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Article: Ike in office. (President Dwight D. Eisenhower)(The Tide Turns: African Americans Enter the Executive Ranks; Special Issue: the Untold Story of Blacks in the White House)
- Article from:
- American Visions
- Article date:
- February 1, 1995
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1995 Heritage Information Holdings, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Photography had been in existence for more than a century before an image was captured of an African American working in the White House in an executive capacity. But it was no fault of American photographers.
Although African Americans worked in the "People's House" or on its grounds from its inception, until the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, they had always served either as domestics or laborers.
Soon after the 1952 election, Eisenhower instructed his incoming White House chief of staff, Sherman Adams, to include qualified African Americans in his new administration. Eisenhower's edict cracked open the door to wider black employment in the federal ...