The Health Status of Early 20th Century Blacks from the Providence Baptist Church Cemetery (40Sy619) in Shelby County, Tennessee

Paleopathological investigations of health are an important component in the construction of a population’s history. Such studies make possible analyses regarding Black health in the late 19^{th and early 20th centuries, a time period where the availability of relevant and objective literature is limited. Also, these investigations permit a comparison between similar populations to determine the extent to which the demographic, social, economic, and political conditions of this time period affect a specific population.}

This study compares the Providence Baptist Church cemetery in Shelby County, Tennessee to two contemporary historic Black cemeteries in order to address an urban versus rural dichotomy suggested by Davidson et al. (2002). The Cedar Grove cemetery, located in rural Arkansas, and the late-period Freedman’s cemetery, located in Dallas, Texas, were used for the comparison. Comparisons of the skeletal and dental indicators of stress across these samples, using data from the Western Hemisphere Database (Steckel et al. 2002), help place the Providence Baptist Church skeletal series in relation to the other sites. A series of pair-wise chi-tests was employed to determine significant differences at the 95 percent confidence level, between the populations for the frequency and severity of each skeletal indicator of stress.

The Providence Baptist Church cemetery demonstrates a high incidence of degenerative joint disease, moderate infectious lesions, few dietary or metabolic disorders, and little trauma. When compared to the other populations, the pathology frequencies indicate a population that is not clearly associated with either the rural or urban condition as defined by Davidson et al. (2002). Significant variation among the three sites was observed with each stress indicator examined. The Providence population demonstrated a relationship with the Cedar Grove Cemetery for osteoarthritis, and with Freedman’s Cemetery for indicators of metabolic stress. The results for trauma and infection were inconclusive, but a possible relationship between Cedar Grove and Providence for trauma and between Freedman’s and Providence for infection was noted.

These pathological conditions indicate a rural community that is augmenting its health status by taking advantage of the resources at its disposal. This suggests that other factors, such as a direct church affiliation, an association with Masonic organizations, or the proximity to the Memphis metropolitan area affected the population’s health.