Articles

Wealth and Health Disparities

The Freedman's Savings Bank's fall is still taking a toll a century and a half later

Charisse Jones, Business Reporter, USA TODAY
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July 8, 2024

In The Rise and Fall of the Freedman's Savings Bank and Its Lasting Socio-economic Impact on Black America (Spiramus Press), former USA TODAY Deputy Managing Editor of Money Rodney A. Brooks tells the story of an institution created to give newly emancipated African Americans a place where they could deposit their earnings and begin to build wealth. Just nine years later, in the wake of corruption, mismanagement and fraud committed by its white management, the bank was shuttered.

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Authored By Rodney A. Brooks

NABJ Book Award 2024
TRAFOTFBThe author tells the history of the Freedman’s Savings Bank, how it grew much too quickly, why it failed and the impact on Black America. The Freedman’s Bank offered a safe depository for formerly enslaved people, expanded quickly and gained millions in deposits – mostly ranging from $5 to $50. But inexperience and corruption doomed it to failure, costing may of the small depositors their savings.

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NABJ

FRWG

“Rodney A. Brooks ‘Fixing the Racial Wealth Gap’ is one of the best written and most prescriptive books I’ve read on this prickly subject. Using powerful stats, stories and insightful wisdom, it is written from the heart, mind, body and spirit … plus years of research and thought as a mainstream journalist, Fixing the Racial Wealth Gap is revealing, humorous, instructive and sobering.” – Dr. George C. Fraser

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