~by Mary Weaver
There are so many concerns to write/talk about. Twenty-one days into President Trump’s second term has brought an overwhelming deluge of executive orders brought forward by Elon Musk and DOGE.
I am certain readers are either extremely frightened or feeling exhilarated, depending upon your political persuasion. Rather than tackle all the issues facing our country with the potential shutting down of our government and voting on Cabinet nominees, I am choosing to discuss February, Black History Month.
I have been thinking about how views and language have changed in my 80 years on this earth. I recall attending Sunday School as a preschooler singing/chanting RING AROUND THE ROSY, last one down is a _igger baby. My parents, who I do not believe were racist, but rather unknowing, sometimes stated when some fact was questionable, “There is a _igger in the wood pile.”
In my lifetime we have gone thru several terms: _igger, Negro, Black, African American, and recently rather than a name, a description— a dark-skinned person with an afro hair style.
In a reverse role of an Anglo person, I served a brief stint as a Methodist missionary to Nigeria. The younger children wanted to touch my skin. Several of them at one of our outpost visits gently rubbed their fingers on my forearm and then looked at their fingers to see what might have rubbed off from my arm.
Gathering information for this topic led me to a surprise. President Trump for all his negativity about DEI – Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion – did issue a proclamation about February Black History Month. He primarily lauded individuals such as Justice Thomas and Tiger Woods, without mentioning slavery, or Reconstruction.
I learned a little history while researching Black History Month. Its origin is in 1915, 50 years after the abolition of slavery. The month of February was chosen to also celebrate the birthdays of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, both prominent abolitionists.
Iowa is proud to proclaim prominent individuals, like George Washington Carver, who created hundreds of agricultural products from peanuts, sweet potatoes, and other crops. He persevered through slavery as a child to eventually pursue higher education at both Simpson College in Indianola and later Iowa State Univeristy in Ames, where he became its first Black student and first Black faculty member.
Iowa also showed early civil rights leadership through the following:
–1839: Iowa Supreme Court refuses to return man to slavery in Missouri saying, ‘No man in this territory can be reduced to slavery’.
–Iowa led the way in desegregating public schools. The first successful school desegregation case (Clark v. Board of Directors) was decided by the Iowa Supreme Court in 1868.
–Iowa was one of the first states in the Union to legalize interracial marriage in 1851.
–Iowa was home to the town of Buxton, where residents and businesses were fully integrated from 1895 through the 1920’s.
–The Katz Drugstore protests in Des Moines began on July 7, 1948, when Edna May Griffin, John Bibbs, Leonard Hudson, and Griffin’s one-year-old daughter, Phyllis Griffin, entered the Katz Drug Store to eat at the lunch counter. The group was refused service because they were Black, leading Griffin to launch a protest against Katz’s racial discrimination practice. Her protest eventually resulted in a lawsuit filed by the State of Iowa, The State of Iowa v. Katz. The lawsuit came before an all-White jury that found the owner of Katz Drug Store, Maurice Katz, and the store manager, C.L. Gore, guilty of racial discrimination. They were fined $50 by the court.
–The first black Miss America contestant was Miss Iowa in 1970.
–Prominent Iowans such as Josiah B. Grinnell and James C. Jordan served as conductors on the Underground Railroad from 1830-1860.
May I suggest a way for you and your family to recognize and celebrate Black History Month? Visit Jordon House in West Des Moines. It served as a part of the Underground Railroad. Guided tours are offered at 11am and 1:30 pm Fridays and Sundays. Call 515-225-1286 at least two weeks in advance to obtain a ticket. The cost on the web site is listed as $5.00.
View from My Window is submitted by Mary Weaver of rural Rippey.
