Born: November 28, 1868, Frederica, GA

Education: Beach Institute, Claflin College, 1886–89; Hampton Institute, graduated 1893 (printing), 1896 (academics); Kent College of Law LL.B., 1899

Died: February 22, 1940, Chicago, IL

Establishing the Chicago Defender in 1905, Abbott made it the largest and most outspoken black weekly before the 1920s.

Initially, he printed, folded, and sold copies. By 1912 he had expanded to paperboy deliveries and newsstand sales for a circulation of 20,000. To sell ads and collect news, he solicited churches and organizations on the South Side, a destination of southern black migrants. Circulation began spiraling with his coverage of the Brownsville, Texas riot (1906). Accused of killing one white man and wounding another, three companies of the all-black 25th Infantry Regiment were discharged dishonorably without court martial. Abbott's editorials denounced army racism.

His reputation soared. He vitalized newspaper publishing with an eight-column, eight-page extra on Booker T. Washington's death (1915). Decrying segregation, disfranchisement, and lynching in the South, he initiated “The Great Northern Drive” editorial series (1917). Print runs peaked at 230,000 during World War I and averaged 180,000 after the “Red Summer” of 1919, which witnessed twenty-five major riots, including the one in Chicago. A member of the Chicago Commission on Race Relations, whose report deplored that conflict, he also founded Abbott's Monthly (1933). In the meantime, unlike most of its competitors, the Defender raised revenue mainly from subscriptions.