- Jun 8, 2004
- 3,210
- 64
http://www.ga3d.net/sweetauburn/alherndon.htm
Alright Black folks, I'm certain this sort of thread will touch folks in different ways, but I wanted to present this page, and possibly this thread, to explore class in African American history... Like most things in the universe, it has it's colors, and Black and White are among them... In essence, there is something positive and something negative to being a rich Black man or woman in 19th and early 20th century America... I would like us to explore and expose it all for what it is, and was...
Rich African Americans have been both our blessing and curse... In attempting to hold on to what they'd accumulated, the oft stood in the way of our collective progress... They oft acted as the buffer between the White oppressor and the Black Oppressed... Sometimes their motives were quite well intentioned, oft they were pretty selfish... When the Great Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth was doing battle against the demonic Eugene Theopolis "Bull" Connor down in Birmingham, he also had to fight the A.G. Gastons, and the Tuskeegee Black Elites... Down in Durham, North Carolina, where North Carolina Mutual Insurance became, at the early dawn of the 20th century, the largest Black-Owned business in the world, the owners were instrumental in destroying one of the most progressive African American trade unions, Winston-Salem's Local 22 Food, Tobacco, Agricultural and Allied Workers... The local was established and led by African American women and men, and had established schools, and a Black history library for their children in the the 1930's! But to protect their fiefdom, the Black Elite collaborated with powerful Durham whites, to destroy this union...
Ironically, African Americans supported this great symbol of Black achievement despite its incursions against their collective progress... That was understandable then, as it would be now... But longstoryshort, the Black Elite have been a good thing, and a correspondingly negative thing for us, as Africans... Would that a few of us at this board could bring our minds together to examine their legacy... Enjoy the page, peops... I will present more down the line...
Peace!
Isaiah
Alright Black folks, I'm certain this sort of thread will touch folks in different ways, but I wanted to present this page, and possibly this thread, to explore class in African American history... Like most things in the universe, it has it's colors, and Black and White are among them... In essence, there is something positive and something negative to being a rich Black man or woman in 19th and early 20th century America... I would like us to explore and expose it all for what it is, and was...
Rich African Americans have been both our blessing and curse... In attempting to hold on to what they'd accumulated, the oft stood in the way of our collective progress... They oft acted as the buffer between the White oppressor and the Black Oppressed... Sometimes their motives were quite well intentioned, oft they were pretty selfish... When the Great Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth was doing battle against the demonic Eugene Theopolis "Bull" Connor down in Birmingham, he also had to fight the A.G. Gastons, and the Tuskeegee Black Elites... Down in Durham, North Carolina, where North Carolina Mutual Insurance became, at the early dawn of the 20th century, the largest Black-Owned business in the world, the owners were instrumental in destroying one of the most progressive African American trade unions, Winston-Salem's Local 22 Food, Tobacco, Agricultural and Allied Workers... The local was established and led by African American women and men, and had established schools, and a Black history library for their children in the the 1930's! But to protect their fiefdom, the Black Elite collaborated with powerful Durham whites, to destroy this union...
Ironically, African Americans supported this great symbol of Black achievement despite its incursions against their collective progress... That was understandable then, as it would be now... But longstoryshort, the Black Elite have been a good thing, and a correspondingly negative thing for us, as Africans... Would that a few of us at this board could bring our minds together to examine their legacy... Enjoy the page, peops... I will present more down the line...
Peace!
Isaiah