I am curious... Black People in the 20's

I just finished watching all 56 episodes over the last 12 days on rental DVDs and am keeping my reply decent as requested.

They show black people being intellectual and crafty, one is even a Medicine student on season 3. The racism at the time didn't allow them to go to study medicine, much less afford it. Why all these false pictures of History?

While it is true that racism and segregation loomed large in the history of the USA, there were schools of medicine exclusively for black people. Of course not near as many as there were for white people. During the time period of this historical fiction series there were 3 in 1920 and down to 2 in 1923. At this link, there is a chart showing the total number of black medical schools established after the civil war. It also tells why 10 of them and many white medical schools were closed, not just because Abraham Flexner was a known segregationist.

http://thescholarship.ecu.edu/bitstream/handle/10342/3086/Abraham%20Flexner%20black%20medical%20schools.pdf

I don't think they said where the Samuel Crawford character attended medical school, but it must have been Howard University in Washington DC as opposed to Meharry in Nashville, TN.

Less believable is the lady who works in the US Attorney's law office with Eli's son Will. But since there were black senators, congressmen and lawyers after the civil war, it is possible that some of their children attended law school and worked on cases. The trivia section says the Esther Randolph character is based on Mabel Willebrandt in real life.

Because people are dumb and do believe everything they see on TV (just think about the Davinci Code).

I understand that there are some people with a twitter speak or cupcake nation frame of mind. If they don't comprehend what based on true stories actually means, why worry. In this series, they say multiple times "you can't fix everything".

Nucky told Chalky White that he pulled serious strings for him to be allowed to own/manage the Onyx Club. The link below may be helpful to understand how some of the characters were woven to fit real life.

http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/boardwalkempire.php

In 1920, Jack Johnson, the first African-American heavyweight boxing champion, opened the Club Deluxe on 142nd Street and Lenox Avenue in the center of Harlem, NYC. Owney Madden, a white gangster, and his partner George "Big Frenchy" De Mange took over operations in 1923, and renamed the venue the Cotton Club.

http://www.babyfacenelsonjournal.com/cotton-club.html

George Remus was a real life Ohio lawyer and bootlegger who made $40 million dollars during prohibition. I never heard of him in gangster lore until I read a book titled "The Jazz Bird" that was written in 2002.

Also, the faceless man did not exist, did he?

Is the Gaston Means character played by Stephen Root the faceless man you ask about? If so, he was a real.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaston_Means

Or do you mean Richard Harrow the WWI sharp shooter who wore the mask?
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Books and movies are usually better than real life.

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I cannot tell if this post is trolling.

The medical student, Samuel, went to a Historical Black College and University, maybe the Tuskegee Institute. Chalky's son was going to attend Morehouse, an HBCU that Martin Luther King attended for undergrad.

Dr. Narcisse was a student of Marcus Garvey, who was a Black Nationalist and Separatist. Garvey believed in segregation, but also black empowerment in the form of self-rule.

Have you ever heard of Booker T. Washington, or George Washington Carver? They ran a huge all-black school called the Tuskegee Institute. It got people educated, from farmers to doctors. They had their own networks, and their own schools, and their own businesses.

Sure, they obviously lagged behind due to the recentness of slavery, but I cannot believe you actually think that a black medical student could not physically exist in 1921.

This thread has got to be troll bait.

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You also need to consider that all of these people were criminals. Green was the only color any of them cared about.

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Is this a serious question? Because the writers are incredibly liberal and made this black storyline. It's absolutely a fantasy and Never took place during that time.

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