The question being: Why doesn’t anyone quote these words from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.?
good question
1
Category Archives: history
eight years ago
photos from FoundersOfAmerica.com
inspired by mad men…sort of
I’ve actually been planning to blog this for a while, but I got lazy and tucked it into a folder on my computer. Last week’s episode of Mad Men has inspired me to get it together though. If you saw the episode, you probably know what this is all about. The blackface. The throwback to the “good old days” when it was just hilarious (and not at all inappropriate) to mock the darkies. I’m not exactly sure how I feel about the scene from the show. It was kind of long and awkward, but perhaps that was the point. Anyway, it’s not like the writers of the show just pulled that out of thin air. I bet they didn’t have the song written for the show. As with racist advertising (and as malevolent as), there is a plethora of good ole “racist” music out there. Wanna see some?
Ernest Hogan was a black man. Here are his lyrics:
“All coons look alike to me, I’ve got another beau you see, and he’s just as good to me as you, nig!”
Here’s some back story on Hogan and the song from Wikipedia:
In 1895, black entertainer Ernest Hogan published two of the earliest sheet music rags, one of which (“All Coons Look Alike to Me”) eventually sold a million copies. As fellow Black musician Tom Fletcher said, Hogan was the “first to put on paper the kind of rhythm that was being played by non-reading musicians.” While the song’s success helped introduce the country to ragtime rhythms, its use of racial slurs created a number of derogatory imitation tunes, known as “coon songs” because of their use of extremely racist and stereotypical images of blacks. In Hogan’s later years he admitted shame and a sense of “race betrayal” for the song while also expressing pride in helping bring ragtime to a larger audience.
“Coon! Coon! Coon! I wish my color would fade. Coon! Coon! Coon! I’d like a different shade. Coon! Coon! Coon! Morning, night, and noon, I wish I was a white man ‘stead of a Coon! Coon! Coon!”
No lyrics for these two, I believe:
Here’s one that I thought was kind of sweet, yet sad:
“Mama, are there any angels black like me? I’ve been as good as any little girl could be. If I hide my face do you think they would see? I wonder if they’ll find a place for Little black me.”
speaking of henry ford
I kind of love
“It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.”- Henry Ford
“If money is your hope for independence you will never have it. The only real security that a man will have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience, and ability.”- Henry Ford
“If there is any one secret of success, it lies in the ability to get the other person’s point of view and see things from that person’s angle as well as from your own.”- Henry Ford
“The highest use of capital is not to make more money, but to make money do more for the betterment of life.”- Henry Ford
“Quality means doing it right when no one is looking.”- Henry Ford
“Life is a series of experiences, each one of which makes us bigger, even though sometimes it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and grieves which we endure help us in our marching onward.”- Henry Ford
“My best friend is the one who brings out the best in me.” – Henry Ford
“Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal.”- Henry Ford
“One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn’t do.”- Henry Ford
“The competitor to be feared is one who never bothers about you at all, but goes on making his own business better all the time.”- Henry Ford
“Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason why so few engage in it.”- Henry Ford
“Time and money spent in helping men to do more for themselves is far better than mere giving.”- Henry Ford
“What’s right about America is that although we have a mess of problems, we have great capacity – intellect and resources – to do some thing about them.”- Henry Ford
“You will find men who want to be carried on the shoulders of others, who think that the world owes them a living. They don’t seem to see that we must all lift together and pull together.”- Henry Ford
four years ago
reunited
Goodbye, Ted
civil rights instruction
I’m thrilled to learn that Mississippi is mandating civil rights instruction for al K-12 students. They’re the first and only state to do so! Maybe this will lead to the eradication of segregated proms there. And maybe even to honest, well- rounded history books/classes throughout the country. Be the change, Mississippi!
JACKSON, Miss. — In Mississippi, where mention of the Civil Rights Movement evokes images of bombings, beatings and the Ku Klux Klan, public schools are preparing to test a program that will ultimately teach students about the subject in every grade from kindergarten through high school.
Many experts believe the effort will make Mississippi the first state to mandate civil rights instruction for all K-12 students.
So far, four school systems have asked to be part of a pilot effort to test the curriculum in high schools. In September, the Mississippi Department of Education will name the systems that have been approved for the pilot. By the 2010-2011 school year, the program should be in place at all grade levels as part of social studies courses.
Advocacy groups such as the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation and Washington-based Teaching for Change are preparing to train Mississippi teachers to tell the “untold story” of the civil rights struggle to the nearly half million students in the state’s public schools.
“Now more than ever we are engaged in national debates about race and so much of those debates are impoverished in their understanding of history,” said Susan Glissen of the Winter Institute. “We want to emphasize the grassroots nature of civil rights and the institution of racism.”
…Education officials looked to other states for a model but couldn’t find one that included anything as comprehensive as what Mississippi has in mind, said Chauncey Spears, who works in the curriculum and instruction office of Mississippi’s education agency.
The Education Commission of the States didn’t know of any other state with a such a program, although it does not specifically track social studies curriculum.
Some states, including Alabama, Georgia and Arkansas, have placed an emphasis on civil rights instruction. New Jersey created an Amistad Commission to ensure the history of slavery is taught in schools. Pennsylvania’s Philadelphia school district requires students to complete an African-American history course before graduation.
“We’re behind time. Students don’t know about what Blacks did. They’re not taught anything about culture, about our history,” said Ollye Shirley, a member of the commission created to research the Mississippi curriculum and a former Jackson Public School board member.
…Deborah Menkart, executive director of Teaching for Change, said it’s important to help students understand that Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. weren’t the only important figures in the Civil Rights Movement.
“The traditional version would be that it started in 1954, thereby leaving out the fact that a lot of groundwork had to be done before that,” Menkart said.
obama-toons
thank you, gladys
Gladys Hernblad, 79; advocate for racial understanding
By Sally A. Downey
Gladys Kinard Hernblad, 79, of Northern Liberties, an educator, author, and advocate for interracial understanding, died of heart failure July 27 at Penn Hospice at Rittenhouse.
Mrs. Hernblad grew up in Saluda, S.C. Encouraged by her mother, Sadie, she walked six miles each way to high school, and after graduation moved to Philadelphia in search of better educational and employment opportunities.
She met Robert Hernblad at a gathering for young adults at a fellowship house in North Philadelphia. He was white, of Swedish and Irish descent. She was African American. They married in 1966, one year before the U.S. Supreme Court struck down bans on interracial marriage in all states.
In 1992, Mrs. Hernblad established the Interracial Families United Network. She told a reporter at the time that she and her husband had experienced discrimination in the early years of their marriage. “We had no support for our situation,” she said. The new network, she said, would support, “all interracial marriages – Asian, Hispanic, and African American.”
Mrs. Hernblad was a major supporter of President Obama, not only for his political views, but because his biracial background mirrored her family’s, which she considered a symbol of improving race relations in America.
lambert (not adam)
Lambert 1, NY 1902
Frank Lambert, a French immigrant spent seventeen years developing the Lambert. The first patent was in 1884 and it came to market in 1896. One types by pushing down on one of the keys, causing the whole round disk to tilt down in that direction. Down below, just above the typing point, is a convex, vulcanite surface, with all of the characters molded into it. This surface is connected to the upper disk and tilts in the correct direction, as it descends down to make contact with the paper. The middle knob is pushed down for a space. (via The Martin Howard Collection)
mulatto diaries 