Hello, I'm Chris Moore, and welcome to this special edition of Black Horizons that we call Keepers of the Flame all across America in small towns and big.

There were places like this American Legion post 450.

Because of segregation.

It was the kind of place where black people came to gather for fellowship and for fun.

We're going to talk to three historians in the course of this program.

We call them Keepers of the Flame.

They have chronicled the history of places like this, places that were our special corner of the world.

Our first keeper of the flame, Bettie Cole of Sewickley.

I wrote my book, on the history of Sewickley, because it's Sewickley is my hometown, and I know it best.

And also, Sewickley is a, I wrote it with the realization that Sewickley is a composite of similar small towns, USA.

And for those not so similar at least an interesting study.

In contrast.

But most importantly, I wrote my book because there is so much history, black history in small towns that, that's vital and it's vital to the entire histor of our United States of America.

Well, I think what often escapes, a lot of people, especially in the small towns, is that they don't realize what a what a vital role, what an important part that the, blacks made in the entire, picture of it and each, each component of their lives, like, in, in the, in with employment starting at the beginning with the pioneers, the basis of it's often said with, with blacks that came to being slaves, or fugitive slave or on the Underground Railroad, but they came to small towns such as Sewickley that I know of, for work and employment.

And also, they set up their businesses.

They were very vital in with their churches, religious background, educational, cultural, all the components that make up a race or a people's life.

This is what the blacks have contributed towards that vital history of the whole town.

And it's important that then everyone know about it, and especially the blacks themselves, the young people.

Bettie Cole is the author of their story A history of African-American in Sewickley and Edgeworth PA, she wrote.

The book is a tribute to Mrs.

Susan Bloxham, who was her mentor.

So what Mrs.

Bloxham did when she found tha she wasnt able to, her health, didn't allow her to continu on her work as local historian.

She asked me would I be the custodian for her.

She had a lot of vintage pictures and scrapbooks and research work, and also what I continue on with her work.

And I told her, yes, I would, I'd be glad to.

And then I said to myself, not realizin the enormity of my, commitment, I said, not only do that, but I will also explore the, minds o the older people that are here, because that's where the history is, and also collect and see if they have anything in their attics and in their basements that perhaps would reveal more history.

So that is how she really inspired me to do that.

And, she's my mentor and, she's one of the persons that I dedicate my work to.

And her family had a histor of being involved in business, too, didn't they?

1907 Horse Blocks and founded his business with this, horse and buggy.

1907 in front of his house, there.

Now, this is his son Ellis.

And this Ellis purchased their first truck, and this was around maybe, what, 1916?

Something like that.

It's Mrs.

Blackstone's husband.

Yeah, Mrs.

Blocks.

Blocks.

Husband, this is Ellis.

So whenever, the son joined them, it became blocks and son.

Then years a much later, it, escalated on to the, to this to the moving van.

Deluxe moving van?

Of course.

In the meantime, the blocks had a fleet, so to speak, maybe 4 or 5 different truck at one time, hauling and moving.

And they had, the largest, black business in the valley for about 65 years.

Tell me about your first constable in this area.

I understand his name was Milt Farrington, and he was quite a character.

Milt Farrington, I think, just had to be around the 1920s.

We're talking about 1920s and 1930s.

But, Milt Farrington was really our first constable, and, his name's his name, I thin it was James Milton Farrington.

But he everybody called him Milt.

He was a constable for Maggie Morgan.

She was justice of the peace, a magistrate, I guess you would call her.

And she was legendary.

And what she would do, she would send Milt out to, cases, especially for the men who were not very, nice to their wives or their cases were brought against them.

I don't know about you, but I would have hated to see Milt coming first in a long line of black law enforcement officers in Sewickley, one of whom, Walter J. Brennan, rose to the rank of chief.

The community must have been very proud of the professional people that developed here the dentist, the doctors, the lawyers, those kinds of people, docto Addison Randolph was our first, dentist here.

Yes, our first doctor.

He was our first dentist, and he started around 1920s.

We're very proud of the fact that all over the country, there are Sewickley natives who got their start here in Sewickley.

And they were educated.

They have illustrious, and brilliant educations, professional careers all over the, United States.

The little town of Seattl is just, well, representative, it's a plethora of doctor and lawyers and professionals.

We are indeed very proud of them.

As a matter of tradition, the colored Negroes did have their own churches.

And the first one was a colored, nation that was on the corner of Thorn and Walnut Street.

So Miss Cole, Saint Matthew's AME.

Zion Church was the first all brick church built by people of color here.

And this a week later, yes, it was.

And this was built about around 1912.

And this is on the same site where they had the first colored nation, which it came to be eventually the, Saint Matthew family science, church and must have been very proud of.

Oh, yes, I'm sure that they were then the others, because they were all just frame.

Frame, buildings before.

But this was our first brick edifice here.

We still have our Saint Matthew's Church, we have our Antioch Baptist Church, we have our Troon Baptist Church and the other two churches, are no longer in existence to talk about what sort of recreational opportunities were here in Sewickle and Edgeworth area for blacks, in order for the blacks to have their own, recreational facility.

They started their, colored YMCA in 1913.

The building itself was the First Church in, Sewickley.

Whenever they built the church on the corner of Thorne and Walnut Street they moved this old little frame building next door facing Walnut Street.

And, they used tha then for the first colored YMCA.

And that was in 1913, of course, sports was one of the biggest events that they had.

And, they had their basketball teams.

What was interesting to in regard to the sports, there were no facilities for gymnasiums.

So what they used was a, well, just a little, little odd, a little place that was called a, it was called the, Sewickley Pavilion.

And it was, part of the public school.

They also had different types, cultural programs, speakers to come in and they had Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts and Girl leaders and all these different organization that they had to have their own.

They were not yet integrated.

The young people coming up and I was part of that myself at one time.

And my children, we didn't have to feel that we had any, that we were missing anything.

We had our scouts, we had our girl reserves and and we had our own sports and thing that to make our lives complete.

Mrs.

Cole proudly claims this community and it in turn has embraced her.

You know, it could be said that American Legion Post 450 became the focal point for black social life in Sewickley.

Mrs.

Cole was so enthusiastic about post 450s role that we had to pay the place a visit.

This is the spot that we called our little corner because, as you can see by the proximity of the post 450 here, Sewickley Community Center there and our athletic field here in front of us.

And it just it just wonderful.

And for many, many years, many decades is where we used to gather in our little corner for our recreation of, and for our cultural fun.

And yes, this is our spot.

This is what we call our own.

Maybe the reason post 450 has been such an important part of life in Sewickley is because Air men believe in playing a role in America's military.

As far back as World War One, they documented their willingness to serve.

This is just a marvelous, photograph here because it held it shows where the men were going after war from World War One, and they met at the main corner corner of Broad and Beaver Street.

And they had a ceremony ceremony there, and the black ladies were there representing the Red cross.

They were very active during World War On and in the American Red cross.

And they had this particular ceremony.

And then the men went off to war from there, went to river camp.

They were going to and that that was a very important part.

That was World War One.

It really seems like in this photo that they're making a statement that we're Americans, too.

Yes, yes, yes, that was an early statement.

That was one of th early statements that they made.

And we have quite a few that that did go after World War One.

We have a photo of a man in a pilot's uniform, I believe his name is Mitchell Higginbotham.

Was he one of the Tuskegee Airmen now?

Mitch Higginbotham was a he was our first, black pilot.

And, of course, that, you know, the Tuskegee famous, the gallant Tuskegee Airmen.

I just have so much regard for them.

And Mitc was our first in Sewickley area, and I think we had about five altogether.

They also touched upon what it was like, many of them to, to to experience so much racial, discrimination, during World War two, in Sewickley true, we had we had some of it, we lived with it and grew up with it.

But when you go into the, to the services and, and there was so much and a lot they weren't a is harsh.

They weren't accustomed to that.

But yes, we represented well.

And in speaking of the Tuskegee Airmen, I was always I was intrigued by that because that was a part, another part of our history that so many just nationwide didn't know about.

These gallant, wonderful men from all over who did so much stories are just legendary and wonderful.

You speak to a lot of young kids, black and white, and I wonder how they react t the history that you tell them.

They would say, gee, I didn't know.

I didn't know the black people were allowed to eat there.

And and I didn't know they had had their own businesses.

And, and, I didn't they didn't.

They were kind of odd.

You know, I didn't know I didn't know some of the blacks they knew, but they were aware, but they didn't know to what extent and how much we were involved.

The blacks.

But some of the white youngsters, and I'm talking about because I spoke from the very young ones in the, in the elementary schools all the way up to the, senior schools and speaking with them.

So they had different levels of, amazement, you know, and expressing the fact that they didn't they didn't realize to the extent, extent they, they were very happy the, the, black children said that, it gave them something to be very proud of and that they were going to tell everyone.

And when they used those words, it it made me feel so good because that's what I that's what I wanted to do.

I wanted to tell them so that they could tell.

Places like this American Legion Hall are important in commemorating the brave acts of African Americans who served overseas during World War Two.

No one knows that better than our next keeper of the flame, historian and journalist Frank Bolden.

He is one of only tw correspondents to be certified as African Americans and as war correspondents during World War Two, and the reason why I like the titl keeper of the flame is because it keeps alive a burning desire for us to eliminate second class citizenship.

You and I are still Americans.

We are not Africans.

We are Americans with African roots.

That pursuit, that pursuit of equality is still a viable desire for everyone who is in this country.

And I consider myself and my colleagues as Americans with African roots.

We all came to America.

All of us in this country cam to America in different boats.

But we're all in the same boat now, so we should all just grab an oar and pull fo the betterment of the country.

So if I can do my little bit by saving articles, delving into history, and finding out what my people have done for this country, it makes me proud to be able to be keeper of the flame.

During World War Two, Frank Bolden was one of onl two African Americans accredited as official correspondents by the War Department.

He covered the China Burma India Theater, otherwise known as the CBI, where a large number of blacks served as engineers, truck drivers, fighter pilots, nurses and infantrymen.

As a war correspondent in World War Two, I saw them die, at the time I was out, they had said that Africa so that a Negro soldiers would not fight under fire.

But I lived to see the 92nd Infantry Division in the Buffalo Soldier Division.

And the Tuskegee fliers distinguished themselves so well in battle, that President Truman desegregated all the armed services.

And I was fortunat to be invited to the disbanding of the 92nd when the war was over.

The Secretary of War pointed out that day that this division in World War One and two had earned 12,096 American citations for valor, and 48 foreign countries had honor them.

I felt very good about that.

As I sat there and thought about what I have seen these men do, it just hit me.

That and all the wars that we had fought, African-Americans had volunteered for service.

And most important of all, my race has never produced a traitor to this country.

The Pittsburgh Courier, was very disturbed because white America, led by the dominant white press, New York Times and others said that black Negro soldiers or black soldiers would not fight under fire.

They would turn it around.

In other words, they were cowards.

The courier believed that the honorable service should be desegregated at that time.

All true for the exception of medics and nurses were relegated to service jobs, ditch digging, truck driving, bridge building and that kind of thing.

The no combat units.

The courier thought we ought to have reporters telling the story of our men in the service, because the white press was not doing it.

And, they were a littl reluctant at first to try for it because they figured that the War Department wouldn't.

Okay any reporters who would work for the black press.

But with some pressure in Washington and, and some other things, they were able to get the War Department to agree to, having a war correspondent.

I went to Iran first and worl supply lines up in the Russia.

I stayed in Russia over, almost eight weeks.

Then I went from there to the China Burm India Theater to the Ledo Road.

Negro soldiers built that road.

India and Chin have been trying for centuries, almost to get a road through from India to China.

And these men did it.

And the interesting thing about that road, during the monsoon season, you couldn't move more than two miles every three months.

The jungle and the mud was so bad.

And the road markers on that road is now called the Stilwell Road.

But in place of the marker saying 30 miles to Anding or 200 or 600 miles to Chongqing, or 80 miles to Kunming, each one of those markers had a Negros name on it as a grave marker.

Corpora John Graves died August the 3rd.

And so on and so on and so on.

So victim of Japanese sniper or cobra bite or attack by by, Tiger or Panther?

Frank Bolden also covered black American fighting men who had to prove themselves under fire.

The, 92nd was ready for combat.

Eisenhower general.

And I would not take them to Europe.

He still believed tha they wouldn't fight under fire.

Mark Clark, who needed troops in Italy, took them.

And, he put them on his left flank.

They had a Japanese regiment on the right.

Neither one of those regiments gave up an inch of ground.

They fought so well that Clark distributed 15 or 16, battlefield promotions, ranging from the second lieutenant to major and, as I explained, it was the beginning.

They fought so well that President Truman, looking at the wor that the 92nd did in the fifth and the Tuskegee fliers desegregated all branches of the armed service.

So there was something to be said for that.

And, there's a monument to the black soldier in America out of Fort Huachuca today.

And I was surprised to find out that I was part of the that I had been out to Arizona to, to speak at, fraternity's Founder's Day.

And my remarks about the rehabilitation of the Negro family hit the newspapers out there.

The intelligence officer at Fort Huachuca picked up on the story, and they followed it down.

They wanted to know, was I the Frank Bolden that had covered the troops at Fort Huachuca Because the Frank Bolden, they thought I was dead.

I said, no, I'm very much alive.

And they invited and asked we could I stay over and, until Friday and I did.

And when I got there, I found out the inside of this building around the walls, all the way around the walls were my dispatches on the 93rd and 92nd Infantry Division.

These dispatches I had never seen.

So I sent them back, but I had never seen them.

So, behind all of that, the Buffalo Soldiers made me an honorary Buffalo soldier.

And, there's my captain, sabers there, the cross sabers.

Frank covert, America's ten Yanks, as he dubbed them.

Not only the fighting men, bu those who held service positions still not on the front lines.

These nurses, engineers and truck driver known as the Red Ball Express, faced their own share of dangers on the little road, that rode all the way into China.

1044 a mile is marked with those service, and I remember we had no African-American officers.

These were black troops and their white officers.

And they built that road.

And of course, it became his history making.

And it's a historical landmark today.

And I covered I'd like the CBI, because those guys really put out for America, incidentally, the best hospital in the whole CBI, a theater was established up a shimmering under, major Wilbur Strickland of Philadelphia.

One of the nurses there is a Pittsburgher.

She's living here now on East Liberty.

Lily Lasaying during the, malaria epidemic, those nurses stayed on their feet in 90 days without relief.

And, it was such a good hospital, both for therapeutic work and surgery, that white officers flew as much as 7000 mile from Calcutta, from New Delhi.

And all that to get service in that hospital.

What a surprise.

All they when they walk in and saw a black nurse.

I know they had heard about them so they knew.

Yeah.

You see this was at a time whe they were separating blood and.

Oh that's right, that's right.

But the they took that blood up there.

See, when you're near death you don't worry about race.

And they learned the hard way.

They learned the, the, the quickest to lear were the bigots from the South.

Those officers in the South tickle me.

But they, they didn't object.

They wouldn't have come that far.

They knew about the hospital.

There were two other hospitals in the command, but, they didn't stack up to this one.

And, naturally, I was proud of that.

I have stories here that I wrote about them.

And a little of the scene, was one of those nurses, that was so heroic.

So all in all, it was good that we had.

I was happy that the courier sent me.

It gave us a chance to le America know what we were doing and how we were doing.

It also, I should mention the fact that when we went, advocating that Negro soldiers be put in combat, we were certainly criticized by Van and and Mr.

Lewis and all of them.

But, you see, we, we had already realized that if we didn't go into combat when the war was over, the men who put their life on the line in combat would get the first benefits of the G.I.

Bill.

We didn't want to be left out of that.

And, our judgment proved right, because, World War two, our men gained more, the G.I.

benefits, and they got in th Korean War and the Vietnam War.

They got homes, they got to go to school, got to go to college and all that.

So all in all, I was happy to be able to be a part of the system.

Pittsburgh Magazine once called Frank a Road Scholar, and in his travels on the road as a journalist, he met many of the men who changed the world.

Gandhi, a very brilliant man, the originator of nonviolence, that did not originate with Martin Luther King and originated with him.

They have to remember that nonviolence was offered by a little brown skinned man, the loin cloth.

It was not a Christian.

We're going again here.

They were the only two Indians who combined their effort to free, India.

It's never occurred before in Indian history.

A Brahmin and a merchant class representative.

Keeping in mind that Gandhi was a lawyer, a very good lawyer, Nehru reminded me that we do not need a lot of people around us to be successful.

He said.

Too many people are dangerous.

So the third bit of Hindu philosophy, I came on back to America, never thought about it much.

And so, in 1964, when I was having my sessions with Doctor Martin Luther King, all three men had never met, but they had the same idea of making the playing field level for all people.

But, Martin Luther King, Gandhi and Nehru.

Churchill wasn't bad.

He was dictatorial, but he he was a smart.

Churchill Yes, sir.

On conference.

Did you interview him?

Oh, yes he was.

He was he was the number one man there.

Roosevelt.

Just listen.

He didn't say too much.

The man who dominated the round conference was Churchill.

He, is even Stalin.

They both respected him.

He was tough.

He knew more about their countries and they did themselves.

He was terrific.

And, as they say, he save England because he knew England.

He knew the people.

And other thing, about Churchill, he knew the enemy better than the other two leaders.

Roosevelt and Stalin did not know the Germans nor Hitler.

Churchill did, and of course commander Chiang Kai-shek.

They didn't know anything about the world.

Commander Chiang did not wan black drivers on those convoys.

They didn't want him.

She didn't want black soldiers attend the Yanks.

As I said, she didn't want him in China.

But Churchill, in a war, he said, you use all your resources and that includes all people.

Frank Bolden is a graduat of the University of Pittsburgh, the oldest living member of their marching band.

And while at Pitt, he wanted to go to medical school.

I went up there 1st July afternoon.

Oh.

My friend, a colleague who was also a graduate assistant, Norman Horowitz from Squirrel Hill here, and when Doctor Donaldson, dea of the medical school, said, oh, Mr.

Bolden, I've been wanted to meet you for some time.

He said, I want to thank you for what you did for two of my faculty members, two of my teachers.

I had taught the how to make slides in histology, bone slides you use on a microscope, microscopic slides, he said.

And, they, they they're ver high in praise of you, he said.

And my this is such a fine transcript.

He said you worked hard to get this many A's.

He said, you know, I would admit you to miss school this afternoon if you're only white.

Then he said to Norman, he said, and what do you want?

He said, Horowitz.

Oh, oh, you're Jewish?

Yes.

Jewish He said, you are one month late.

We already have our quota of Jews.

So Norman and I walked down the hill from the med school here.

You had two minorities who were refused admittance to med school.

Frank says you can never allow life's disappointments to make you bitter.

If you're bitter, it destroys the most importan part of your body, your brain.

You spend all your time feeling sorry for yourself over conditions of which you had no control.

And what you have to do is develop.

My philosophy is achievement.

Whatever you try to be good.

Just like when I was the first African-American in the Pitt Varsity Marching Band.

My my my, my examination was twice as tough as the white flowers.

And that's the way it was going to be.

That's the way it was at that time.

That's the way it's going to be today.

They don't turn yo down when you achieve something.

Nobody turns down Michael Jordan as a basketball player.

I think he's good.

The surgeon out there in California who operates on the cliff underneath the cleft palate, the pineal gland, and no one else in the world has been successful in those brain operations.

But him.

He's twic as good as the other surgeons.

That's why.

So that's one of the prices you pay for being a minority.

And if I was going to be better, I wouldn't.

I made up my mind since I didn't want to go south to teach because, you know, I wouldn't last at six days in a south behind the cotton curtain.

I couldn't go for that.

I decided to stay with the good.

Stay in journalism because didn't want to teach the South.

And I'd been in.

I had interest in med school.

And when you sit around and cry about it, you don't get anything done.

Also, you miss a lot of friends.

Say, for instance, it was probably good for me.

I never would have got to meet all the people that I did never acheive the success in journalism that I have.

You always felt as though you had to be among the the common people, Plato of the pavement, as you always like to say.

Why is that?

Because that's where the action is.

It's the basic people that keep your communities going here in Pittsburgh.

If it wasn't for my friends I knew at Crawford Grill and other places in the early days, the street, the wisdom of the street will settle You down See, the danger is when you don't mingle with the common man, as they call him.

You get that elitist idea that you were born to lead.

You don't.

It doesn't work.

Also, you'd be surprised a the wisdom you gain from people who have not had the advantages of higher education.

What they have gotten from their own experiences is worth its weight in gold.

To you.

Frank Bolden has had a wealth of experiences amongst the mighty and the meek, and as a keeper of the flame, he wants to make sure that that flame continues to burn.

I see a glimmer of hope if we older people take these young people and say, listen here, we're passing on this torch to you.

Don't don't let it go out unless the media, unless the fraternities.

And let's see, middle aged people that we have can instill fait and hope in these young people, then there will be no the flame will go out.

See, the flame was passed on to us from Homer Brown.

When Bob, then Daisy Lampkin, etc.

people like myself, Edna McKenzie and others, we want to pass it on to someone else.

And you have one thing on your side, and that's age.

You're young, you have years ahead of you to do this.

You can make that flame much brighter by being a participant in get personally involved and.

Take some pride in our race.

Think of those that have come before us, like the Marybeth Lewis the Charles Drews, the, Thurgood Marshall Robert Vance, the Daisy Wilkins.

Step up there to the plate to the plate and take your heat for that, because nothing great was ever achieved with that enthusiasm.

Our next keeper of the flame is Doctor Edna McKenzie.

She was the first black woma to graduate from the University of Pittsburgh with a PhD in history.

She believes in teaching from original sources.

She doesn't accept the interpretation of other historians.

She goes to th original documents of the time to see what people who lived in those times were thinking.

She's our next keeper of the flame.

And she believes that black history is American history.

The truth has not been told.

And with all of the concern about we are entitled to know the truth.

Truth has not been told about American history.

Not only African American history, but it's all American history.

And I've concentrated on that role rather than reach back too much to Africa.

Although I've been there and study, I do believe that the thing we should be most concerned about is what happened here in our native land.

I'm an Army preachers daughter and I grew up in churches all around Western Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

In addition to that all I learned from the beginning was Richard Allen and independence and protest and, how to demand your God given rights.

And I think it's so importan because during the years I went to school in Pennsylvania I heard nothing about my people, that only they were slaves.

But as the Lord would have it, my father was moved by th bishop into West Virginia, and I went to a segregated school.

And the first book I got was The Negro in Our History, written by Carter G. Woodson.

And then, and I had an entirely different view of life.

How do you think knowing your history can change your view of life?

Oh, I really believe that.

You need food for the soul and the spirit as well as for the mind.

You certainly need to know more than reading, writing and arithmetic.

And you can't.

You can't be a whole person.

You don't know anything about your ancestry or about the achievements of great people.

You can't have ambition if you think that people like you never did anything worthwhile.

Not only does doctor McKenzie know her history, she helped make history by writing for the Pittsburgh Courier and testing the segregation laws in the 1940s.

If they insulted you.

I remember one restaurant and it was in, McDonald or Clairton, one of the little towns, and I asked for a cup of coffee and the coffee urn, great big coffe cup sitting right on the counter and cups everywhere, and peopl sitting around drinking coffee.

They tell me we don't have any.

And then I said, but you do have some and I just like to have a cup.

Well, if you lived around here, you'd know better.

We don't serve Negroes.

And so you're, you know, obviously your best bet is to get out of here.

But those kinds of things I had to do, and I had to do it for about six weeks.

And, Mr.

Paradis, who was the executive editor, then told me, you know, you have to jump in the fire and other words, you know, you're going to get burned, but you jump in anyway.

And, now, as I think about it it was very important to do that because then we could sue them, and then they would have to open up their restaurants for black people.

During World War Two, the Pittsburgh Courier conducted its famed double V campaign.

It meant that black Americans wanted victory abroad as well as at home.

Our men were overseas fighting in a segregated army, but they were being treated equally by the French and Italians and other Europeans.

But Americans, you know, still, we're not treating our men right.

But they were over there.

Well, we all know the stories of the great triumphs of the 99th Percy Squadron and our men, who finally got their Medals of Honor 50 years late.

However our men were willing to do that, for America.

But we were being treated equally at home.

And so our mission was to try to win some battles at home.

And one was to get the respect that we deserved in our own communities.

And public accommodations were supposed to serve everybody, every citizen, the last protected as.

But the laws were not enforced because we were not, we didn't have the enforcement power ourselves.

We had to depend on the state and the local and the federal government, as we do now, to enforce the law equally, it was a very difficult task for m because I wanted to keep my job.

So I had to go and get insulted every other day and then come back and write the story.

But I understood that it was important and that I needed to do it, that the editor was exactly right.

We will never, never get things changed if, if we don't, as he said, jump in the fire.

So I willingly, And I'm so glad now, when I read the stories that I did it, because I know that I contributed to making things better for our city of Pittsburgh and surrounding areas, because we don't have that problem now.

Docto McKenzie is a strong supporter of the historic role of the black press, which is to be an advocate for black causes.

We will always have to have some papers of our own, some way to get our story out.

They will never tell it.

I understand it, I'm not even angry with them about it, because you can't expect other people to do for you what you can do for yourself.

You can't.

Hardly even.

I would say, ask the Almighty to do for me what I can do for myself.

Just get busy and do it and b willing to make the sacrifice.

We broke down the, segregation.

Although Pennsylvania had a equal rights law passed in 1935.

Nobody obey the law.

They didn't even know the law and didn't want to learn it.

That's the thing that always amazes me about America and how Americans, we are so lawless.

I mean, the general population don't pay attention.

And, you know, they never paid any attention to the 14th amendment or there would never have been a need for the 60s.

You see, it's written in the law.

The presidents didn't pay any attention to it.

Congres never paid any attention to it.

No local authorities enforced the 14th amendment.

And that's why we had that mess in Florida, because I still think that black Lawless nation there is there are mountains of information all over this country, down in courthouses, in the books, in first editions, many of which I have, I buy them because I want to be able to open the book and see what it said by people who were there at the time, not something that someone else has, you know it.

And and what's the word they use the spin masters.

I want to see what it really says.

And that way then I can be sure that when I write something, I teach my students something that I am giving them the authentic material.

One of doctor McKenzie' contemporaries at the Pittsburgh Courier was a writer and historian named J.A.

Rogers, who revealed historical facts about African-Americans that many people found hard to believe.

The one thing about Rogers, let me tell you, if you go check the old world sources or any of the sources he names, he got it right.

In this case, here's Alexander Hamilton, original portrait.

And then he's Caucasian ized over here so that we don't understand that he had African blood, born on the island of Nevis, which was populated, obviously by slaves of the European countries.

And so is that an original portrait?

Yes.

This is drawn from life by Peale.

And that was the famous artists of the, of the era of the revolutionary period.

New York Public Library collection.

Hamilton was darker in color than the picture shows.

Note his wolfish hair.

Now when we get to recognize version, then we see a different person.

Why do you think American historians did this?

They did thi because they didn't want blacks to ever believe that any one of their ancestry were great contributors to American society.

That's why they don' want to apologize for slavery, because they want to believ that these were unworthy people, and therefore, if they were unworthy or inferior, you could do anything to them and not feel as though you had say, committed a sin or a crime or done anything wrong.

Furthermore, doctor McKenzie says that historians intentionally distorted the history of black people in the South in order to justify lynching and burning.

That to me is is you know, it's unconscionable.

But, you know, the recently when these young peopl are coming out with these books, the Tulsa riot, they still don't want to hear it.

It's true, but they don't want it now.

The, the the, exhibit on the lynchings, postcards where peopl were standing around gleefully seeing people burned alive and getting souvenirs.

Children, people letting church out to go to a lynching.

I don't understand why we don't want to air these kind of things and get it over with.

Painful memories of American history, I know, but it's what Martin Luther King King used to say.

You, Source it's not going to he until you expose it to the fresh air.

Right.

Is that right?

Then he say that you've got to bring it out in the open.

And why don't we hurry up an get it out and and acknowledge that it happened?

And then we can move on.

We can't do it continually sweeping it under the rug or telling ourselves lying to ourselves that it didn't happen or that it wasn't so bad telling black people to get over it.

I got to get over something like that.

And why would you ask people to accept that as their do?

Would you?

And accepted your death?

Were you ever surprise by any of your own discoveries?

No, I was not, because I never believed what I was told in elementary schoo that blacks were happy slaves.

That didn't make sense, because my own experienc had taught me, even as a child, that if you did something to me I didn't like, I didn't like you.

So I couldn't have been happy.

And neither could slaves have been happy when they knew they had sense enough to know they were being exploited, oppressed, abused, and they, I guess, came nearer to hate.

And then.

And then love because they're human beings.

Docto McKenzie may not be surprised, but you might be to know that some slaves were actually paid for their skilled labor, which enabled some of them to buy their own freedom.

Self hire was a practice throughout the whole.

The whole South by most, common in the Upper South.

We called Virginia, Maryland and states, Tennessee, etc.

but slaves who were highly skilled hired their time.

They were permitted to live, virtually free.

They went out got their own jobs collected their own wages, but paid a kickback to the owner.

This was a mutual agreement and mutually beneficial.

They were only those people who had marketable I would say, marketable skills.

For instance, you tak the Cooper at Cooper was the man who made the barrels in which the staples were shipped down the Mississipp to New Orleans for world trade.

If water seeped in those barrels, the rice, the sugar, the cotton all was spoiled and the I can't use the word master.

I say the owner.

The slave owner was indeed ruined.

So if the Cooper came to hi and said, I want a dollar a day, which was really a lot of money in that period, what could the owner do if he could make the barrels meaning, oh, my students always said that beat him up and you disabled, then who would still?

Who would make the barrels?

Who would make them?

You couldn't make them.

You couldn't find another Cooper anywhere around, because they all had owner who understood that they needed to be paid in orde to be kept on the job, in order to make the whole operation successful.

So, you paid him, and generally he hired his, he got his own home.

He many of them sent their children to universities in the north, some overseas.

When the evidence of this, do you say what evidence?

I have the records, court records, agreements signed by the owner and the enslaved.

The person, and they were set free.

My goodness.

Many of the people who came north and became the, black abolitionists had been, had hired their own time.

It was not an uncommon phenomenon.

It made a lot of sense.

See, I think Americans need to stop talking about the morals of the Founding Fathers.

How could a man be moral and and and keep slaves and torture and beat and brutalize them for his profit?

Who are you talking about?

You.

I'm talking about George Washington and Jefferson.

Madison, all of them.

All of them were immoral to the core because they could not have done the evil things they did if they were Christians o even believed in Christianity.

It doesn't make sense, does it?

Jesus not love?

Maybe it's because she's a preacher.

Starter.

Maybe it's because of our faith in God and country that despite America's history of racism, docto McKenzie still holds out hope.

But I honestly believe now that we can have one America I honestly believe I might not.

I won't live to see it, but I believe once people learn to respect each other and we have to bring the evidence, you say, now for me to say, well, you have to accept black people who are just as highly intelligent as any people in the world and have contributed as much to the body of knowledge in the world as any other race.

And I can prove it onl when I can bring the evidence.

See, when I go to Tanzania and go in their archives and bring books that just need to be translated, which are now translated, then they can say, yes, that's the story, that's the true story.

But if I refus to even accept the, the notion that I should inquire, then I'm doing myself a disservice because I have a closed mind and I'm afraid of the truth.

And we should not be.

I really believe we'll get it together one day in America.

But we can't slack.

We can't be slac in doing the work that it takes.

And I wish that there were a thousand black researchers and historians going around in these repositories, down in the courthouses into the old rare books, you know, areas where they keep them in the archives and dig it all this stuff out, it's there.

I'm just now too old to do al do the kind of thing I could do 30 or 40 years ago but I'll tell you, it's there.

There is all kind of information, but nobody's going to bring it to us.

We have to do it.

Doctor Mackenzie's advice to young people is simple.

I say to them, work hard at something marketable.

That is something you can use, something people will buy, something people need and be so good at it that you won't ever have to look for a job.

You won't ever have to worry about making money.

People will be looking for you a good seamstress a good musician, a good teacher, a good writer, all those kinds of things.

Whatever you do, if you are the best, you know, a housecleaner there, there are people who have little businesses no that go around and clean houses, and if they do it well, they're independent entrepreneurs.

So I say study hard.

Make up your mind what you want to do.

You know, good lawyers, good everything.

Good doctors write their own ticket, their own salaries.

And you can do it too.

But I was always cautioned by my husband, make sure you tell the it was not easy, that you had to work very hard, and that you had to sacrifice everything else.

These are our keepers of the flame, the journalists, historians and scholars that have preserved our past so that we might better navigate our future.

And the reason why I, like the title keeper of the flame is because it keeps alive a burning desire for us to eliminate second class citizenship.

It's an honor to be considered a keeper of the flame, but I really feel like, it was my duty and still my duty to keep pressing forward to make sure that we are included in America's package.

The truth has not been told.

And with all of the concern about.

We are entitled to know the truth.

Truth is not being told about American history, not only African American history, but it's all American history.

And I've concentrated on that wrong.

I just feel highly complimented to be part of that, of bein one of the keepers of the flame.

It certainly is my hometown, and I know it best.

But most importantly, I wrote my book because there are so much history, black history in small towns that, that's vital.

And it's vital to the entire history of our United States of America.