Death of a Nation

By Joseph L. Kyle

This book presents some very raw facts about the negative aspects of racism and the devastating effects it has on individuals, municipalities, States, the Nation and indeed the world. It covers a ten year period in the authors life, presented autobiographically, from 1940 to 1950.
The story is based primarily on historical events as reported in the ex Black weekly newspaper, The Pittsburgh Courier. The news articles are presented as parts of fictionalized dialogue between the author, his young peers and older adult advisors. Most of the fictionalized accounts have some bases in truth but some did not occur in the sequence or to individuals as presented.
Names of individuals reported in news media have not been changed, nor have the names of family members and teachers. Names of townspeople have been changed although a real person existed for that character.
The primary goal of the book is to present true facts about the history of the disease based on a false premise of race that has caused so much suffering, ignorance and despair over centuries in the hope that we will stop perpetuating it and let it die the ignoble death it deserves.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 28, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503559127

Joseph L. Kyle

EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND 1952 Graduate of Wendell Phillips High School, Chicago, IL 1952-1956 Morehouse College, Atlanta, GA; Bachelor of Science degree in Biology and Chemistry 1960-1966 Illinois Institute of Technology (I.I.T.), Chicago, IL ; Master of Science (equivalent) in Cellular Physiology and Biochemistry 1969-1976 Additional 72 graduate semester hours in Biochemistry and Cellular Physiology PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE 1956-1960 Histologist at Lakeside Veterans Hospital and Chicago Medical School 1960-1972 Research Biochemist at IIT research Institute, Chicago, IL, 1965-1969 Clinical Chemist, University of Chicago Hospitals 1974-1977 Assistant Professor of Biochemistry and Anatomy/Physiology and Affirmative Action Director, Illinois College of Optometry, Chicago 1977-1981 Director of Training and Compliance, State of Illinois Department of Equal Employment Opportunity 1983-1992 Faculty Research Director for Graduate Students at Chicago State University 1974-2007 Professor of Biological Sciences at Kennedy-King College, Developed Courses in Biology of Drugs and Stress Nutrition and Diet Therapy Pharmacology for Registered Nurses 2000-2007 Chairman, Biological Sciences Department, Kennedy-King College 2007-2014 Emeritus Professor of Biological Sciences, Kennedy-King College PATENTS 1962 “ A Patentable Procedure for Extraction of Heparin from Porcine Lung Tissue.” PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS American Association for the Advancement of Science National Association of Biology Teachers Human Anatomy and Physiology Society SIGNIFICANT AWARDS Ford Foundation Undergraduate Scholarship Wendell Philips Hall of Fame (Educator) Who’s Who Among American College Teachers “We Are Concerned” (television program) Community Service Award Phi Theta Kappa Honorary Membership Phi Theta Kappa Star Performer Award Kennedy-King Student Government Outstanding Biology Teacher Kennedy-King College Distinguished Professor Award, 2006 City of Chicago “Kathy Osterman Superior Public Service Award,” 2007 HOBBIES Reading History, Philosophies and Diverse Religions; Golf, Cooking, Puzzle Solving.

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Copyright © 2015 by Joseph L. Kyle.

Cover Illustration By: Earlene Gayle Escalona

Library of Congress Control Number:   2015905082

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-5035-5910-3

                Softcover         978-1-5035-5911-0

                eBook              978-1-5035-5912-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 04/07/2015

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T here is no concept more blatantly wrong than that of racial superiority and there are no more pitiable fools than those who believe it is true.

I heard these words for the first time during my freshman year in 1952 at Morehouse College. They were spoken by Dr. Benjamin Elijah Mays, our college president, and it expressed my sentiments exactly and very eloquently. I was a teenager at the time and had spent the first fourteen years of my life in the segregated south. I had observed the illogical enforcement of Jim Crow laws, the segregation and inequality of our school systems and churches, and the extreme hatred on the part of many whose skin color was mainly due to blood in superficial blood vessels toward those whose skin color was due to deposition of darker melanin in a single layer of the skin.

Throughout the southern states that had been a part of the Confederacy, extreme acts of violence were legally allowed by whites against Blacks. These states also had the worst school systems among the forty-eight states, and the intellectual levels of their populations were equally poor and filled with pitiable fools.

My introduction into this completely senseless society came when I was four years old when my great-aunt told me that I could not play with the white children who lived across the street from us. Bobby and Annie Scott were six and five years old, respectively, and we had played together daily, weather permitting, for over a year in beautiful childhood innocence. I could not understand her reason for telling them that they could not come into our yard anymore and that I would not be allowed to play with them again.

My great-aunt Rosie Grubbs had raised me since I was six months old and had been my sole guardian during that time. I was born in her house in March 1936 to my eighteen-year-old mother, whom Rosie had also raised. I was born with a right side inguinal hernia, which caused my lower abdominopelvic region to bulge when I lifted heavy objects or when I strained in certain ways. The day before she barred the Scott children, I had experienced one such incident. I had previously been instructed to lie down in a supine position with my knees flexed until the swelling subsided and I was no longer in pain. I did this, but I was crying, so Annie bent over me to try to comfort me while Bobby alerted Rosie to my crisis. Once Rosie saw Annie examining me in my inguinal region, near my genitals, she became alarmed because she knew how many white adults might misinterpret this innocent act as a form of sexual interplay between a white girl and a Black boy. The prevailing political and social attitudes and laws in Mississippi (and throughout the Southern United States) in 1940 held dire consequences for Black males in any kind of sexual contact with white females. I did not know this at the time, and I was quite upset by her action. She tried to console me by telling me, In a few years, they will think that they are better than you and will want you to call them ‘mister and miss’ when you talk to them. I was not happy with this idea, and within a week or two, I became accustomed to not playing with them although we did speak to one another across the street until they moved.

Rosie and my actual grandmother, Sylvia Williams, were sisters. Rosie was two years senior to Sylvia, and they maintained a big sister–little sister relationship throughout their lives. Rosie had taken my mother from Sylvia in 1918 when she went to Sylvia’s house and found my eight-month-old mother abandoned, soiled, and hungry. Sylvia was out on one of her wild escapades with some libidinous male for several days. When she returned home, she went to Rosie’s house to retrieve her baby, but Rosie told her she could not have her because she was dangerously negligent. Thereupon, my mother, Katie Lucille Williams, became Rosie’s daughter, and I was destined to be her grandson. This proved to be one of the best things that happened to me. Rosie became my motherdear, or as I called her m’dear, and she was my primary caretaker until I was fourteen years old.

We lived in a small rural hamlet in northwestern Mississippi which I will call Gotham. The town had come into existence in the early 1900s when the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) had constructed a levee that prevented flooding of the area during springtime when the northern snows melted and flowed into the Mississippi River. Gotham abutted the levee, and when the river receded, it was no more than two miles away. Our house was less than one hundred yards from the levee. Prior to the construction of the levee, the river would extend fifteen miles to the east of the town in springtime. Rosie had been one of the town’s homesteaders and at one time had owned many of the houses that levee workers rented while working. After the levee construction, many of the workers settled in the town and became farmworkers. One section of the town was called Liberry for Liberia because all its residents were Black, and Rosie owned most of the houses that they rented or bought.

Unfortunately, I was not a benefactor of her affluence because the Great Depression that enveloped the nation in 1932 depleted most of her assets. She told me she owned four automobiles, including a 1928 Packard (the crème de la crème at that time) in 1928 and my mother was driving it at ten years old. We were able to survive on the government pension of her husband, Bill Grubbs, who died in World War I, and a few renters she charged no more than two dollars per month. She remained a widow for the rest of her life (until 1992) and received a widow’s pension until she died. Rosie had great wisdom although she could not read or write and was considered to be illiterate. She was worldly-wise and had what many would call mother wit. She was also very protective and vigilant about all of my activities.

The void of the Scott children as playmates was filled by my younger uncle Johnny Raymond, who was born exactly 112 days after me. Sylvia and Katie Lucille were pregnant at the same time. Lucille (her preference) was seventeen, and Sylvia was forty-six. I also met my first female friend, Priscilla Alexander, who was seven months younger than I, and the boy who would eventually become my best friend, Larry Sherrod, who lived in the next house west of the Scotts. Two of my favorite people were my godmother and godfather, Bertha B. and Virgil B. Williams, who lived in one of Rosie’s houses just west of us. Godmother was an excellent cook, and the odors from her kitchen attracted me daily. Bertha B. was exceptionally talented among all of the women in our town. She had a two-year college degree from Rusk College in Holly Springs, Mississippi, which had been established to teach Black females the domestic skills that made them desirable hires for white households (Jean’s Girls). She was well skilled in home management, and she could read, write, and do arithmetic better than any white woman and most white men in our town. My godfather Virgil was considerably older than she was, but he too was very skilled as a woodsman, hunter, forester, and farmer. In my younger years, I thought he knew everything.

In 1940, my world existed between home, Sylvia’s and Johnny’s house which was just at the back of my house, my godparents’ house, and the Reed family’s house, which was directly across the street from us. Mr. James Reed was a carpenter who taught me how to drive a nail, and his wife, Mamie Reed, was a devilish vixen who taught me how to swear. She would tell me to go home and say shit, goddammit, and I would do it until many spankings taught me to tell her no. Rosie also corrected her, and Godmother was livid that an adult was teaching a child to swear. Godmother had started teaching me to spell simple words with a set of alphabet blocks my mother had given me. I had learned all the letters and could print their capital forms during this time. I really enjoyed this since my reward for good work was usually some type of savory dessert from the world’s greatest cook.

My mother asked Rosie to bring me to Chicago in the summer of 1940 so I could have my hernia treated. We made the trip in early June, and I was completely overwhelmed by the city that would eventually become my hometown. I was taken to a children’s hospital for evaluation and possible surgery; however, the doctors concluded that the opening on my inguinal ligament was gradually closing and I should be reevaluated in two years. If it was not completely closed, then surgery would be performed. Fortunately, it closed by the time I was six years old.

While we were in Chicago, Rosie was diagnosed with early-stage congestive heart failure, and she spent a week in the hospital for treatment. This was the first time my mother and I had spent extended time together, and she took me everywhere. I saw my first movies, and we visited the children’s museum, the beaches of Lake Michigan, and the city parks and playgrounds. I also saw my first Bud Billiken parade. This was a special treat for me because one of my heroes, world heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis, was in the parade, and I had been named after him. I truly enjoyed this visit and started to look forward to the day when I would live in Chicago.

We did experience one very negative incident in the city. The police shot and killed a Black man two blocks from our house in the middle of the street. The victim had stolen food in a nearby grocery store and was running away when several white policemen chased him down and shot him multiple times. We received the news of the incident and walked to the scene. The man’s body was still lying in a pool of his blood on the street more than one hour later. Many white policemen were on the scene and appeared to be enjoying the whole thing. Lucille and Rosie told me that this was wrong and that there was no need to kill someone for stealing a loaf of bread; the man was obviously hungry. They explained that this was an example of the attitude that many white people had toward Black people.

Rosie and I returned home in early October before the weather in Chicago turned cold. I shared my urban experiences with all my friends and anyone else who would listen. Several changes had occurred during our absence. My first cousin Tommie Lee Reddick, who was three years younger than me, had grown enough to try to follow Johnny, Larry, and I around, and we tried our best to lose her. We even threw stones at her to dissuade her pursuit. The biggest change was my godparents moving to their new house three blocks away, which was under construction when we left. Their house was only three houses from the white school, and it had six rooms. The location of their new house still allowed me to visit them daily, since it was only a short walk from ours. Godmother asked me many questions about my trip and my experiences in Chicago. She listened quietly and explained many things that I did not understand, including the police incident. She told me the Black man was wrong for stealing, but the police were even more wrong in their actions. The punishment did not fit the crime. She strengthened her teaching efforts, and by the end of the year, I had started to read and spell simple words. She acquired new first- and second-grade books from the white school, and she spent at least one hour each day teaching me. I spent even more time trying to read at home. Rosie approved this training wholeheartedly, and even though she could not read, she encouraged me to follow all of Godmother’s instructions. I was attracted to the comics in Goddaddy’s newspapers. He subscribed to the Memphis Commercial Appeal, and we read the comics together. At first he read to me, but as my reading skills improved, I would read to him. He bought me a children’s dictionary for my fifth birthday and taught me how to look up words I did not understand. Godmother did not let up; the more I did, the more she asked me to do. I learned to read the first-grade primer and the second-grade reader. I also learned to spell all the words in the second-grade speller with one difficulty: I refused to spell doll because it was a girl word and boys should not associate in any way with girls. Godmother whacked my butt several times, but I still refused. When she withheld food, I reluctantly spelled and pronounced the repulsive word. After this hurdle, she moved me into the third-grade reader and started to teach me the basic arithmetic functions of addition and subtraction. The location of her house near the white school caused the white children to pass on their way to the town’s commercial district during recess and lunch. I usually took recess when they did. I would sit on the steps of the front porch and stop the smaller children to ask them what they were learning. It was not yet apparent to me that I would not be able to attend their school, which was so near. But it was readily apparent that the quality of my instruction was not inferior to theirs. Several of the first, second, and third-grade students would stop to ask me to read passages from their books, and in some cases, Godmother would help them with their assignments. As a result of this interaction, it was not long before I was introduced to my new name nigger. I became that little nigger, that smart little nigger, or that smart little Black nigger. One day when I was inside, several boys knocked on the door and asked Godmother, Where is the little nigger boy who sits on the steps? Godmother replied, No niggers live here and don’t come back again. She was quite agitated when she came back into the house. I asked her, Godmother, what is a nigger? She replied, "It is a word that white people use to describe Black people. It may have come from the word Nigeria, which is a country in which many Black people have roots. Most of these white people have no idea where Nigeria is, and they intend it to mean someone who is less human than themselves, less smart, and socially inferior. They believe they are better than we are in every way."

I said, Those boys are not smarter than me. I can read better than all of them, and they ask me for answers they don’t understand.

She laughed. Oh, you know that very well. Let me tell you, don’t ever think you are inferior to anybody because of your skin color. Brainpower does not depend on color. Always do your best in everything and you will do better than they will, even though you won’t be able to go to school with them. I was disappointed to hear this because I thought that we could work together. She explained that Mississippi law mandated that Black and white children attend separate (but equal) schools.

While we were in Chicago, the house my godparents had occupied was rented to a new couple, Mr. Coot Millun and his wife, Lea. Rosie had entrusted the management of her property to her trusted utility man, Guy Crockett, and he had negotiated the terms of the rental. Guy Crocket was not his real name since he was a fugitive American Indian who had escaped from prison in Louisiana and found his way to Gotham. Rosie had befriended him and encouraged him to cut his hair and assume the name of one of the prominent white plantation owners in the area. Rosie trusted Guy to handle her affairs over her sister, Sylvia, because Guy was far more responsible than Sylvia.

I met the Milluns the day after our return from Chicago and instantly took a liking to them. Mrs. Millun was stunningly beautiful. She was a small woman, about five feet-two, and weighed about 120 pounds. She had long black hair that she wore in braids that hung to her waist, and her skin was copper colored. I learned later that she also had partial Indian ancestry. Mr. Millun was a relatively small man about five feet- ten and weighed around 150 to 160 pounds. His skin was very dark, and he had eyes that were not uniformly focused (cross-eyed), which made it appear that he was not looking directly at you. Both were in their midforties when I met them, and they quickly became a part of my daily greeting and eating routine: home, the Milluns’, Mamie Reed’s, and my godparents’ houses. The latter was also my schoolhouse. Mr. Millun would play a very significant role in my street and world education later.

In the fall of 1941, Godmother convinced Rosie that I should be allowed to attend the Gotham Mississippi School for the Colored even though I was only five years old and the entry age was six. I was well coached in what to say, and my youngest Aunt, Lillie B., who was eight years older than me, escorted me to our separate but equal school. What a contrast from the multi-room, multi-teacher brick white school. The Colored school was located in Liberry across a creek that flooded when it rained, making it inaccessible. It was a ramshackle one-room wooden building with peeling red paint. The walls had boards missing, and one could look through the holes to the outside. The seats were rough wooden benches that provided splinters if one slid across them. There was one potbellied stove in the center of the room to provide heat when it was cold, and the smaller children sat closest to the stove, while the larger children sat behind them, wearing their coats to block the cold from the holes in the walls. The teacher, Mrs. Ruby Ward, was a twenty-five-year-old newlywed who knew my mother very well, and she was quite familiar with my background. She was also expecting her first child. She was the only teacher for all eight grades which was the highest academic level available to Black students in most of Bolivar County, Mississippi. There were only three Colored high schools in the county, and I learned later that two of these were so inferior academically that their graduates essentially had the equivalent of an eighth-grade education or less. When Mrs. Ward noticed my presence, she asked me, Joe, how old are you? I replied brilliantly, I am five, but they told me to tell you I am six. She suppressed her laughter long enough to tell me, Baby, I know how old you are. I can’t let you come to school now. It is against the law. I know your godmother has been teaching you and you can do the schoolwork, but you are going to have to wait a year before you can start. I was devastated, and my aunt Lillie B. made it even worse. She told me, You are a fool for telling her your real age, and I am not going to leave school to take you home. You can find your own way. I left the school bawling and made a beeline for Godmother’s house, which was about a half mile away. When I got there, I was sobbing uncontrollably. After she consoled me enough to be able to talk coherently, I explained what happened. She laughed, gave me a hug, and fed me. After I returned to sanity, she promised she would teach me every day to prepare for next year. We concentrated on third-grade reading, spelling, and arithmetic. She taught me to write in cursive and helped me to write my first letter to my mother. My mother was so impressed by this that she came to visit us for two weeks. Mrs. Ward came to see her at our house, and she apologized for not allowing me to attend school, but she said, I have to obey the law. I was okay with this, but I was anxious for the day when I could start, especially since my friend Larry had started and was already in the first grade.

Godmother did not allow me to have other children around when she was teaching me, and I had a few assigned chores that I did after my lessons. We were usually finished by noon, and she allowed Priscilla Alexander to come and play with me daily. Priscilla loved it because she partook of the goodies to which I had become accustomed. One day in October 1941, it was Priscilla’s fifth birthday. We were playing in the vacant lot between my godparents’ house and their neighbors’, the Hightowers house. I told Priscilla, I’ve got to pee. She replied, Me too. Rather than going to the outside privy, I decided to urinate near a tree on the side of the house. I look toward Priscilla and observed that she had lowered her underpants and was squatting near the ground while urinating. The ensuing conversation went as follows:

Me: What are you doing?

Priscilla: Peeing.

Me: Why are you peeing like that? What are you peeing out of?

Priscilla: This is the way girls pee, and I am peeing out of my pee hole.

Me: What happen to your thing? Did you break it off? (At this point, I was kneeling to see where her urine was coming from).

Priscilla: Boy, you don’t know anything. Girls are made different from boys, and we don’t pee like boys.

Me: You sure do look funny down there.

Priscilla: This is the way girls are made. You can do more with your thing than pee out of it.

Me: I can? What can I do with it?

Priscilla: Let’s go on the porch and I will show you.

We went on the porch which was enclosed with wood from bottom to halfway to the ceiling. The upper part was screened to block out insects. She proceeded to a corner of the porch, removed her panties, and laid down. She instructed me to remove my pants, lie down on top of her, and place my penis on her external genitalia.

She said, Move up and down and say ooh, ooh, ooh.

I followed her instructions so well that Godmother overheard me and caught us (the first of many times) flagrantly indelicate. Godmother pulled me up by the seat of my pants and whacked my butt several times while telling me this was bad behavior. Meanwhile, Priscilla retrieved her panties and was attempting to put them on while running away. As she ran, she was looking back at us, and she fell into a ditch filled with muddy water in front of the house. It had rained recently, and the water in the ditch was unusually high. Godmother saw her distress and dropped me to go pull her out of the ditch. Godmother was angrier with Priscilla than I had ever seen her before or after. She took a belt and started to lash her viciously. She said, You are nothing but a little whore like your mother and grandmother, and you can’t come back to this house ever again. She was whipping Priscilla so violently that I begged her, Please stop before you hurt here, while tugging on her apron. She threw Priscilla to the ground and shouted, Get away from here and don’t ever come back! I spent the rest of the afternoon in bewilderment. I did not understand what we had done that would make my usually loving godmother act that way, especially toward Priscilla.

Goddaddy came home at his usual time, and we had dinner together. During dinner, Godmother told him about the incident. He laughed uproariously and had her repeat the story several times. He patted me on the back and said, That’s my boy! He asked Godmother, What did you do? She told him she whipped both of us, whereupon his whole mood changed. He exploded. You whipped him for screwing? What are you trying to do, make him afraid of women? Don’t you ever, as long as you live, whip him for being with a woman. He is a man, and he will act like a man. The dinner was exceptionally good to me, but Goddaddy pushed away from the table and told me, Get your hat. We’re going uptown. I obeyed, and we went two blocks to Lizzie Alexander’s store, moonshine center, and gambling house. Lizzie was Priscilla’s grandmother, and when we entered, several other men were present along with Lizzie and another woman. The men greeted me like a hero. They had heard about the incident, and no one admonished me or decried my behavior. Lizzie told me, Your woman is in the back. Why don’t you go see about her? Godmother had told Mrs. Hightower, who had told her husband who ran the blacksmith’s shop and who had told everyone that came along. The incident was the talk of the town.

Goddaddy bought me a twelve-ounce Royal Crown Cola, and I went into the back room where Priscilla was playing. I asked, Are you all right? She replied, I’m all right. Are you all right? I assured her I was. We shared the cola, and I apologized for Godmother’s behavior. I told her I had never seen Godmother so mad. She told me, Mrs. Williams probably knows your godfather used to go with my grandmother, and they might still be doing it. That is why she acted like that, but I’m all right. We stayed at the store until midevening, and Goddaddy walked me home. Rosie had heard about the event, and she asked me what happened. I told her in detail exactly what had occurred. She laughed heartily and said, Go to bed, you little mannish thing. You are only five years old. Ain’t you something? In less than two weeks, we were caught again while expanding our knowledge of our anatomy, this time in the backyard of her grandmother’s store, and we received no punishment.

My godparents had no children, so I became their only child. Goddaddy and I had developed a strong bond, and he was my main male role model. Rosie had introduced me to attending church, but Goddaddy took responsibility for taking me to Sunday school each week. When we returned home, we read the Sunday edition of the Memphis Commercial Appeal newspaper. I was especially attracted to the comic pages, and this attraction hastened my determination to learn to read. Goddaddy read them to me at first, and he allowed me to read to him after I learned. He corrected my mistakes and explained the words I did not understand. He told me the Commercial Appeal and the Memphis Press-Scimitar were white newspapers and most often printed only negative things about Black people. Indeed, these newspapers published only police blotter information of criminal activity by Blacks, especially violence against each other. Although I had not yet learned the use of proper English in writing, Goddaddy pointed out that these newspapers did not use capital letters when printing the names of Blacks and that they put an n in parentheses at the end of the printed name to indicate nigger. He told me that most of the news about us was his story rather than history. He introduced me to news media published by Blacks, including the Chicago Defender, the Crisis published by the NAACP, and the best newspaper ever, the Pittsburgh Courier. He was an avid baseball fan, and his favorite team was the St. Louis Cardinals. We listened to their games on the radio, and he taught me the rules of the game and how to read the printed box scores. We also pulled for the minor league team, the Memphis Chicks (short for Chickasaws), and he taught me the rudiments of playing the game.

The nature of Goddaddy’s work entailed the use of many tools and weapons that were dangerous if not used with proper caution. He had many animal traps, some of which could break human bones. He also had wood saws of many sizes, both two-man and single-man which he sharpened with great expertise for the pulp wood company that employed him. He also had a virtual arsenal of rifles, shotguns, and handguns. There was a gun in nearly every room in his house. He supplemented his income by hunting and trapping animals for their fur hides, which he stretched and sold to furriers. He either kept the meat from the wild game or gave it away to be used for food. He did not kill animals for sport. He taught me how to use these weapons when I grew older, and he emphasized the precautions and cautions necessary for safe gun use. Our location near the Mississippi River levee gave us access to many fishing holes. When we wanted a meal, we simple dug some worms out of the ground for bait, took our cane poles, and went over the levee for a few hours. Most often we returned with an abundance of fish of various types. My first catch was a beautiful golden sun perch, and perch has remained my favorite fish throughout my life.

Suddenly, we were jolted by the news that Japan had attacked the United States pacific fleet in Pearl Harbor in the territory of Hawaii on the morning of Sunday, December 7, 1941. This attacked decimated the fleet and caused President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to asked for and get a declaration of war against Japan. A war was going on in Europe between the Allied forces of Great Britain and France and the forces of Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany. The Germans had formed an alliance between themselves, fascist Italy, and Japan called the Axis, and Hitler chose to declare war on the United States the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The United States of America reciprocated, and our nation entered into World War II.

The Japanese attack engendered a swell of patriotism throughout the country. It seemed that everyone, regardless of race, hated the Japanese and wanted to strike back at them. I overheard a group of white men discussing their feelings. One of them described the Japanese as yellow-skinned niggers who wanted to take over the country so they could get ahold of white women. The others nodded in agreement. Glen Arnold, the owner of a large cotton plantation, said, This means that the government is going to draft folks into the army. We are going to have to make sure they don’t take our niggers because we need them to work the fields and we can’t afford to let them go.

Cotton Davis said, We don’t need niggers learning how to shoot guns and blow things up. The next thing you know, they will think they’re as good as we are and they will try to take white women. Cotton’s father, Judd Dragline Davis, said, Boy, don’t even talk like that. We had to kill a nigger a few years ago who was looking at a white woman like he wanted her even though he swore he was not but you know no nigger ever tells the truth. Dragline acquired his nickname from his job as a crane operator during the building of the levee. He had participated in the lynching of a Black man near Gotham in the early 1930s, and he had severed one of the victim’s ears and converted it to a tobacco pouch in which he kept his chewing tobacco.

I asked Rosie what war meant, and she told me it was a situation where many people tried to kill one another. She said her husband had been killed in World War I, and she still could not understand what he was fighting for. Goddaddy told me that he had fought in World War I and it was a terrible experience. He had many pictures of battlefield scenes from that war and a kaleidoscope viewer, which fascinated me. Many of the scenes showed bodies of dead soldiers strewed over the ground. I was confused by this because I had never had a fight with anyone, although I had seen the body of one man who had been killed.

In the next weeks leading up to Christmas and beyond, I heard and read more about the war. The first person from our town to enlist in the army was a twenty-year-old Black man, Bernard Gilmore. He went to the county seat and signed up. When he completed his initial training, he came home in his uniform, which made a strong positive impression on me. It obviously did not impress the whites in the town, and the town marshal told him he could not wear his uniform or he had to leave town. He chose the latter, much to the consternation of his mother. Rosie told me the whites did not like the Gilmores because they were independent and not beholden to any white boss in any way. Bernard’s father had also been killed in World War I. Unfortunately Bernard was killed in the war in 1943. I was fascinated and mystified by this war, and I read and listened to everything I could about it. The United States (its leaders) had not wanted to get involved directly in the war with Germany, which was being fought and lost by the British and the French. The German chancellor Herr Adolf Hitler espoused the theory of Aryan supremacy, and this was a welcome theory to many Americans and other Europeans. When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, Americans of all skin tones became livid with rage and wanted to kick some Jap ass. Many Black Americans saw this war as a chance to serve with honor and gain the respect of the nation. They hoped this would help change the Jim Crow laws in the southern states and change the stereotype of the Negro in the country. Many whites, including administrative officials, congressional representatives, senators, and cabinet members, had just the opposite point of view. This led to a great dispute concerning how, if at all, Black soldiers should be used in the war.

Immediately after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, a Black soldier, Robert Brooks, became the first American killed in action in the Philippines. Many Black Americans were willing to fight and die against the foes of democracy, but they expected more democracy for themselves and all other Blacks in this country. I read about the demands being made on President Roosevelt by Mr. Asa Phillip Randolph who proposed and planned a protest march of one hundred thousand Blacks and their sympathizers on Washington, DC. The march would protest (1) the inability of Blacks to gain employment in defense industries due to racist exclusionary policies, (2) the reluctance of the federal government to confront these policies, and (3) the ignorance of many in this country who failed to realize that most Blacks were loyal Americans who would fight and die willingly against the worldwide threat to democracy if they got the chance. There were no Blacks who agreed with Hitler.

During his declaration of war against the United States, Herr Hitler excoriated President Roosevelt as a pawn of international Judaism. He brought down the house (the Reichstag) when he told them, We have nothing to fear from America. Half of that country is Jewish and the other half is niggers. What do we have to fear? A crippled leader? Jews? Niggers? This declaration was broadcast on radio to the German people, and many of them rejoiced in Hitler’s words. Meanwhile, America asked its Black citizenry to forego years of denigration and not make waves. The white newspapers railed against A. Phillip Randolph and his proposed march. He was depicted as the worst subversive in the country, and they called for his imprisonment. Goddaddy and some of his friends expressed concern that the marchers would be attacked by the military.

Fortunately, none of this happened. Randolph was successful in getting President Roosevelt to issue Executive Order 8802, which opened many defense jobs to Blacks. I was full of questions about everything.

I asked, Goddaddy, how come Mr. Randolph wants Colored people to come to Washington?

He is trying to help Colored people to get a fair chance to work and live in this country.

"Why are Colored people different from white people?’

You are not. You are just as good as they are, and some of them are not as good as you.

Why do they call us niggers?

Son, they have been fooling themselves for a long time. They brought the idea that they are better than us from Europe, and even though some of them know it’s a lie, they can’t seem to let it go. They have repeated the lie so long and so often that even some Colored people believe it.

Do you believe it?

Hell no, I know better. I have lived around them and with them enough to know that we all have the same strengths and weaknesses. The color of a person’s skin has nothing to do with his or her mind or strength. They are made out of meat just like we are.

Our conversation shifted to Goddaddy’s work. I was curious about what he did on his extended stays in the woods. He promised to take me with him on one of his excursions if the ladies in our lives gave their approval. Both Motherdear and Godmother approved after much reassurance from him that this was not a dangerous mission. Godmother made him promise to have me read my books each day, and he promised he would have me read the Bible each day.

The first day out, he was teaching me to fish from a boat when the wind blew my hat into the water. I jumped into the lake to try to retrieve it although I could not swim. Goddaddy pulled me back into the boat and used his fishing pole to get the hat. When we got to shore, he whacked my butt a couple of times and scolded me about my rash action. I cried, I want to go home. I don’t like you anymore.

He laughed and said, Well, you better start liking me because we are not going home until I have finished my work. Get your fishing pole so we can catch some fish to eat.

I calmed down after he caught our first fish. I even caught two more. We cooked the fish over a fire he made in a pit, and we kept the fire burning during the night. I was amazed by the reflections of the eyes of the woodland animals in our campfire. Goddaddy told me they were afraid of fire and would not try to eat us as long as the fire was burning. We stayed in the woods for three days. He marked many trees to be cut by the pulpwood company workers in the warmer months. He showed me how to track animals, the kinds of spoors they left, and how to set traps and anchor them. I enjoyed it so much I did not want to go home when the time came. We were welcomed home with much fanfare. Goddaddy was nonplussed, and I imitated him, acting as if I did this every day. He had made me read my books, and I memorized every page in the first-grade reader. I even spelled the abhorrent girl word D-O-L-L, which I had resisted spelling for Godmother.

Goddaddy continued my biblical education by having me read various passages in the Bible. He had assumed the role of my spiritual instructor from as early as I could remember. He took me to Sunday school each week at St. James Missionary Baptist Church. There were three Black churches in our town located on a single strip in Liberry. Godmother was a member at Bethel Methodist Church, while Goddaddy and Rosie belonged to St. James. My first impression of God came from these three and from the sermons and teachings in the churches. I wondered why there were so many churches but only one God.

Another major contributor to my early education was the newspapers. The war news was most interesting to me. In 1942, the president of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, had established a committee on fair employment practice, later to become the Fair Employment Practices Committee (FEPC). The need for this committee arose from the gross actions of some white Americans in their resolute resistance to allowing Blacks to engage in good-paying war industry employment. The threat of a march on Washington by one hundred thousand or more Blacks, led by Asa Phillip Randolph, the leader of the labor union of Black Pullman porters, opened the doors to employment opportunities for Blacks in some areas. It did little, however, to improve the treatment of Black enlisted men. The census of 1940 reported approximately thirteen million Blacks in the United States, which was 10 percent to 11 percent of the total population. More than five million of these people were available for the workforce; however, only about 2 percent of this potential workforce were employed in war industries despite Executive Order 8802 (the FEPC Order).

In war action, the forces of Nazi Germany had attacked their allies in Russia in June 1941. They were very successful in the early stages of this heinous backstabbing. Millions of Russians were killed in the first few months of the Nazi’s Operation Barbarossa. Early in 1942, the Russians came fighting back with a vengeance. German intelligence had told Adolf Hitler that the Russians could probably muster no more than 230 divisions of fighting men. He decided to attack them with 196 divisions of Aryan supermen against the advice of several of his generals. His success in Western Europe had emboldened him. He believed that all or most of the reasonable facsimiles of Aryans in Eastern Europe, the Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, and others, would be eager to join forces with Germany in gaining living room for the master race. The Russians surprised him. They eventually threw more than five hundred divisions of men, women, children, animals, and machinery at them. Many were people that the Nazis considered to be subhuman: Mongols, Tartars, Cossacks, and the descendants of Genghis Khan. The Germans suffered their first major defeat at Stalingrad.

Unlike the Russians, America trained Black men in a segregated military. Naturally, we were perplexed. A vast majority of Blacks wanted to fight for our country, and many thought this service would improve the lot of Blacks throughout the United States. The March on Washington Movement was ridiculed even by some Blacks. The movement had made legitimate claims and demands on the U. S. government. Countless Black intellectuals implored the government to let the Negroes die with honor on the battlefield as first-class citizens. The War Department quickly crushed these hopes and ambitions, declaring in essence, We are not a social agency to correct all of the social and moral problems of America. We are giving niggers jobs, but we are not going to have nigger heroes in this war. It remains an abhorrent fact that at the end of World War II, 10 percent to 11 percent of the enlisted servicemen were Blacks who had been confined to segregated service or labor units for the duration of the war.

Despite the need for fighting forces, southern Blacks who were bound to plantations as sharecroppers or via other terms of indenture were not being drafted into service as assiduously as northern Blacks and students from southern Black colleges.

I was confused and incredulous by all of this, and I bombarded everyone around me with questions. My mother wrote me weekly letters, and she sent me many books and subscriptions to the Pittsburgh Courier and the Crisis, the official NAACP publication.

The Black press carried credible accounts of the contributions of Blacks to the war effort. Monsieur Felix Eboue, the governor of Equatorial Africa, had opened his territory to the Allied forces. He had refused to accept odious armistice terms from the Germans and Italians. Instead, he gave the Free French access to the Chad Territory, an expanse that stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to the borders of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and the Libyan Desert. I was mortified to learn that the Anglo-Egyptian Sudanese considered honey-coated flies to be a dietary delicacy. M. Eboue’s contribution was hardly acknowledged in the white press. Some northern papers carried the story, but no southern paper even mentioned the action. Mrs. Shirley Graham, the wife of the editor in chief of the Crisis, Dr. W. E. B. Dubois, wrote an essay entitled Negroes Are Fighting for Freedom, wherein she noted the value of M. Eboue’s action.

The war headlines in all papers were not good in the first half of 1942. The Japanese not only attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, but also erupted all over the Southwest Pacific Islands within days. The white newspapers carried disheartening headlines: Japs Invade Netherlands East Indies, German Ships Escape Brest, British Surrender Singapore, Rangoon Evacuated, MacArthur Arrives in Australia, Corregidor Falls, and U. S. Forces Surrender on Bataan." Meanwhile, the Germans were pinching in on the Middle East and the Mediterranean, threatening to link up with their Japanese cohorts. The two belligerent nations were close to gaining complete dominance of the world. On the positive side, twenty-eight nations joined in an alliance to fight the Axis powers (Germany, Italy and Japan) and their satellites.

The Black press reported that the regional director of the American Federation of Labor (AFL) told an NAACP committee, I consider the Negro an evil rather than an asset to organized labor. I don’t believe all of this discrimination exists against the Negro and if it does, it is the Negro’s fault and his fight. In Alexandria, Louisiana, a Black soldier rebuked a white female driver who narrowly missed him by asking, Would you run over a soldier? This incited a riot in which ten Black soldiers were slaughtered in an attack on a group of them by heavily armed white military, state and local police, and national guardsmen. The War Department clamped a blanket of censorship on the incident.

The American Red Cross stated it did not need or want blood donated by Blacks and the organization would respect individual prejudices as a symbol of democracy. Major General James C. McGee, the U. S. surgeon general, opposed the integration of Black doctors and nurses in the armed services.

The white residents of Tucson, Arizona, refused to allow the construction of a $50,000 USO recreation center for Black soldiers stationed at Fort Huachuca, Arizona.

A hopeful Black lady, Mrs. Nannie Burroughs, wrote, This war, if fought to a successful conclusion, will purge the world of more sin and do more lasting good than anything that has happened on this planet since Jesus Christ arose from the dead. This is a war of the five R’s, race, rights, religion, raw material and room.

I struggled to understand all this. It was becoming clear to me that we (Black people) were not being treated fairly and equally. I was fortunate to be surrounded by many people who encouraged and taught me the best they could. Mr. and Mrs. Millun became my third family. She was an excellent cook, and she baked a cake or pie daily. I tried to be present when she served it. One day, she made two pies and placed them in her kitchen window to cool. My uncle Johnny, who was three months my junior, and I climbed on wooden soda pop cases to reach the ledge, and we took one of the pies. When she discovered it was missing, she only had to look beneath the window because we ate it on-site and the evidence was around our mouths. Sylvia wanted to beat, us but Mrs. Millun stopped her. She said she intended to give us one of the pies, and she admonished us not to steal but to ask for what we wanted. I thought she was the most beautiful woman alive, and I loved her madly. I found excuses to go to her house to run errands or do small chores. She encouraged my educational efforts, and she worked with Godmother to reinforce my teaching. We discussed the war and the newspaper headlines with Mr. Millun, who was exceptionally knowledgeable about many things.

Finally, in September 1942, my big day arrived. I was able to enroll in school. It did not disturb me that the Colored school was a large barnlike structure with holes in its walls, that it only had a single teacher for all eight grades, and that the school only offered elementary training. This was the separate but equal education that the state of Mississippi provided its niggers. The school year ran from late September or early October to early May, with time off for cotton picking. Many of the students were in their late teens or early twenties and were in fourth, fifth, sixth, or seventh grade. Very few of them finished eighth grade. The teacher, Mrs. Ruby Walker, arranged the students according to size, with the smaller pupils seated closer to the single potbellied stove and the larger students at the back of them to help shield them from the wintry blasts that blew through the holes in the walls. The older boys were responsible for chopping wood, hauling coal, and maintaining the fire in the stove. The school day had no fixed hours. We started at 8:00 a.m. and ended when all of the students had been called on to read or demonstrate their assignments, so the length of the instruction period was dependent on the number of students present that day. Many of the students were unable to perform the assignments. During good weather conditions, many of the students would remain to play on the school grounds. This allowed more social contact between the genders. When the weather was bad, the school grounds became a quagmire of ankle-deep mud, and heavy rain made the school inaccessible because the creek that surrounded the grounds would rise and had a current resembling a raging river. Toilet facilities consisted of boys’ and girls’ outhouses.

Mrs. Ruby welcomed me to school on my first day. She completed paperwork with my vital statistics and assigned me a place with six other students who were entering the first grade. She gave me the first-grade primer, which I noted had been used for six years at the white school, and I knew all the white students who had used it. It had been used at the Black school for three years. I was disappointed because I wanted to sit next to my neighbor Larry Sherrod. Mrs. Ruby told me that students had to stay with their grade group, and Larry was in second grade because he had started school the previous year. I protested, but she made me stay with my classmates. Larry heard this exchange and poked his tongue out toward me. I did not understand his reason for doing this, but I did not dwell on it. I was the youngest of the first graders. We ranged from six to ten years old. Mrs. Ruby began our instruction by asking us to write the alphabet and the numbers 1 to 10. I completed this assignment in a few minutes and helped Charlie Mae Odum with her work while Mrs. Ruby was engaged with other students. Charlie Mae was three years older than I, but her parents had not allowed her to attend school until her oldest brother, Ed, who was actually a year younger, started school. He was also one of the first graders. There was no compulsory enrollment age for whites or Blacks.

Mrs. Ruby reviewed our work, and she stopped the entire school to show them my work which was completed correctly. I told her I could read the entire book and could count to 100. She commented, Your godmother has done a wonderful job with you. Let me hear you read the book to the whole school. I read the book in a few minutes. She complimented me and gave the entire school a stern lecture about their lack of effort and poor performances. She turned back to me and said, I guess I’m going to have to put you in the second grade. I was elated because I would be in the same group as Larry. She gave me the second-grade reader and spelling book and told me to join the second-grade group. Charlie Mae Odum started to cry, but I rushed to a seat near Larry. I told him, See, I caught up with you.

He responded angrily, I’m going to beat your ass after school. You think you’re so damn smart. I’m going to show you something.

I did not understand why he was angry with me. I wanted to be friends with him since we lived close to each other and played together often. He kept his promise with some instigation from two teenaged boys. He knocked me down from behind and kicked me. When I stood up, he knocked me down again. Fortunately, my aunt Lillie B. who was a fourteen-year-old eight grader stepped in and stopped his onslaught. I was crying quietly when we got home. Lillie B. told Rosie what happened in school and in the fight. She said with scorn, He just let him hit him and he would not fight back. They’re going to be jumping on him every day if he doesn’t learn to fight back.

Rosie responded, That won’t happen because I won’t allow it. Joe, stop crying right now. I mean it. Larry is not bigger than you, and there is no earthly reason for you to let him beat up on you. Get in the house and change your clothes. She was furious, and she continued to fume for hours after Lillie B. went home. Toward evening, Larry and the two older boys walked pass our house. Rosie stopped them and scolded the older boys for urging Larry on. She promised them the beatings of their lives if it happened again. Each of them claimed innocence. When she came back into the house, she whipped me and promised the same each time I did not fight back with someone my own size. She accompanied me to school the next day and discussed the incident with Mrs. Ruby who had heard about it. Mrs. Ruby whipped Larry, Louis Gillis, and Gus Moore soundly, but this aggravated the problem.

During my recital time, I told Mrs. Ruby I could read the second-grade reader. She asked if I could spell all of the words in the spelling book. I could not, but I asked if I could be promoted to third grade if I learned them. She thought it was a good idea since it would separate Larry and I. Lost in all of this turmoil was the fact that I had completed first grade in one day.

The news of the fight and my first day in school had spread around the town. Mamie Reed, my cussing coach, gave me a stick with a nail in it and told me to hit Larry in the eye with it if he attacked me again. Rosie threw it away. Godmother told me I had to learn to protect myself. Rosie took me to Dr. Brockington, our town’s physician, to check if my inguinal hernia had healed. He assured us it had. He even asked me about the fight and congratulated me on my school performance. Later that day, Guy Crockett came to our house. Rosie invited him in, but he said, Not right now. I came to see my little partner.

I asked, "You came to see me, Guy?

He said, Yep, that’s right. Get you a sack and let’s go in the woods and pick up some pecans.

I said, I want to go, but I have to ask M’dear first.

She was listening, and she said, You can go. She nodded to Guy with a wink.

We were able to quickly fill our sacks with pecans because there were many trees and the nuts literally covered the ground. Satisfied that we had enough, Guy said, Little partner, I want to teach you a few things. Every man needs to know how to fight, and the time to learn is when you are young. Once you know how, you don’t need to pick fights, but you can stop people from picking on you. You need to know when to fight and when not to. Don’t ever get in a fight with two or three people if you can help it. When you decide to fight one person, don’t wait for him to throw the first lick. Knock the shit out of him first. Now let me see what you know about fighting.

I started swinging my arms wildly in circles. He told me I fought like a girl. He taught me how to throw punches while protecting my face and how to kick the shins, groin, and kneecap. He warned me to avoid wrestling since I was small, but if I was thrown to the ground, he told me to roll the opponent over so I would be on top. This was only the beginning of my instruction. He taught me to use my hands and feet each day for the next week. During this time, I practiced spelling with Godmother until I could memorize all the words in the spelling book.

After two weeks in second grade, I informed Mrs. Ruby of this in our class session. She assembled all the other students to witness me read and spell all the words in the second-grade books. She discovered that I had memorized the words in order of the pages, so she skipped around in the book. Finally, satisfied that I could indeed spell all the words, she promoted me to third grade. The students who started with me were in awe, most of the older students were amazed, Charlie Mae