Social justice advocates are creating a queer history archive that celebrates Bayard Rustin, a major organizer in the Civil Rights Movement and key architect of the March on Washington.

The fighting resulted in hundreds of deaths and caused civil rights activist James Weldon Johnson to coin the term “Red Summer.”Sadly, there probably wasn’t a more appropriate term for what took place. During the war, industries that typically segregated blacks allowed them to work for their companies due to labor shortages. In Elaine, Arkansas, an estimated 100 to 237 blacks were killed along with five white men. Both in Chicago and during another riot in Washington, D.C., McWhirter, who authored, “Red Summer: The Summer of 1919 and the Awakening of Black America,” noted that white rioters set up barricades to protect their neighborhoods and had marksmen with rifles on rooftops. If there is a legacy of the “Red Summer,” it has been credited as being among the first series of race riots where blacks fought back against white attackers, in the process setting a precedent for future civil rights battles.