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Fascinating and Lesser Known People Who Changed American History

Khalid Elhassan May 5, 2020 33 min

Normandy landings - Operation Overlord — Men of the 320th in Normandy. YouTube

10. Coming Face to Face With Jim Crow

The black barrage balloon operators’ training camp near Paris, Tennessee. National Archives

Many black recruits of the 320^th Barrage Balloon Battalion – particularly those from the north – were jittery when they got off the train in Paris, Tennessee, for training at nearby Camp Tyson. Those who were not from the South were fearful about what they would encounter in the land of Jim Crow. It did not take long for them to discover that things were just as bad as they had imagined and often worse.

The first bad sign was when their locomotive crossed the American marker: the Mason-Dixon Line, and all black soldiers were ordered to the “Negro car” – the filthiest and most decrepit one at the end of the train. Upon arrival, their orientation included helpful tips to get along with the locals – or at least avoid infuriating them into a potentially homicidal rage. Among other things, they were advised to never look a white person in the eye, and to step off the sidewalk if one was coming towards them.

Also Read: Jim Crow Laws for Road Trip Travel Guide for Black Americans.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.