Memphis Free Speech and Headlight
Rev. Taylor Nightingale of Beale Street Baptist Church founded this black newspaper in 1881. The paper served as a place for Nightingale to project his militant reactions to the white attempts to reconstruction. Nightingale also used his church as a way to spread his newspaper and it's prospects. The paper itself cause controversy within the white community and between the clergy of Nightingale's church, it also accelerated racial disputes.