Obama supporters Mary Decker, center, Annete Davis, left, and others celebrate as the Democrat's presidential win is announced in Birmingham, Ala., on Nov. 4
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Obama's candidacy inspired scores of blacks like Michael Johnson, 33, to vote for the first time. At about noon on Nov. 4, Johnson showed up at his Gary, Ind., polling station to cast his vote. But he was turned away. The reason: his name appeared on a list of people who had already cast absentee votes. Johnson left the station dismayed. He spent the next five hours driving across Lake County, Ind., sorting out the mess with election authorities in Crown Point, the county's seat, before eventually returning to the Gary polling station. He says the polling station's managers applauded when they saw him. "They didn't think I was coming back," the hotel dishwasher said late Tuesday. "But this election was just too important for me to miss." (See pictures from the historic Election Day.)
Meanwhile, Barbara Gray, 65, a retiree who is also from Gary, said she voted for Obama partly because she hoped he would take interest in improving conditions in urban areas — like Obama's adopted hometown neighborhood, Hyde Park, a leafy Chicago enclave surrounded by some of the city's bleakest communities. She said Obama may be the first President with a firsthand understanding of life in neighborhoods like hers. Gray said she wants the basics: cracked sidewalks repaved, enough funding so that largely black and Latino urban public schools can compete with the predominately white schools in affluent suburbs. "Just look around," she said on Election Day, pointing to a long row of blighted buildings along one of Gary's main boulevards, Broadway Street. "There's 101 things that need to be done." (See the next President's to-do list.)
In an interview with TIME this week, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said that Obama's election "shows that there's nothing else we can't be. There's no university we can't be seriously considered to lead. There's no bank we can't be considered in if we have the right credentials."
There's no doubting that Obama's candidacy represents the shattering of many of the racial barriers that have long been entrenched in America. But it is also worth tempering those expectations. Standing in the crisp breeze along Chicago's Michigan Avenue, on the night of Obama's election, Freddie Arnett, a 51-year-old maintenance supervisor, expressed hope that Obama would show concern for urban affairs. But Arnett acknowledged, "I know it's going to take time."
Shortly after Obama's election, a throng of people stood outside the Chicago headquarters of two of the country's leading chronicles of black life, Jet and Ebony magazines, and beamed at a row of covers featuring Barack and Michelle Obama.
"Our country is showing its forward evolution, that the color of one's skin cannot inhibit one's ability, and that's worthy of celebration," said Corey Booker, mayor of Newark, N.J.