The sharecropper strike of 1939

The Poplar Bluff Museums have tales about us, our family and our history. I want to tell you some of those tales found within their museum walls.

On Jan. 10, 1939, motorists were shocked driving from Memphis to St. Louis. As they passed Sikeston, they saw up to 1,700 people along the side of the road. Mostly African Americans, they were in cars and wagons, and truck beds. Men, women and children were huddled around stoves and campfires. The cold rain turned to snow. This sight was the same for 100 miles along highways 60 and 61.

These were families of sharecroppers and renters of farms and plantations who had been evicted from their meager homes. The roadside protest lasted five days in the winter weather.

The protest was a result of unintended consequences of an attempt to right a wrong. In 1939, the federal government decided that landowners would have to share the subsidy paid to them with their sharecroppers and renters. To keep the sharecroppers’ portion, the landowners evicted the sharecroppers only to rehire them as day laborers. As day laborers, they were no longer covered by the act and had to subsist on 75 cents a day. One owner bragged he was saving $2,000.

Owen Whitfield, an African American sharecropper and minister from New Madrid, led the protest. He mobilized the displaced persons and moved them onto the highway. The protest gained national attention and donations rolled in.

The state government stepped in and relocated 100 families to temporary homes just south of Poplar Bluff. This 90-acre tract of land was purchased from donations. The integrated Southern Tenant Farmers Union lobbied the federal government for a more equitable laws. Many St. Louis residents further lobbied for assistance for low-cost homes. In 1941, the bill was passed as part of the New Deal and 600 homes were built, managed by the Farm Security Administration.

In 1945, Congress liquidated the rental communities which would leave the sharecroppers homeless again. A group of St. Louis businessmen and clergy quickly formed the Delmo Housing Corporation and bought the homes from the government. They were resold then to the renters. In 1954, all the renters were now homeowners paying only $800 each for their house.

The Poplar Bluff community was known as Sharecropper’s Camp. At one time, there were 1,000 residents. It became its own town. The camp still stands today on 33 acres and is now the Southeast Missouri Youth Camp.

The story of the Sharecroppers’ strike is told by St. Louis Post-Dispatch writer Cynthia Todd. Her story is on display in the Wheatley Historical Preservation Association Museum, including photos of the protest. The museum is located in the Wheatley School at 921 Garfield. It is open by appointment by contacting Rex Rattler at 573-872-9090. Tell them Mike sent you!