USA TODAY’s New “Never Been Told” Project Seeks to Spotlight the Untold Stories of People of Color in the US

USA TODAY launched a new yearlong network project today, “Never Been Told: The Lost History of People of Color,” to elevate, through deeply reported investigative and explanatory journalism, the people, places and ideas that are often excluded from history books.

The ambitious project aligns with Gannett’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion in its news coverage and initiatives. It highlights unseen, unheard, unheralded and forgotten stories with newly found records, documents, research and eyewitness accounts. With support from Gannett’s more than 250 local news sites in 46 states and Guam, USA TODAY will publish an in-depth story each month with accompanying video, historical photographs and graphics.

The series kicks off with the story of Jimmie Lee Jackson, whose killing by an Alabama state trooper on February 18, 1965 sparked the Selma to Montgomery marches for Black voting rights. The international outcry after Bloody Sunday – the March 7, 1965 beatings of protesters on the Edmund Pettus Bridge – led, ultimately, to the signing of the Voting Rights Act. Yet, Jimmie Lee Jackson remains a forgotten martyr of civil rights. USA TODAY’s Javonte Anderson, enterprise reporter for racism and history, traveled to Alabama in April to shine a light on Jimmie Lee Jackson’s legacy. Anderson’s in-depth piece is accompanied by a personal column, video, and graphics – including a locator map of Marion showing Black voter registration in 1960s Alabama.

The project is designed to evoke thoughtful remembrance, and provide provocative impact, down to the very typeface used for the “Never Been Told” wordmark. Gannett designers chose to use the open-source Redaction typeface, created for a project by visual artist Titus Kaphar and attorney poet Reginald Dwayne Betts that speaks to the injustices within the criminal justice system. While indicative of obscured justice as used by the artists, it fittingly signifies the distortions and omissions of history that leave people of color out of the American story. 

USA TODAY racism and history enterprise editor Nichelle Smith, who is overseeing the project, said, “History isn’t a static document, delivered to us by the founding fathers as the biblical Moses handed down commandments written on stone. History is a fluid, living, energetic thing fed continuously by the stories of the people creating that history. They include all the people of color whose labor and thought built our society.”

To learn more about “Never Been Told,” please visit: neverbeentold.usatoday.com.