1920 Poll Tax Receipt for Michael Gladden Sr.

The Michael Gladden Sr. and Elizabeth Gladden Collection

Original Poll Tax receipt on paper

c. 1920

Michael Gladden Sr.; Michael Gladden; Mike Gladden

Apopka, Florida, United States of America.

A 1920 poll tax receipt for Michael Gladden Sr., as proof of payment for the year 1919. At the time this poll tax receipt was issued, the comptroller for the State of Florida was Ernest Amos (1867-1943), whose name is present in the top-right section of this receipt. Michael Gladden Sr.'s signature is also present in the "Received of" line, written in pencil.

During the Jim Crow era in the American South, poll tax receipts were used to disenfranchise Black Americans and poor whites by requiring this proof of payment to be shown to register to vote and cast a ballot. The requirement of the poll tax receipt successfully blocked impoverished Americans from voting. Even if able to pay the $1.00 fee in Florida (equivalent to around $36.00 in 2026), election officials often mishandled and refused to issue these receipts to Black Americans. In 1964, the passage of the 24th Amendment outlawed poll taxes in federal elections, and the Supreme Court banned them in state elections in 1966.

Michael Gladden Sr. (09-07-1876 - 10-06-1924) was born in Charleston, South Carolina, on September 7, 1876. In 1898, he married Elizabeth "Bessie" Gladden. On December 23, 1899, their eldest son, Michael Gladden Jr., was born in Charleston, South Carolina. As of 1900, Michael Gladden Sr. worked as a grocery store porter and rented his family home. He and Elizabeth Gladden were both literate and attended school. In 1910, the Gladden Family moved to Jacksonville, Florida, where Michael Gladden Sr. worked as a watchman or safety patrol officer for the city. After 1910, the Gladden family moved to Apopka at the request of Sarah Mead, a formerly enslaved woman and entrepreneur who invited Black families to South Apopka for economic opportunities. Upon first arriving in Apopka, Michael Gladden Sr. worked as a lumber-mill laborer for Consumers Lumber and Veneer Company, earning only $1.25 a day. Around 1918, Michael Gladden Sr. founded his own grocery store sometime during or after 1918, following an unsuccessful joint business venture with two other Black businessmen, Mack Williams and Ed Jones. On October 6, 1924, Michael Gladden Sr. was stabbed to death by Will Wilson following a domestic dispute which was said by the Apopka Chief to have followed an alleged affair between Michael Gladden Sr. and Will Wilson's wife. Wilson was found guilty of second-degree murder by a jury, presiding under Judge T. P. Warlow. Michael Gladden Jr. would inherit proprietorship of M. Gladden Staple and Fancy Groceries following his father's murder.