C is for Cleage Bricks

A-Z Challenge 2013, African-American Genealogy & Slave Ancestry Research, Cleages
a-to-z-letters-c

This is my third post for the April A-Z Challenge. I am blogging every day in April using the letters of the alphabet as prompts. Today I am going to write about Samuel Cleage’s building operation. Samuel Cleage owned the plantation where my Cleage ancestors were held as slaves. When he died, the slaves were divided between his sons. I am writing about the time before this today.

Samuel Cleage, who spelled his name “Clegg”, was born in Lanchaster County, PA in 1781. He moved with his parents and siblings to Botetourt County, VA. After his parents died he moved with his family and slaves to McMinn County, TN.

samuelcleage
Samuel Cleage

As I was getting ready to write this I realized that he didn’t just get on the train and move, that they must have traveled by wagon down well worn, but primitive roads.  Not only was he moving his whole little community of married children and slaves, 339 miles through the Blue Ridge Mountains, he also carried the tools of his trade – whatever he needed to build brick houses. As he traveled he would convince farmers along the way that they needed a fine brick home to go with their fine farm. For payment he accepted slaves, gold or livestock.  They say that some of these houses are still standing. I can’t imagine how long it took the group to travel this way.  A fully loaded Conestoga wagon, the usual method to move through the mountains in the early 1800s, could travel 5 miles a day. That would take about 4 months if you traveled straight through. They didn’t. They were stopping and building brick houses.  And they had to make the bricks! How could that work? All sources agree that by the time he reached McMinn County, Samuel Cleage was a very wealthy man, both in slaves and gold. I think I will have to check into this a little further. Here is a description of the way traveling worked. To read more, click the title.

Conestoga_Wagon_1883
A Conestoga wagon.

Sturdy transportation

First the word, Conestoga, America’s first big truck. It was made in Conestoga, Pennsylvania, and it was one huge wagon: 26 feet long, 11 feet high, with the capability of carrying 8 tons. Pulled by five or six horses and followed by as many as a dozen packhorses, the Conestoga wagon became any traveling family’s best friend.

It became the expected sight along the road known by many names: the Warrior’s Path, the Carolina Road, the Valley Pike, the Great Philadelphia Wagon Road, or simply the Great Wagon Road.

With a body the shape of a swaybacked horse, Conestogas could float across a river as long as the wheels were taken off. And those wagons were so heavy and laden with a family’s every possession, they created deep wheel ruts all along the Great Wagon Road…

great_wagon_road-1
I outlined the section of the Wilderness Road they would have taken to Knoxville, TN, where the road turns west. At that point they would have continued south to Athens TN in McMinn county.

Above I mentioned that they had to make the bricks before they could build the houses. “They” being the highly trained and skilled slaves that were traveling too. It was not easy to make the bricks. And it wasn’t a quick process.  Here is how Joe Guy described it in his book “The Hidden History of McMinn County”  There is also a link to this chapter in the title.

The Cleage Slaves and the Bricks of History
Joe Guy

 Samuel Cleage, the itinerant contractor who traveled into the Tennessee Valley from Virginia in the 1820’s, is generally credited for the construction of several historic homes and buildings in East Tennessee, especially in McMinn County.  While it is true that Cleage was the driving force behind his construction business, it is important to remember who, in fact, was actually performing the labor.

Besides livestock and gold, Cleage was often contracted to be paid in slaves after having completed a house or building.  Many of Samuel Cleage’s slaves later adopted the Cleage name when they obtaining their freedom, and several black families in East Tennessee still trace their lineage to these Cleage slaves.  Cleage was a wealthy landowner besides being a builder, and so he used his slaves almost exclusively as bound workers in his construction business.  One of the duties often exclusively regulated to the slaves was brickmaking.

By the time Samuel Cleage was involved in building, the art of making brick had been around since 3500 BC.  Essentially, 19th century brickmaking involved five steps: winning or digging the clay, preparation, molding, drying, and firing.

 East Tennessee is well known for having the natural clay useful for brick production.  Once dug by the slaves (normally in the fall), the clay was exposed to the weather so that the winter freezes could break the clay down, remove unwanted impurities, and allow it to be worked by hand. In the spring and summer, water was added and the clay was worked by the slaves’ hands and feet in large open pits until it obtained a smooth consistency and most of the rocks and sticks were removed.  

The clay was then taken to the moulding table, where the slave designated as brickmoulder directed several assistants in the process. A skilled brickmoulder would work at the moulding table for twelve to fourteen hours, producing 3500 to 5000 bricks in a day. A clot of clay was rolled in sand and “dashed” into a sanded mould, which prevented the clay from sticking. Once the clay was pressed into the mould, the excess clay was removed from the top of the mould with a flat stick.  Moulds ranged from single to six bricks at a time, but single brick moulds were often desired because even the slave women and children could be employed in carrying the “green” bricks from the table to the drying area. The “green” bricks were then stacked and dried for about two weeks.

Once most of the moisture had dried out, Cleage’s slaves stacked the bricks in a kiln, or clamp.  Rows of bricks were built up to construct tunnels, which were filled with wood and set fire.  For two to five days the bricks were cooked, the slaves feeding the fires and getting very little sleep.  After the bricks cooled, the slaves removed them from the clamp and sorted them as to their degree of quality, the best being chosen for the building’s outside walls.  Bricks which were closest to the fire sometimes received a natural glaze from the sand that fell into the flames, and were used in the interior courses of the walls. Some bricks would be left with a salmon color, were only slightly underfired, and made for good insulation in the inner parts of the walls.  Bricks that were over burned, cracked, or warped were called clinkers and were saved to be used in garden walls or paths.”

After arriving in McMinn County, Cleage picked out a spot and built the house below, which is still standing. The black and white photographs were taken during the 1930s. The color photo is more recent. I read an article online that described the renovations the new owners were carrying out to make the house livable again.  Unfortunately, I cannot find the article again.

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Front door. A more recent picture on the right shows that some work had been done.
front_door_bricks_combo
Front door, outside, drawing and inside.
fireplace_mantel_photo_combo
Where did all those papers come from?
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Side of the house.
floor_plans_combo

B is for Buford Avritt

A-Z Challenge 2013, Investigations
a-to-z-letters-b

This is my second post for the April A-Z Challenge. I will be blogging everyday using the letters of the alphabet as a prompt. Today I am going to write about one of my great grandfather’s – Beauford Edmund Avritt.

Beauford Avritt was my father’s mother’s father.  I wrote about her mother, Anna, yesterday. There were few stories passed down about Beauford Avritt in my family. I was told that he was my grandmother’s father, and that he was a “doctor of English extraction”, but advised not to never mention this to her.  My uncles and aunts told me that at some point Anna and her family were having a difficult time and the older sons went to ask him for help.  His reply was “I know nothing about you people.”  My father once mentioned that his own father had not had a middle name and as an adult took the name “Buford” out of respect to Beauford Avritt.  I thought that was pretty strange, given the story that I had heard over the years of knowing nothing about you people.  When I mentioned this to my Aunt Gladys, she said that wasn’t how her father got his middle name. She said that he picked it on his way to Medical school when they passed a town called Buford, before he met my grandmother.

I learned from cousins on my grandmother’s side that my grandmother’s older sister, Minnie, had the middle name of Avritt. Recently I learned that her brother Hugh had gone to California with his family and changed his name to Averrette.  The story about the father of Anna’s four younger children being Beauford Avritt’s was also told in other branches of the family.

For a long time I didn’t claim Beauford Avritt and avoided doing any research beyond the basics. Since he didn’t want to know anything about my grandmother and her siblings, I didn’t care to look for anything about him. After finding Hugh’s family, I became interested in spite of myself. I found the details of his life in various places online. It is from these that I wrote this post.  I don’t have any photographs of Beauford Avritt. I was hopeful today, when I found the archives of the University of Louisville School of Medicine, but so far no luck. I have written them and I’m still hopeful that one will turn up.

Beauford Edmond Avritt was the second of the nine children of John and Elizabeth Marshall Tucker Avritt.  He was born July 21, 1839. His father was a farmer.  The 1840 census is the only one I have found that shows the family owning a slave. There was one female slave under the age of 1 counted with the family.

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John and Elizabeth were literate and Beauford and his siblings attended school and were educated. Several of his brothers were farmers, two were lawyers and Beauford was a physician.  He attended the Kentucky School of Medicine, completing in 1866 and University of Louisville, finishing in 1873.He worked treating the sick during the Cholera Epidemic of 1873. It started at the Marion County Fair in Lebanon and was spread through people coming to and from the fair.  Here is a report made about a case of his during the epidemic from; MARION COUNTY. – NARRATIVE OF THE CHOLERA EPIDEMIC OF 1873.

“Case 2- Reported by B.E. Avritt, M.D. of Lebanon, KY. – Cholera – Second stage – Recovery.

Charles, a negro (sic) age 35 years, single, after a few hours of diarrhea, was attacked with vomiting and purging, attended with excessive prostration.  Cramps of hands and feet were rapidly developed.  The discharges assumed the rice-water character.  Skin of fingers and toes was shriveled.  he was first seen by Doctor Cleaver at 6 o’clock p.m. of September 10.  The patient was in an old shanty, without any of the comforts of a sick-room.  Some one had made up a bed for him, but at the time of the visit he was alone.  He was placed upon full dose of opium, calomel and bismuth, and Doctor Avritt was asked to take charge of the case.

At 7 o’clock p.m., Doctor Avritt exhibited a full dose of chloroform; continued the powders. At 8 o’clock p.m. the chloroform was repeated, and quinine, gr. ij, was added to the powder already noted.  Finding it impossible to obtain any nurse for this man, Dr. Avritt made him as comfortable as the circumstances would admit; placed by the side of his bed a bucket of ice-water and a glass, and visited him as often as possible during the night.  The vomiting and purging continued during the night, but at lengthening intervals, and as water from the tumbler did not satisfy him, he drank from the bucket as long as he could tilt it to his mouth.  During the night he drank all the water that was provided.  At 6 o’clock a.m., September 11, surface of his body was not so intensely cold, a slight pulse, no vomiting or purging; by noon was fully reacted and on the 13 was able to sit up.”

Beauford never married and as far as I know had no other children.  In 1880 he shared his home in Gravel Switch, Marion County, Kentucky, with a store clerk, C.C. Mines. In 1900 he lived with a widowed relative.  In 1910 and 1920, at 80, he lived alone in Bradfordsville with family living next door and down the street.   The distance between Bradfordsville and Lebanon is about 9 miles.  The distance between Gravel Switch and Lebanon is 11.9 miles.

On July 7, 1926, Beauford Avritt died of “senility”. I have sent for his death certificate but have not received it yet.  He is buried in Ryder Cemetery in Lebanon, Kentucky.  Perhaps one day we will have DNA which will prove this relationship.

Note: DNA has provided proof in the form of DNA ties to descendants of other Avritts.

A is for Anna Allen Reed

A-Z Challenge 2013, Reeds
a-to-z-letters-a

This is my first post for the April A-Z Challenge. I will be blogging everyday using the letters of the alphabet as a prompt. Today I am going to write about one of my great grandmothers, Anna Allen Reed.

Anna Allen Reed was my father’s mother’s mother.  I don’t have any photographs of her but my grandfather said that my Aunt Gladys looked just like her grandmother and that Anna Reed was the meanest woman in the world.

gladys*02
Gladys Cleage, Anna Reeds lookalike.

When I started asking for information about the family and tracing my grandparent’s family in the 1970s, my grandmother Pearl Reed Cleage sent me a paper on which she had written her parents and grandparents on the right hand side and her husband’s on the left.  She listed their children and their professions below. Scotch tape held the two papers together. Although she always said her grandmother, Clara was a Cherokee Indian, there is no evidence to support this.  The mtDNA test that my Aunt Gladys took that goes back through the material line is L3e2a1b1, which goes back to Northeast or Central Africa. I also cannot find the family before 1870 which indicates, to me, that they were probably enslaved.  They are listed in the censuses as “mulatto” or “Black” or “Negro”, depending on year and location.  Anna was Catholic and raised her children as Catholics.

My grandmother's handwritten family tree.
My grandmother’s handwritten family tree.

In 1870 twenty five year old Anna was living with her 3 year old son, George and working as a cook in a household in Lebanon, KY.  Her maiden name was listed on several of her children’s documents as “Ray”. On others it was listed as “Allen”. In 1870, her oldest daughter, Josephine, lived with Clara and James Greens.   By 1880 Anna Reed was living with 6 of her 8 children, next door to Clara and James Green. She was supporting her family as  a “laundress”.

"Washer_Woman"_-_NARA_-_559154
“Washer_Woman”. Artist unknown.

According to Sharecropping, Laundry, and Black Labor in the New South, “Black laundresses were … in great demand in southern Jim Crow society. Because of the widespread call for their services, laundresses could, in some cases, manage to exercise some small degree of independence. They could, for example, choose to do laundry four to six days a week, depending on how many households they chose to serve. But economic necessity usually dictated that number, and the washerwomen were usually obligated to work as much as possible. Laundresses made $4 to $8 a month, and theirs was one of the hardest possible domestic trades; the more clothes that people accumulated in the post-industrialized clothing boom of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the more work was left for the washing women. These women desperately needed the income … They had to make their own soap from lye, starch from wheat bran, and washtubs from beer barrels that they cut in half. They would cook dinner for their families while ironing. Without running water in their homes, the washerwomen had to carry gallons of water from local pumps, hydrants, or wells in order to wash, boil, and rinse customers’ clothes. It was backbreaking work.“

Anna had eight children. Her oldest daughter was listed as a Campbell in the 1870 census and I don’t know who her father was. George was listed as “Ray” in that census. According to my Aunt Barbara, Anna married George Reed and when he died she married his brother, Palmer Reed. They had two children together – Sarah and Louise. I have found no marriage records for Anna with George Ray or George Reed or Palmer Reed. Sometime after the children were born, Palmer left and Anna had a long term relationship with a white doctor named Buford Avritt.  They had four children together, Hugh was born in 1876, followed by Minnie in 1878, Clarence in 1882, and my grandmother Pearl in 1886.  This chart may help make sense of the relationships. Eventually, they all used the surname “Reed”.

Anna's_Family
A Chart of Anna Allen Reed’s children and their fathers.  Click to enlarge.

Anna Allen Reed was mulatto and Buford Avritt was white.  They lived in Kentucky at a time when such a marriage would have been illegal, even if they had wanted to get married. There is no legal record of this relationship.  It is oral history that has gone down through various branches of the family. Minnie’s middle name was Avritt. Hugh and his family eventually changed their name from Reed to Averette.  There are no stories of Buford Avritt supporting the family, buying them a house or groceries or sending the children to school.

Anna’s son, George, was the first member of the family to move north to Indianapolis, Indiana looking for work in the Van Camp Cannery.  As soon as he was able, he sent for the rest of the family. A George Reed, identified as “colored” appears in the Indianapolis Directory in 1884 as a laborer. He would have been about 17 years old. His older sister, Sarah married James Busby in Indianapolis in 1889. By the 1893 Indianapolis Directory Anna (Widow of George) and George Reed, laborer are listed at 31 Willard Street. The next year and in the years following, Anna was listed as the widow of Palmer.

In 1900 Anna and her family were living at 529 Willard Street in Indianapolis. She was 51 and no longer working. Living with her are 28 year old George, 18 year old Clarence, 16 year old Pearl and Josephine’s daughter, Bessie who was 14. Josephine is dead. Minne and her family are living next door at 525 Willard.  Sarah and Louise were living in Berrien County, Michigan and Hugh was in the Navy. Neither Anna or George could read or write. All of the younger people in the home were literate.

In 1905 George bought a house at 2730 Kenwood Avenue. This house was north of downtown. This was the house that my grandmother lived in when my grandfather, Albert B. Cleage, was courting her.  Anna did not approve of my grandfather. He believed it was because he was “too dark” for her liking.  My grandmother saw him in spite of her mother and sometimes it resulted in anger on her mother’s part. In 1910 my grandparents were married in the Kenwood house so there must have been some acceptance, although bitter feelings seem to have remained.

On February 22, 1911, Anna Allen Reed died of a cerebral hemorrhage.  My grandmother Pearl filled out the information on the death certificate. Anna was listed as being 58, although she was closer to 68. She was the widow of Palmer Reed and born in Lebanon, KY.  Her father’s name was Robert Allen and her mother was Clara Green.  Anna’s occupation was “housewife”.   She is buried in Mt. Jackson Cemetery in Indianapolis.

Although I spent much time in Indianapolis when one of my daughter’s lived there, I was unable to get photos of the houses they lived in because they had been torn down.

No More Photographs

Cleages, sepia saturday

My father took many photographs that now help me document my family’s life. There are photographs houses, street scenes and my mother in San Francisco and Los Angeles. In Springfield, MA he took pictures of my sister, my mother, me and along with those of St. John’s Congregational Church and members.  For the first few years after we moved back to Detroit, there were photos and then, he stopped taking pictures.

Taking photographs - 1940s.
Taking photographs – 1940s.

A few months ago I noticed that my father took no more photographs of our family after we moved from 2212 Atkinson to 2254 Chicago Blvd.  Pictures taken during that time were not taken at home. We were at one of my grandparents houses, or in Idlewild. And the photographer was not my father, my mother or other family members were.  I wondered what happened during that time that made him stop.

In 1953, at the time we moved from Atkinson to the house on Chicago, there had just been a church split and my father, a minister, was involved in building a new church from the ground up, something he hadn’t done before. This involved finding a church building and raising the money to purchase it. New members had to be found and a program that would get those new members involved and feeling a part of the church, had to be developed. There were constant meetings at our house, a combination parsonage/church activity building.  And my parent’s marriage was ending.  My parents separated in 1954.  Maybe, on top of everything else, his camera broke and he couldn’t afford to replace it because he kept donating his salary back to the church.

______________

You can see some of the photographs my father took in these earlier posts:

You can read more about the church split in this post – A Church and Two Brothers – Two Splits.

For other Sepia Saturday photos, CLICK!
For other Sepia Saturday photos, CLICK!

Me, Detective – A Short Story by Henry Cleage

Cleages, poetry & literature,

Today is my uncle Henry Wadsworth Cleage’s birthday. He was born on March 22, 1916 in Detroit Michigan. If he had not died on June 15, 1996, he would have been 97 today. In honor of his birthday I decided to run another one of his short stories. He wrote it in March of 1947 and sent it out to an agency but it wasn’t published. He also wrote a longer and slightly different version of this story. There was, however, no mention of a camera and that is the prompt for this weeks Sepia Saturday.

Henry and Hugh examine a camera.
Henry and Hugh examine a camera.

Me, Detective

By Henry Cleage

“Rural Detective Agency routes Thief” was in great big letters and underneath was the picture of the old man Lucas’s cat wearing the false teeth.  Then there was a little article about Sam and me.  I was humiliated. I jammed the magazine in my pocket and went up to the office.  The office is over the drugstore.

I opened the door and started towards my desk. I was almost there when I fell over the tripod. It was sulking in the shadows the better to destroy me.  I staggered on to the desk and sat there trying to organize myself.

Finally my mind was made up.  Whoever heard of a detective agency with a darkroom? I would just have to force Sam to stop fooling with them cameras and stick to business.  I couldn’t stand the strain and the indignity any longer.  It was getting so bad I was getting a fixation about cameras.  I could smell one a block away, and the smell didn’t do my blood pressure any good either.  After all, who was running the joint anyway?  I was in a state when Sam finally wandered in.

“Hello Dan.”. he said. He was loaded down with a camera almost as big as he was. He’s just about five foot six himself but he’s all energy and foolishness.  Oh, he’s a good boy all right. I don’t mean to say that he ain’t been a big help and all that, but after…  Just because he was the one who got us our license and set up the office don’t mean he can run around with a camera all the time. Besides it was only because he happened to know Sidney Jones’s daughter in the university where he was taking some fool course in photography that he was able to get the license.

 

But take that university business.  Ain’t that just like him?  If I wanted to be a photographer I would just grab a camera and start snapping pictures.  But he’s got to go at it the hard way.  He’s got a stubborn streak a mile wide.  If he wants anything, he’ll bust hell wide open to get it.  I didn’t even speak to him when he walks in.  He wanders around awhile tring not to get in my way, but I’m right there looking him dead in the eye.

At last I speak. “Sam”, I says, “What do you think is wrong with the business?”

“Geez” answers Sam “I think it’s wonderful.”

Now, ain’t he a ninny?  “Wonderful?” I gasp. “How can you say that when we ain’t had no business since old man Lucas lost his false teeth?”

”I don’t think we can expect a great volume of business, ever.” Says Sam. “That’s why I’m developing a sideline. With photography and our detective business, we ought to do alright.”

“How come we can’t expect a lot of business?” I says, stung to the quick by this fresh evidence of unamericanism.

“Why, the town is too small.” Says Sam innocently, his wide eyes even wider.

“Well”, I says “I think we can do more business if a certain one of us would tend to business and let our hobbies go.”

Sam seemed shocked.  “But, I think my camera work can be a help in the business.” he said.

Ain’t he a ninny though?

“Did the camera help in the Lucas False Teeth Case?” I roared.

“The picture I got of the cat wearing the teeth did.” Replied Sam.  “We sold it to the magazine for a hundred bucks.”

“Did the camera help in the Lucas False Teeth Case?” I repeated.

“I found the teeth.” Sam had the indecency to say.

“Did the camera find the teeth?” I scored.

“No.” Sam admitted.

I rose to my full six feet and glared down at Sam, sitting at his desk.  “Then admit you are wasting time with them gadgets.”

For a minute I thought I had him, but he’s stubborn.  He looked pained for a minute and then scratched his head.  He don’t like to argue.  That’s what I was counting on.

“I don’t think the camera has had a fair test.” He says.

I am almost exasperated but just then the phone rings and I grab it.  It’s old man Jones’ daughter herself.  She wants an appointment right away.  She gets it.

“I’ll tell you what I’m gonna do.” I says, turning back to Sam. “I want to be fair about this thing so we’ll make a bargain.” I look at him like I’m giving him the chance of a lifetime.  “That is if you got the nerve, the faith of your convictions.”

“What is it?” asks Sam.

“If you can use your camera in some legitimate way in our next case, I’ll keep my mouth shut. If you can’t, you’ll get down to business and forget it.”

Sam starts to protest but I come in fast.

“Oh?” I says “Welching?”  I shake my head disgustedly.  “Just a kid who don’t want to give up his toys.”

This gets Sam where he lives. He hates to be called a kid. That’s what I counted on.

“All right.” He says, his face tight and confused, “I’ll go along with you.”

I got him, I got him, I got him!  Geez, what a sucker.  I don’t know why, but I can get away with anything on him.  With other guys, he is as shrewd as the next one, but with me, he is putty.

Things are still pretty tense in the office that evening when Miss Jones comes in.  She is a looker all right. A tall well stacked dame with plenty of everything that makes the world go around.

When she sees Sam, she almost picks him up and puts him in her lap.  It seems they were regular old buddies at school.  Sam seems pretty fond of her too.  They act like two old college buddies.  Disgustin’.

“How is the demon photographer?” she hollers, laughing like mad.

“How’s the philosopher?” says Sam, grinning like an ape.

They kid each other around like two guys. I look at this chick again.  It’s amazing.  Usually a big shot chick with as much on the ball as this one, is got a lot of agony and such.  You know what I mean.  I figure this chick must be a problem to someone.  I can imagine her pulling almost as many silly ones as Sam.  I clear my throat and bring the meeting to order.

She’s really got a problem.  It seems that in her studies at school she comes across something pretty interesting in the way of the law of averages. And being the girl she is, she shoots right out to Whitey’s Roadhouse to see if the books are right.  They ain’t.  One thing follows another and before all is said and done, she gives an I.O.U. Now, for some peculiar reason, Whitey don’t want to give her back the I.O.U. even for the money.

“Well”, I says, “Why worry?” This chick must have a screw loose, I think to myself.  I would take the money and call it a good deal.

“Her father is running for mayor on the reform ticket.” Says Sam.

“What’s that got to do with it?” I shouts, very much put out by Sam’s habit of bringing up non-essentials.

“Petey Grace, the mayor’s handyman called me today and advised me to see that daddy did not choose to run or he would publish a Photostat of the I.O.U. in the paper.” She says.

That Sam, I think to myself.  Always showing off.  How in the world does he think we can get an I.O.U. if the guy don’t want to give it?  Besides, that Whitey bunch ain’t no boys to get too gay with.  And he’s in with the mayor too.  That’s a hard combination to beat.  It ain’t like finding old man Lucas’s false teeth.

I’m just on the verge of telling her that we are pretty well tied up, when I get a flash of genius.  This is just the case for showing Sam the folly of his ways.  It’s got to be strictly hush-hush, see.  The last thing you could use in a case like this is a camera.  I turn back to Jones with a suave smile.

“The way I see it”, I says, “the whole thing has got to be strictly hush-hush.”

“Definitely.” Says Jones, tossing her blond curls with a certain twist of her shoulders.

“No pictures or nothing.” I insist.

“Heavens no.”, replies Jones.  “That would discredit the reform ticket.”

“I’ll take care of it.” I say, standing up and bowing like they do in the movies when the interview is over.

Sam is pretty quiet after Jones leaves. I am pretty quiet too.  She carries quite a thrust, that girl does.

“Dan.” Says Sam.

“Huh?”

“That bargain,” he says.

“Yea?”

“Of course we can’t use this case as a test.”

“And why not?” I come back indignant.

“It ain’t a normal case.” Says Sam.

“There ain’t no such thing as a normal case.” I says.

“The bargain is unfair anyway.” Says Sam.

“Oh!” I says. “Baby wants to back down.”

Sam stalks out of the door.  I am dancing with glee, myself.  Sam knows he is licked.  He is so beat he walks out with only one camera, that little one with the light on it.  How can I lose?  It’s open and shut.  I look around at all the photo junk Sam will have to cart out of here.  Why with all that stuff out, I can get a bigger desk.  One like them big shots got.  Then I can get my bluff in on clients when they come in.

The twelfth hour found me doggedly making my way to Whitey’s Roadhouse.  It’s on Latham Road, about ten miles north of town.  Ordinarily I would have made it in half an hour.  Indeed in even less!  The fact is, the gas pedal on my 1936 Ford sticks, sometimes up and sometimes down.  Tonight it sticks up and so instead of traveling approximately 80 miles per hour, as I sometimes do, I was traveling ten miles an hour as I sometimes do.

When I finally reached the club, it was all dark.  I looked at my watch.  Two thirty AM! I kicked the gas pedal so it would know just who was to blame for my unseemly arrival.  The pedal, in perverse retaliation, became unstuck at that precise moment and the car, roaring like a lion, charged headlong into a large black limousine then leaving the driveway and pummeled it to a standstill.  So authoritatively did my car get in it’s licks that the limousine backed up in hurried confusion and swooshed off into the darkness.  But not before I caught a glimpse of Petey and the mayor.

Strange, I said to myself as I pried my ribs from around the knob on my steering wheel.  I drove on to the door.

When I walked in the door, I realized that I had taken quite a beating from that steering knob, particularly that spot on my chest where that knob had hit.  I stopped a moment in the dark to gingerly touch the bruise.

Immediately a short jug-headed individual who was looming out of the darkness skidded to a halt with his hands waving wildly in the air.

“Don’t shoot, boss!” he said. “The joint’s yours.”

I tried to gather my fumbling wits together but I didn’t do so good.  “Turn around,” I growled “and take me to Whitey.” I kept my hand on my chest because I knew he thought I had a gun.

So there we go, across the lobby and down a very discouraging hallway.  It felt like I was getting in deeper and deeper with every step.  I was in such a state, I wished I could see old Sam, cameras and all.  I want him so bad that for a minute I figure I can smell them cameras, even out here.  They don’t smell half bad now, but I had to stop dreaming ‘cause jughead stops in front of the last door.  I tell him to knock.  Then I hear voices inside.

“Did you hear that?” says the first.

“Who, me?” asks the second.

Finally the obscenities quieted and the second voice was prevailed upon to see to the knocking.  A guy who looks like the brother of the guy I am trailing opens the door and looks at my boy with considerable disgust.

“What the hell you knocking f…” then he sees the shape of things and waves the air with his hands too.

“A stick up!” grated Whitey who was cowering behind his desk in amazement. To him, the whole thing was like the tail wagging the rat. But a rat is fast.

I’m having myself a time.  I got the corners of my mouth turned down like a regular tough guy and I’m looking them over through narrowed eyes.  And then I hear the noise.  It’ just a little creak but I know it’s the door behind me.  Quick as a wink, I wheel towards the door, but I don’t see a thing.  Then I turn quick to keep whitey under control, but I am too late.  Whitey’s hand darts to the switch on the desk lamp, turns it off and continues on towards my head.  Somehow or other there is a gun in it when it point at my head.

Undignified as I must have looked I dived for the back of the desk and the protection it would give me.  The crash of the gun seemed to unhinge all the brains that I have.  Light and more light seemed to blast the room with almost as much authority as the noise of the gun.  It was all so unheard of, that the last I remember is the smell of that photo junk and that light.

The mumble of voices welcomed me back amongst the living.  I looked about wildly.  I was in my room and Sam was giving orders to the landlady.  It seemed he wanted a bucket of hot water and a tub of ice cubes.

“Oh no you don’t.” I shouted hysterically.

Sam dashed over to the bed and looked at me professionally.  He had a certain air about him and I didn’t like it.

“What happened?” I asked suspiciously.

“Well,” said Sam “after you dived into the desk and knocked yourself out, they gave me the I.O.U.”

“Yeah!” I hollered, scared that he would see how happy I was, but everything was so mellow.  We got the note and Sam has got to give up the camera.  Everything is breaking my way.  “Where did they find you?”  I ask, not that I give a darn but just to make conversation.

“I was there.” Says Sam.

A horrible feeling comes over me.

“If it wasn’t for the picture, we wouldn’t have got it.” Sam is swaggering, even though standing still.” I followed you in there and when Whitey shoots you through the hat, I get a picture.  After you knock yourself out, he finds out you ain’t out to hijack the joint, so he is glad to forget the whole thing if I give him my roll of film.”

Sam takes out a cigarette and lights it, all the time looking at me like an owl.  “Anything I can do for you before I go?” he says.  “I got to develop some pictures.”

I wave him out.  I ain’t got the heart to speak.

To see more Sepia Saturday offerings, click.
To see more Sepia Saturday offerings, click.

My A – Z Challenge Calendar

A-Z Challenge 2013

test_calendar2I have laid out my April A – Z Challenge posts using a calendar. My over all theme will be, as usual, my family history. I have a mix of Individuals who I will profile, names and careers that I will trace through the family, a family mystery and my kindergarten career. On Sundays I will do the Sepia Saturday challenge a day late.

Although I have my month planned out, I have not written any of the posts ahead of time. I may get a few done but probably I will be writing and posting as I go along. Of course I will visit other blogs to see the different ways the challenge is handled.

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Click to see other bloggers participating in The Big Reveal.

 Mina Lobo @ Some Dark Romantic and David Macaulay @ Brits in the USA are co-hosting this blog hop to introduce the themes we will be using for the A – Z Challenge in April.

A Church and Two Brothers – Two Splits

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In March of 1953, a disagreement between my father, then known as Rev. Albert B. Cleage Jr., pastor of St. Mark’s Community, United Presbyterian Church and a group of members who were not happy with the direction he was was taking the church, came to a head. My father and 300 members of the congregation resigned and founded St. Mark’s Community Church, which several months later became Central Congregational Church and in the 1960s became the Shrine of the Black Madonna.

1953_Church_split2The split within the church also precipitated a family split. The ties between my grandfather, Dr. Albert B. Cleage Sr. and his brother Henry Cleage were  broken. The close relationship they shared throughout their lives, was gone. My sister didn’t know she had a cousin Shelton Hill (Uncle Henry’s grandson) until he introduced himself when they were classmates at Northwestern High School.

Left to right: Albert, Josephine, Edward. Back L Henry, back R Jacob
The Cleage siblings: left to right front; Albert, Josephine, Edward. Back left Henry. Back right Jacob

My grandfather Albert B. Cleage Sr. was the youngest of five siblings.  He and his brother Henry were always close. They helped organize Witherspoon United Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis and worked together to open the black YMCA there. During the 1930s and 1940s, they lived several blocks away on Detroit’s old West Side and saw each other almost daily.

After my father, Albert B. Cleage Jr. (later known as Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman) was ordained in 1943, he served as pastor of churches in Lexington, KY, San Francisco, CA and Springfield, MA.  During those years he often wrote home asking his family to help him find a church in Detroit.  More than once he mentioned getting his Uncle Henry to help.

In 1951 a group representing the United Presbyterian Church, including Albert Sr. and his brother Henry, organized St. Mark’s Presbyterian Church. It was located on 12th Street near Atkinson. My father was called to be the pastor. They started with 90 members and increased to over 300 during the following two years.

Uncle Henry and my father were both strong minded men. By the spring of 1953, they had reached an impasse over who was in charge and whether the focus of the church should be  on its own members or on the larger community. An emotional church meeting in March 1953 caused a split between both the church members and the brothers, Albert Sr. and Henry.

In 1956 my grandfather Albert was very sick with cancer when the family heard that Uncle Henry was quite ill and in the hospital.  Soon after they heard that Uncle Henry had died. They wondered if they should tell their father.  He was so sick and they didn’t know how it would affect him.  In the end, they didn’t have to. My grandfather was lying in bed and said “Henry died, didn’t he?” They said he had. Grandfather said, “I thought so.”  They never figured out how he knew.

My grandfather was too sick to go to the funeral. Afterwards, Uncle Henry’s family had the funeral procession drive by my grandparent’s house on Atkinson. The cars drove past very slowly.  It was a gesture toward the healing of a rift that began with the church fight in 1953.

Henry William Cleage died April 10, 1956. My grandfather Albert Buford Cleage Sr. died a year later on April 4, 1957.  Both are buried in Detroit Memorial Cemetery in McComb County, Michigan.

The Freedom Now Party 1964

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Today’s post is about the Michigan Freedom Now Party. My photographs were taken during the first convention, which took place in Detroit in September 1964.  It was held at Central Congregational Church, now the Shrine of the Black Madonna. To read an interview with Henry Cleage about organizing the party and what happened during the election, click this link – Freedom Now Party,.

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Freedom Now Party Convention.

On the far left, back of my sister’s head and the back of my head. Standing in the checked shirt is Oscar Hand. Behind Mr. Hand, in the white shirt, is Richard Henry (later Imari Obadele) Writing on the wall is Leontine Smith. Against the wall in the white dress is Annabelle Washington.  I cannot name the others.

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FNP flyer
Henry Cleage reading platform. Grace Lee Boggs in left corner.

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Preamble to the Freedom Now Party Platform
Freedom Now party candidates
Four of the many candidates on the Michigan Freedom Now Party slate.  From left to right:  Loy Cohen, secretary of state; James Jackson, lieutenant governor ; Albert Cleage (later Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman), govenor  and Milton Henry (later Gaide Abiodun Obadele), representative of the 14th Congressional District.
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For more about my family and elections go to these posts: More From Elections of Yesteryear and Wordless Wednesday – Elections Past.

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To see more posts about crowds and more – click this link!

 

My Grandmother Fannie Mae Turner Graham’s Birthday Today

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Fannie Mae Turner Graham would be 112 today if she had not died in 1977.  This photograph was taken in my grandparent’s backyard during a trip home to Detroit from Springfield, Massachusetts in 1948.

My grandmother Fannie, my grandfather Mershell and my mother Doris. I am standing on the table.
My grandmother Fannie, my grandfather Mershell and my mother Doris. I am standing on the table.  1948 – Detroit, Michigan.

My grandmother, Nanny is looking at me and smiling while I stand on the little table. My grandmother was 60 years old, 6 years younger than I am today. I turned 2 in August of that year.  This was my first visit to Detroit. My grandmother came to help my mother when I was born, but she hadn’t seen me since. This was my grandfather’s first time seeing me.

My mother was several months pregnant with my sister Pearl.  We traveled by train. When I got back to Springfield, I came down with a case of roseola. There were no lasting effects for me or for my yet to be born sister.