The Unveiling

Sold Down the River:

“Everytime we start to get ahead

They hate it

They’d rather see us broken 

And incarcerated.”

This is the refrain to a spoken word poem created by Black middle and high school students in a creative writing workshop with Hannah Drake. They performed it at the dedication of the (Un)Known Project, a memorial to enslaved people whose stories may never be uncovered.

From many accounts, the term we often use for betrayal, “sold down the river,” was invented right here, on those same Ohio River banks where enslaved people once looked longingly across to Indiana and freedom. They were held in chains, many even kept in pens. Yes, you read that right. Pens. For human beings. Those pens held people who’d been sold and were awaiting boats that would wrench them away from home, from loved ones whom they’d never see again, to work on plantations in the deep south, where the conditions were known to be much harsher and treatment of slaves much more brutal. It was deeply dreaded: the greatest betrayal. And thus the phrase came to be: “He (she) was sold down the river.”

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Casual Killings:

In slaveholding Virginia, a law was passed stating that if a slaveowner in “correcting his slave, should cause him to die, there is no felony and there is no consequence.” In other words, an enslaver could literally murder an enslaved person with no penalties if s/he claimed it was due to the slave resisting being “corrected” (punished). This could apply to anything from looking the enslaver directly in the eye, picking bad tobacco, or trying to escape the horrors of enslavement.

These deaths were referred to as “casual killings,” thus the name for the law. The word casual revealing just how lightly the lives of enslaved people were taken.

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Down on the Old Plantation

On a visit to Nottoway Plantation in Louisiana in the 1990’s, we were told by the tour guide that the outside path from the kitchen to the main dining room was named “The Whistle Walk.” So named, she said, because enslaved people were required to whistle to assure they did not sneak bits of the food as they carried it to serve their white masters. This, we later learned, is a common story told about plantation life--and some people question how prevalent the practice was. But we’ll report it here because we heard the disgusting story from Nottoway’s own spokesperson.

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Children in the Movement:

When we picture the turbulent years of the Civil Rights movements, with its snarling dogs and firehoses set on Black people, our mental images are often of adults: John Lewis beaten to the ground by a white policeman, Black men peacefully marching with I Am a Man placards on their chests while surrounded by tanks and National Guardsmen with rifles cocked. We may not imagine children in these horrific scenarios. But they were there. And they got results.

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40 Acres and a Mule:

If you’re like us, you learned in U.S. History that when the Civil War ended, freed slaves were given 40 Acres and a Mule to start their new lives. For the most part, sadly, this story is untrue.

Teaching the incomplete story of 40 Acres and a Mule has had the effect of convincing generations of Americans that freed slaves were repaid in some sense and given a chance at autonomy rather than thee truth: they were “set free” to hunger and homelessness.

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Planning for Poverty:

We’re all fully aware that our city(ies) are deeply segregated. Anyone can see that nice stores, restaurants, thriving businesses, and desirable housing are available in mostly-white neighborhoods. The opposite holds true in mostly Black neighborhoods. No matter your city, this is probably the pattern. Louisville is no exception. In fact in U.S. rankings, we’re in the “high segregation” category, and in fact, we planned it that way.

Louisville had one of the first residential zoning ordinances in the U.S--passed in 1914. And it was among the most restrictive in the country. The city designated who could live on each block by race. By law.

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You’ve Raped Our Women:

When Dylann Roof shot and killed nine innocent, unarmed Black people in a Charleston church, he first told one of them why: “You’ve raped our women…you have to go.” This was 2015. The historic and unrelenting propaganda of the Black man as sexual predator and white woman as helpless innocent that must be protected had poisoned this young white man’s mind. He’s one in a long line. 

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Black People and Vaccine Hesitancy.

It's rooted in history...

Many of us have been puzzled by some groups’ avoidance of the COVID-19 vaccine, especially Black people who often already have health issues and limited access to quality health care. Some find it hard to understand why Blacks wouldn’t hurry to get free protection from this deadly virus. The answer, like so many others we’re learning, is rooted in our dark history. The relationship between Blacks and the U.S. medical community is marked by a long series of betrayals.

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Pull Yourself Up By Your Own Bootstraps

How often have we heard this phrase to refer to someone who is “self made”? In a 1968 speech just before the Poor People’s March on Washington, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke of the federal help given white settlers (many of whom were European immigrants) as they spread across the midwest and west in the years after the Civil War. From his speech, we learned how sharply their experience contrasted to that of the newly freed Black slaves — who had helped build the great wealth of this country — and who were also trying to make a home and living for their families. With no help.

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How Far Would Southern White Women Go To Save Face?

Let’s dig into the role that white women played in cultivating and perpetuating white supremacy, starting with “southern honor.” Humiliated by losing the Civil War, southern women began to look for ways to justify and glorify their fraudulent past. How? By banding together in 1876 to create The United Daughters of the Confederacy and launch a campaign to rewrite the story of the war and the Confederacy itself.  Though deeply dishonest, this has been a highly successful effort--so much so that it continues today.  

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The Lost Cause. A campaign of misinformation and propaganda

If you can, think back to your school years. Your time of learning about this country. Bring to mind your early impressions of the American south and slavery. We’ll wait. If you’re like most white people, you pictured large peaceful estates, graciously smiling white mistresses, and in the background, black-skinned people contentedly going about their business. If these were images you naively carried into adulthood, there’s a reason. Yes: the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

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What Kind Of Deal Is This?

Most progressives (including ourselves) have a special place in their hearts for the FDR administration and its visionary 1935 New Deal which provided unprecedented protections for our most vulnerable citizens: the old, the poor, the sick, the disabled. New Deal programs such as Social Security lifted many Americans out of abject poverty and still today, offer a safety net and dignity against some of the hardships of life. What is not well-known is how the New Deal explicitly left out many of our most vulnerable: much of the Black population, which at the time was predominantly southern, rural, and impoverished. 

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Black Code Laws

Written to ensure a cheap labor force after slavery was abolished.

“Why has it been so hard for Black people to get out of poverty?” we hear people ask. “After all, the slaves were freed over 150 years ago.” But were they really, though? Andrew Johnson snuffed out federal efforts to create financial stability for newly freed Black people. There were other factors, too:

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Southern Baptist Theological Seminary’s Dark History

Part 1:

It’s no secret that these founding faculty, like many successful businessmen and clergy of their day, were slave owners. However, at the Seminary, those ties to slavery are deep and very dark. In 2017, amid growing national racial unrest, Seminary President, Reverend Al Mohler requested a thorough investigation into the institution’s historic ties to racism and slavery. The results were published publicly, and they were about as bad as you can imagine.

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Southern Baptist Theological Seminary is not alone with its dark ties to racism and slavery

PART 2:

To be fair, Mohler and the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary are not alone with this “inconvenient truth.” In the past two decades, numerous universities have researched their ties to slavery and found dreadful results. Emory was built with slave labor as was the University of Virginia, Alabama, North Carolina at Chapel Hill, etc. Not surprising from southern universities. But the north was not innocent. Rutgers used slaves to build the campus and to serve students and faculty.

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How Do We Right the Wrongs?

PART 3:

To be fair, Mohler and the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary are not alone with this “inconvenient truth.” In the past two decades, numerous universities have researched their ties to slavery and found dreadful results. Emory was built with slave labor as was the University of Virginia, Alabama, North Carolina at Chapel Hill, etc. Not surprising from southern universities. But the north was not innocent. Rutgers used slaves to build the campus and to serve students and faculty.

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The Tulsa Race Massacre

100 Years Later

Tulsa’s Greenwood neighborhood, sometimes known as “Black Wall Street,” is said to have been the wealthiest Black community in this country, with people traveling great distances to move there. Yet, because of one rumor about a Black man accused of molesting a white woman (which was later proven false) whites rose up in huge numbers to lynch him. 

And although more than 300 Blacks were dead, 800 wounded, more than 1,200 homes, at least 60 businesses, dozens of churches, a school, a hospital, and a public library all burned to the ground, according to a report issued by Human Rights Watch, below was the newspaper headline the following day.

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Jim Crow is from Louisville Kentucky??

Where did the term “Jim Crow” come from?

Well, legend says Louisville, Kentucky. 

A traveling northern minstrel man named Thomas Dartmouth “Daddy” Rice is said to have been performing in Louisville in the 1830’s. The Southern Theatre overlooked a livery stable owned by a man named Crowe. In the stable, worked an old Black slave. By some reports, the old man had physical deformities such as a crooked shoulder and a limp. But he danced and sang to himself as he worked. Watching him, Thomas Rice saw opportunity. He studied the man’s movements, his poor, ragged clothing, his manner of speech, the song he sang. When Rice later went onstage in the character of the old slave, his face was charcoaled black and his clothes were dirtied; he used exaggerated expressions and Black vernacular to portray a foolish, lazy, untrustworthy Black man who joyously danced a little jig. Rice called the character Jim Crow. Audiences from Louisville to New York City went wild with delight. 

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“SHUT UP AND …”

Athletes on Race and Justice

We’ve all seen the iconic photo of Black American track stars Tommy Smith and John Carlos with their heads bowed and black-gloved fists in the air on the podium of the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City. Smith said he had raised his right fist to represent black power in America, while Carlos raised his left fist to represent black unity. Together they formed an “arch of unity and power.” 

Many people don’t know the back story of this incident. Though they won 1st and 3rd in their event, the two had considered not attending the Olympics at all. Tommy Smith, the fastest man in the world at the time, had experienced disgusting racism in the United States when he was off the track. A friend, San Jose State Professor Harry Edwards, had organized the Olympic Project for Human Rights (OPHR) and called for Black American athletes to boycott the games and let the world know the civil rights movement had not gone far enough. He told Black athletes they should refuse "to be utilised as 'performing animals' in the games."

The boycott never happened; the Black athletes showed up and smashed the record. They did not, though, forget the troubles faced by Blacks back home.

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Seneca Village and New York City’s Central Park’s Dark History

Most visitors to New York City make sure to spend time in beautiful Central Park. Over 42 million come each year to stroll the pathways, picnic in the grassy meadows, row boats on the lake, listen to concerts, and escape the hustle bustle of the city. The view from above--of a large rectangular green space with buildings pushing right up against its edges--suggests that visionaries once claimed and created this natural Eden before development could encroach. 

Not quite. Before the park was built, a thriving community of free Black people lived there. They were removed to make way for it.

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