Six on History: Black History is Every Month
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1) Inside Strivers Row, a Historic Neighborhood in Harlem - Untapped New York
White came up with the unique back-to-back layout of the houses, which allowed the residents to share a rear courtyard and back alleyways for the discreet stabling of horses and delivery of supplies. He was also responsible for the gateways and arches that once stood at the entrances to the rear courtyards. Despite the architecture of Strivers Row, sales were very low at first. Speculators had overbuilt in Harlem, while the Panic of 1893 brought a great slowdown to economic activity in all of New York. David King defaulted. His creditors, the Equitable Life Assurance Company, took over ownership of most of the houses, and refused to sell or rent to African Americans. Many sat empty or were converted to rental units until 1919, when the company finally allowed Black ownership. The Black elite would soon after purchase “Royal King Houses” for $8,000 each. Among the new tenants were many ambitious and successful members of the Black community in such fields as medicine, law, dentistry, and the arts.
For over a year and a half, one of the most controversial issues on Kenyon’s campus has been an effort to organize a union of undergraduate student workers. The student organizers feel that a labor union would be an important advocate for student workers. After carefully considering their point of view, the Board of Trustees and I concluded that a union would undermine the distinctly educational relationship we have with students. This is a complex issue, with legitimate points of view in conflict, and it will take the National Labor Relations Board to resolve it. In the meantime, the passions are intense, shaped in part by a larger national debate over unionization on college campuses. I am in the position of authority, and with this has come the types of attacks (“union buster,” etc.) that one would expect at these moments. It goes with the territory, and generally it has not affected either my position on the issues or the respect I have for the student organizers.
But this essay is not about the union-organizing effort, or about Kenyon’s students. It is about the most recent time my egg timer went off, last week.
My office, and several other offices on campus, received a series of voice-mail messages that cut straight to the chase. An example: “Tell your n***** president to recognize the union, or go back to the plantation where his grandma is from.” Other messages invoked collard greens and fried chicken (I should put these down and recognize the union). And rap music (once I recognize the union, I can go back to playing it). And a strange reference to Harriet Tubman that unintentionally highlighted ignorance about slavery.
If I sound flip about this, it is because such attacks are all too familiar. This is not the first time I have received racist messages; it has been a fairly predictable event whenever a college controversy attracts attention beyond the Kenyon community. In this case, we don’t know the source of the messages. The available evidence suggests that they probably came from off campus — from someone unaffiliated with Kenyon. We put the usual safety measures in place. I was angry when I first heard the messages, and rode extra hard on my stationary bike. But I was not shocked or surprised.
Moreover, I am not alone in this experience. At a meeting of African American college and university presidents last year, someone asked for a show of hands from those who had received harassing or threatening messages. Nearly every hand went up. In America, being called the N-word at moments of controversy is part of the cost of leading while Black.
I have been asked over the years by well-intentioned white acquaintances whether I see myself as a college president or a Black college president. My racial identity, like all aspects of my experience, is not something from which I can (or would want to) separate. It informs the way I see the world, the way I teach, the way I lead. But the question itself inverts the reality of the lived experience of Black Americans. I know, and my colleagues know, that I will be seen as a Black president, regardless of how I define or describe myself.
But more than that — I have come to expect that race will be weaponized to undermine not only a leader’s authority but also that leader’s very humanity and sense of belonging. The aim is to intimidate and exhaust us. It is certainly no accident that one of the messages left with a colleague, also a Black man, appealed to the tired trope of affirmative action. The larger message could not be clearer: We do not belong, we are not qualified to lead. Racism is easily identifiable in N-word-laden comments. But we should not forget that this extreme racism is enabled — indeed empowered — by a more subtle yet still toxic rhetoric of disrespect.
I greatly admire the resilience and strength of my friends who are Black leaders in a range of fields, who manage this extra emotional weight at every difficult decision or controversy. They lead with integrity and dignity, knowing that a racist backlash lurks around the corner. For the most part this labor is silent. Folks absorb the abuse in order to avoid being seen as over-reactive, over-emotional — to avoid the accusation that we are the ones playing the race card. But perhaps it is time that we break this silence, for our own health if nothing else.
In the meantime, I’ll reset my timer."
Desegregation would not come to Las Vegas until the “Moulin Rouge Agreement” of March 25, 1960, that integrated public accommodations. In popular histories, the agreement is sometimes portrayed as a snap decision that led to full-fledged equality overnight. However, the city’s desegregation was a multi-decade effort that included many key events, such as the protest by the local NAACP branch for jobs at the Hoover Dam in 1931; the Las Vegas Colored Progressive Club’s fight for the Black community to resettle west of the railroad tracks in the early 1930s; and the hiring of the first black teacher by the school district in 1946. And in the early 1950s a noteworthy Black entertainer residing in Paris, France made a decision that not only reverberated across the United States, but it also started to crack the foundations of racism that consumed this small resort city located in the Mojave Desert. In 1951, Josephine Baker, having recently completed her work in the French Underground of World War II, decided to tour the United States. In 1952 she came to the Last Frontier Hotel located in Las Vegas, Nevada. Though unknown at the time, her appearance showcased the intersection of the financial profits, racism, world class entertainment, and desegregation movements embedded within the city’s socio-political structure.
Baker’s challenge to racism in Las Vegas is known by those who have studied her history, but given the brevity of her stay there is a tendency to generalize its impact. One website, for instance, credits her with “integrating Las Vegas nightclubs.” But this assertion is both overly romantic and far too broad for understanding her actual impact in the long term. While it is true that Baker integrated one club for the few days of her engagement, it was not a permanent state of affairs for the Las Vegas casino industry. However, the maneuvers she made were rather unprecedented at that point in the city’s history, and it can best be described as a spinning dance step that pirouetted over the years. Baker’s initial impressions of the city and her immediate commitment to uplifting its Black community are documented in the oral memories of Black Las Vegas, and these sources are crucial for understanding how Josephine Baker cracked the foundations of the color line and helped to further galvanize Black Las Vegans to push for structural change.
According to J. David Hoggard, a Black man who served as Executive Director of Clark County’s Economic Opportunity Board, Josephine Baker made an immediate impact:
[She] came into town and took a cab over to West Las Vegas and stopped at the corner of Jackson and D Streets. She entered the liquor store at that corner owned by Mr. and Mrs. Andy Bruno and asked if they knew how she could get in touch with the president of the local NAACP and where could she find a good beauty parlor.”
Both questions were answered and then directed to Woodrow Wilson, president of the local NAACP. Upon their first meeting, Wilson recalled that Baker told him that “she had arranged tables to be reserved for her at every show. She needed his assistance in filling those tables with blacks each night of her engagement. Of course, we agreed.” Hoggard recalled the events of the first evening that Baker performed, noting that he, Wilson and a few other Black Americans were in attendance, a practice that was strictly prohibited at Strip properties. Baker told the group beforehand to notify her if they experienced any issues at the entrance and she would intervene. Unsurprisingly, they were stopped at the door and the manager defiantly told them they could not enter and would be arrested if they did not leave the premises. The group refused to move, and Woodrow Wilson left to use the telephone and inform Baker of the situation. According to Hoggard, it only took “a couple of minutes [before] Josephine Baker showed up, reminded them of the clause in her contract, and threatened not to perform if we were not seated. We had no more trouble.”
Baker was well-aware of Las Vegas racism, as noted by the “clause” in her contract that stipulated certain liberties not often given to Black Americans in the city, as even Black celebrities faced discrimination within the same venues that they performed. She challenged these segregationist policies by demanding tables for her guests, be they white or Black, and by staying in a cottage on the premises of the hotel casino, a practice that was taboo within the city’s tradition. Baker’s behavior in Las Vegas may not be surprising, as she held a well-documented commitment to civil rights activism, but it is important to note that up to that point few celebrities had challenged Las Vegas segregation quite like she had.
Baker approached Las Vegas with her usual bravado and demanded tables in the front portion of the showroom for her guests. Lubertha Johnson, an activist and member of the NAACP, remembered attending the event with an interracial group of NAACP members on the second night when the hotel attempted to renege on the contract, asserting they would not honor her request a second time. Baker told the group to not engage with the doormen, but to seek her out at any hint of hostility. The moment the group found trouble at the entrance, they located Baker and she led them “right through where people were being served.” Johnson continued, “They didn’t know what to do, because Miss Baker was in front. They let us go in but they wouldn’t serve us. Miss Baker went out on the stage, and she just sat there. She said, ‘Now, I’m not going to entertain. You just stay where you are until something happens. I’m going to sit right here till they make up their minds what they want to do.’ Finally, they served us.”
In a 24-hour city based upon the consumption of entertainment and the primacy of star power, Josephine Baker graced its stage and used her platform to challenge segregation and discrimination. She could have arrived in the city, performed, received payment, and left. But she chose a higher path, one that expressed commitment to the elevation of her people. Even if her time in Las Vegas was fleeting, her impact remained everlasting by those who witnessed it. Las Vegas inhabitants are known to live by the clock of the casino, working, eating, and sleeping according to the rhythm of the city that pulsated from the shuffle of the cards and the roll of the dice. African Americans were expected to play their position as a community neither “seen” nor “heard,” completely immobilized, silenced, and invisible. For just a few hours, Josephine Baker danced above that rhythm and invited Black Las Vegans to join her, ensuring they would never again accept anything less."
"Ninety percent of Black working women in the late 19th century were employed in domestic service. Domestic service is work in a private home, which includes cleaning, laundry, cooking, and childcare. It was an industry in which Black women could easily find work. Black servants tended to stay in the industry longer than immigrant domestics. Immigrant domestics typically left the workforce after marrying or having children. In many cases, Black families could not afford for women to leave the workforce. As a result, Black women often spent more time with the white families they worked for than with their own.
Relationships between Black domestics and their white employers could be challenging to navigate. This was especially true in the South, where Black domestics often performed the same household duties they did during slavery. White employers took advantage of their Black workers by paying them poorly and treating them harshly. In addition, Black women often faced sexual harassment. Freedom from enslavement, however, empowered some Black women to stand up for better working conditions. Others decided to leave the South and move to northern states in search of better employers.
Isabel Eaton was an assistant to W.E.B. Du Bois, a famous Black writer, teacher, and activist. Eaton was a white middle-class woman, who conducted research in working-class communities and advocated for better working conditions. She helped Du Bois on his book The Philadelphia Negro. In 1899, she published the “Special Report on Negro Domestic Service.”
This resource includes three tables from Eaton’s 1899 report. The first table shows that less than one-fifth of Black domestic workers in Philadelphia were natives of the city. Almost half migrated from either Maryland or Virginia. The second graphic shows that Black women worked in domestic service significantly longer than the industry average. The third table shows how male and female domestic workers spent their free time. Their responses indicate that the church played an important role in Black social life, particularly for women."
- domestic work: Paid work done in someone’s home, including cooking, cleaning, and taking care of children.
"Early Thursday morning, a video of a fatal police shooting rocked the internet. Police dash- and bodycam footage captured the events leading up to the death of 26-year-old Patrick Lyoya, a Black immigrant who was killed by a police officer during a traffic stop in Grand Rapids, Michigan, earlier this month.
The case is another example of the hundreds of cases over the last five years where a traffic stop ended with the death of an unarmed driver or passenger, according to a report by the New York Times.
The officer asks Lyoya if he speaks English, to which Lyoya says that he does, but he looks confused. After a brief back-and-forth, the situation escalates. Lyoya appears to try to walk away. The officer tries to grab him, prompting Lyoya to break into a run.
The footage cuts to a different camera angle as the officer tries to tase Lyoya, and it ends with the officer lying on Lyoya’s back before shooting him in the head.
The unnamed police officer involved has been placed on paid leave.
Grid spoke with David Harris, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh who studies police behavior, law enforcement and race, after he reviewed the footage. He unpacked the steps that set the stage for the officer to lose control of the situation and escalate it, rather than de-escalating and potentially avoiding the fatal outcome. He also raised a bigger question: Given the well-documented outcomes, should armed police officers enforce traffic infractions at all?
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Grid: You’ve reviewed the footage. What stuck out to you as fatal mistakes?
David Harris: Well, the things that stood out to me were the immediate miscommunication, and misunderstanding that you could see, when the man got out of his car and the officer ordered him to get back in. This is something that I came across years ago. For folks raised in this country, or who spent their driving lives in this country, we understand without anybody telling us that when you’re pulled over, you stay in the car. But for folks who were raised in other parts of the world, particularly in parts of the African continent, there are other ways of dealing with police.
For one, the police in many countries are corrupt and brutal. But more than that, it’s considered a sign of respect to get out of your car when stopped and approached the police officer. And that was what I immediately wondered. I know this gentleman was from the Congo and had been in this country five or six years. I don’t know what he knew or didn’t know or what the customs were where he grew up. But right away, we have this misunderstanding. And you can also see that while he does speak English, there are some language difficulties he [has]; it’s obviously not his first language. And this is a sign that things, if we’re not careful, can go sideways.
No. 2, the officer tells him, “You have a license, I’ll get the license.” And at this point, the officer doesn’t know anything about him. He doesn’t know who he is. He doesn’t know if he might be armed. And yet, he’s telling them, you know, reach into the car and get your license. We know that there’s another person in the car, presumably, the officer would have known that [they] would have been able to see the other person from the back, you know, as he pulled them over.
Second thing, and this is unclear from the video. But you see, very quickly after the man is getting his wallet or something, he walks the other direction. And this was a little hard to tell what happened. But suddenly, they’re in a physical tussle. And really, from that point on, things go downhill very, very quickly. Why did that happen? The officer clearly didn’t have control of the situation. He had ordered the man to get back in the car; the man had not gotten back in the car. The officer hadn’t insisted on it. It is not clear that the officer explained himself well.
G: There’s a term that criminologists use to describe tactical mistakes officers make that increase the chances of a deadly encounter: officer-created jeopardy. Do you think that term could be applied to this situation?
DH: We hear a lot about de-escalation. But its opposite is when officers do things that increase the risk, unnecessarily. Sometimes there’s no choice, but sometimes they do things that amp things up. And it’s just not necessary. And when you look at the situation, like I said, just let this guy run away. I mean, how far can he get? And where could he possibly go? He’s not going to run away and never want his car again. You see this sort of thing happen in all kinds of situations, where an officer will approach in ways that are not good tactics or will talk to people in ways that raise the temperature. All that increases the risk that something is going to go catastrophically wrong. They get into this situation where they’re grappling with each other; the officer chases them, calls for backup and is yelling at him, “Stop resisting, put your hands behind your back.” And he can’t seem to physically control the guy.
G: What, in your opinion, would have been the best way to handle the traffic stop without resorting to violence?
DH: Well, I guess I have a question about that: Why did the physical tussle start? It’s sort of unclear. As I said, when looking at the video, it’s hard to tell why they start struggling next to the car, what was it that the man did that caused the officer to say, “Oh, no, no, no” and start to grab him, which starts the physical altercation? Alright, so that’s what I want to know before I can really tell.
But certainly, you could let him run away. It’s against police officer instinct, but what’s the worst that happens? He gets away. And then you find him because you already know this is the car he drives, right?
Why do we need armed police officers pulling people over for having the wrong license plate? Now, ask yourself that question. Certainly, we can see how these things can go catastrophically wrong. Think about Walter Scott down in South Carolina. Remember him? He’s pulled over for some minor traffic offense. And he might know that he’s got a warrant for child support or something like that. So, he decides to run. Because he gets chased, and the person chasing him is a police officer, and because that police officer thinks it’s OK to shoot running people in the back, this guy is dead, right? But why did we need an armed officer to enforce that very minor criminal law in traffic code? We need to be asking questions like that.
Now, part of it is because we have these catastrophes. But the other part is because these kinds of minor traffic enforcement things are much more often used against people of color. It’s often used as a pretext to ask them questions about guns and drugs, and so they can search your car and so forth. And that problem has persisted.
People know that they wouldn’t be stopped for a cracked taillight lens, except for the fact that it’s in this neighborhood, or it’s a Black driver. And the numbers bear it out. So you have both the possibility for a catastrophe like this and the drip, drip, drip everyday feeling of injustice that people get when they experienced this over and over. We need to ask ourselves not just what led to violence in this situation, but why was this a good way to enforce the law?"
