just a better living.
[plucky folk guitar]
In wanting to know more about my family's migration to Beloit,
I started to research when a lot of Blacks came to Beloit.
Very little was mentioned about the African American history.
I came across the name of Tom Polaski.
He is one walking encyclopedia
on the Great Migration and Fairbanks.
- Tom Polaski: The Great Migration
actually involved almost every southern state.
Anywhere where there's a strong industrial base
that offered decent and consistent pay,
you begin to get migration
of Black people coming in from the South.
- With a shortage of European immigrant labor,
Beloit industries needed new workers.
NFairbanks Morse found a solution to their employee shortage
through a Black janitor named John McCord.
- Cheryl Caldwell: John McCord was from Pontotoc, Mississippi.
Migrated north as a young man.
He came in contact
with personnel manager, Eugene Burlingame.
John McCord was going to go home to Pontotoc, Mississippi,
for the summer to visit his parents,
and he was asked by Burlingame,
"Hey, do you know any other good workers?
If so, bring them back."
In September of 1916,
John brought 18 men from Pontotoc, Mississippi,
back with him.
And that was really the beginning of the migration
of Black men and families from Pontotoc.
And so, within a matter of years,
a lot of the residents in Beloit were from Pontotoc.
There were other areas that they recruited,
but most of them came from Pontotoc, Mississippi.
And so, they did call it the "Pontotoc Up North."