U.S. Census Office, Density of the Black Population of the United States (1903)

This choropleth map, which was included in the 1900 Statistical Atlas of the United States compiled under the direction of Henry Gannett, shows the density of the Black population in the United States by county. The darker shaded areas indicate a higher Black population density. According to Gannett, the South Atlantic and South Central states contained 90% of the Black population (p. 43). The states with the highest Black population densities were South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama. Counties next to the Mississippi River in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana also had higher Black population densities. Other areas with significant Black populations were Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Missouri, and Kansas. The map shows the highest population densities extending from the South to the East Coast, a pattern largely attributed to these states' histories as former slave states.