Each Friday, after a long week of teaching, Ida B. Wells attended a cultural club meeting at one of the Memphis, Tennessee, churches. Every meeting ended with readings from the group’s newspaper, the Evening Star. When the editor of the paper moved away, the club asked Wells to take his place.
Shortly thereafter, Baptist minister the Rev. R.N. Countee invited Wells to write for his weekly religious newspaper, Wells had no formal journalism training. By her own account, she admitted to having “no literary gifts and graces.” Yet she accepted the challenge.
