Transcripts For CSPAN2 Gretchen Sorin Driving While Black 20

Transcripts For CSPAN2 Gretchen Sorin Driving While Black 20240713

Cooperstown graduate program of the State University of new york and the author of in the spirit of martin the living legacy of dr. Martin luther king jr. And through the eyes of others africanamericans and identity in american art. In her new book, driving while black, just out today, professor sorin tells the story of the indispensable green book which both reshaped the africanamerican traveling experience throughout our segregated land and helped drive the nays sent Civil Rights Movement. Please welcome Gretchen Sorin to the free library of philadelphia. [applause] good evening. Its wonderful to be in this great city of philadelphia. And im, i apologize that rick wasnt able to join us this evening. He had a little bit of an emergency, and hes in italy. But i hope that youll enjoy the preview of our film that he sent along. So im going to talk, im sure many of you have seen the green book movie, and im going to talk this evening really about something, a broader story. And if that story is about the automobile and the role that the automobile played in africanamerican life. Id like you all to think about how important your mobility is to you, how important is it that youre able to travel where you want to when you want to, how important is that to american liberty. The ability to travel freely is something that all of us in this room talk for granted. Take for granted. But if you think about the role that liberty that mobility played for africanamericans for very much of american history, africanamericans were prohunted from traveling prohibited from travel thing freely. Travel and the idea with of journey central to the africanamerican experience. The ordeal of the Middle Passage and enslavement begins the journey for africanamericans, and its central to what it means to be black in this country. But the idea of travel is about forced travel. This is a path, a slave path, and it says pleased to let Benjamin Mcdaniel pass to new market and return on monday or tuesday next to montpelier from mrs. Madison. June 1st, 1843. So africanamericans traveling had to have passes. They had to have permission. Freedom was so important to many enslaved persons that they ran away. They sold themselves and exercised their freedom of movement. Excuse me. I have a 5yearold granddaughter, and hes given me the kindergarten [laughter] in the early 20th century, the great migration is the story of the greatest mass if movement of people in this countrys history. Seeking Job Opportunities in the north and fleeing racism and poverty in the south as many as seven million africanamericans left their homes seeking refuge in such cities as chicago, new york, detroit, newark where my parents moved and philadelphia where my uncle moved. With expanding opportunities in education and employment came more and more black citizens among the ranks of the black middle class. The freedom of mobility to go where you wanted, when you wanted became essential. But it also came to mean the ability to avoid the indignity of the jim crow bus and the Jim Crow Railroad car. And here is a jim crow bus. In the first half of the 20th century, behavior and etiquette for africanamericans was proscribed by geography and custom. If you were from a particular place, you knew what the rules were. Rules changed from place to place throughout the United States. Each state had its own rules. Each community had its own expected etiquette. Emmett till didnt know the rules of racial etiquette, for example. Particular driving etiquette was also expected. Africanamericans faced segregation in moat most aspects in most aspects of public travel and accommodation in the south where it was overt. But in the north, it was dictate by custom. So was the fact of segregation of buses, taxis, trains, hotels, restaurants, beaches and just about any place that people gathered. And this is a Jim Crow Railroad car. Insulting, humiliating, filthy as well as feint on timetables dependent on timetables. Although they were only supposed to run in the south, many of them ran in the north as well. And africanamericans even if you purchased a first class ticket were often expected to go into the jim crow car. This is a columbia and Gulf Railroad car from 1929. And you can see the word colored on the backseat. The automobile gave africanamericans freedom. It freed black travelers from the tyranny of the Jim Crow Railroad car and bus. It offered freedom of movement and it offered dignity. Africanamericans found that the segregated trains that gave them no dignity and here, well, here is your own private, rolling living room, right . If you were driving in your own car, you had a private space, it was protected, you were freed from the segregated insults, you were freed from listening to the bus driver tell you to move to the back of the bus, you were freed from the railroad car that might be right behind the engine. Is so this was really an important change in africanamerican life. The automobile. By the 1950s with the interstate highway system, upwardly mobile black families were able to travel and become travel consumers. And they started to consume travel just as theyd consumed things like refridge raters and televisions and coffee percolators. They used the dollars in their dispose disposable income to purchase many things. It was important for the black middle class to travel for leisure. They chose to travel because they could. Often participants worked hard parents worked hard to make sure that their children were not aware of the indignities they faced. So the children installed in the backseats of these cars or werent always even aware of the indignity their parents faced, nor were they aware of the danger that their parents faced when they went out on the road. Now, if you think about the make and model of automobiles, make and model was very much tied to identity. Africanamericans purchased large cars. And we know this from Market Studies that were done of africanamericans that were conducted in the 1940s and 1950s by Research Firms for the black newspapers. Africanamerican motorists preferred large, heavy buicks and olds mobiles, those kinds of cars we now would call gas guzzlers. These are not small cars. I think africanamericans preferred large cars because they offered protection, they were hard to turn over, they were a place to sleep if necessary, you could carry blankets and pillows, and you could sleep in your car. You would carry water for the radiator, you could carry extra pan the belts, you fan belts, you carried those big coleman coolers full of food because you couldnt stop at a restaurant. Black motorists created a home away from home in their automobiles. And this is an ad for the buick electra, and it says all the electra lacks is a fireplace. [laughter] so the electra was a heavy car, and you could sleep in it if you needed to. When civil rights worker medgar evers needed a car to travel through rural mississippi, he chose an oldsmobile rocket 88. The rocket was large enough to enable him to stretch out for the night on the front seat, and it responded immediately if he hit the accelerator, enabling him to get away from a pursuing car. This is a picture of the rocket 88. And ask we know that method forward evers died beside his medgar evers died beside his car in his driver, shot if by a sniper in 1963. Africanamericans also saw their automobiles as a symbol of class status, and this is a cadillac on a harlem street. Africanamericans were often prevented by discrimination from purchasing houses. You couldnt buy a house because your neighborhood was red hawaiianed and banks redlined and banks would not give you a mortgage. Therefore, the car became their largest and most important purchase. And, therefore, africanamericans used their disposable income to buy beautiful cars. Now, you may have heard the stereotype that all africanamericans bought cadillacs. Africanamericans purchased cadillacs in exactly the same proportion, percentage as white americans, thats 3 . 3 of africanamericans purchased cadillacs. That is a stereotype that all africanamericans had those, those cad a lacks. The preferred car was the buick or the oldsmobile. But for africanamericans, travel by carr posed a paradox. Africanamericans had the freedom to travel, but they were forced to stay in segregated black neighborhoods anding is segregated black accommodations that would accept them. Now, id like you to think for a minute about what it was like for all americans before there were cars, before the automobile. Before the automobile people generally stayed put. They didnt travel very far at all from their own neighborhoodings. White people generally stayed in white neighborhoods, black people generally stayed in black a neighborhoods. In some poor neighborhoods, black and white people lived side by side, but the country was generally segregate by race. Now think about what happens with the automobile. With their cars, africanamericans crisscrossed the country traveling through white spaces to get from a safe black space to another safe black space, say to get from a black neighborhood to a black resort, they had to go through a variety of white spaces where they were unwelcome. They faced signs, billboards, posters and objects that ranged from insulting to frightening. Thaw asserted their rights finish they asserted their rights to unfetteredded travel by going where they wanted, when they wanted, and this could be dangerous. The landscape for africanamerican travelers was fraught with psychologically and emotionally damaging messages. And this is just one example of those kinds of messages. Welcome to klan country. This is a restaurant chain that was popular on the west coast, started in salt lake city, and diners entered the restaurant through the giant coons mouth. And this is the banner that welcomed visitors to greenville, texas. Greenville welcome t. Blackest land, the whitest people. And, of course, there were hundreds of sun downtowns in the United States. And sundown towns in the United States. They were faced with towns that actually had signs that said if you were black, you needed to be out of town before sun down. And these communities were all over the United States. Many, many in the midwest, many in the west and even a few, like connecticut, in the northeast. Theres a great story that Thurgood Marshall told. He was standing on a train car, a train platform waiting for a train to shreveport, and a man came up to him and said and this is before Thurgood Marshall was Supreme Court justice, when he was a lawyer for the nacp. And the man says to him, nigger boy, what are you doing in this town . And he says im waiting for the train to shreveport. And the man says, well, nigger boy, you better with out of this town before sun down because the sun has never set for a nigger in this town. Thats a story that Thurgood Marshall tells in his autobiography. Some africanamericans faced all kinds of intimidation and even real dangers when they traveled. And this is a fair in colorado. I have to wonder why were they wearing these outfits on the ferris wheel. So africanamericans often depended on travel guides like the negro to motorists green book which was produced in new york city. Now, how many of you have heard of the negro motorists between book . Many of you. And how many of you have heard of all of the other dozens of travel guides that existed . There were many different travel bides for a variety of audiences. If you were a part of a church group or a fraternity or a sorority, there were guides that found special housing for you. There were guides for show people. There were many different guides. And in the back of black newspapers and magazines, there were travel guides as well. So the green book is the most long lasting of the africanamerican travel guide. And the reason it was so long lasting was because of their relationship with with standard oil. Which is exxon or formerly exo gas stayings. They saw africanamericans as a market, and they had enlightened selfinterests. They thought these people have money, and we would like to get some of it. And they had a policy of nondiscrimination in their bathrooms. At their gas stations. And so africanamericans very often preferred their gasoline. And they gave away the green book, and that helped victor green to make his green book successful. The idea for the green book was based on jewish travel guides. Victor green writes in his very first issue of the green book that his jewish brethren gave him the idea for the travel guide. So when, if you were a jewishamerican and you were traveling, you also needed to be concerned about places to stay. Very often if you called the hotel and said your name was schwartz or your name was rubin, you would find that suddenly they had no rooms available. So jewish newspapers and jewish, there were jewish guides that told you places you could stay and places where you could observe the dietary laws. Green really believed that travel was fatal to prejudice. He believed if people went out across the country, it would help to defeat prejudice in this cup. And this is a quote in this country. And this is a quote from mark twain from the innocence a abroad. He says travel fatal to prejudice, and victor green adopted that as his mantra. This is victor green and his wife alma. Green was a postal worker. He opened a business in harlem, he opened the Green Publishing Company. What is so important and the reason i always talk and show alma is because victor green dies in 1960, and the Green Publishing Company was then operated by alma green and by four other women. So it was a fivewoman operation. And this was a business that Publishing Business was very unusual for women to be working in publishing in this time period, much less running a Publishing Company. But alma green continued to run the Publishing Company until the late 1960s. Victor green had a variety of way of finding places to put in his green book and ill alma, i have to make sure almas in there. One of the ways was by sending out postcards and by sending out letters and asking his travelers, people that had good experiences traveling, to send him information about the places that they stayed. The green book included gas stations and this one, of course, is an exo station. Hotels, motels, restaurants, with mcas, also ymcas, churches, doctors, barbers and there was at least one article in each issue. An article might tell you about philadelphia and the things that you could do and see in philadelphia. Or it might tell you about chicago. They usually were geographically situated, and they toll you the places that you might be welcome to visit. The green book also courted the black middle class and reflects black middle class values about polite and wellmanneredded behavior. And here i think you can see that. You have a very charming muddle class couple with matched luggage. You can see a little butt of their car, and you can see little bit of their car, and you can see their suburban neighborhood in the background. It was the black middle class that could afford to travel, and green shows us the ideal black traveling couple. Over the course of the life of the green book, the content expanded from just new york, new jersey and contract connecticut to the entire east coast, then the entire United States, then all of north america and finally to europe, africa and asia. But there were other travel guides like this one. This is the baltimore a afroamerican travel map that was part of the afroamerican newspaper. Other guides were called the go guide, travel guide, the travel guide and [inaudible] just to name a few. And you could also see the middle class iconography here with the couple playing golf in the upper righthand corner. Many of the places that were listed in the guide and especially the early ones were either ymca dorm rooms or the home of africanamerican families. So you might, if you had an empty room or an extra room, women rented their room ares out, and they provided good breakfasts as a way to make extra money for their families. And this is a ymca room. This is the rock. If any of you have visited the africanamerican museum in washington, d. C. , i youve seen the rock which was a please your place leisure place to stay in maine. It was an africanamerican guesthouse that was run by hazel and clayton sinclair, and this is the rock in its original environment. This was a mace that was away from a place that was away from the beach. The beaches were segregated. But you could go and you could stay for a week or two weeks at rock rest. You could enjoy your meals at rock rest. Hazelling was, apparently, a really good cook, and she catered meals for the White Community as well as for the back community. There were other places to stay like mckenzies dmowrt hot springs court in hot springs, arkansas, which was a motor hotel and perfect for the automobile. You could park right outside your door. Most of these places were own by africanamericans, but some were owned by white americans but catered only to black people. These are some advertisements from the green book. They offered the same values and products that were offered to whites in parallel establishments. Some of the folks that operated these places clearly placed themselves in the ads to show readers that they were black. And this grainy picture is of Shenandoah National park. I know the National Parks like to say that you are always welcome at the National Parks, and the National Parks were always open to africanamericans. The problem was that all of the park facilities the guesthouses, the hotels, the restaurants were operated by private, private individuals, and they discriminated. So this is a picnic grounds for negroes at Shenandoah National park. It took a long time for the National Parks to be fully integrated. Finish id like to talk just for a

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