This black-and-white pinback button celebrates the Adams Morgan Organization (AMO, pronounced ‘ammo’) and affirms self-governance in urban communities. Founded in 1972, AMO developed a participatory democracy in Washington, DC’s Adams Morgan neighborhood, where all residents shared an equal vote. AMO tackled urgent issues of gentrification and mass evictions by providing information and support to
The Anacostia Museum created this pinback button for program participants to wear. The rectangular button displays the logo for a museum program on teenagers and AIDS. The program’s title declares its intent to dispel ignorance about AIDS, a disease first identified in 1981. The button’s bold design follows suit. “Straight Up!” appears in purple, slanted script accented by orange dots spattered di
This pinback button belonged to Ethel L. Payne (1911-1991), who covered the AFL-CIO’s merger in 1955 as a reporter before joining its staff in 1958. Hands clasped across a map symbolize the alliance between the two major labor unions. The blue-and-white button emphasizes “Jobs for All” as a theme of the AFL-CIO’s Conference on Unemployment, held April 8, 1959 in Washington, DC. Jobs and civil righ
The Anacostia Museum created this pinback button for visitors to wear. It “artfully” announces an exhibition focusing on “the arts in public places.” The button’s design includes diamonds in blue, red, and yellow, connecting to the building blocks of color and to diamond patterns on the Museum’s facade. The Museum’s name and the exhibition year, 1990, encircle the bottom. The exhibition encouraged
This pinback button urges support for PATCO, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization, in a strike that pitted the union against President Reagan in 1981. Major changes in labor relations resulted from the strike and the government’s unprecedented response of firing and replacing unionized federal workers. The blue-and-white pin belonged to reporter Ethel L. Payne (1911-1991), who had
This pinback button expresses eagerness to vote for Harold Washington in Chicago’s Democratic primary for mayor in October 1982. A coalition of voters “punched eight” for Washington, the eighth candidate on the ballot. Hailing from the city’s predominantly African American South Side, Washington made history when he was elected the first African American mayor of Chicago in April 1983. The blue-an
This pinback button promoted participation in the Children’s March for Survival held on March 25, 1972 in Washington, DC. Sponsored by the National Welfare Rights Organization, thousands of protestors, half of them children, marched near the White House to protest the Nixon administration’s proposed welfare reform policies. On the round, white button, geometric shapes in orange and yellow represen
This pinback button advocates for statehood for the District of Columbia. The red-and-white button proposes “New Columbia” as the potential 51st state’s name. It belonged to journalist Ethel L. Payne (1911-1991). A longtime Washington, DC resident, political reporter, and activist, Payne became known as the First Lady of the Black Press for her pioneering career.
Created for a 1974 referendum campaign, this pinback button’s bold red-and-black lettering encouraged residents of the District of Columbia to vote for the Home Rule Charter. The campaign led to the Charter’s passage, shifting some powers from Congress to local government and establishing Advisory Neighborhood Commissions, which represented smaller sections of the city and informed decisions on sp
This pinback button supported the 1968 presidential campaign of Hubert Humphrey and his running mate, Edmund Muskie. The red, white, and blue button belonged to journalist Ethel L. Payne (1911-1991), a Chicago native who moved to the nation’s capital in 1952 to cover national and international news for the preeminent African American newspaper, The Chicago Defender. She worked for the Democratic N
This pinback button proclaims love for Fisk University, an historically Black university located in Nashville, Tennessee. The button, sporting the school’s emblematic gold and blue, belonged to journalist Ethel L. Payne (1911-1991). Fisk honored Payne with an endowed professorship named for another pioneering journalist and activist, the Ida B. Wells Chair in Journalism and Mass Communication. As