Black or White, It’s “Our” History…

Black or White, It’s “Our” History…

The American poet Maya Angelou wrote; “History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, and if faced with courage, need not be lived again.”

I believe it takes courage and strength to review American history and learn from the successes and failures of others. All history is profitable for teaching, for reproving, correction and can improve any person or group of people – if they choose to improve.

We should celebrate the individuality of a person and the various cultures which make up this great country. I look forward to such celebrations as; “Black History,” (February) “National Hispanic Heritage,” (September 15 – October 15) “National American Indian Heritage,” (November) and others. But these should be celebrated in the context of the whole American culture.

Admittedly, it is difficult to look back in Our History and see the inhumanity of one person to another or how one group of people abused another group. For instance, the terrible acts committed against Native Americans by individuals and our government are horrible. The long and cruel story of slavery in America is a terrible part of our history, but it is Our History and as Ms. Angelou wrote, it “cannot be unlived.”

The first book I remember reading about an American of African descent was of Booker T. Washington, ‘Up From Slavery.’ An amazing book, I learned much about Mr.

Washington and esteem him highly. I changed by learning about him.

While on vacation one year I read the book, “Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?” by Beverly Daniel Tatum, Ph.D.

I have other books focusing on the “black experience” such as “Scottsboro” by Dan T. Carter and “Negro Slavery in Arkansas” by Orville W. Taylor. A poignant and humorous book bringing truth to the conversation of race in America is “Defining Moment in Black History – Reading Between the Lies” by Dick Gregory. Why do I read these and other books? Simply said, I wish to better understand others, their point of view and improve myself.

I have been told that because I am white, I cannot understand what it is like to be black. That is true, but by that same logic a black person can’t understand what it is like to be white or any other hue. But I ask, should this keep us from having empathy for one another? Should we cease to learn about others because we are different? I say no!

I hear various leaders say that only a black person can effectively teach a black student. This statement is itself a racist and, an extremely divisive comment. This destructive logic continues to make the divide between folks even wider. Instead of having leaders closing the gap, we have leaders expanding the gap through education, faith, politics, and economics.

I taught for five years at a local Primarily Black Institution (PBI – this is the branding of schools by the U.S. Government) and have first hand experience in this matter. This racist and destructive lie that only black teachers can teach black students is a twisted and destructive argument used to keep our nation divided. This logic is elitist and racist in its conception and corrupt in its practice.

I want to go to Black History events to learn and develop relationships with people – I want to, but when I hear the logic “to understand being black you must be black,” I know that the invitation to join with others to learn and grow has been cancelled.

Watch their actions, listen carefully to the meaning of words used by those leading protests and demanding separate and special opportunities. Many who protest racism, hatred and cultural appropriation, are themselves guilty of racism, bigotry, hatred and intolerance for they are but wolves in sheep’s clothing seeking whom they may conquer.

I want to help celebrate Black history because in many ways it is my history, it is all Our History! However, I have noticed that history often focuses on the lives and sacrifices of a very few well-known men and women.

While these few and famous should be admired and celebrated I believe we can learn much from the unknown and quiet many who came before the famous few.

Do you know of John L.

Handcox? John Handcox was born in Brinkley, Arkansas in 1904 and became the official songwriter for the Southern Tenant Farmers Union (STFU). John also inspired many of the folk music performers we know like Pete Seeger and others. His life story is amazing and worthy of your time to discover.

Do you know of Isaac Shaw? Isaac Shaw, a survivor of the Elaine, Arkansas massacre of 1917, later became a minister and an integral part of the first STFU (Southern Tenant Farmers Union) convention in Tyronza, Arkansas and one of the leaders of the STFU.

Isaac Shaw said (speaking about the STFU); “We colored can’t organize without you…and you white folks can’t organize without us… For a long time now the white folks and the colored folks have been fighting each other and both of us has been getting whipped all the time.

We don’t have nothing against one another, but we got plenty against the landlord. The same chain that holds my people holds your people too.

If we’re chained together on the outside we ought to stay chained together in the union.

It won’t do no good for us to divide because that’s where the trouble has been all the time.”

Many of our politicians, academia and religious leaders, motivated by an insatiable hunger for money, influence, power and preeminence are dividing people. Our nation is now more fractured and broken than at any time in our history.

The Southern Tenant Farmers Union was the first time that whites, who belonged to the KKK and blacks, who had been racial separatists joined together in the 1930’s and struggled together for better pay, living conditions and hope for a better future.

This all happened in the small town of Tyronza, Arkansas.

In the rooms of a former gas station and dry-cleaning business the first plans for the STFU were laid down, first in ideals then in reality. Soon the public street in front of the gas station became known as “Red Square” (So called because a few of the STFU leaders favored socialism and even communism). The building that housed a gas station and dry-cleaning business that once served as the nerve center of the STFU is now a museum. I believe the STFU movement was the genesis and incubator for the modern American Civil Rights Movement. It proved that blacks and whites could work along side each other to obtain the same goal – the American Dream.

This may be a revolutionary thought and I know it flows against mainstream and conventional thinking, but, I believe, the modern civil rights movement started in Tyronza, Earle, Parkin and other small communities in Arkansas in 1936 when black and white men and women joined a union, shared leadership and called each other “Mr.” and “Mrs.”

Have you heard of Jim Reece, Eliza Nolden or Frank Weems? These three along with many hundreds and thousands of others worked quietly and steadfastly to bring change to white and black sharecroppers – perhaps the poorest of all Americans at that time.

Jim Reece was almost beaten to death just outside of Earle attempting to organize sharecroppers. Eliza Nolden was beaten so badly she later died of her wounds.

Frank Weems was beaten the same night as Reece and Nolden and left for dead. His body was never found. There was even a funeral conducted for him but as providence had it, he turned up alive in Chicago according to H. L. Mitchel in his book “Mean Things Happening in This Land.”

Why did these people suffer so? Because of their belief in equality and to help others rise-up and leave the deadly grip of share cropping, day laboring, poverty and generational dependency.

Do you know of George Berry Washington, Jr.? Mr. Washington was a planter (farmer), cotton gin operator, store owner and minister. He was born into slavery on Christmas Day, 1864 in Crittenden County and he worked hard and became one of the top ten landowners in Crittenden County by the 1920’s.

This quiet man is part of the unknown many who paved the way for the famous few.

At one point in his life, “Uncle George” as he was often called (due to the prevailing cultural rules of not calling a black man “Mr.”) employed almost 100 people on his plantation.

He donated land to the white church now known as the Gibson-Bayou Cemetery and Pentecostal Church Association (23 December 1919).

Part of the land was used for the cemetery and part used to build a church.

Mr. Washington is resting in his Indian Mound burial site just north of Earle and even though his property has been divided in different ways, he is forever honored by artist Carroll Cloar in his famous painting “Angel in The Thorn patch.”

An amazing success story for a man born into slavery! We should celebrate his life and accomplishments. I believe he is worthy to be included in the history of America as a man who crossed racial boundaries. Mr. Washington, one of the quiet few, paved the way for the famous and thankful many.

I believe Ms. Angelou as she wrote, “those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it.” The desire to learn from history begs the question; what can we learn from history? I believe, our history is one, multi-colored thread woven into one beautiful fabric we call the culture and nation of we America.

One part of this thread of history is found in the history of slavery, sharecropping, peonage and modern-day welfare. We can learn and must learn from this part of the thread.

Slavery is cruel for it binds the body and soul keeping it from the very thing God created the body, soul and spirit for – freedom. Slavery in any form is wrong but unfortunately it is still widely practiced throughout the world.

Though it was once legal in our country, I am thankful it is no longer legal, honored and respected. The whole part of slavery is an unremovable stain on our nation.

The term “Share Cropping” brings back memories for many of our elders. Sharecropping was a system of shackling a man and his family to the ground. By the sweat of their brow and aching muscles they planted, hoed and harvested their crop on land belonging to someone else. The sharecroppers would pay half (many times more) of their harvest to the landowner not to mention paying for all they had to purchase on credit at the owners store. It was a cruel system of keeping folks in legal slavery.

Have you heard of “peonage?” Most people are unaware that peonage existed from the end of the Civil War up to the 1940’s and it was legal “with a wink of the eye” in most southern states.

Arrested for a trivial charge like vagrancy or a trumped up charge the court ordered fine would be an impossible amount for the “criminal” to pay. Farmers and others would then pay the court ordered fine and “rent” these victims for a time as “laborers” on farms, orchards, building projects or whatever the project was.

Peonage was a method of keeping people captive, working against their will to whomever would or could pay their “court fine.” There were more white sharecroppers than black but there were more black victims of peonage than whites. This was a cruel system of keeping folks in involuntary servitude.

Though peonage began at the close of the American Civil War, only one person in American history has ever been convicted of this practice. That man was from Earle, Arkansas and what a story it is!

Welfare is a modern method of keeping people dependent and captive to the government thus giving power to those who control the flow of money and benefits. Welfare kills the human soul and has enslaved generations of people.

Our government has taken from its citizens more than $16 trillion dollars (CBS News Report) since President Lyndon B. Johnson first presented his “war on poverty.”

Poverty has indeed won war and the losers are millions of Americans chained to the handouts of the American god – government.

Slavery, sharecropping, peonage and welfare are brothers in the same family.

When people are held captive to the will and desire of others and not allowed to enjoy the heights of freedom and the taste of their own work, we all lose. To ignore the many lessons of history means to be doomed and doomed we are because we do not learn from our history.

Maya Angelou was correct in her statement, “history … faced with courage, need not be lived again.” Much can be learned from history if we face it with courage and resist the temptation to see the actions of others through our values, morals and ethics. When we apply our current day values, political and social views to historical events we are unable to properly learn the lessons history provides. If we are unable or unwilling to learn from previous generations, we are doomed to repeat the same mistakes.

Have we learned any lessons? I believe, history and current events prove we have not learned. Native, Hispanic, Black, Anglo, whatever hue of color, language, faith or culture in our nation, it’s all history and it’s our history.

What happens in the black culture affects the white, Hispanic, Native Indian and every other culture. What happens in the white culture also affects the black, Hispanic, Native Indian and every other culture.

We, as the worlds “Great Melting Pot” must stop seeing ourselves as individual “races” of people, there is one race – the human-race made up of various tribes, colors, languages, customs, commonalities and influences. We are “One Nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.”

What we need is to work on the unity of being “One Nation” and making “liberty and justice for all” a reality.

Black, white, Hispanic, Native American, whatever background, whatever history, it’s all Our History.

Clayton Adams, West Memphis, AR email: claytonpadamslll@ gmail.com

By Clayton Adams Special to the Times