She Told the Truth, Built Wealth, and Hired Help in the 1890s. What’s Your Excuse?
Ida B. Wells proved something America still doesn’t want to admit.
The “reason” they gave for lynching wasn’t the real reason.
So she did what truth-tellers do
She investigated.
She read the white newspapers.
She dug into the data.
She followed the money.
And what she found was horrifying.
Black people weren’t being lynched only because of lies about “crime.”
They were being lynched because they were building power.
Opening grocery stores.
Buying land.
Starting businesses white folks couldn’t control.
Economic competition was a death sentence.
So Ida picked up her pen and went to war.
Not with vibes.
With receipts.
She ran the numbers.
Named names.
Published the truth in pamphlets like Southern Horrors and The Red Record.
Cold detail.
No comfort.
No softening.
Then she took that truth on the road.
Boats.
Trains.
Packed rooms.
In the 1890s, she toured the U.S. and Britain, speaking about lynching and Black economic terror.
And here’s the part people skip:
She made money doing it
Those lectures and publications earned her what could arguably be worth over seven figures in today’s dollars across her career.
A Black woman.
Talking about racist violence.
Getting paid to tell the truth.
In the 1890s.
And she did it while raising a family in Chicago.
Building with her husband Ferdinand L. Barnett — a prominent Black lawyer, journalist, and later the first Black assistant state’s attorney in Illinois.
Chicago roots.
Law.
Media.
Money.
Movement work.
Ida was doing all of that before any of us.
But the part that really sits in my chest?
She traveled with help.
She organized her life so she could mother, write, travel, and speak.
She brought support with her when she hit the road.
Long before anybody had language like “traveling nanny,” she was living the truth:
Black women do not have to do everything alone.
Now let me make this personal.
I’m from Chicago.
I’m a lawyer.
I’m a speaker.
I travel with a nanny so I can do my work and raise my baby without burning out.
And yes—people have told me:
“That’s not what Black women do.”
But Ida B. Wells was doing it in the 1890s.
So miss me with the shame.
We’ve been Black women who sell.
Black women who travel.
Black women who tell the truth.
Black women who build wealth and hire help.
We’ve been making money with our minds and our voices.
Not just our labor.
That’s why I created Black Women Sell Live.
Because I wanted a space where Black women don’t have to choose between:
Being brilliant and being paid.
Telling the truth and being safe.
Having a family and having support.
You don’t have to shrink.
You don’t have to hide.
You don’t have to play small.
Get on the waitlist for tickets.
Join the 450+ women who already said they want in: https://lnkd.in/gNc6R-Pg
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She Told the Truth, Built Wealth, and Hired Help in the 1890s. What’s Your Excuse?
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