Only one percent of Black workers held professional jobs in 1890.

Evidence

In 1890, 87 percent of black workers were either in farming (56 percent) or domestic service (31 percent). Most were employed in the South. Only 1 percent were in professional service. Tommie Moss was in that 1 percent. — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations, 288

Categorization

• CANDY: The occupational distribution is a crisp stat-set for illustrating the scarcity of Black professional success.
• XREF: connects to: Only one percent of black working women ever reached professional middle-class status — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 210