I didn’t think I, or anyone who was in Newark during the 1967 Riot (as it was called then), needed a picture book in order to recall the images captured by Life photographer Bud Lee.
I was only seven years old; but I believed my memories of that unforgettable week still were just as vivid, and probably even more so than Lee’s photos would be.
It was actually the first time I’d heard the phrase, “The Cops are killing Black people.” And those aren’t words a seven year old little Black boy is likely to forget.
Every sentence I’ve ever read that began with “The first African American or the first black person to…” was historic and significant because it almost always preceded some true story — one where the names weren’t changed to protect the guilty — that I hadn’t known, or which simply needed to be retold to remind some folks.
Needless to say, there are more of those stories now than I could ever count. And this one, well, to quote my boys from Oaktown…
Because it’s the telling of the national story, the whole story, our stories, that spark (and, yes, sometimes ignite) the much-needed conversations America still needs to have that challenge the carefully crafted false narratives we wrongfully call American History.
But if we continue to tell them honestly and without condemnation, and if they’re received openly and without shame, we can replace fiction with truth and dispel the myths embraced by so many folks (black, white and other, but mostly… y’all know who you are) that one was the first to accomplish everything and the others are the last to do anything.
So, here’s to another first. Not one black quarterback vs another black quarterback, but the Chiefs vs the Eagles.
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