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from Mrs. Bertha Boykentod. We've

1:02

heard from Mrs. Todd in a couple of

1:04

previous episodes. She's a

1:06

94-year-old community leader in Wilmington, a

1:08

retired school administrator. Mrs. Todd was

1:11

not born in Wilmington. She's

1:13

lived there for only 70-plus

1:15

years. She grew up in Sampson

1:17

County, 60 miles from Wilmington

1:19

and got her master's degree at the

1:22

historically black North Carolina Central College,

1:24

now Central University, in Durham.

1:27

She moved to Wilmington in 1952. We

1:31

were both so struck by what she

1:33

told us about that experience. She'd been

1:35

hired fresh out of her master's program

1:37

as a media specialist at Williston, the

1:39

city's black high school. It

1:41

was a culture shock. Why

1:43

culture shock? This was the Jim

1:45

Crow South. And there's a tendency

1:47

maybe for those of us who never lived in it

1:50

to think that segregated white supremacist

1:52

world was more or less the

1:54

same everywhere, at least within a

1:56

given state. But now... I

1:59

was accustomed. Durham was there progresses.

2:01

As a student in Durham, the

2:03

young Bertha had gone to integrated

2:05

dances with white university students from

2:07

Duke and UNC Chapel Hill. This

2:10

would have been unthinkable in Wilmington.

2:13

In Wilmington, I did

2:15

not see blacks and whites openly

2:17

talking with each other and

2:21

I saw most blacks not

2:24

even looking white straight in

2:26

the face. I was not brought up that way.

2:30

I was pretty outspoken and the blacks

2:33

looked at me as if I may have come from

2:35

Mars and the

2:37

whites looked at me as if I guess

2:39

said where does she come from. She's

2:42

not like the people around here, which I

2:44

wasn't. Later in the 1960s, Mrs. Todd

2:47

would lead efforts to desegregate the

2:50

schools in New Hanover County. I

2:52

was angry with members of the

2:54

black community during school

2:56

desegregation. She felt

2:58

they weren't pushing hard enough. I

3:02

said well these black folks don't care

3:04

about the kids. Mrs.

3:07

Todd didn't understand at the time

3:09

why black folks in Wilmington seemed

3:11

so resigned to their second-class status,

3:14

but now she does. To what extent

3:17

did you think that had to do with the history?

3:19

100% it had

3:22

to do with it. We're talking

3:24

about the 1898 atmosphere? Yes, as

3:27

I reflect. I didn't

3:30

really realize the profound

3:33

residual effects of

3:35

1898 then. So 60 or 70

3:41

years after the massacre in Koo, this

3:43

place that had been a haven of opportunity for

3:46

black people in the 1890s now

3:48

stood out as a place where white

3:50

folks were even more dominant than elsewhere

3:52

in North Carolina and black

3:55

people felt beat down. Another

3:57

generation later in the 1990s... Bertha

4:00

Todd led a small group of community

4:02

leaders, black and white, informing

4:05

a committee to commemorate the events of 1898 for

4:07

the 100th anniversary. She

4:11

remembers the reaction when she reached out

4:13

to the leaders of the city's mostly

4:15

white civic organizations. Let

4:17

sleeping dogs lie. Don't

4:20

bring this up. Why do

4:22

you want to bring this up now after almost

4:24

100 years? That was the first

4:26

question from all white groups. But

4:30

I finally got over to them

4:33

with the more

4:35

comprehensive analogy that

4:38

I developed. I believe in divine

4:40

guidance. At first

4:42

I said, well, don't you celebrate

4:46

anniversaries? This is

4:48

history. Finally

4:51

I said, sometimes

4:54

wounds don't

4:56

heal properly. And

4:59

the physician has to lance the

5:02

wound. It

5:05

hurts. It's painful. But

5:08

it will not heal properly until

5:11

he has to lance it. The

5:14

massacre, the

5:17

violence in 1898 was

5:20

a bad wound on

5:23

New Hanover County. It

5:26

was never addressed. We

5:30

simply tried to get the data,

5:33

face the facts, and

5:35

began to heal and develop

5:38

a process of reconciliation. And

5:43

the spot may not be historic. That

5:46

is such a powerful metaphor, the

5:49

need to lance a wound so it

5:51

can heal properly. Mrs.

5:53

Todd was making a case for something

5:55

quite limited in that moment, a

5:58

process of shared acknowledgment. the

6:00

people of Wilmington. But her

6:02

analogy raises the question, what

6:05

would it really take to repair a

6:07

wound like this? In our

6:09

conversations with black folks in Wilmington, none

6:11

of them felt that a full acknowledgment of the

6:14

massacre and coup and its costs

6:16

has ever been achieved, considering

6:18

how many people still don't know the

6:20

story or still have a distorted

6:23

view of what happened in 1898. At

6:26

the same time, of the many black North

6:28

Carolinians we've talked to for this project, and

6:31

Michael Betts, you're included, none

6:33

would say that an acknowledgment, however complete

6:35

it may be, is enough.

6:38

No. Giving the facts widely

6:40

known is an important step, but

6:43

only the first step. So,

6:45

what more needs to happen, not

6:48

just in Wilmington, North Carolina, but across

6:50

the United States, to address

6:52

the profound damage done by

6:54

centuries of white supremacist violence,

6:56

disenfranchisement, and theft? From

7:03

the Canaan Institute for Ethics at Duke

7:06

University, this is Seen on Radio, Season

7:09

6, Echoes of a Coup, Episode 5.

7:12

I'm John Biewen. And

7:14

I'm Michael Betts. In this episode, we're

7:16

going to try for a kind of... reckoning.

7:19

Right, Michael? Oh

7:21

no, not that word. I

7:23

know, I know. We heard it a

7:25

lot in 2020, 2021. After the

7:29

murder of George Floyd and the protest

7:31

movement that followed, America's

7:34

racial reckoning was finally

7:36

here. Until it wasn't,

7:38

and was followed by a powerful backlash.

7:41

So, we'll talk about that too. Our

7:43

reckoning will touch on that

7:46

aborted reckoning. Fair enough. And

7:49

with help from some brilliant and committed people

7:51

we've been talking to, we'll think

7:53

through a way forward, for Wilmington,

7:56

for North Carolina, and

7:58

for this country. What

8:00

would it take and what would it

8:02

even mean to heal, to

8:04

make things right or at

8:07

least less wrong? Let's

8:09

start with that acknowledgement thing.

8:12

The failure to tell the truth about 1898 has been a

8:14

big theme for us. And

8:18

in fact, contributing to the acknowledgement

8:20

of this country's brutal history is

8:23

central to what we're up to in

8:25

this series and on this podcast generally.

8:28

You just said it's only a starting point,

8:30

Michael, but it is a required

8:32

step, isn't it? Absolutely.

8:35

And people in North Carolina have made real

8:37

strides since the 1990s when

8:39

those white folks were telling Bertha Todd

8:41

to let sleeping dogs lie. She

8:44

and her fellow members of that committee, which

8:46

included an equal number of white Wilmingtonians, put

8:49

on a 100th anniversary commemoration of the

8:51

massacre in Koo in 1998. That

8:55

committee was supported in its work by

8:57

some direct descendants of white people who

8:59

were involved in 1898, including

9:02

descendants of the Secret Nine, the

9:04

committee of elites who led the white

9:06

supremacist campaign. A few years

9:08

later, the state Wilmington Race Riot Commission

9:11

funded the study by LeRae Umfleet, which

9:13

resulted in a powerful and detailed report

9:15

on what happened in 1898. And

9:19

a few years after that, in 2008, again

9:22

with leadership by Bertha Todd and

9:24

others in Wilmington, the

9:26

city established the 1898 Memorial Park and Monument. It's

9:32

small, kind of a pocket park at the

9:34

edge of town, near where the

9:36

first shootings took place in 1898 and

9:39

close to the Cape Fear River. A

9:41

busy boulevard runs past on one side.

9:45

There's a lawn and a couple of sitting areas

9:47

shaded by trees. At the

9:49

center of the park, two low stone walls are

9:51

inscribed with the summation of the events of 1898,

9:54

written by Bertha Todd. Behind

9:58

those walls? the monument's main

10:01

feature, an array of

10:03

slender, bronze structures, six of them,

10:05

each standing 16 feet

10:07

tall. There's stylized boat

10:09

paddles. Cedric Harrison,

10:11

who owns and operates the historical

10:14

tour business, Wilmington in Color, starts

10:17

his tours at the monument. To

10:19

him, the paddles evoke a deep

10:21

relationship between black people in America

10:24

and water. Now of course we can talk

10:28

about the positive connection as we look at

10:30

religion and Christianity, baptism, renewing,

10:32

rebirth, refresh. But

10:35

this is more so the connection

10:37

to the negative struggle that

10:39

people of African descent had with

10:42

the water spiritually. The connection between people of

10:44

African descent coming over the bodies of water

10:46

during the time of enslavement. But

10:48

then more locally, the connection between Wilmington

10:50

Black Natal's being thrown into the

10:52

Cape Fair River during 1898. The

10:55

monument, designed by Georgia-based

10:57

artist Ayacunle Odeleh, is

11:00

beautiful and fitting. But

11:03

it's in a spot that gets very little

11:05

foot traffic, and most times when I visit,

11:07

there's no one here. And

11:09

then there's this. The Cape

11:12

Fair River is just a couple hundred yards away.

11:15

That made Odeleh's boat paddles that

11:17

much more meaningful when the monument

11:19

was placed here. But

11:21

a decade later, a real

11:23

estate development became a higher priority.

11:26

And so originally in 1998 and

11:28

in 2008 when it was first put

11:30

here, you can see the

11:32

beautiful blue Cape Fair River in the background, but now

11:35

it is now blocked by some

11:37

high rise apartments called Flats on

11:39

Front. What do you

11:41

believe that this says about the ongoing commitment

11:43

of the city and New Hanover County to

11:46

processing the community trauma? It's

11:48

a story that continues to tell itself, just

11:51

being so tunnel visioned and focused on

11:54

economic development, capitalism, whatever, what have you,

11:56

the bottom line, that

11:58

they of

12:01

healing, of repairing, of

12:04

resiliency. I

12:10

love the stuff that's happening in the black community

12:13

right now, but there still are some challenges. It's

12:15

still hard for a lot of stuff to happen

12:17

in this city. That's the

12:19

documentary filmmaker, Christopher Everett. He

12:22

grew up in Laurynburg, North Carolina, but

12:24

now lives in the Wilmington area. His

12:27

feature film, Wilmington on Fire, came out

12:29

in 2015. It

12:32

was another milestone in the campaign to make

12:34

the story of 1898 more widely known. Everett

12:38

is now at work on a second film about

12:41

young black Wilmingtonians who are working today

12:43

to bring about change. I've always been

12:45

in the mindset of, if

12:48

it's not there, we gotta create it. And

12:50

that's why I did the first Wilmington on Fire. No one

12:52

did a documentary on it. And I say, you know what?

12:54

Let me try to do it and be a part of

12:56

the solution. Chris's film has been

12:59

widely screened and won a couple of awards. In

13:02

2019, during a congressional hearing about reparations

13:05

for the descendants of enslaved black people,

13:08

Julianne Malveaux, the economist,

13:10

commentator, and former Bennett

13:12

College president, gave the

13:14

film a shout out. There's a film called

13:16

Wilmington on Fire. I want everybody to watch this

13:18

film. Wilmington on Fire, it really does

13:20

talk about what happened in Wilmington in

13:22

1898 when they just

13:25

basically burned black folks out. For

13:27

a long time, documentary makers, teachers, and

13:29

others who tried to educate the public

13:31

about the history of white supremacy in

13:34

the US toiled away on

13:36

the margins. They might get

13:38

some attention from time to time, but

13:40

it was hard to see the needle move. Then

13:43

came 2020 and the murder of George Floyd. You

13:47

saw a shift throughout the whole country. You

13:49

started seeing people for a brief period of

13:51

time go all out to support black business.

13:53

I even seen it in my own stuff,

13:55

man. I was getting hit up left and

13:57

right to speak about racism. streaming

14:00

numbers go up, even a

14:02

Black owned streaming service, QuelleTV, that I'm a

14:04

part of, subscriptions went up tremendously.

14:06

I know I would go to Black

14:08

farmers markets, you could easily walk in

14:10

and get what you need and out,

14:12

but during this time, lines were around

14:14

the block just to get into these

14:17

Black farmers markets. So it was a

14:19

widespread support of Black initiatives and everything.

14:21

Then it went away. And

14:23

the same thing happened in Wilmington. You started to

14:25

see a lot of things happen, but it kind

14:27

of died down over the period of time. That

14:31

racial reckoning. I

14:33

struggle with that term. What

14:35

started out looking like a reckoning really

14:38

just petered out. Yes,

14:40

millions of people of every shade did go

14:43

into the streets, in the US

14:45

and all over the globe. It

14:47

was widely considered the largest protest movement ever

14:49

in the United States, if not in the

14:52

world. Workers

14:54

and other organizations made big pledges about

14:56

how they were ready to turn a

14:58

new page on race in these United

15:00

States. The bestseller lists were

15:03

dominated by books on whiteness and

15:05

white supremacy. John, you must

15:07

have seen a similar surge in interest towards

15:09

some of your work. To put it mildly,

15:12

seeing white our season on the history

15:14

of white supremacy was three years old

15:16

at that point. Folks

15:18

downloaded those episodes more than two million

15:20

times in the six months after George

15:23

Floyd was killed. Far

15:25

more than listened when the series came out in

15:27

2017. For

15:29

a few months, it seemed like Americans

15:31

of every shade, including a

15:33

lot of white folks in the mainstream, had

15:36

sat up to take notice,

15:38

moved by the brutal, slow

15:41

motion, videotaped murder of George

15:43

Floyd and wanted only

15:45

to learn more. But then

15:47

came the backlash. Or

15:49

should we say, whitelash. Senator

15:51

Ron DeSantis announced new legislation he's calling

15:53

the Stop Woke Act or Wrongs Against

15:56

Our Kids and Employees Act. The bill

15:58

creates a lot of bad news. up

16:00

the state's Board of Education's ban on

16:02

teaching critical race theory in Florida schools.

16:05

After the protests subsided, right-wing

16:07

politicians and commentators launched a

16:10

well-organized campaign to

16:12

undermine the surge of interest in

16:14

talking about white supremacy and its

16:16

history in the United States. Ron

16:19

DeSantis' campaign against wokeness is emblematic

16:21

of the pushback. On

16:23

the right, critical race theory became

16:26

shorthand for any claim that anti-black

16:28

and brown racism was a prominent

16:30

feature of American institutions and laws.

16:34

There's also been a wave of book

16:36

banings in various towns and states, including

16:38

Wilmington, by the way, and

16:41

attacks on teachers who said too

16:43

much in the classroom about racism

16:45

in the U.S., past or present.

16:47

Florida's Stop Woke Act explicitly

16:49

banned lessons that might make

16:51

certain students feel discomfort, guilt,

16:53

anguish, or any other form of

16:56

psychological distress on account of their race.

16:59

Which brings to mind what we heard from

17:01

historian William Sturkey in the last episode. Remember,

17:05

he was talking about historians in the

17:07

early 20th century who shut down any

17:09

teaching about white supremacist terror after the

17:12

Civil War, including the

17:14

Wilmington massacre in Coo. That's

17:16

basically how history was treated. If it makes

17:18

white people upset, then you just don't tell

17:20

it. The

17:25

Stop Woke Act in Florida was put

17:27

on hold in the face of legal

17:30

challenges from the ACLU and others. A

17:33

district judge who blocked the law from

17:35

taking effect called it positively

17:37

dystopian. There's still

17:40

so much work to do before we

17:42

can say that Americans have reckoned with

17:44

the reality of our white supremacist history,

17:47

including crimes like the Wilmington massacre in Coo.

17:51

The resistance to that journey of understanding

17:53

and acceptance, and the commitment

17:55

to the nation's customary denial, are

17:58

still so strange. While we're

18:00

working on that front, the

18:02

next question becomes, what

18:04

would it mean to repair the damage

18:07

to make amends? When I was a

18:09

kid, I shoplifted strawberry

18:11

lip gloss from Kmart. And

18:14

my mom caught me. She was

18:17

mad. She was really mad. Kim

18:19

Cook is a sociologist, criminologist,

18:22

and restorative justice practitioner at the University

18:24

of North Carolina at Wilmington. And it

18:26

was an hour drive to Kmart. So

18:29

she drove me back to Kmart, and that's a long way

18:31

to go to return strawberry lip

18:33

gloss. And she made

18:35

me take it back into the store. She

18:38

made me take it to the store manager. She made

18:40

me tell the store manager what I had done. And

18:43

she made me pay for it. I had to return it, and

18:45

I had to pay for it. I

18:48

had to pay for it three times with

18:50

embarrassment, with not getting the strawberry lip gloss, and then

18:53

with the money that it would have cost had I

18:55

bought it. My

18:57

mom taught me to take

18:59

responsibility for myself. My

19:02

mom taught me to take responsibility

19:04

when I do something wrong. And

19:08

the 1898 massacre in Kudetai was one of

19:10

the wrongest things I've ever heard about. I've

19:14

ever read about, I've ever seen unfold.

19:17

I didn't see the violence unfold in 1898,

19:19

but I've seen the impact of it unfolding

19:22

in this town since I arrived in 2005. It

19:25

is a crime against humanity with

19:28

many different types of crimes connected

19:30

to it, like a cluster of crimes. For

19:33

Cook, who is white, that cluster

19:35

of crimes includes, of course, the violence

19:37

and loss of life, but

19:40

also the loss of property, the stolen

19:42

wealth, and the theft of

19:44

political power from the black community in 1898 and

19:46

really ever since. And

19:50

it's sort of a given when we're talking

19:52

about these sorts of historical crimes. But

19:55

Michael, it still hit us. It

19:58

was another one of those moments during our interview. views

20:00

when we looked at each other. When

20:03

Kim said that next thing, yes. When

20:06

she pointed out that the actions of those

20:08

white supremacists in Wilmington were never

20:11

reversed. As far as

20:13

I know, no historian has documented,

20:15

no effort has

20:17

been made to repair

20:20

the harms of the 1898 massacre in

20:22

Coo. It has to

20:24

be repaired. For this city to

20:27

be made whole, for this

20:29

community to be made right, for

20:32

the people that caused the harm

20:34

and their descendants who

20:36

have inherited the benefit of that

20:38

plunder, and for

20:41

the descendants of the people who

20:43

were harmed to feel the benefit

20:45

of people caring about what their

20:47

families have been through over the

20:49

last several generations, that

20:52

needs to happen. That's paying

20:54

for it three or four times. 1898 is

20:56

not a million years ago. In many details

21:00

of the massacre and Coo are known. So,

21:03

Cook says, let's get specific.

21:06

I mean let's talk about the

21:08

cost of the property that Alex Manley

21:10

lost. Let's talk about the cost of

21:12

the printing press. Let's talk about the

21:14

cost of Joshua Halsey's life and the

21:16

impact on his children and his wife

21:18

Sally. Let's talk about William

21:20

Mazan, whose descendant is one of my

21:22

friends here in town and whose descendant

21:24

is also a resident on death row

21:27

in North Carolina. William

21:29

Mazan was one of the black men shot

21:31

down in the first blast of gunfire at

21:33

4th and Harnett streets on November 10th, 1898.

21:35

Think of the successful black businessmen

21:40

and professionals who were banished

21:42

at gunpoint and forced to

21:44

leave their biggest assets behind

21:47

and the working-class black families who

21:49

fled the gunfire and had to

21:51

start over somewhere else. Let's talk

21:54

about what they've lost. Let's talk about the

21:56

rug being pulled out from under them. Let's

21:58

talk about repairing all of them. of that

22:00

harm. Let's have that conversation

22:02

and let's make it right. Let's

22:04

fix it because it isn't fixed yet.

22:07

I was going through some of the journals

22:10

and stumbled across an ad

22:14

for the Metropolitan Trust Company and

22:16

I saw the name Ice and Quit and I was

22:18

going to turn the page and I was like, record

22:21

scratch, let me back up.

22:25

Hey, that's my great-great-granddad's

22:27

name. I was

22:29

reading the names of the board members

22:32

of the bank and said, wait a minute, something

22:34

is a mishear. Inez Campbell Eason,

22:37

a school psychologist in Wilmington, can

22:39

point to several branches of her ancestry

22:41

who have been in the area for

22:43

generations. She says years ago,

22:45

a researcher from the Cape

22:48

Fear Museum of History and Science

22:50

encouraged Inez to look into her

22:52

family history because the Campbell side

22:54

of her family owned substantial property

22:56

in the 19th century. But

22:58

then Inez learned about that

23:00

great-great-grandfather on the other side of the

23:02

family, Ice and Quick, who'd

23:04

run a wood and coal hauling business and

23:07

had real estate investments. He charted the first black-owned

23:09

bank, he helped to chart the first black-owned bank

23:11

here in the city of Wilmington back in 1893.

23:13

It was called the

23:16

Metropolitan Trust Company. And

23:19

I learned this year not only

23:21

was he on the board of

23:23

directors of that bank, and

23:26

that bank responded for close

23:28

to a million dollars, it was like $900,000,

23:30

which is a lot now. So just think

23:32

about in 1893. Not only was

23:34

he on that bank, but he was on the board

23:36

of directors of two other banks. As

23:38

a member of the Committee of Colored Citizens, Ice

23:41

and Quick was the target of white supremacist

23:43

threats in 1898, according

23:46

to the official state report. He

23:49

survived and remained in the city after the

23:51

massacre and coup. But in

23:53

the new Jim Crow Wilmington, his

23:56

Children and grandchildren never recovered the

23:58

financial status that he had. It

24:00

achieved. Fiddle. With will have

24:02

not heels are the African American community

24:04

with the say that as an arm

24:06

ugly so silly, politically and psychologically send

24:08

a lot of the things that were

24:10

impose and Eighty Ninety Eight are here

24:13

today. This is Sonia. been

24:15

it's own. Patrick Speaking in Twenty Twenty

24:17

Two. And the Lore Flanders Tv

24:19

and Radio show. Been.

24:21

Some patrick his chair of the

24:23

new head of a county chapter

24:25

of the National Black Leaders Caucus.

24:27

see also tears the Democratic Party

24:29

in North Carolina seventh District which

24:31

includes Wilmington. Remember. How the

24:33

White Supremacists campaign of Eighty Ninety

24:36

Eight took aim at the specter

24:38

of negro rule in North Carolina.

24:40

As we said, that was a

24:43

wild overstatement of black people's political

24:45

power. Even in Wilmington, a majority

24:48

black city and the strongest bastion

24:50

of fusion ist multi racial politics,

24:52

Black man held only a small

24:55

fraction of local elected and appointed

24:57

offices. But. A number

24:59

of black man did hold positions

25:01

of responsibility, and black voters were

25:04

pivotal in choosing the city's leadership.

25:06

Visit. On Patrick says black

25:09

political influence has never recovered

25:11

for. Example: They didn't have a

25:13

public officer that was African Americans.

25:15

A seventy years later today. we

25:17

still have never had a black

25:19

mayor and you can count the

25:21

number of public official over that

25:23

period of time to the day

25:26

out onto hands are we haven't

25:28

Lana without a board of education.

25:30

The has no African Americans on

25:32

it as well. We don't have

25:34

any want any residences currently in

25:36

a safe house. Tim. Cook

25:38

influenced by conversations with Sony have been

25:40

it's own Petard. And. Determined to

25:43

help change the dynamic in Wilmington. Hope.

25:45

To start a local chapter of

25:47

Coming To The Table, It's a

25:49

national organization that was founded by

25:52

the descendants of Thomas Jefferson and

25:54

the descendants of two women with

25:56

whom he produce children. His.

25:58

wife martha and Sally

26:00

Hemings, the biracial enslaved young woman

26:03

that Jefferson's owned. They all had

26:05

children and the

26:07

descendants for many generations denied knowing

26:09

that they were kin to each

26:12

other. Ultimately, through

26:14

DNA testing, they discovered that they

26:17

were in fact biological

26:19

relatives of each other. And

26:22

they wanted to do something because

26:25

of the national prominence of their story and

26:27

because of their legacy

26:29

in this country, they wanted to

26:31

do something about

26:33

repairing racial harms around

26:36

the connections that people have to

26:38

the history of slavery and

26:41

to move forward in kinship

26:43

and in unity around truth

26:46

telling, making

26:48

historical connections, taking

26:51

action to repair the harms and

26:54

working toward a strategy

26:57

of healing and hopefulness.

27:00

The Wilmington chapter of Coming to the

27:02

Table has a similar goal. Kim

27:05

Cook co-facilitates the group with

27:07

Frankie Roberts, a black

27:09

community activist and lifelong Wilmingtonian.

27:13

It brings together people, black and

27:15

white and biracial, whose ancestors

27:17

had a role in the massacre and

27:19

coup as perpetrators

27:21

or victims. Kieran Hale

27:23

grew up in Southern California. He'd

27:26

never been to North Carolina until his

27:28

first visit in 2021. But

27:30

he'd heard family stories about his

27:32

ancestor in 1898. And

27:35

now he's a member of the Wilmington Coming to

27:37

the Table chapter. Alex Manley

27:39

was my great, great grandfather. I'm

27:42

a direct descendant in that way.

27:44

Alex or Alexander Manley, the black

27:47

newspaper publisher who had to flee

27:49

Wilmington for his life before the

27:51

white mob burned his printing press.

27:53

Kieran Hale is a DJ, music

27:55

producer and racial justice activist. Our

27:58

Theme music for. Cast series

28:00

is a cure inhale composition. For.

28:03

Tear in the expiration of his

28:05

family's history and North Carolina has

28:07

powerful relevance in his everyday life.

28:10

In. Fact in his body. Lot.

28:12

Is great Great grandfather Kiran is

28:14

light skinned. I've chosen to acknowledge

28:17

myself india myself not as wife,

28:19

but. Certainly. Others

28:21

in my position, my siblings could live

28:24

their entire lives as white if they

28:26

really wanted to was looking as I

28:28

do. Hail. Is convinced that

28:30

his health also holds painful clues

28:32

about his family history and the

28:35

legacy of racist brutality and exploitation.

28:37

I have been diabetic sense unless

28:39

the nineteen when I was first

28:42

diagnosed but I've had some health

28:44

problems but my health started getting

28:46

compounding we worse Right as I

28:49

turned thirty my hip broke turned

28:51

out that I had brittle bone

28:53

disease that that came about after

28:56

a year to have medical research

28:58

and. Testing I've had it's a hip

29:00

replacement surgery. I've been sort of scrambling

29:02

to deal with it ever since, and

29:05

as I've tried to figure it out.

29:07

Ah, as far as they can sell,

29:09

the only. Leads.

29:11

That I that I have point

29:13

to my man. we background points

29:15

to the man lies and so

29:18

I started at that point trying

29:20

to just do some research check

29:22

my family trees but my family

29:24

tree stops at Alex manly. Alexander

29:27

mainly was almost certainly descended from

29:30

enslaved people. As a mixed race

29:32

man born in nineteenth century North

29:34

Carolina, fill says his research on

29:36

brittle bone disease pointed to something

29:39

disturbing. One of the consistent saying

29:41

it's a cause for all of

29:43

it is I inbreeding in your

29:46

background. Everyone is aware generally me

29:48

think of slavery. Everyone knows that.

29:51

The. Master Woods time to time have his

29:53

way with some the this female slaves

29:55

and eventually add to his slave population

29:57

with with it was in images or

29:59

less. The democratic and I view

30:01

it's ah, what people don't think

30:03

about is that when that's the

30:05

status quo for decades and decades,

30:07

eventually they're raping their own daughters

30:09

and in a big in a

30:11

slave population. Cousins and

30:14

half siblings would be married to

30:16

each other, and that's that's just

30:18

a reality of plantation life that

30:20

people have chosen not to investigate

30:23

or think much about. So

30:26

John imagine. Conversations.

30:28

Between folks like you're in

30:30

a hill, alexander man least

30:33

great great grandson, and white

30:35

people. Descended. From and who

30:37

participated in The Mask Or and. right?

30:40

Conversations based on to borrow

30:42

Kim Cooks words, kinship and

30:44

unity around truth telling. Working.

30:47

Towards ceiling and hopefulness and

30:50

taking action to repair the

30:52

harms. The Coming to

30:54

the Table chapter is working to develop

30:56

a proposal for reparations. For

30:58

the damage that White Supremacy is done to black

31:00

woman, Tony Adams. In Eighty

31:03

Nine and otherwise. Michael

31:17

when we talk on this show

31:19

about the importance of Ah People

31:21

and the U S acknowledging the

31:24

nation's white supremacist history or the

31:26

need to repair the damage from

31:28

that history. We're talking in particular

31:31

about white folks. The. Majority

31:33

population that still very much holds

31:35

the power in this country. Sometimes

31:37

we make that explicit, sometimes it's

31:39

implied, right? I think everybody understands

31:42

that to that leads me to

31:44

something that doesn't get said enough

31:46

to you know, who's already doing

31:48

a lot to try to repair

31:50

the damage from White supremacy. And.

31:53

Always has been putting in that labour. Let.

31:55

Me guess. People. In those

31:58

marginalized oppressed community. At

32:00

least let's say to the extent

32:02

folks can given their limited capacity,

32:04

especially financially. Black and brown and

32:07

indigenous folks tend to be out

32:09

here doing a lot. In. This

32:11

case, since our series is about

32:13

an African American community that was

32:16

devastated by a massacre crew and

32:18

disenfranchisement. Let's focus on the Black

32:21

community. Yes, I spoke with

32:23

some people in Wilmington about this

32:25

f one of our responders or

32:27

y y de spend all this

32:29

time volunteering and suicide because. I'm

32:31

black and I remember that interview to see

32:33

looked at me like how the see you

32:36

ask me this class selling just most ridiculous.

32:38

Question I've ever heard before. Candace

32:40

Robinson is my colleague at the

32:42

University of North Carolina at Wilmington.

32:45

She's. A sociologist and she studies how

32:47

black people, especially in the middle and

32:49

upper classes, show up in the world.

32:51

The. What I find is that they're doing

32:54

a lot of volunteering because they recognize

32:56

that any. Qualities that are already baked

32:58

within the system and are not

33:00

interested An arm only siding for

33:02

the institutional saying. They also recognize there

33:05

needs to be a little bit

33:07

of neutral is. There needs to be a little bit.

33:09

Of support because the government's not going to do

33:11

enough. When I was doing my dissertation, I ask

33:13

people how many hours a week. This.

33:15

Is unclear to sleep and. They

33:18

would say you know I have my nine

33:20

to five and then I have my five

33:22

The nine. So it's like a part time

33:24

job. I'm only working like twenty extra hours

33:26

on volunteer work even though twenty hours is

33:29

a lot of time to. But some of

33:31

these people I would see our I would

33:33

get emails from I would get tax from

33:35

I will be Etti Mats and they are

33:37

grossly underestimating how many hours a week that

33:39

they were doing. Things I know when someone

33:42

calls me and they're like a t shirt

33:44

off this email real fast. I would never

33:46

consider that five minutes. Of. Part of five

33:48

volunteer work, But it's incredibly important. or

33:51

if i help my mom or how my

33:53

on or help my cousin i'm not going

33:55

to consider those things as part of volunteer

33:57

work and i think for african americans We

34:00

historically and contemporarily are a communal

34:02

group, which means we don't consider

34:05

these things as volunteering. We just consider it

34:07

part of what you're supposed to be doing. Robinson

34:10

also studies organizations that have long

34:12

worked to address the unmet needs

34:14

of Black people and to

34:16

advocate for change and repair in local

34:18

communities and in Washington, DC. When

34:21

we look at organizations like the National Urban

34:23

League and NAACP, they really are standing

34:25

in the gap to ensure that poverty and

34:28

inequality actually isn't worse than it already is.

34:31

The Urban League's mission is to help eradicate

34:34

inequalities around education jobs, housing,

34:36

health care. And ultimately,

34:38

they add civil rights after the civil

34:40

rights movement. So you have the

34:42

NAACP. You have the National Urban League.

34:44

And as you move into the mid-20th

34:47

century to 1960s, you

34:49

have things like the Student Nonviolent

34:51

Coordinating Committee, CORE. You

34:54

have organizations that are dedicated

34:56

to the experiences of Black

34:58

women, National Council of Negro

35:00

Women, National Council of Colored

35:03

Women's Club. You have

35:05

intergendered organizations. You have interracial organizations.

35:07

Because at the end of the day,

35:09

back to what one of my respondents

35:11

said, they were Black and they saw

35:13

the need and how important it was

35:15

to create things to stand in the

35:17

gap because the government really wasn't doing

35:19

much. Michael, I want

35:21

to just step in here for a

35:23

second. Because some people might bristle at

35:26

Dr. Robinson's words there, the government wasn't

35:28

doing much. And might

35:30

say, the government does a lot, spends

35:33

billions of taxpayer dollars on

35:35

anti-poverty programs and so on,

35:37

right? No doubt. People

35:39

would say that. But I think what Candace

35:42

would say, and what a series like

35:44

this one shows, the way it looks to me, is

35:47

that the argument, the government does plenty

35:49

to help poor people who

35:52

are disproportionately Black and Brown, that

35:55

argument just doesn't do justice to

35:57

the scale of the historical task.

36:00

of exploitation and theft from

36:03

those communities. Exactly.

36:07

I knew you were gonna say that.

36:09

Of course it's true. The government spends

36:11

billions on food stamps and child

36:13

support and housing assistance and on and on.

36:16

And by the way, the majority of that

36:18

support goes to white folks simply

36:20

because white people make up the majority

36:22

of people in this country, including low-income

36:24

people. But especially and

36:27

disproportionately for folks who are not

36:29

white, the whole that

36:31

millions of people have to dig

36:33

out of is just so deep.

36:35

Because of the widespread and systematic

36:37

crushing and disempowerment of those communities,

36:40

Wilmington being just one of countless

36:42

examples, black and

36:45

indigenous people have been the most

36:47

oppressed and dispossessed groups, going

36:49

back to the founding of the country

36:51

and colonial America. So those

36:53

band-aid government programs are good as far

36:55

as they go. They're essential

36:58

in fact, but they just

37:00

aren't adequate to lift people out

37:02

of those deep holes. Did you

37:04

know the phrase lift yourself up

37:06

by your bootstraps was originally meant

37:08

sarcastically because of course it's physically

37:10

impossible to do that? I

37:13

mean the physics just ain't

37:15

there. And yet I don't

37:17

think black and brown and indigenous folks

37:19

get enough credit for how we've survived

37:22

and often thrived in this country in spite of

37:24

it all. Of course there's

37:26

a long-running debate within the black community

37:28

about which side of the coin to

37:31

emphasize. The unjust treatment this

37:33

society has dealt out to us and

37:35

what society should do to make up for that

37:38

or our own responsibility to work

37:40

together and improve things in our

37:42

communities. That argument famously goes back

37:44

at least to the 19th

37:46

century. Booker T. Washington

37:48

on one side emphasizing racial

37:50

uplift by black folks themselves

37:53

and thinkers like Frederick Douglass or

37:55

W. E. B. Du Bois calling

37:57

for racial justice. Yes. debate

38:00

is alive today. I think

38:02

we have to look at ourselves as

38:04

far as what liberation looks like. We've

38:07

come a long ways as a people.

38:09

We are in a different circumstance.

38:12

That's Paul Gervais. There's some

38:14

poetry in the fact that he's a lifelong

38:17

newspaper publisher. After the

38:19

white mob burned down Alexander Manley's successful

38:21

Black Daily newspaper, The Daily Record, in

38:23

1898, it took almost 30 years

38:26

before the Gervais family founded a new

38:29

black paper, The Wilmington Journal.

38:32

The Gervais have owned and operated other

38:34

newspapers in North and South Carolina, and

38:37

Paul recently retired as publisher of

38:39

Raleigh's black paper, The Carolinian. When

38:41

he says black people have come a

38:44

long way, he's talking about, for one

38:46

thing, the wealth that black folks collectively

38:48

have amassed. That wealth

38:50

could become a wealth dynamic

38:53

if we could put it together nationally,

38:57

statewide, and locally. It's

39:00

very hard to deal with

39:03

liberation when you have situations

39:06

of child hunger, when you have

39:08

situations of poverty in the community.

39:12

I think, and this is I, this is

39:14

not the black press, I

39:16

think we need to step back and look at

39:18

the village that we have lost. I

39:21

think our strength going towards liberation

39:24

is unification. If

39:28

we get it together on our side of the

39:30

street, before we go to the other side of

39:32

the street, we can get what

39:34

we want as far as liberation is concerned. Paul

39:39

Gervais is making a point about the

39:41

importance of black people acknowledging our blackness

39:43

and our distinct position in society as

39:45

a way of bringing us together to

39:47

work for our freedom. Unlike

39:50

him, I was once in my college days

39:52

in the Booker T. Washington camp, but

39:54

more of a budding black conservative. I

39:57

wanted a colorblind society. Black

40:00

folks needed to get ourselves together and

40:02

lift ourselves up. And yes, I

40:05

still believe we should do all the things.

40:07

Mutual aid, bring back the village, pull our

40:09

resources to take care of one another. Hell

40:12

yes. And organize

40:14

politically. But

40:16

my opinion shifted as I learned

40:18

more history and

40:21

gained a deeper understanding of how we

40:23

got this grotesque racial wealth gap, for

40:25

example. We're talking about the

40:27

fact that white American households have roughly 10

40:30

times the assets of the average black

40:32

household. For Latino families, the

40:35

gap is roughly 5 to 1. Put

40:38

another way, according to Duke economist

40:40

Sandy Darity, there's a gap of

40:42

$300,000 in wealth

40:45

for every man, woman, and child,

40:48

or $850,000 per household, depending on whether the

40:52

family is black or white. There

40:55

are a whole bunch of concrete reasons for this. We

40:57

don't have time to rattle them off

41:00

here, but folks, if you haven't listened

41:02

to the scene on radio episode, White

41:04

Affirmative Action, go do that. It's

41:06

from season two. Those reasons,

41:09

no surprise, go back to 250

41:11

years of racialized slavery. And

41:15

they reach up to now. I think if

41:17

a person can prove that they are

41:19

the descendant of the victims and

41:22

that there was some property laws, that

41:24

they should be compensated. Larry

41:26

Rennie Thomas was a journalist, filmmaker,

41:28

and scholar, and another

41:30

Wilmingtonian who spent years trying to shine

41:32

light on the 1898 massacre in Koo.

41:37

He passed away in the summer of 2023. Here

41:40

Thomas is speaking in Christopher Everett's

41:42

2015 film, Wilmington

41:44

on Fire. An organization is

41:47

called the International Organization for

41:49

Compensation and Reparation for

41:51

the Victims of the Wilmington Race

41:54

Massacre of 1898. I've

41:57

been seeking these people, and I've found two of

41:59

them. Two descendants,

42:02

a manly and Thomas C. Miller's

42:04

descendant. And they want to

42:06

be compensated. There's no telling what they

42:09

could have done, especially the

42:11

manly's with his newspaper. No telling what he could

42:14

have done with that newspaper. Thomas

42:16

C. Miller was the wealthiest black man

42:18

in Wilmington in the 1890s. He

42:22

ran a real estate and pawnbroking business and

42:25

lent money to black and white people. He

42:28

was one of the men that the Secret Nine decided

42:30

to run out of town at gunpoint for

42:33

being successful while black. It's

42:36

hard to calculate what Miller and his family lost when

42:39

they had to flee and start over someplace else. But

42:42

Larry Thomas thought that somebody should be

42:44

doing that math for

42:46

the benefit of Thomas Miller's descendants. So

42:48

I do favor compensation because I think

42:51

it's the right thing to do. Just

42:54

simply that. I mean, it's just as simple

42:56

as that. We talk about going

42:58

to court. We talk about lawyers

43:00

handling this. I'm not a lawyer. You

43:04

have to ask a lawyer how

43:06

to do that. There's a difference between what

43:08

I would consider to be the legal truth and

43:10

the moral truth, right? Kim Cook

43:13

again, the UNCW sociologist

43:15

and restorative justice

43:17

practitioner. So the legal

43:19

truth might have been and might

43:22

be that the

43:24

city took over derelict properties after

43:27

1898 that had been, quote, abandoned

43:32

or for nonpayment of taxes when the

43:34

actual people who owned those properties were

43:36

run out of town and no longer

43:38

were safe in this town. So

43:41

it might have been legal for the

43:43

city to take over those properties. But

43:45

the moral truth is missing from that

43:47

legal truth, right? The moral truth

43:49

is why were those properties abandoned?

43:52

Why were those properties not having

43:54

payment of taxes? Why were

43:56

those people no longer in their homes

43:58

or on their properties? that they owned

44:00

and why did the city decide that

44:02

it was okay to not pay those

44:04

people back for the property

44:06

that was taken away from them that they were

44:08

run out of town. So

44:12

the moral truth is we

44:15

owe it to people. I think

44:17

about 30 years ago, I was

44:19

a reparation skeptic myself. I

44:23

was absolutely convinced that it's something

44:25

that would never happen and so

44:28

there wasn't much point in investing

44:30

time and effort in trying to

44:32

promote the idea. The

44:34

Duke University economist William Sandy

44:36

Darity is arguably the nation's

44:38

leading proponent of a major

44:41

national reparations project for the

44:43

descendants of enslaved black people

44:45

in the U.S. He

44:47

and his partner Kirsten Mullen co-wrote

44:49

From Here to Equality, a

44:52

book published in 2020 that lays

44:54

out their proposed program. Here,

44:56

Darity is doing a Zoom interview in

44:59

2020 with Pastor Phil

45:01

Davis on the PBS program

45:03

Courageous Conversations. Darity

45:06

says years ago a fellow scholar sent

45:08

him a collection of essays on the

45:10

prospect of reparations and wanted

45:12

Darity to write the introduction. The more

45:14

that I read, the more I was

45:17

absolutely convinced that if we are

45:19

serious about addressing racial economic inequality

45:21

in the United States, that it

45:23

will require something of the magnitude

45:25

of a reparations project for black

45:27

American descendants of U.S. slavery. Darity

45:30

points to two examples of

45:32

national governments paying substantial reparations

45:35

to groups that those governments

45:37

themselves had harmed. Germany's

45:39

reparations for victims of the Holocaust

45:41

and their descendants and

45:44

the U.S. government's payments to Japanese

45:46

Americans who were wrongly incarcerated during

45:48

World War II. That

45:50

one was signed in 1988 by President Ronald Reagan. For

45:54

Darity and Mullen, reparations for black

45:57

Americans should have three components. First,

46:00

Acknowledgement, which would come

46:02

with an apology. The second

46:04

component of a program of

46:06

reparations is redress, which is

46:09

the act of restitution which

46:11

traditionally has meant direct payments

46:14

to the eligible recipients or

46:16

the victimized community for

46:19

the harms that have been inflicted upon them. Finally,

46:22

the third component, closure.

46:25

Which is the settling of accounts,

46:27

the recognition that the

46:29

act of redress is adequate

46:32

for the victimized community to make

46:35

no further claims on

46:37

the culpable party. Now this

46:39

doesn't mean that you forget about the

46:41

harms. In fact, one of the things

46:43

that we emphasize as an important component

46:45

of a reparations plan is

46:48

an educational and instructional activity,

46:50

set of activities that would

46:53

set the record straight about America's

46:55

past, particularly with respect to slavery,

46:58

the Civil War and the Reconstruction

47:00

Era. But under Darity

47:02

and Mullen's proposal, the restitution

47:04

payments would mean the account is settled

47:06

for all time. So long

47:09

as atrocities against the black community don't

47:11

continue or start again. To

47:16

be sufficient, they say, the U.S. government's

47:18

payments would have to total $10 to

47:21

$12 trillion. That's

47:24

what it would take to close the wealth

47:26

gap between black and white Americans. You've

47:30

talked about reparations before on this show, John.

47:33

In fact, Dr. Darity appears in that

47:35

same episode we mentioned earlier, White Affirmative

47:38

Action, from the Seeing White series. That's

47:40

right. But it seems appropriate

47:42

to touch on reparations again in the

47:45

context of this story, Wilmington 1898,

47:49

because it's such a powerful example

47:51

of the damage white supremacy has

47:53

done to living, breathing human beings

47:56

and their children and grandchildren. The

47:59

violence, the political disenfranchisement, yes,

48:02

but also the overwhelming harm done

48:04

to people's livelihoods and their efforts

48:06

to create some kind of economic

48:09

security for themselves. Wilmington 1898

48:12

is also a stark reminder that a

48:14

lot of that damage was done after

48:16

slavery was abolished. So

48:25

Michael, what's left to

48:27

say? Since you asked John,

48:29

this is a bleak, frankly horrifying story that

48:32

we've told here. It's traumatizing

48:34

honestly, so I feel we

48:36

should end on a different kind of note. Here's

48:39

the thing, we wouldn't

48:41

be talking about any of this if

48:43

white supremacy had been completely successful. Hmm,

48:46

I'm proof that it didn't work. Every

48:49

black American who's alive today and

48:51

doing just fine things is

48:54

proof that it didn't work. And

48:56

it's because of the resilience of

48:58

black and brown communities the white supremacy

49:00

has to keep reconstituting itself, keep

49:02

taking different forms and new disguises,

49:04

think we at water. And

49:07

I know you don't usually go in for a

49:09

lot of touchy-feely stuff on this show or references

49:12

to comic books. Well, I

49:14

haven't read a comic book since 1971 and it was probably

49:18

Archie, but hey

49:20

my friend you have the floor. Okay,

49:24

I'm talking about the superhero comics where they're

49:26

fighting to save the world, right? Yeah, yeah.

49:29

There's a reason that so many of those

49:31

stories rely on the power of love to

49:34

destroy evil. Love is

49:36

the only thing that in its exhaustion rebuilds.

49:41

It is actual perpetual

49:44

emotion. Oh, preach.

49:47

Well now that you mention it, I can't

49:49

help but think of my childhood of

49:51

bringing in the church. Not to proselytize,

49:54

but there's a passage that feels especially

49:57

salient. You know how

49:59

when people People get married in the church. They'll

50:01

often use that reading about the characteristics of

50:03

love. Love is patient,

50:05

love is kind. That's the one. That's the

50:08

one. It's a letter from Paul. In

50:11

the verses right before that he says, if I

50:13

could speak all the languages of earth

50:15

and of angels but didn't love

50:17

others, I would only be

50:19

a noisy gong or a clinging symbol. Right,

50:22

right. In lines like, if I gave

50:24

everything I have to the poor and

50:26

even sacrificed my body, I could boast

50:28

about it, but if I didn't love

50:30

others, I would have gained nothing.

50:33

So I think what you're saying is, it's

50:36

great to talk about policies and

50:38

programs and structural changes to make

50:40

things better. In fact, we have

50:43

to talk about those things and

50:45

do those things, but

50:48

it would sure help if all

50:50

of us could approach one another and

50:52

our painful history with a

50:54

commitment to kindness and love. It's

50:58

the only way forward really. Love. That

51:01

sounds like it could be the last

51:03

word, but it's not, is

51:05

it? Nope. To be honest, that bit

51:07

was mostly for white folks. There's

51:09

one more person I want us to hear from, and

51:12

this is for black and brown people. It's

51:15

someone you and I both know, Michelle Lanier.

51:18

You're talking about the folklorist, former

51:20

director of the North Carolina African

51:22

American Heritage Commission, and

51:24

now director of the Division of Historic

51:26

Sites for the State of North Carolina.

51:29

That Michelle Lanier. That's the

51:31

one. She and I

51:33

had a long conversation, but

51:35

I want to end the series with just a few minutes

51:37

of it. See what

51:40

Michelle does here is she addresses the

51:42

fear, the terror, and

51:45

the nihilism that a lot of

51:47

black and brown people can so

51:49

easily fall into. You mean in

51:51

the face of white supremacy's relentlessness,

51:54

its seemingly unlimited capacity to morph,

51:56

to change with the times, and

51:59

to create a pretense. text for backlash

52:01

or whitelash every time the

52:03

country seems to be making a breakthrough on

52:05

race. Yes. Here's

52:08

Michelle. I was raised primarily

52:11

in Columbia, South Carolina and Hilton

52:14

Head. I was raised in

52:16

the shadow of a state capitol building before

52:18

Bree Newsome brought it down that had a

52:21

Confederate battle flag flying. And so I

52:23

was taught by my elders to

52:27

seek safe haven

52:29

away from any

52:32

symbols mentioned or

52:35

celebration of anything

52:38

to do with the American Civil

52:40

War. Because in

52:42

their estimation, Civil

52:44

War memory equaled Confederate memory,

52:47

equaled white supremacy, equaled racial

52:49

violence you need to run.

52:53

So for me to enter into

52:55

the field of public history at

52:57

a time when many public historians

52:59

were starting to prepare for the

53:01

150th anniversary of the American Civil

53:03

War. So when I

53:05

started in 2006 as a curator,

53:09

we were beginning the process, five

53:12

year process of planning

53:14

the Civil War sesquicentennial.

53:19

And that meant we had a decade of

53:21

commitment to that commemoration, five years of planning,

53:23

five years of commemorating. And

53:25

so I had to find

53:28

something inside of me that would be

53:32

able to engage that

53:34

commemoration with something other than terror. How

53:38

did Michelle come to shed that sense of

53:40

terror and to face US history,

53:42

including the history around the Civil War, without

53:45

wanting to run or even flinch? She

53:49

learned. She studied black

53:51

people in North Carolina who

53:53

had fought back, persevered, and

53:55

sometimes thrived. She

53:57

learned about Princeville, a town in eastern North

53:59

Carolina. Carolina that was founded by people freed

54:02

from slavery in 1865. The

54:05

first community in the United States to

54:07

be chartered and governed by black people.

54:10

She learned about Pauli Murray, the

54:13

gigantic civil rights leader, legal scholar

54:15

and Episcopal priests who grew up

54:17

in Durham and wrote the

54:19

memoir, Proud Shoes. Reading Proud

54:21

Shoes, reading more closely incidents in the

54:24

life of a slave girl, reading the

54:26

work of Anna Julia Cooper, who was

54:28

born and played in Raleigh as

54:31

the war was raging, from

54:33

members being awakened, being

54:35

asked to prophesy as a child who was

54:37

dreaming whether the war was going to end

54:39

with freedom. And

54:41

then goes on to get a doctorate at

54:44

the Sorbonne and starts, you know, works in

54:46

education in DC. So reading all of these

54:48

connecting points, the U.S. colored

54:50

troops of New Bern, 4,000

54:54

plus U.S. colored troops from North Carolina who

54:56

fought on the side of the union, the

54:59

black and Lumbee and

55:01

Wacomassou on people who were forced to

55:03

build Fort Fisher. Learning,

55:07

digging, seeking, opened

55:10

up not only an opportunity for

55:12

me to heal from my sense of terror

55:14

around the civil war. I've now I'm a civil

55:16

war buff. I'm now interested in

55:19

teaching me how to read troop movement maps.

55:21

I want to know about that. That's interesting

55:24

to me. I want to

55:26

know why reenactors have certain

55:28

buttons and not others. What were

55:30

the washer women doing and why did some of

55:32

them wear red shoes? I want to know. Yes.

55:34

I want to know all of these things. I

55:37

want to know about the Gullah Geechee baskets

55:39

traditions and how we can be a good

55:42

steward of the lands that still hold sweet

55:44

grass. I became

55:48

less afraid. It has allowed for me to

55:50

bond with people I have never expected to

55:53

bond with. It has allowed for me to feel

55:55

more at peace in my skin. I

55:58

can walk through a gathering

56:00

of Civil War reenactors and

56:02

not feel a bit

56:04

of anxiety. As

56:07

a black woman, I can

56:09

walk through and say, good afternoon. How

56:11

are you? Allow me to

56:13

introduce myself. This is why

56:16

I'm here with you, my sharing what brings you here

56:18

and to listen. Sometimes

56:21

those conversations

56:25

don't go well. And

56:29

sometimes those conversations are

56:32

so moving and beautiful and

56:34

transformative that I leave

56:36

feeling changed into

56:38

a stronger

56:40

version of myself. Michelle

56:48

is saying so much, but

56:51

at least one important piece of what she's

56:53

talking about is the power

56:55

of knowledge, right? Yeah. That's

56:59

a big part of how we overcome and

57:02

step more effectively and

57:04

more courageously toward freedom

57:06

and healing. Before

57:11

we go, I just want to say

57:13

thank you for this opportunity to tell this story about

57:15

Wilmington, a place that's becoming more

57:17

dear to me every day as I'm

57:19

spending more time and teaching there. Thank

57:22

you for asking me to take this journey

57:24

with you. And I'm

57:26

pleased our amazing listeners could come along. Where

57:30

can folks follow you in your work, Michael? Find

57:32

me on Instagram at KITSWETTER. That's

57:35

K I D S W E

57:37

A T E R. All

57:40

right. Season six is a wrap. I

57:43

hope you all are subscribed because

57:46

season seven is coming. Not

57:48

in two years, not in a year,

57:51

but much sooner. And we're

57:54

taking a big swing with this next one.

57:57

Just saying. Echoes

58:04

of a Coup is an initiative

58:06

of America's Hallowed Ground, a project

58:08

of the Kenan Institute for Ethics

58:10

at Duke University. It

58:12

is written and produced by Michael A. Betts II and

58:14

me. Our

58:17

story editor is Loretta Williams. Voice

58:19

actor, Mr. Mike Riley. Music

58:22

by Kieran Hale, Blue Dot Sessions,

58:25

Okaya, and Lucas Piedman. Logistics

58:28

by KidSweater Design Group Limited.

58:31

Thanks to the Kenan Institute

58:33

team, our website is managed

58:36

by Christian Ferny. Communications, Sarah

58:38

Rogers. The director of

58:40

the Kenan Institute is David Toole. For

58:44

more on the America's Hallowed

58:46

Ground project, see americashallowedground.org. Our

58:50

website is senonradio.org. You

58:53

will find transcripts there. The

58:56

show is distributed by our friends at PRX.

58:59

Senon Radio comes to you from

59:01

the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke

59:03

University.