June 20, 1869

The idea to found a black press was approved by a committee of African Americans, led by local advocate Jerome Lewis, at Wesley Chapel Methodist Church on the campus of Philander Smith College; a dinner was later held at the City Hall of Little Rock (Pulaski County) to raise funds to establish a newspaper. The committee included several ministers and community leaders who felt that their concerns were not printed in the city papers such as the conservative Daily Arkansas Gazette or the Morning Republican, the official press of the radical Republican Party to which many African Americans subscribed. The Arkansas Freeman began publication in August 1869 and was the first newspaper in Arkansas printed by an African American.