Got On My Traveling Shoes

This chapter examines the role played by the Great Migration in the development of black sacred music in Chicago. Starting around 1916, thousands of black men, women, and children landed on Chicago's shores as part of the Great Migration, also known as the Great Northern Drive. Regardless of the way migrants traveled, Chicago was the destination of choice, the Promised Land. This chapter first discusses the sources of the new African American migrants' disillusionments in Chicago, including unemployment and substandard housing, before turning to early congregational singing in sanctified services and in storefront churches. It then considers the rise of African American Protestant churches as well as the migrants' creation of their own “islands of southern culture.” It also compares northern and southern worship practices among African American churches and concludes with an overview of the proliferation of storefront and sanctified churches in Chicago, along with sanctified worship in Spiritual churches and their influence on gospel music.