Randolph Miller began a new life in the newspaper industry in 1865 after surviving the horrors of slavery and war. Learning to read as he went, he worked for five years with newspapers in Chattanooga. In 1869, he founded his own newspaper, The Weekly Blade. The Blade became one of the only newspapers in the country to be published and edited by a former slave. Miller used The Blade to advocate for the rights of communities of color still under the heavy oppressions of white supremacy. In 1905, as rebellion against the imposition of Jim Crow laws exploded across Tennessee, Miller organized a three-week boycott of Chattanooga’s newly-segregated streetcars. He continued the paper until his health prevented him from publishing in 1914, and was laid to rest in 1916.