It's Curious City, where we take your questions about Chicago and the region, and investigate, report, explore, from WBEZ.

Hi, I'm Ariane Nettles, journalist and professor at Northwestern University.

In 1893, legendary activist and journalist, Ida B. Wells,

came to Chicago on a mission. The World's Fair was happening that summer. Millions of people were

expected to visit. And anybody with a product to sell, a constituency to celebrate, or a message

to promote, wanted to be there.

Prominent African-American leaders applied for space to celebrate their achievements since the end of slavery.

But the fair planners denied them.

So Wells traveled here to speak out.

She was working with well-established black leaders like Frederick Douglass.

Back then, pamphlets were a key tool in political protests and campaigns. Wells was the lead author of a pamphlet, arguing that Black Americans' work be recognized.

In her words,

They have contributed a large share to American prosperity and civilization.

The labor of one half of this country has always been and is still being done by them.

But there was a problem.

They didn't have the money to print the pamphlet.

Frederick Douglass had said he was going to get the funding,

and he was trying the more traditional way of getting some newspapers to sponsor and all that kind of stuff. And he was having a lot of problems with it.

This is Michelle Duster. She's the great granddaughter of Ida B. Wells.

I just think it's funny. She's like, step aside. Let me show you how to do this.

Wells went directly to Chicago's black community, from church to church, asking for money

from their women's groups, and she got the money.

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