Black History
A celebration of history, heroes and humor

REVIEWS BY RON WYNN

Few things can be more dull or aggravating than stuffy discourses on past events. Unfortunately that happens far too often during Black History month, when well-meaning writers recycle familiar tales about George Washington Carver or the civil rights era. Fortunately, there remain many authors and historians whose research and study unveil valuable new information while also clarifying misunderstandings and shattering widely held myths. That's the case with these five new works.

How the West was

One historical area where African-American involvement is frequently overlooked is in the development of the American West. Historian William Loren Katz's newly updated and reprinted work The Black West thoroughly corrects this oversight. Katz's pioneering volume covers every phase of African-American life out West, from fur trading and homesteading to serving as scouts, guides and explorers to the military campaigns of the Buffalo Soldiers. First published in 1971 and now in its fifth edition, The Black West has an improved photo archive, offering more rare shots of black riders, ropers, cavalry members and ranchers, and includes a fresh section on black women on the last frontier. Katz also touches on such areas as black participation in rodeos and the creation of western films designed for African-American audiences. While longtime fans of westerns have always known who Nat Love, aka Deadwood Dick, and Mary Field, aka Stagecoach Mary, were, The Black West provides new information for those fooled by John Wayne films and TV shows like "Gunsmoke" into thinking only whites wielded six-guns and broke broncos.


Defining a culture

Noted historian Nell Irvin Painter goes back even further than the days of the covered wagon with Creating Black Americans: African American History and Its Meanings: 1619 to the Present. Painter blends striking visual depictions with extensive analysis, covering everything from the extent of the African slave trade in North and South America to slavery in the U.S., Reconstruction, and the emergence and development of black culture, politics, economics and community life. She blends candid photos, stills and action shots of key community leaders and hard-working regular folks by artists ranging from Romare Bearden to Kara Walker, and her descriptive portraits are equally diverse, including familiar figures such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X and lesser-known names such as Olaudah Equiano (one of the first African slaves able to record his own account of captivity). Exhaustive yet easily understood and digested, Creating Black Americans supplies plenty of knowledge without ever becoming pedantic or dry.


Riding for rights

Raymond Arsenault's Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice covers a shorter, more specific time frame. The Freedom Riders were a courageous, racially integrated group of volunteers who traveled together on buses from Washington, D.C., to the heart of Dixie. They openly defied segregation laws and bore the brunt of vicious attacks, including firebombings and physical assaults that occurred in full view of the police. The sheer brutality that was presented on the front pages of major metropolitan newspapers shocked the Kennedy administration into finally protecting the Freedom Riders. Arsenault's book goes into exacting detail about rides, destination points and vicious acts of retribution during the pivotal year of 1961. It outlines a story of supreme courage against unspeakable cruelty and disgusting bigotry, and presents the Freedom Riders as one group that probably hasn't gotten the recognition it deserves for its crucial role in the civil rights movement.


Black comedy

A welcome departure from the grim accounts in the Arsenault volume comes via Hokum: An Anthology of African-American Humor. Novelist Paul Beatty, whose own works The White Boy Shuffle and Tuff are satiric triumphs, personally selected this compendium of routines, speeches, folktales, poetry, snippets from theater and film, even some rap lyrics. Some are delivered in pristine English, others in wildly profane fashion, but together they illuminate the wealth of the black comedic tradition. Though few readers would associate Dr. W.E.B. Dubois or Sojourner Truth with hilarity, their contributions are just as funny as those of Hattie Gossett or Wanda Coleman. Not quite a history of black comedy, Hokum serves more as a reference guide through various eras, showing how humor and comedy have changed over the years, and how laughter and wit have sometimes been as effective in the fight against racism as marches and votes.


A Renaissance man remembers

Gordon Parks Jr.'s accomplishments as a photographer and writer are remarkable, but he has also been a composer, painter, director and producer. While he's already penned one majestic book about his life, The Learning Tree, it was impossible to fully chronicle such a rich life in one work. A Hungry Heart puts his amazing career into perspective, with Parks recalling his personal triumphs and disasters and his encounters with such famous names as Dr. King, Stokely Carmichael, Roy Wilkins, Malcolm X and various actors and athletes. Though longtime followers of Parks' work will probably know many of the details in these stories, this new treatment lets him look back at harsher times and evaluate past decisions and actions. Sometimes there's a hint of regret, as when he acknowledges the devastating effects that making the film Leadbelly had on his marriage. He also recounts in graphically descriptive language the impact hunger and suffering had on him both as a youngster and later during the Depression. A Hungry Heart is living history from an icon whose existence defines and illuminates the black experience.


Ron Wynn writes for the Nashville City Paper and other publications.

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