hitting political short that discusses the economic exploitation of and police violence against African American and Puerto Rican residents of Harlem. The film depicts the ongoing effects of the second wave of the Great Migration. This print is incomplete, and it's unclear how much of the film is missing -- but it seems likely it was originally 11 minutes long. Harlem apartment tenement buildings (0:09). Residents go about their daily lives while surrounded by run-down conditions that some might characterize as a ghetto (0:16). Police lead horses down the street (0:21). Children playing in the alley way (0:47). African American mother caring for her children (0:57). Smiling black baby (1:12). Room displaying poor living standards with black triplet babies (1:17). Five black boys sleeping in the same small bed (1:50). Black girl enters a bathroom in poor condition (1:55). Man reads the paper while sitting outside of his window (2:02). White man, presumably a landlord, struts about the streets and collects money from black tenants (2:07). Tenement building that housed more than 100 people in late 1940s Harlem burns down (2:23). High-pressured water treats the fire (2:30). Luxurious new buildings in Manhattan with fountains in front (2:36). White children playing in the fountains (2:47). African American children playing in building scraps (2:55). Cop rides a horse down the street (3:00). Butcher storefront with ham displayed and black children reflected in the glass (3:04). Close up of meat and its price (3:11). Black woman carrying a paper bag out of the butcher (3:13). Empire restaurant / diner sign shown, along with a sign advertising a 95¢ special (3:16). Cops from the 28th Precinct patrol the streets in their Chrysler Corporation Plymouth radio cars (3:25). Men put their feet up and rest on a city street (3:33). Children / teenagers sit in shambles (3:36). Advertisement for Chevrolet, depicting white upper-class people sitting in a car's back seat (3:41). African Americans lined up in front of a storefront called “Checks 290 Cash,” waiting for relief / welfare checks (3:50). Sign for Manufacturers Trust Company (4:09). Storefront of Corn Exchange Bank (4:12). Police officer walks alongside white woman (4:14). Chrysler Corporation Plymouth radio cars (4:20). Close up on Lexington Ave. E. 109 St sign that points out the direction to the police department (4:23). Puerto Rican Travel Agency (Agencia De Pasajes) storefront (4:24). La Placita Productos Tropicales sign (4:29). Nice car passing in front of people loitering on a street corner (4:34). Puerto Rican / Latin American women and children (4:37). Multi-racial protest calling for equal rights for all Americans (4:46). Sign featuring A&P grocery store (4:51). Woman carrying groceries in front of a protest (4:52). Series of signs protesting the A&P store: sign calling for the rights of Italian Americans (4:58), sign in Spanish (5:00), sign calling A&P a “Jim Crow store” (5:02), series of signs in Spanish (5:08). Cops standing and riding horses down the street (5:12). Black young men and boys playing checkers in front of a building entrance (5:22). Cop scolds the young men for loitering and points to a sign that says private property (5:33). Cop violently interrupts the checkers game and physically forces the young men to move (5:57). Man speaks about the cops’ murder of Mr. Bernice Barber, a black man, in the neighborhood of 122nd St and Lexington Ave. (6:00). Mr. Barber’s aunt speaks about the killing of her nephew (6:49). Photo of the widow and children of Richard T. Brown, another black man who was murdered by the police (7:10). Interview with Joseph Bogman as well as his friend, Joe Jackson, and wife about his encounter with police brutality (7:19). New York Amsterdam News newspaper (8:08). Series of cartoons featuring wealthy bankers and capitalists (8:32). White landlord writes a check (8:38). Photo of politician Earl Brown (9:18). Series of scenes with multi-racial working people (9:29). This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com Transcript Follow along using the transcript. Show transcript PeriscopeFilm 759K subscribers Videos About Support Us on Patreon "SCHLEY RIDE TO HAWAII" 1952 TRAVELOGUE HANA-MAUI RESORT VOLCANOES NATIONAL PARK REEL 2 XD52384 by PeriscopeFilm
Transcription
foreign lied about this is our home over half a million of us live here Negros Puerto Ricans colored from all over the world and in our midst the cops everywhere mounted and on foot like an army like an army of occupation in the midst of our city like conquerors or troops of empire in a colony why why are there more here than anywhere in New York than anywhere in America why they are here to protect not life not Liberty not the pursuit of happiness no they are here to protect a six billion dollar investment in bad housing in slums six billion dollars invested by banks in a Jim Crow ghetto foreign they are here to prevent us from protesting to intimidate us when we try to do something about these shambles that pass for homes to shut us up when we speak out that the one night triplets Monica Roberta Valerie have a right to live in something better than one room with seven others ten people in one crowded apartment with the welfare allotment discontinued [Music] the cops want to force us meekly to accept five in a bed Ten in a room a TB rate seven times out of whites more negro infants die than live the first year of life [Music] to keep us silent their cops strut rinse fifteen dollars for a kitchenette three sunless rooms at sixty dollars built 75 100 years ago these houses were paid off by us principle and interest long ago the Banker's gravy train six percent guaranteed if a hundred died by fire last year that doesn't matter it's the six percent to the banks that matters [Applause] and when they build new homes Banks the Rockefellers in their Metropolitan Life to make sure it will not disturb the sacred six percent the sacred six billions invested in Jim Crow slums they keep us out this is their studied [Music] this is one reason why all the cops in Harlem and there are other reasons too we try to make us swallow other things ungraded meat sold at prices higher than grade a meat downtown the cast off food the rotten food unsellable elsewhere is dumped for us a 75 cent meal downtown is 95 cents uptown to keep us quiet about this robbery their boys in blue tell us don't stand here break it up Move Along we are the reservoir cheap labor they keep us unemployed to drive wages down lots to be hired first to be fired menial jobs only bought a domestic Works dividers to unload Asphalt in the 30s they forced us onto the long bread lines now they force us onto relief give us checks and starve us a relief check will buy you seventy percent of the food you need to live on and always two percent to cash it [Music] wasn't their boys in blue it's not safe for you here ma'am they try to make the world believe that lie [Music] and you will find them here too among the Puerto Rican people in Harlem their cars parked on each Corner trying to intimidate us for harlemism from Puerto Rico Jamaica from Latin America [Music] and because we have found oppression here as well we fight back we March negro and white Puerto Rican American and negro American United don't buy in this store it's anti-negro anti-puerto Rican united we have won many battles negro drivers on Fifth Avenue buses Negros and Puerto Ricans hired on 125th street so they try to break our Unity the cops watch our picket lines and ride their horses specially trained for anti-picket Duty [Music] but they do more than stand and twirl their clubs and ride [Music] hey bro Mr Bernice Barber was in the neighborhood of 122nd Street and Lexington Avenue he had apparently been robbed he was running away from his attackers and ran into a delicatessen store on 122nd Street in Lexington he had no shoes on his hat had been lost and other articles of clothing had been removed two cops drove by in a squad car and they saw Mr Barber running into the store without asking any questions whatsoever they jumped out of their squad car opened fire on Mr Barber with a volley of 15 shots six of which hit him and killed him instantly in the store Mr Stroud Mr Berber was your nephew would you tell us how you feel about this brutal killing well he was a hard-working boy he sent money down south his family to support his mother so I hope something be dead about it because the other young boys coming up like my nephew so they're going to have the same thing happen to you the Widow and children of Richard T Brown murdered by a cop my name is Joseph Bogman on July the 20th at 6 30 P.M I was sitting on the ice door and this Iceman said to me he said you can't sit down you have to move so I didn't move fast enough so he pushed me I said don't push me fella and he stuck me with a ice pick then me and him got into a fight and I knocked him out and I was standing on the crib and a cop came up and hit me my name is Joe Jackson I saw the whole thing cop came up in his car jumped out ran across stuck Joe across the head without knowing what it was all about the blood came crashing out the people of the man that got the cops didn't hit you again I'm Joe's wife I was down and top hit him in the head and I yelled for him not to hit him again otherwise he would have [Music] police brutality is part of the part of plan of the banks the government and big business like the Nazis they want to create a master race prove Negroes are inferior this is why they beat us Lynch's Northern style and go unpunished and we know who stand behind the cops the bankers six billion invested in a Jim Crow ghetto the profiteer the gravy boys a 75 cent meal downtown cost 95 cents uptown the gods they too are behind the cops protect the sacred six percent for Metropolitan Life whites only the Jim Crow boss who hates all labor and tries to break our Unity and the clan in New in New York pregnant woman beaten children made bars where negro behind the cops the politicians and their Stooges like Earl Brown who have sold out themselves and their people for a price Banker lyncher profiteer Clansman cop United against the people but we don't just take it we're hard-working people who love life love a ball game love kids we're people who love laughter and hate oppression we've fought them before the bankers and their cops and one and we fight them now
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