The 20th Century and On

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), founded in 1909, opened a Troy Chapter in 1920.

Walter White, Assistant Secretary of the Board of Directors of the New York City chapter, was the main speaker at the first organized meeting of Black citizens of Troy. For the remainder of the 1920s, the organization focused on the Great Depression unemployment crisis in the city of Troy. In 1928, the Troy NAACP branch voted in favor of a city-wide survey which would look at who was out of work. During the 1930s, the Troy branch focused on local and national news, such as the progress of the Scottsboro case in Alabama.

In 1934, a meeting of all the NAACP branches in the Capital Region was held at the A.M.E. Zion Church. The purpose of the gathering was to review the activities and duties of the organization for the past 25 years. The head speaker of that meeting was William Pickens, Field Secretary for the National Association. He emphasized that the organization’s main goals were to fight against segregation, disenfranchisement, and lynching. Pickens also emphasized the success that the organization had had with winning 90 percent of court cases that were brought in front of the Supreme Court.

With the rise of better job opportunities for Blacks in the northern part of the United States, Troy’s Black population saw a large increase. By 1942, with such a large influx in the Black Community, there soon became a housing problem. The Troy NAACP took action by forming committees, holding meetings, and conducting surveys in order to improve the living conditions of Blacks in Troy and raise awareness of the issues of “red-lining,” which illegally prevented them from renting or owning homes.

In 1960, the Troy NAACP planned a sympathy demonstration for the lunch counter sit-down strike in the south. The demonstration took place at the Troy Woolworth’s. In the late 1960s, the Troy branch worked to help underprivileged Black students in School 5 of Troy. They also worked on establishing a city-wide interracial committee to encourage more businesses to hire more Blacks. By 1976, the national NAACP branch was struggling financially, so many local branches, including the Troy branch, held fundraisers to keep the national branch from going bankrupt.

More recently, the NAACP of Troy has been working on coming back as a more powerful force in the community after many years of not being very active. In January 2018, Renee Powell became the new president of the Troy NAACP. As recently as October of 2019, the NAACP of Troy has been working alongside the mayor of Troy to form a Police Review Committee. The purpose of the Committee is to create a stronger relationship between the community and the police officers of Troy. Ms. Powell notes that it is critical to strengthen the Troy NAACP branch again. “It has never been more important to help put systems in place that work to serve the needs of Troy’s residents … we are moving in the right direction to provide that protection to all members of the community.”