Friendship: An African-American Community on the Prarie Margin of Northeast Texas

The following report summarizes the findings of an intensive archival and oral history review, coupled with limited archeological investigations, of the small post-Reconstruction era African-American community of Friendship located on the Prairie Margin of Northeast Texas. The archival and oral history reviews concentrated on the community as a whole between the years of 1880 and 1945: its beginnings, its social and religious structures, its economic development, its interaction with other communities in the area, and ultimately, its demise. The archeological investigations were directed more toward individual sites or homesteads within the community. The results of these investigations have culminated into a study unit which may be used as a guide when investigating other post-Reconstruction era, African-American farming communities in Northeast Texas.