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0:22

long live singing to the oldies, jamming out

0:25

to something new and everything

0:27

in between. Hey,

0:32

y'all. I want to let y'all know that you

0:34

can get more small doses. Yes, I am now

0:36

doing weekly small doses bonus episodes, and they are

0:39

for my people at the SEAL Squad. So if

0:41

you ain't getting enough of this, baby, there is

0:43

more for you. This is a little taste of

0:45

what you're getting. I think a lot

0:47

of folks who don't understand protesting simply

0:50

just have never protested, because when

0:53

you are there, you feel

0:55

kinship, which is something so

0:57

much of us don't feel as Americans because

0:59

we have been divided and conquered. Like, I

1:02

feel like MAGA is less about them

1:04

actually like believing what they're saying, and

1:06

more so just about feeling connectedness. You

1:09

know, that's what gangs are about for what it's

1:11

worth. Like, folks aren't in gangs because they're trying

1:13

to like make money. Most of the time people

1:15

are in gangs because they want to feel connected.

1:18

They want to feel part of something. They want

1:20

to feel safe. And when

1:22

you go to protest, you have all those

1:24

feelings in addition to the

1:27

feeling of knowing that you

1:29

are on the right side of history. I

1:31

don't even like telling themselves that, but they're

1:33

not on the right side of history. But

1:36

if you are at a protest for

1:38

the purpose of liberation, you're always

1:40

on the right side. Mm-hmm,

1:44

a spoonful of sugar makes all that go down.

1:46

And let me tell you something. I'm having a

1:48

great time getting to be more connected with y'all

1:50

because when we do the small doses bonus episodes,

1:52

we do them live. So you get to be

1:55

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1:57

you've been thinking about, hmm, do I want to

1:59

join page three? Now is the

2:01

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2:03

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2:05

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2:08

doses bonus episodes at patreon.com. All

2:12

right y'all, before we get into this episode of

2:15

Small Doses Podcast, wanna remind you that I'll be

2:17

in Detroit this weekend. I know I was supposed

2:19

to do four shows, well I'm still doing two,

2:21

all right? No, I was about to cancel it,

2:23

so you're lucky. But I'm still doing the two

2:25

shows, so you can catch me on Friday at

2:27

7.30 and

2:29

on Saturday at 7 p.m. at the

2:31

Detroit House Comedy. And you

2:33

know what? We're also doing a shoe

2:36

drive for the Congo. Yes, I partnered

2:38

with the foundation that is sending shoes

2:40

to the Congo, it was created by

2:42

a Congolese brother. And shoes are

2:44

really needed out there in a place where people

2:46

are constantly displaced and there are so many health

2:48

threats by simply just walking barefoot. So this is

2:51

a simple way for you to be helpful. It

2:53

doesn't involve you having to shell out a bunch

2:55

of money that you may not have, but still

2:57

can serve your spirit and serve other people's needs.

2:59

So if you're even not able to afford tickets

3:01

to the show, you can still come and drop

3:04

off shoes in the boxes that will be outside.

3:06

So make sure if you are coming to the

3:08

show that you come bearing a pair of shoes

3:10

or else I'm going to judge you, just letting

3:12

you know. All right, you can

3:14

also make sure that you are listening to

3:16

our bonus episodes as follows as podcasts. But

3:18

the thing is, you gotta be a member

3:20

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3:23

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3:25

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3:33

make sure you subscribe to the

3:35

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3:37

Last but not least, if you haven't gone to amandasales.com

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3:41

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3:44

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3:48

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sign up for the newsletter so you can

3:59

be in... the mix. All right, let's

4:01

keep it going right here. It's another episode

4:03

of small doses podcast. So funky.

4:15

Welcome to another episode

4:17

of small doses podcast.

4:19

Y'all this is a

4:34

doozy of an app. A couple of

4:36

years ago, I had gotten reached out

4:38

to by Henry Lewis gates and their

4:40

team to do finding your roots. But

4:42

then it just never happened, but it

4:45

never stopped being something that I really

4:47

wanted to explore, particularly because my father

4:49

and I are not close. And my

4:52

mom has really done her best on

4:54

our side of the family in Grenada

4:56

with trying to follow, you know, our

4:58

genealogy. But I don't know anything about

5:00

my father's side. And so when

5:03

I met Kimberly Renee, who was an influencer

5:05

that creates really great videos about

5:07

black history and who is now

5:09

our weekly historian on the Amanda

5:11

Seale show with our segment, why

5:14

you bringing up old ish, I didn't

5:16

know that she did genealogy. So once she's talked about

5:18

it, I was like, well, hold up on now. It

5:21

sounds like it's time. So

5:24

in the spirit of father's day,

5:26

uh, we are doing this episode,

5:29

finding my roots where I

5:32

will get to learn about,

5:34

you know, where I'm from on my

5:37

father's side. And for all

5:40

of those who consistently talk

5:42

shit about my not being

5:44

black enough, well, we'll find

5:46

out. We'll find out

5:48

if it's time for me to eat shit or for

5:50

them to eat crow. Let's get

5:52

into it. All right, we're here.

6:00

I don't even know, I'm just, I am a

6:02

vessel. So this is your show today. Yeah.

6:06

So we have my buddy,

6:08

old pal Kimberly Renee, who

6:11

is joining us to tell me

6:13

what, you know, my father should

6:16

have told me, but you

6:18

know, nonetheless, I know the right

6:20

people. And I

6:22

am so glad that we are able to

6:25

take this walk together, my sister. Yes,

6:28

yes. So am

6:30

I leading this today? Is this me? Yeah,

6:32

this is your show. I am a guest.

6:37

But wait, don't we have to do the intro? I'll

6:39

do it after. Yeah, but you're on your skit gates

6:41

right now. You're on your skit gates. Okay. Okay,

6:44

we're doing it. So I think

6:46

we should start with you telling

6:48

us some of the

6:51

wildly inaccurate stories about

6:54

your family history that other people have told

6:57

you. Let

6:59

me just start by telling y'all, I like Kimberly so

7:01

much. This

7:04

is one of these times where like you meet someone

7:06

through the internet and this is how people end up

7:08

on catfish, because like you be meeting people through the

7:10

internet, like I really connect with this person. And

7:13

I just feel like we'd be having the same mind

7:16

about so many things. Like sometimes Kimberly will be in

7:18

my DM like, you see this? I'm like, ah. So

7:22

the fact that you knew to start it this way

7:24

is yet reason number 2000, when I'm like, I fucks

7:26

with Kimberly, yo. hardcore.

7:30

So people love to tell me that my

7:32

mother is a white European woman. People love

7:34

to tell me that my father is not

7:36

a black man. People love to tell me

7:38

that I am not a descendant of shadow

7:40

slavery. People love to tell me that I'm

7:43

not black. People often

7:45

tell me that I

7:47

am a culture vulture because

7:50

they say that I am speaking to a

7:53

lineage that is not my own. The

7:55

latest is that I'm a tragic mulatto and.

8:00

that I essentially,

8:02

to a lot of people,

8:04

I feel like they think that because my

8:06

mother is from the Caribbean, that it's irrelevant

8:08

where my father is from.

8:11

So they'll tell me you would never

8:13

get reparations. Like, which I think is

8:15

funny because in this patriarchal society, everything

8:17

is actually passed down through the man.

8:20

But I guess because it's convenient to undermine me,

8:22

in this case, all of a

8:25

sudden they're feminists. But, you know,

8:27

these are the things and it's like

8:29

so pervasive and it's

8:32

always done to

8:34

attempt to devalue my voice.

8:36

Yeah, yeah. As like a

8:38

supporter, a proponent, like lover of black people.

8:41

Right, right. And I feel like you do that with

8:44

your whole soul all the time.

8:46

Yes. To the point of, I

8:48

would say excessively to wear almost harm to

8:51

yourself. Because you've, because

8:54

I mean, I feel like times where it's like you need a

8:56

break and won't take it. I feel attacked. I'm

8:59

sorry. I'm joking. You

9:02

know what? I think it's just habitual.

9:04

It's just like the way that I,

9:07

we were talking about this where I was like, I feel like I'm supposed

9:09

to take a break right now. And then I just like didn't,

9:12

like I just couldn't. And I

9:14

was like, I think I just need to change how

9:16

I interact with the world.

9:18

But ultimately my love for black

9:20

folks is in my DNA, like

9:23

in a very real way. And not just on

9:25

the American side, but also on the Grenadian side.

9:28

And anybody who knows about Grenada and just as a

9:30

people and as a revolutionary people, like

9:33

it's in us. So I feel as though

9:36

you are right. Part

9:38

of it is more so to the detriment of my mental

9:41

health in the sense

9:43

that sometimes I feel like I'm pouring into a

9:48

vessel that doesn't want to pour back into me. But

9:51

that sometimes is me just, I feel like letting

9:53

the detractors speak louder and

9:57

like, no, like we really need you and we love you.

9:59

And that's my, more important. And

10:02

this episode is

10:04

not just for me,

10:06

but also for just like the

10:08

greater conversation around genealogy. And around

10:11

how we as black folks, like we really

10:13

have to do all of this to like

10:15

find where we're from. Like some of

10:17

these white people like they're like, yeah, we're getting married in

10:20

my family's castle. What are you talking about? They

10:22

have like their coat of arms, you

10:25

know, like they are able to like

10:27

trace so far back

10:29

because it's in the house. Right.

10:32

Like here's our book, you

10:34

know, like that we've

10:37

passed down, you know, since my

10:39

uncle walked up the hills of Dunson

10:41

Ayn. So, so this means a

10:43

lot to me. Also because I, my father

10:46

is like, I know my dad, but like we don't

10:48

have a connection. You know, like

10:50

we're not friends, like we're not family.

10:52

You know, he's

10:54

really just, you know, a

10:56

genetic source. Yeah, I feel that that's

10:59

relatable. I feel like to a

11:01

lot of people, especially when you

11:03

were raised primarily by your mother, even my

11:06

own parents, my dad

11:08

lived down the street from me, but we're

11:10

still so much strangers. So

11:16

that's a whole other episode because

11:21

my father lived in New Jersey while I went

11:23

to purchase and lived

11:25

in New York for 15 years. And

11:28

it's like you right,

11:31

you're right there. Well just

11:33

as I know, because I know y'all love a story, I went

11:35

to go to my dad's house one time with my two peoples

11:37

and we got there and he wasn't there. And like,

11:39

of course my sisters and brothers like let me in

11:41

the house. And so when he got home, he was

11:43

like, let it that they had let

11:46

me in the house. And he was like, you let

11:48

strangers in the house. And me

11:50

and him like went in the laundry room to hash it

11:52

out. And he was just talking so much nonsense. I was

11:54

like, listen, brother, yo, referring

11:59

to my father as brother made his

12:01

entire brain explode. Like it was

12:03

literally his spontaneous combustion. That's one

12:06

of my greatest moments of all

12:08

time. Wow. Wow.

12:11

That's so relatable, but again, that's another. So

12:14

your dad, your dad, black man

12:17

from Boston, lived in Roxbury.

12:20

And one of the things that I found interesting was

12:22

that you didn't know what he did for

12:24

a living. So I know

12:27

his credentials, but we

12:29

have never really known what he's done for a

12:31

living. Like I will ask him all the time.

12:33

I know at one point, I think he was

12:35

a Dean of Meharry Medical School. And

12:38

that was like the last job job that

12:40

I can say like, yes, like if I

12:42

needed to call my dad at work, I

12:44

would not, like I wouldn't

12:46

know where to call. And my brothers and

12:48

sisters, they're the same. We're all like, oh,

12:50

I'm not sure. Like he's going to be pissed

12:52

about this episode. Oh my gosh. Well, let

12:55

me find out. Let me find out

12:58

he worked as a meditation. No, no, no,

13:00

no, no. Very noble job. No, he's not

13:02

a sanitation record. Right. No, he has credentials.

13:05

But the first piece of documentation that

13:07

I found about your

13:09

dad was him being who's

13:12

who of California in 1983. What?

13:18

Okay, so I have my first little

13:20

piece of documentation. I'm going to show you. And

13:23

it's a screenshot of the

13:25

entry from who's who 1983. And

13:30

you were what, two years old?

13:32

Yeah. Okay. But look at

13:34

all of the things he's done. I

13:36

mean, this list is, what's

13:39

the word? Magnamis, magnanimous. What's the word?

13:41

I know you know the word. Magnanimous

13:43

works. Yeah. Magnanimous. So

13:46

highlight, let's highlight for the listeners. He

13:48

was a physician, is a physician, was

13:51

a chief medical officer. Is this what I'm

13:53

looking at? Assistant professor of public health. Is

13:56

this the who's who? It's slide number one.

13:58

Okay, got it. Okay. Yes, and

14:00

this is, I'm not saying these in order. I'm just

14:02

giving you highlights. Okay, got you, got you, okay. Yes,

14:05

so assistant professor of public

14:07

health, director of

14:09

ambulatory care, parasitology

14:11

researcher, I've never seen that before. I don't

14:14

even know what that is. Right, White House

14:16

fellow, a

14:18

board member of the Sheenway School

14:20

in LA. He

14:22

was nominated as Time Magazine

14:25

Newsmakers of Tomorrow. What are

14:27

you talking about? What

14:30

are you talking about? Go on. I'm

14:33

just reading, I'm just reading. What

14:35

is this lady saying, AJ? Okay,

14:40

I'm here, I'm here with you. Just know

14:42

that I'm gonna exclaim a lot. Okay,

14:44

that's fine. Diane Watson, California,

14:47

she used to be US representative

14:49

for California's 33rd congressional district. She

14:51

served from like 2003 to 2011.

14:55

Anyway, while she was on

14:57

California State Senate, she

15:00

had an organization that he

15:02

was a member of, and

15:05

it's called Senator Diane Watson's

15:07

Commission on Health Welfare. And

15:10

mind you, this is 83, so

15:12

he is 33 years old, and

15:15

this is his list. So

15:18

when my mom met my father, she

15:21

was 34. So

15:28

she's two years older than him, and

15:31

she had been married, and they

15:33

actually met when he came,

15:35

she was selling the house. She realized the only

15:37

way I'm gonna get out this marriage is I

15:39

gotta sell this house, because her husband would basically

15:41

come to the house on weekends and play marriage

15:43

and then leave. And so she was like, I

15:45

gotta get out of this house. And her

15:47

husband, he was an executive at

15:50

IBM, I think, but he also

15:52

would try these get-rich-quick schemes. So

15:54

he had all these like gum

15:56

machines in laundromats. So the house,

15:58

apparently the house, barely had like any furniture

16:00

because they had like just moved in and she was like, I'm

16:02

done with this. But there was like

16:05

a whole, all like all these boxes of like

16:07

juicy fruit and big red and double mint gum,

16:09

like by the door. And my dad came

16:11

to the house to look at the house to buy the house.

16:14

And apparently when he came inside, he looked

16:17

around and said to her, so

16:19

who gets the gum and the divorce? And

16:21

that's how we got here. That

16:23

was, oh, that's how I got

16:26

here. And that feels nice. Sucka for jokes. Suckas,

16:29

suckas for jokes. So

16:31

but he like, but she couldn't get pregnant. So

16:34

when she was with her husband, like she was

16:36

like infertile for 10 years. Like they told her

16:38

that she's the problem. Like she's the reason, et

16:40

cetera. So she thought she could have babies. Guess

16:43

what? So he like thought

16:48

that she was trying to trap him and

16:50

she's like, you're the irony about this

16:52

is that I don't think my mom knows about any of

16:54

this. Wow. I don't think my mom knows about any of

16:56

this because he was still a resident when

16:58

she met him. And my mom had like a

17:00

401k. My mom worked at

17:03

Traveler's Insurance. Like she had like a whole

17:05

job, job, job. And she was like, trap

17:07

you. Like who

17:09

was you? So

17:11

this is going to blow her mind too. I know

17:13

she's in the car listening right now. Like, Oh my

17:15

God, man. You're telling all the business. When

17:19

did he have time for anything other

17:21

than career? I don't know

17:24

that he was a good partner. I don't think

17:26

they were like a couple. I think they were

17:28

just, you know, hanging. They were friendly.

17:30

Yeah. I mean, and he was handsome and

17:32

my mom was a baddie. So I get

17:34

it. And

17:37

my mom was a nurse. So there's

17:39

also that like my mom is a

17:41

nurse. My uncle is OBGYN. Like my

17:44

family is very, not just

17:46

my family, but like my extended

17:48

family, like medicine is like really involved. So I feel like there's

17:50

a kinship there. Did you feel any

17:52

connection to like want to go in

17:54

that direction? Yeah, absolutely. I wanted to

17:56

be a pediatrician until I saw Anna

17:58

Paquin win the Oscar for the piano

18:00

and I was like change of plans. I

18:30

mean, I don't see why they're here. And

19:00

you were talking about how you needed

19:02

to fill roots. And I

19:04

wondered if your dad moving

19:07

around a lot impacted

19:09

your desire to want

19:11

to kind of be settled

19:13

more so and not as

19:15

considerate for, you know, being a

19:18

digital nomad. I think part

19:20

of it is more

19:22

so that I'm a cancer and so

19:24

like I like to

19:26

really make my home my home. And

19:29

so to be in other people's places, like

19:32

as like a lifestyle, I feel like

19:34

I wouldn't feel like it's

19:36

mine. And I need a place to feel

19:38

like it's mine. I mean, maybe

19:40

there is something just in my blood about

19:42

that. But I genuinely, my dad moved around

19:44

a lot like when I was growing up

19:46

and I'd have to go visit him, you

19:48

know, like I'm visiting him in Harrisburg.

19:51

I'm visiting him in Wisconsin. I'm

19:53

visiting him in Tennessee, you know,

19:55

so I know that he

19:57

did do his fair share of moving around even once I was

19:59

like... like in my kid

20:01

era. Yeah. Yeah. Now

20:04

your dad was a junior.

20:07

So that means his father was

20:09

also named Huey Senior.

20:11

Pop. Did you know

20:13

anything about him? Cause I feel like he passed when

20:16

you were little. I don't know anything about anybody. Okay.

20:19

So Huey Senior was a

20:21

Mason, Prince Hall Mason.

20:24

And he worked as a machinist.

20:28

He actually worked for an

20:30

organization called Revere Sugar Refinery,

20:34

which was a subsidiary of

20:36

the United Fruit Company, which is

20:38

now known as Chiquita Brands. Okay.

20:41

Now Chiquita Brands, if

20:44

you know about them, they were a participating

20:46

oppressor during the banana massacre that

20:48

occurred in 1928. Are

20:50

you familiar with that? No. So

20:52

the short answer is the people

20:55

at United Fruit

20:57

wanted to unionize, but

20:59

Chiquita was like, we're not having it.

21:02

And then they decided to,

21:04

Chiquita decided to partner with

21:07

the government and

21:09

create like a militia to

21:12

keep people from unionizing,

21:15

basically. And thousands

21:17

of people were murdered because

21:20

of it. And where was this? So

21:22

Columbia, the banana massacre.

21:24

It's definitely something to check out.

21:26

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So

21:28

Huey Senior. So this is why I'm saying they killed a bunch of

21:30

laborers for unionizing, for picking

21:33

unions. Correct. Who's they? So

21:35

it's called the AUC. I'm

21:37

probably going to pronounce it wrong. Autodefenses,

21:40

Unidiz, the Columbia. And

21:43

it was an organization of right

21:45

wing paramilitary groups that

21:47

aligned with the government and

21:49

the Colombian military for

21:52

the interest of Chiquita Brands.

21:55

Oh, so they were just paid centuries. They were like the Unsullied.

21:57

Got it. Yes. OK.

22:00

So, Huey had

22:03

a lot of wives. Huey Sr. He

22:05

had a lot of what? His first wives. Did he?

22:08

Yes. Okay. So,

22:11

three that we know of. The

22:14

first that we see

22:16

in his obituary, which

22:18

is slide number three, is Irma.

22:22

And I also want you to

22:24

note on slide number three where we

22:26

have Irma, we also see Dr. Huey

22:29

as a son. And then

22:31

we also have Ernie. I remember Grandma Irma. She

22:34

had a daughter named Henrietta. Yeah.

22:37

And I remember Henrietta and my mom. Oh

22:40

yeah, there we see beloved father of Henrietta.

22:43

Henrietta had always been really kind to my

22:45

mom and Grandma Irma was kind to my mom.

22:48

I love that. So Irma

22:50

was the last wife before

22:52

Irma was Geraldine

22:54

or Jerry. Does it get blacker

22:57

than the name Irma? I

22:59

mean, while we're here, Irma is

23:02

so distinctly black church, certain timeframe.

23:09

Irma. I feel like Geraldine is too.

23:12

You're right. Henrietta, I mean,

23:14

they're all... Yeah, and

23:16

these are black people in case y'all are unclear.

23:19

These are all black people. Yes. Back

23:21

to Jerry or Geraldine, but

23:24

Huey Senior's first wife was

23:26

Betty. Okay. Betty was black,

23:29

in case y'all are concerned about that. Betty

23:33

was born in Bob

23:35

Ward Township of Crittenden,

23:38

Arkansas. So

23:40

before he married Geraldine, he

23:43

was married to Betty. Huey

23:45

Senior was married to Betty in

23:47

Arkansas. Okay. Is he

23:49

from Arkansas? So let

23:52

me show you the documentation that we have.

23:54

And you can actually see his

23:57

name is slightly misspelled. We see a few

23:59

different... spellings of the name when we go

24:01

through this. But he's married to Betty, and

24:04

they both are listed from

24:06

Arkansas. Wow, fascinating. This

24:08

is like their marriage license? No,

24:11

so this is the census

24:13

from 1940. Oh,

24:18

wow. Now, in the subsequent page,

24:20

you'll see that he was actually a tenant

24:22

farmer. So basically, he rented the land, and

24:24

he farmed on it, and that's how he

24:27

supported his family. He was a sharecropper. So

24:31

this is when he was married to Betty. He

24:33

was a tenant farmer. Correct. And

24:35

you see Ernie is right there, too. Remember Ernie

24:38

from the obituary? There's

24:40

Ernie right there. Oh

24:42

my gosh, OK. I'm

24:44

bugging right now. But

24:46

did you know you had family that went all

24:48

the way back to Arkansas? I knew that there

24:51

was a vague Arkansas presence,

24:53

but I didn't know in

24:55

what context. And it was

24:57

very much thrown out, like, yeah, we have people from

24:59

Arkansas. But everybody got people

25:01

from somewhere. So that's like a thing we say. We

25:04

have people from X, Y, Z. And you're like, OK,

25:06

but who people, what people, why people? OK.

25:09

So if we keep going, we're now

25:12

in a new census, 1930. And

25:16

we see Hugh Lee,

25:19

mother, Georgia. And

25:22

then we have all of his siblings. But

25:24

notice the name difference, because at first,

25:26

they were going by Hughie. Yeah. And

25:29

Hughie Lee. And now it's

25:31

Hugh Lee. His name

25:33

is spelled Hughie, H-U-G-H-I-E, on

25:36

my birth certificate. But

25:38

then he started spelling it H-U-E-Y, like

25:40

in life. And

25:42

we're going to see another spelling, too. OK.

25:45

Got it. And then next,

25:47

we see Porter. Yeah.

25:50

And so that is your

25:52

great grandfather, Porter. Porter. All

25:54

right. Now

25:56

notice this. Porter was born in Arkansas.

26:00

However, his parents were both

26:02

born in the Mississippi. What?

26:04

So we're going even further south. I'm from

26:06

the south. Yes, deep south, girl.

26:10

Wow. Okay, okay, okay, okay.

26:13

So just to

26:15

recap, we have Huey Sr.'s parents as

26:17

Georgia Lee and Porter. They were both

26:20

born late 1800s, like 1898, 1897. Okay.

26:25

All right. So let's continue. Now

26:28

we have Huey Sr.'s birth

26:30

certificate and notice the spelling,

26:33

H-U-R, maybe

26:35

R-A-L-I-E. I

26:38

don't know what happened. I don't know if it's like, what's your baby name?

26:40

Hurley? I don't know if

26:42

it was just like real country and they

26:44

just didn't know how to transfer it. I

26:46

don't know what happened. Oh my gosh, that's

26:48

wild. Okay. So we have Porter as the

26:51

father, Georgia as the mother, both

26:53

living in Arkansas, both colored for

26:56

the record. Wow. And

26:59

we see him as a farmer. They were 22 and 20. Wow.

27:04

We're going to see various

27:07

spellings of the names because

27:10

the census takers weren't black. They

27:12

don't care. They didn't care. It's just write whatever

27:14

you said, keep it moving. Okay. Because her or

27:16

Lee is wild. Huey

27:19

Lee is definitely interesting. So

27:22

we'll continue and you're going to

27:24

see Porter died in Memphis. Now,

27:27

if you remember Betty, Betty was

27:29

married to Huey senior. That

27:31

was the first wife. When

27:34

they got divorced, she moved

27:36

to Memphis. That's where

27:38

her and Ernie were. So I

27:40

don't know if Porter was

27:42

in Memphis visiting Ernie

27:45

or if he had moved there, but

27:48

Memphis is where he died. Okay. Actually in

27:50

a car accident. Oh no. Okay.

27:53

And so he broke his femur and

27:56

that led to a pulmonary embolism.

27:58

Shut up. Wow. Yeah.

28:02

Okay. Yeah. And

28:04

so his parents are O.F. and

28:07

Lily Jones, and he was married

28:09

to Maddie, who is

28:11

not Georgia Lee. I was

28:13

like, hold on now. Multiple.

28:17

It's a theme of multiple marriages. People

28:19

being married multiple times, not just dating,

28:21

but multiple marriages. Multiple marriages. Okay. Mm-hmm.

28:24

And so we've seen three

28:26

marriages with Huey Sr., and

28:29

there may have been at least three with

28:32

Porter as well. What was the th... Well...

28:35

Because we see these two names here. Geraldine, Maddie.

28:37

Mm-hmm. Who's the other one

28:39

that he was married to? Irma. No,

28:41

Irma is who my grandfather was married to.

28:43

Right. So Geraldine, Irma, and

28:45

Betty. Irma is who my grandfather was married

28:47

to. Porter is my great-grandfather. Right. That's

28:50

what I'm talking about. Yeah. Okay. Irma,

28:53

Jerry, and Betty. So

28:56

then Porter was married to... Georgia

28:59

Lee. Georgia Lee, Maddie. Maddie,

29:02

and possibly a third.

29:04

Really? Dang. Now,

29:07

I heard some kind of story about him with

29:09

a white lady. I didn't find a white lady.

29:11

Okay. I didn't

29:14

find her. Life

29:17

is full of things to manage. Your

29:19

work, your family, your plans, and your

29:21

treatment. After Kysymta,

29:23

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29:25

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29:28

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29:30

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29:32

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29:35

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29:37

Corporation. So

29:41

both my grandfather and great-grandfather were

29:44

tenant farmers? Yes. And

29:46

then my grandfather moved from being a tenant

29:48

farmer to being a machinist and working for

29:50

the company that had the Jacquez stuff? Okay.

29:53

Yes. Okay. Yes.

29:56

So we're looking at now OF, and

29:58

I believe OF. was

30:01

O fellow. Old fellow? O

30:04

fellow. O apostrophe fellow. So

30:06

like O fellow but O

30:08

fellow. Without the T.

30:10

Hs. Yes. Okay. And who

30:12

knows? It could have been a country translation.

30:15

I don't know. Right,

30:17

right, right. And just so you

30:19

have the image, you can see

30:21

Porter and Maddie getting married in

30:23

1941. Okay, I see it like

30:25

a 27 in z. Believe

30:28

it. Now we're

30:30

heading back to 1880. We're

30:32

looking for O fellow. This is the parent

30:35

of Porter. So this is my

30:37

great, great granddad.

30:39

Yes. Okay. And

30:43

we see fellow. Yeah. Who is a

30:46

farm laborer in the home

30:48

of Thomas Calicoat. And

30:51

Calicoat eventually became Calicoat. So

30:53

if you know people with the Calicoat name, that's kind of

30:55

where that came from. When you say farm

30:58

laborer, is he still

31:00

a tenant farmer or is he a slave? So he's

31:02

not a slave, but he

31:04

also isn't renting the land. He's

31:06

working on Thomas's land.

31:08

So like a hired hand. Whereas

31:11

correct. Okay. And if you notice under

31:14

relationship, it says hired. Oh yes, I

31:16

see. Okay. Yeah. And so he's listed

31:18

as born in Mississippi, but he does

31:20

not know where his parents are from.

31:23

Oh, and so this could have mean that he

31:26

was sold at some point, or

31:28

maybe he just too young when they

31:30

got separated. Oh man. But

31:32

that is O fellow. Okay.

31:37

O fellow. Hello. Now let's talk about where they

31:39

are. We're in Lafayette

31:41

County. Now in

31:44

1860, 20

31:46

years earlier, I found a slave

31:48

schedule of a man named John

31:51

also in Lafayette County who

31:53

may have enslaved O fellow and

31:55

or his parents. Obviously

31:58

we wouldn't know that without. DNA

32:00

or additional documentation, but we know that slaves

32:03

were often just numbers. Enslaved people, rather,

32:06

were often just numbers. Right. Right.

32:09

Okay. And so we can see that

32:12

where we have a really long list

32:14

of people who are enslaved under

32:16

John. Whew. Oh,

32:20

my God. What was really interesting to

32:22

me is the note

32:24

on the left side that somebody

32:26

was called an idiot. Wow.

32:29

Talking about their intellectual

32:31

or physical differences. That's

32:34

what they were denoted as.

32:36

Wow. Okay. This is

32:38

just numbers. Yeah, just numbers.

32:41

But that is Mr. Porter. Okay.

32:44

So this is my

32:46

great-great-grandfather, and this

32:48

is a possible owner of

32:50

my great-great-grandfather. Mm-hmm. Wow.

32:53

And this is in Mississippi? This is

32:55

in Lafayette County, in

32:59

Mississippi. What

33:03

does it feel like? It

33:05

feels so close. You

33:07

know, like the conversation around slavery is always

33:09

like it was just this otherworldly time, you

33:12

know, as if it's like the

33:14

time of Attila and the Huns. And it's

33:18

right here just in a document. You

33:22

know, it's not even like it's being passed

33:24

down by some, like, griot, you

33:26

know, who's giving some tale of word of

33:28

mouth. Like, it's right here. And

33:31

even if John didn't own, you know,

33:34

my family, he owned these other families.

33:37

Like, as a person, he owned people

33:39

just really

33:41

deplorable, truly. I

33:44

find a lot of people, when I

33:46

put their documentation together, they always say,

33:48

is it normal for all of this

33:51

formation to feel overwhelming? And

33:53

I'm like, yes. Yeah. There's a normal reaction. Yeah.

33:56

Because you're trying to make something make sense,

33:59

you know. your mind that really doesn't.

34:01

It's really actually unconscionable and then

34:04

it's actually in you. I think

34:07

that your nerves start to wake up because

34:09

they're traveling to connect to

34:11

something that they know. Yeah. Yeah.

34:14

Now, Huey's mother,

34:17

Georgia Lee, her

34:19

parents were John and

34:22

Amanda Harrison. What the hell are you

34:24

talking about? There was an Amanda on

34:27

my father's side. Yes.

34:32

There was an Amanda, a black Amanda in

34:35

the 1910 census, Rebecca

34:39

in Arkansas, Jasper

34:41

township. And you'll

34:43

see John Harrison and Amanda

34:45

the wife. Because

34:52

he did not name me. So that's

34:55

fascinating. And Amanda is not like a common

34:57

name of this era. It

34:59

is not. Okay. What I found

35:01

most interesting here is that

35:04

Amanda birthed 17 children.

35:09

These vaginas that be birthed in, I

35:12

keep hearing this lately. I'm just like,

35:14

how? I mean

35:16

by the third one, you just coughing

35:19

and having the baby, you

35:21

know, like 17, 17, 17. Why?

35:27

None of them survived. Okay. Only six

35:29

of them are alive in 1910. But

35:32

she was pregnant multiple times.

35:34

I'm not going to say 17 because some of them

35:36

could have been multiples, but she was a

35:38

lot of pregnant. Wow.

35:41

Okay. Damn. Now

35:44

there are some notations here. So

35:46

she is noted as born in Mississippi.

35:49

Her father, North

35:52

Carolina, her mother,

35:54

Vermont. I don't know

35:56

if that's accurate. That threw me. I was

35:59

like, how did you get? What? I mean, that's how she got such

36:01

a weird ass name. It could have been Virginia, because I did see

36:03

a VA later. But that was

36:05

an interesting find there. Okay.

36:08

And then obviously Georgia Lee

36:10

is in the household, and

36:12

that is Huey Senior's mother.

36:14

Right. Huey Senior is my

36:16

grandfather. Yes. Yes. So Georgia

36:18

Lee and Porter had Huey

36:20

Lee. Correct. Okay. And Amanda

36:22

is who? Amanda is Georgia's

36:24

mother. Ah, okay.

36:27

So she's a great,

36:29

great grandmother. Yes. Ha! Cool. All

36:34

right. Great, great. All right. So

36:36

we're talking about Geraldine. Okay.

36:38

Miss Jerry. Yeah. What

36:40

do you remember about Jerry? She was mean.

36:43

Oh. So to my understanding,

36:45

well, she was... Okay, let's not fair. I won't

36:47

say that she was mean, but she was just

36:49

very cold. Like she didn't really have much kind

36:51

of like vibes towards me. But I remember... I

36:54

remember her being very cold to my mom.

36:57

And there was always this

36:59

energy that my mom was trying to trap this

37:01

man. And my mom was not pressed about this

37:03

man at all. Like as

37:06

the story goes, when my mother's water broke, she

37:08

mopped it up and then went to the hospital.

37:11

That's the type of lady that she is. And

37:13

then my godmother, Auntie Barbara,

37:16

called my father, and

37:18

he showed up to the hospital in his

37:20

own scrubs. That's

37:22

the kind of person we're dealing with. And

37:25

she had not spoken to him in like months.

37:28

So she went through her pregnancy, you know, by

37:30

herself with like her friends at work. And

37:34

then a couple of weeks later,

37:37

he took us out to lunch and

37:39

on the way home, did

37:41

a pit stop at UCLA to do a DNA

37:44

test. Yo,

37:47

that's crazy. That

37:50

is bananas. My mom was like, where are we going? And

37:53

he was like, oh, we're just gonna do this DNA test real quick. She

37:56

was like, I mean, you know,

37:58

whatever, but like. Like, if that's what you

38:00

need. So Grandma

38:02

Jerry essentially was like, kind of cold

38:04

to my mom, but then to my

38:07

understanding, there was some type of situation

38:10

where her attitude

38:12

towards my mom shifted. And

38:14

I don't know if it's because like she realized

38:16

like, oh, like my son be on one, but

38:19

like eventually, like before she passed her attitude

38:21

towards my mom shifted and like she had

38:23

like reached out to my mom and like

38:25

gave her a blessing and like all the

38:28

above. Cause I think what it

38:30

was, was that she realized

38:32

that my dad like really wasn't trying to care for me. And it

38:34

was like, well, we not going to do that. Like if that's your

38:36

daughter, that's your daughter. So I think

38:38

that's what turned the corner. So do you know

38:40

what your dad and

38:42

Jerry's relationship was like? Was that warm

38:45

at all? No, because I

38:47

don't think she was a warm person.

38:49

So to my understanding, basically they had

38:51

like a good life and then when

38:53

she got divorced from my

38:55

grandfather, they moved to the projects

38:58

in Roxbury. And that

39:00

is apparently when things went left.

39:04

And I think that

39:06

was for my father, like from what I understand

39:08

or what I remember from him telling me, like

39:10

that was just like a very difficult time for

39:12

him. Cause like their quality of life like shifted

39:15

drastically. And I

39:17

think it was also like really racist in Boston.

39:20

And so that was also very

39:22

difficult. Yeah, I can imagine. And

39:25

it's probably like some sort of stigma

39:28

that is attached to being

39:30

divorced because I noticed that

39:34

on most of like the directories,

39:37

Geraldine was always listed as Mrs. Even

39:40

though she was unmarried. So

39:43

I just found that really

39:45

interesting. Like she'd maintain Mrs.

39:47

Geraldine. Interesting, okay. Yeah.

39:50

So if you slide to page

39:52

17, we

39:55

see her working at a stop and

39:57

shop and we see her as a

39:59

factory worker. So these are definitely not like soft

40:02

jobs. Right. Huh.

40:06

Okay. And then right underneath there, you'll

40:08

see Hugh Lee. Remember

40:10

I told you this, felling was gonna change. Mary

40:13

to Irma working as

40:15

a machinist at Revere Sugard.

40:19

Yeah. It's fascinating

40:21

how precise these census records are.

40:24

You know, like I feel like don't nobody really be

40:26

pressed about the census now, but like these are just

40:28

so clear. Yeah. In

40:31

terms of just like their record keeping. Life

40:37

is full of things to manage,

40:39

your work, your family, your plans,

40:41

and your treatment. Consider

40:43

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40:45

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40:48

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40:50

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40:52

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40:54

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40:56

you by Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation. Now

41:01

I remember you told me that you

41:03

assumed that she was born in Baltimore,

41:05

right? Yeah. So I

41:07

actually uncovered that she was born in Philadelphia.

41:09

Very much a city girl. Oh

41:12

wow. And she was a little bit difficult to

41:14

like track down because she didn't

41:16

live with her parents at the beginning of her

41:18

life. But on the

41:21

next slide, you'll see her obituary. And it

41:23

says that she's a native of Philadelphia

41:26

and a former employee of Pentran,

41:29

which I believe is the rail

41:31

system. You know, she

41:33

went to church, little Sunday school lady. She

41:36

was also a foster grandparent. So when

41:38

you told me that she was a

41:40

cold woman, she was also a foster

41:42

grandparent. So I'm curious like what that

41:44

dynamic look like. Huh.

41:46

Okay. I mean, you know, she

41:48

had like real grandkids. So I'm not sure. What

41:53

the foster grandkids was getting, but she wasn't giving

41:55

us much, not in my vibes. Well,

41:58

we know she was in Boston. Oh,

52:16

okay. Yes.

52:22

I do. Life is full of things

52:24

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52:27

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52:29

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52:36

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52:38

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52:40

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you by Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation. the

56:00

eel of Virginia. But now, this

56:02

is not someone I'm related to.

56:05

He was an enslaver of my relatives. Just go with me.

56:08

I said I'm going to give you a little bit of

56:10

a go with me. Just go with me. But

56:13

this is the owner of the house

56:15

where Jesse is living. Correct. Jesse is

56:17

living in this man's house. Black

56:20

Jesse? Leroy is living

56:22

in this house. Jesse

56:24

is married to Cena. Jesse

56:26

is white. Maria. Married to Cena. Leroy

56:29

is living in this house. And Leroy is

56:31

black. Leroy is black. How is Jesse related

56:33

to you again? We

56:36

haven't got there. Oh, OK. Sorry. Yes. So

56:39

this is a birth registry. And this one shocked

56:41

the heck out of me. I'm just going to

56:44

tell you. We see in June, a

56:46

Maria was born in Lancaster County. OK.

56:49

This is where we are. That's where

56:51

those sentences were. Father's

56:53

name, James Hill. Keep

56:56

going with me. This

56:58

is the other half of that document. The

57:01

mother's name is Cena. Wiggins.

57:05

The father's name is

57:07

James Hill. In

57:10

the far right column, he is

57:12

listed as owner. He

57:16

had a child with a black

57:18

woman in June,

57:20

July, August, September

57:23

of that same

57:25

year. While he was married,

57:28

he was a serial rapist.

57:31

And he was putting his name on the

57:34

birth certificates? And he put

57:36

his name on the birth certificate. I

57:38

rarely see that. This is James. James

57:40

Hill, where Leroy Williams

57:43

is living. So that means that Leroy

57:45

Williams is going to marry the daughter

57:47

of James Hill, his boss. So James,

57:49

who was the picture of? The picture

57:52

was of James? The picture is of

57:54

James's son, John. OK. That was just

57:56

to give us a frame of reference.

57:59

Correct. But his father is James.

58:02

Correct. And James is the

58:04

serial rapist. Correct. Maria,

58:06

who was living with Jesse

58:09

and Sina, is not Jesse's

58:13

daughter. Maria is not Jesse's daughter. Maria is

58:15

James and Sina is James. Maria belongs to

58:17

James. Yeah. But Maria

58:19

is listed as white? No. Maria

58:22

is black and white. So she

58:24

has an M. Mulatto. And

58:26

she is going to marry Leroy. Yeah,

58:29

somebody who's working at James' home.

58:32

Whoa. Where did Maria

58:34

live? With her mom

58:36

and her stepdad. What

58:38

kind of life is that? Like, I mean,

58:41

I just wonder what the dynamic is in that

58:43

type of home where, so

58:45

Sina is a slave in these people's

58:47

home. She was. In the census that

58:49

I showed you, she is no longer a slave. But

58:51

she was in their home. So

58:55

James had a child

58:57

in May, June, July,

59:01

and August with women

59:03

that he owned. What?

59:09

You know what's sad when I think, not that

59:11

there aren't, there's a bunch of sad things. Sad

59:14

is a very generous word. But when

59:16

I think of people who would say to me, like, you're

59:18

not black. You're not a descendant

59:20

of shadow slavery. It was like,

59:22

oh, you can't lay claim to this trauma. And

59:25

I think there was a part of

59:27

me that thought that I would feel some type of,

59:29

like, see, I told you so. But

59:32

instead, I feel more of a just

59:34

like, it was

59:36

just sadness that my people had to endure

59:38

this kind of trauma. And

59:40

that that is our birthright into

59:42

blackness for some people.

59:46

You know? Hmm.

59:49

Yeah. And I think we

59:51

know that in Hollywood, when we present, I'm

59:53

not going to say we, when films are

59:55

presented, blackness is often rooted

59:57

in trauma. And so we.