The caption on the front below the photograph reads: “Newark New Jersey July 16 Sunday in riot plagued Newark. A little girl in her Sunday dress passes a National Guard roadblock on her way to church on the edge of Newark’s riot area Sunday morning. Guardsmen, stationed across the street from the St. James A.M.E. church, did not interfere with the movement of members of teh congregation. The church membership appeared to be predominantly Negro. A.P. wirephoto”
The 1967 Newark “riots” were among the most deadly days in US history – four days of violent, armed conflict in the streets of Newark, New Jersey. Occurring between July 12 and July 17, 1967, at least 26 people died and over 700 more sustained serious injuries. The catalyst for the rioting was the arrest and beating in custody of a local cab driver, John William Smith: police stopped Smith’s cab, arrested him and beat him up in the street and at the station. Smith was Black; the officers, white.
Protesters who saw the incident gathered as it was occurring and others joined. The anger arising from the constant ill treatment of the city’s majority Black population at the hands of the police and the courts raged into fury.
Smith was jailed but five years after his conviction, the U.S. 3rd District Court of Appeals ruled in his favor, the three-judge panel deciding that he should not have been indicted for assault and battery on a police officer because Black people were excluded from the grand jury that indicted him.
The back of the photo has information in Spanish from the Associated Press.