Re:On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality
by colechristensen on Thursday November 16, 2017 @10:51PM
(#15718751)
This exact situation happened around 1850 in Iowa, a small group of free black families settled in Fayette County. I wish I could find more than a passing reference to pass on what I've read.
Iowa has a history of progressivism. For example in 1851 it was the second state to legalize interracial marriage. In 2009 it was the forth state to legalize same-sex marriage (and not through any change of the laws, the Iowa supreme court decided it was legal)
I know the culture I experienced was not pervasive in the whole midwest. I'm also not saying that there weren't bigots, but it was certainly very much different than a lot of other places in this country.
I think the threat of race-based violence would have made this very difficult. One family, perhaps, but a little neighborhood? Not OK -- I'm thinking specifically about the Tulsa riots of 1921 and other racial violence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_incidents_of_civil_unr...).
(Grew up in suburban Kansas and spent plenty of time hanging around towns like the fictional Gedanken.)