Buckley. [applause] thank you very much. Thank you very much for being here. Im delighted to be in beautiful savannah. I have been asked to speak a little bit about myself, to say what role books have played in my life and how i first became interested in writing. I think the important thing to begin with is that i was born in 1937 and have, therefore, seen some pretty important changes in american life. I graduated from Radcliffe College in 1959 which means i had a harvard education. I wish id studied more and enjoyed myself less. [laughter] after college i had a terrific job as a reporter at life magazine, the job i loved even though i was paid less than a man doing the same work. Life is probably where i first thought about writing as a career. But part of being born in 1937 meant that most young women with College Degrees got interesting, if illpaying jobs, and then quit to get married. I gave up life because my first husband wished me to. I did not work again for 15 years. Ive been married twice. My first husband was a film director, and my second husband was a journalist, Foreign Correspondent and editor. I have two wonderful children and two delightful grandchildren. Because i was basically an only child with a mother who was a voracious reader, books have always played an enormous part in my life as i traveled in the summers with my mother. I dont see how i could have gotten through childhood and adolescence without books. From dr. Doolittle and nancy drew to 17th summer and the catcher in the rye which the housemaker in my Quaker Boarding School confiscated from my room as unsuitable. [laughter] i remember certain great traveling book moments. For example, reading moby dick straight through nonstop on a train from new york to california, which may be the best way to read moby dick. [laughter] discovering a new favorite, h. G. Wells, because he was the only englishlanguage author in the library of a french transatlantic liner. And arriving in london from school in new york to have my mother greet me by immediately thrusting a book into my hands and saying you have to read this. It was the first james bond. [laughter] i have been asked about my life and letters and what inspired my latest book. The idea of a life in letters amuses me because it makes me think of brilliant and probe lick people who write prolific people who write all day and talk about books all night. My life in letters has been sporadic, intermittent and late. My first book was published in 1986. My second book was published in 2001, and my third book was published in 2016. I clearly have not had a life in letters. But all three of my books have been inspired by the same impulse; family stories. My first book, the hornes, was inspired by objects found in my grandfathers trunk of family momentos. My second book, american patriots, was inspired by my great uncle who died as an officer in the first world war. And my third and current book tells the story of the black calhouns of atlanta, the horne founding family. Who are the black calhouns . They were an extended, atypical africanamerican family who from 1865 to 1965, north and south, were also typically more than in their dreams is and aspirations. They were typically american because their founding father, my great great grandfather, moses calhoun, implicitly believed in the american dream. Although he was a slave until he was 35, he was culturally, geographically and historically lucky. He was lucky because despite laws mandating illiteracy for blacks, he had been educated in slavery. His owner, andrew pone that part bonaparte calhoun, a cowz sin of cousin of john c. Calhoun, wanted a literate butler and was powerful enough to ignore the laws. Moses wuss gee graphicically lucky because he lived on a town in a town and not on a plantation. And he was historically lucky because amendments to the constitution gave him everything he needed for luck in freedom. Besides the 13th amendment which made him truly free, the 14th ghei him equality under gave him equality under the law, and the 15th gave him the vote. He was, therefore, an american citizen with all the rights of every other american citizen. As an enterprising and intelligent man, moses took advantage of everything that reconstruction had to offer. I dont know what would have happened to my great, great grandfather without reconstruction, but with it he was able to create a successful life for himself and his family and to utilize his skills and abilities to amass enough money and property so that in 1886, 20 years after the end of the war, the atlanta constitution would call him the wealthiest colored man in atlanta. The black calhouns, moses and his mother and sister, had a sort of Family Business andrew calhoun. Moses was a butler, his mother was the cook, and his sister was the nursemaid. They were considered favorite slaves. A. B. Calhoun appeared to be a benevolent and generous owner. After the war he deeded process to moses mother and sister. The story of the black calhouns is the story of the family of moses whose descendants would prosper in the north, and the family of moses sister whose descendants stayed and prospered in atlanta. From 1865 to 1965, the black calhouns lived through the civil rights century. Surely the most volatile American Century of all. It was both a wonderful and a terrible century for black americans. On the one hand, it was a century of freedom, aspiration and achievement. On the other hand, for most the freedom was ephemeral except for a lucky few. The doors of as ration and achievement were closed aspiration and achievement were closed. American slaves were field without compensation, preparation. Americas emancipation compared to britains, for example, was badly done. Britain compensated the slave owners and mandated education for the exslaves. Reconstruction officially only lasted ten years, but its spirit was indelibly engraved on all the psyches of the black calhouns through the generations. They not only believed in america, but believed they had a role to play in the progress of their country and community. As might be expected, the black calhouns moved north to full fill their aspirations to fulfill their aspirations and achieve success. Less expected, perhaps, those who stayed in atlanta had equally successful and aspirational lives. In some ways, even more successful. Obviously, in many aspects life in the north was easier than life in the south. Northern parents could raise their children where there were no whitesonly signs on libraries, museums and parks. But high achievement was the norm on both sides of the family with interesting differences. Northern achievement tended to be political and public while sour achievement tended to be professional and private. The other differences were personal. Among the black calhouns, northern marriages tended to be up happy and families can unhappy and families more dysfunctional with more divorce, adultery, etc. , while southern marriages were longer lasting and seemed to be happier. My personal theory is with fewer social and political choices and opportunities, southerners turned inwards towards family, church and community while northerners had more choices, they also had more temptations. Moses calhoun waited until he was free to marry. At 36 he found a bride who was 15 years younger, looked white and had been born in free had been born free in new orleans. The two with beautiful daughters, cora and lena calhoun, were both highly educated in the socalled missionary schools that sprang up all over the old confederacy after the war. Sponsored by white northern philanthropists and mostly staffed by white northern teachers, these schools and colleges instilled confidence as well as rigorous academics into their students who were being trained to become the first black teachers in the south. Cora graduated from Atlanta University, and lena graduated from fisk in nashville, tennessee, where a massachusetts youth named w. E. B. Dubois, known as willie, who was prepping for harvard fell hopelessly in love with her. Back in the mountains of massachusetts where duboises family had lived in freedom since colonial days, young willie was both the star student and the star athlete, but he had never before seen such confident young men or beautiful girls as he saw in the south. And he was bowled over by what he described in his autobiography as the rosy, apricot beauty of 16yearold lena calhoun of atlanta. Duboise famously named his famous black teachers to be the talented tenth, the 10 of the negro race whose job was to uplift the other 90 . Both calhoun girls married successful young men, breaking willie duboises heart, lena married a slightly older fisk graduate, and later in the classic black middle class way being something of a renaissance man, a successful ophthalmologist in chicago. Her older sister, cora, married edward horne, the adonis of the negro press. And their cousin, the daughter of moses sister, married a graduate of Atlanta University who became the very prosperous and highly respected first black licensed Real Estate Broker in atlanta. Well, cora and lena calhoun and their husbands moved north in the wake of plessy v. Ferguson, the Supreme Court decision that entrenched white supremacy. Their cousins family stayed in atlanta to remain pillars of the black community. Cora and edwin horne moved to new york city to raise their four sons, two of whom were born in the north in stillzillionbucolic brooklyn. Edwin became a democrat and a tamny man, writing pamphlets for the 1910 election that leapt black men for the first time to lead the Republican Party and elect a democrat as governor of new york. Edwins successful work on behalf of black tamny also won new york its first black National Guard unit. It became the famous 369th regiment known as harlems own, the most highly decorated American Unit in the first world war. Although it fought in french uniforms under the french flag because racist president Woodrow Wilson did not want blacks to bear arms for america. Coras oldest son, Second Lieutenant err roll horne, a veteran of the poncho via campaign, died in the war. Not in battle, but in the 1918 influenza pandemic. Black life in the south was also touched by the world war. The granddaughter of moses sister married a young medical officer, a wartime captain who became one of the most beloved members of atlantas black community and the father and grandfather of three more. More three more doctors. While life in the south remained difficult for blacks in general, for some atlanta blacks in particular, life was very good, indeed. A Business Culture rather than a planter culture, atlanta always had one eye on northern investment. While it punished certain black political aspirations, it rarely punished black business aspirations. Atlanta remained a good place for enterprising and familyoriented blacks. Cora horne, a true member of the talented tenth, came into her own during the war as a red cross organizer, as secretary of the brooklyn urban league, as a direct or of the big brothers and being sisters federation where she was a mentor to the very young paul robison and an appointee to the brooklyn victory committee. The war years were coras slow years. The former suffragist really became an activist in the 1920s after she got the vote. Meanwhile, in 1919 she made her granddaughter, lena horne, the child of her second son known as ted, a lifetime member of the naacp at the age of 2. [laughter] cora was a busy woman, and edwin horne was a successful man, but they had an unhappy marriage. Handsome and debonair, edwin was known to have a lady friend in manhattan. His son, my grandfather ted, also had an unhelp marriage despite baby lena. Both of my mothers young parents decentered her before she was 2. Deserted her before 2. After making a small killing on the black sox scandal of 1919, ted horne left his job to pursue easy money on the fringes of the rackets while lenas mother, a member of an old black brooklyn family originally from massachusetts, left to pursue an unsuccessful theatrical career. Until she was 6 years old, little lena horne lived in brooklyn with her grandparents where her grandmother never spoke to her husband except to say, good morning, mr. Horne. Postwar black life in the north changed radically in the 1920s. Now a voter, cora horne became a republican activist certainly for historical reasons, but possibly to annoy her tamny activist husband. [laughter] she campaigned for Calvin Coolidge in the 1924 election as a member of the Speakers Bureau for the Republican Party, and as a National Organizer and secretary of the Eastern Division of the Republican National womens auxiliary. Something else happened in the 1920s. Suddenly, harlem was envogue. Not just in new york, but around the world. Harlems sudden vogue stemmed from a combination of reasons. From the fact that harlem nightclubs, protected by a compliant mayor, happily ignored prohibition to the discovery of african tribal art in former german colonies which caused picasso to change the faces of his painting [inaudible] into cubist masks to a smash broadway show could shuffle along, a fastpaced show with a hit dance called the charleston. To a whole new group of black points and novelists including coras third son, frank horne. Known as the family intellectual, frank horne became a prizewinning poet and young second tier member of harlem renaissance. In typical black middle class family, he also had a day job. Like his uncle, he was a practicing harlem ophthalmologist. In the mid 1920s, frank went south for the first time to become dean and first black acting president of an Industrial College in georgia that could have been the model for the college in Ralph Ellisons invisible man. Frank wrote home about his new southern experience. Im initiated into the negro race. From now on im the interrer of side doors and back doors and sometimes no door at all. Meanwhile, cora hornes southern cousin and her daughters married to prosperous husbands were also club women but of a very different nature. Middle class black southern women concentrated on selfimprovement rather than dogooding or uplifting the race which could be dangerous occupations in the 1920s south. They formed circles to discuss horticulture, literature and foreign travel, but politics were forbidden, and dogooding was done strictly through atlantas first congregational church. Coras granddaughter, little lena, now had her own First Southern experience. In 1923 lenas errant mother, touring the south as an actress, wanted her daughter with her but mostly left her with strangers. Lena now became an object of contention between her mother and grandmother, pulled between her secure brooklyn life and wherever her mother was in the south. So young lena, who went to an [inaudible] Nursery School and a Roman Catholic Primary School in brooklyn, now attended oneroom southern schoolhouses where the other children always hated her. In 1927, however, lenas life changed completely when her mother eloped to havana with a white cuban military officer. For the next two years, lena remained in the south, happy at last, living next to her uncle franks english teacher fiancee in the glirls dorm. Frank himself would be rescued from back doors of the south in the next decade by an invitation to join fdrs socalled black cabinet as assistant director of the division of Negro Affairs in the new deals National Youth administration. In 1929 lena left the south and went back to brooklyn permanently where her beloved grandfather took her to museums and to the theater. She was so smitten by fred astaire on broadway that she asked for and received singing and dancing lessons, both leading to starring roles in middle class black brooklyns young amateur theatrics as well as notice in the black press. Everything or changed for lena in 1932, however, when cora horne died and her mother returned from cuba with her husband, now a refugee from the latest revolution who spoke no english. Needing money, lenas mother took her out of Girls High School to audition for the chorus of the world famous cotton club, a big, glamorous, mobrun showcase of black talent for allwhite audiences in the middle of a black community. Lenas father ted was one of the rare blacks allowed in to see the show because his best friend, a former world war i black officer, was now the numbers king of harlem. Lena, 16 years old and beautiful whose mother protected her virtue by sitting in the dressing room every night, was also famously protected by the black mob. By 1935, however, lena was ready to move on. Against the wishes of the cotton club, lenas mother spirited her away to boston to sing with noble sis el society orchestra, meaning black musicians playing white music at the ritz carlton hotel. It was the first black orchestra, and she was the first black singer to appear at bostons ritz. Lena sang blue moon in a white dress and won a harvard fan club who came every night. Lena, 19 years old and tired of show business as well as her mother hovering in the dressing room, took a vacation on her own to visit her father who now lived in pittsburgh where he owned a small hotel with a discreet, private gambling den. In pittsburgh she met and married my father whose older lawyer brothers were important in democratic ward politics. Lena was now a young housewife who made occasional forays into show business, mostly because her husband who played high stakes bridge and unknown to lena never gave up his former girlfriend needed the money. Despite the birth of my baby brother, little teddy, lena, finally aware of louis philandering, called an end to the marriage leaving the children with her father and ten mother in 1940, she went back to new york to look for work. Level at the harlem ywca, lena had the calhoun luck. Charlie barnett, one of the most popular of the big bands whose hit 1940 records cherokee was looking for a black singer. Lena made wellreceived recordings with both barnett and artie shaw. Barr nyet, shaw and Benny Goodman were the only big band leaders who hired black singers or musicians. But lena was tired of bands and hated touring. She wanted to be in new york with her children. She now got another career break, singing at cafe society in greenwich village. Cafe society was unique in its day. Besides presenting extraordinary young talents like billy holday, it was the only integrated night club outside of harlem with black patrons as well as black performers. Lena was an enormous hit. Unbeknown to most of the performers and patrons, however, cafe society was a fundraising outlet for the thenlegal communist party usa as the American Communist Party was known. If she had known, lena doubtless would not have carried. She did not know a communist from a republican. [laughter] but in the 1950s, every performer who appeared at cafe society would be blacklisted. Now, however, she was able to bring me and little teddy to new york where we all entered her childhood brooklyn home. Little teddys visit was shortlived, however. Louis cruel divorce agreement stipulated that i would live with my mother while teddy lived with our father. But my mother and i were soon to move even farther away. Because of her cafe society success, lena had received an offer from hollywood not for the movies, but from a new nightclub called the little trock. Once again, she was an overnight sensation. One man who came night after night was mgms roger eden, the man who discovered judy garland. Talent and beauty won lena a longterm hollywood contract, the first in hollywood for a black performer. But it might not have happened without world war ii. Lena arrived in hollywood the same time that walter white and the naacp and 1940 republican president ial candidate Wendell Willkie began their campaign with hollywood producers to eliminate degrading, racist stereotypes of people of color including negroes, asians and latins for the sake of wartime allies. Thus, lena whose contract partly brokered by her father stipulated no servant or jungle roles was almost singlehandedly expected to prove to the allies that america, unlike germany and japan, was not a racist country. So lena became known as the first black movie star. She became the first black member of the board of the Screen Actors Guild and the first black person to appear on the cover of a movie magazine. Despite allies of color, however, her scenes were always isolated from the main portion of the movie so that they could easily be cut out of the picture whenshown in the south. In fact when it was shown in the south. In fact, she was cut out of every picture she ever made in hollywood except for two when they were shown in the south. Unless the cast was all black, the southern rules stipulated that blacks in movies could only be shown as servant types. Nightclubs continued to be hugely theatrical venues for lena, from harlems cotton club to bostons ritz carlton to greenwich villages cafe society to hollywoods little trock. And now in 1942, while she was waiting for her first movie to be released, she became the first black entertainer to appear at manhattans very elegant savoy plaza hotel. Once again, she was an overnight sensation, so well noticed that she was features in time, life and newsweek all in the same february 1943 week. Nightclubs gave lena recognition, but world war ii made her a star. Black g. I. S needed a pinup, and lena was always embarrassed that she was the only one. While two atlanta cowz to sips married tuskegee airmen, lena was chosen as queen of the 99th pursuit squadron, their combat arm. She toured black army camps but was kicked out of the uso for refusing to sing at a camp in arkansas where black g. I. S were forced to sit behind german prisoners of war for her show. Her grandmother would have been proud. The postwar years saw many changes in lenas life. One door was shut and others were opened. By 1947 her movie career was essentially over, but her nightclub and live performing career went from strength to strength. In 1947 she went to europe for the first time. She had Great Success touring the still wartorn british isles. Shed built in fans though cabin in the sky and Stormy Weather were unfit for g. I. S, theyd been deemed approved for the british fleet. She married her second husband, lenny hayden, a white mgm conductor composer arranger who became a wonderful stepfather to me. They came home to find the blacklist which began in 1947 with the hollywood ten. All screen writers and former communist Party Members who went to prison for refusing to testify before a congressional committee. The blacklist ultimately touched all professions and walks of life. Lena was finally named in 1950 when she was listed and red channeled. Lenas crimes included her appearance at cafe society and especially her friendship with two men, w. E. B. Dubois and paul robison. Because they were actually her grandparents friends, the relationships were more dutiful than political. Hollywood communists had, indeed, wooed lena, but paul robison, in fact, warned her against them m. In reality, lena was one of the luckier blacklisted artists. Although banned from network tv for ten years, her nightclub career and International Touring career never suffered. In the days before tv kept people home at night, she remained one of the highest paid performers, nightclub performers in the world. By 1957 she was cleared by the blacklisters and starring in jamaica, a hit broadway musical. Broadway, by the way, basically ignored the blacklist. Lena wasnt the only black calhoun to be suspect. Frank horne came under his own blacklisting cloud in washington where he was investigated by the Civil Service Loyalty Board as a founder of the National Committee against discrimination in housing. Supposedly ferreting out unamericanism, blacklisting was also an excuse for racism and antisemitism. Appropriately enough, the modern Civil Rights Era began in 1960 at cora hornes alma mater. In april 1960 a fullpage ad appeared in the atlanta constitution. We, the students of the six affiliated institutions forming the Atlanta University center, have joined our hearts, minds and bodies in the cause of gaining those rights which are inherently ours as members of the human race and as citizens of these united states. We must say in all candor that we plan to use every legal and nonviolent means at our disposal to secure full Citizenship Rights as members of this great democracy of ours. That same year a Young Atlanta cousin, moses calhouns great, great grand niece, was chosen to be one of the desegregaters of an Atlanta High School until her mother, fearing the traumatic upheaval surrounding the integration of little roxanne [inaudible] high school had second thoughts and sent her daughter to a massachusetts boarding school. Meanwhile, in the north lena threw herself into the Civil Rights Movement. She and Frank Sinatra produced a famous twonight Carnegie Hall benefit, one night of which benefited the student nonviolent coordinating committee, the youth branch of the southern christian leadership conference. Lena went to jackson, mississippi, on behalf of the naacp, the organization which she had been enrolled at the age of 2, to join medgar evers at a Voting Rights rally two days before he was assassinated. She went to the march on washington wearing her naacp cap, and she recorded a civil rights song called now that was banned from the radio in several states. The enemies of civil rights had very powerful weapons at their disposal, but the Civil Rights Movement won the high moral ground early, and the long arc of justice ultimately turned towards the american blacks. The larger and more systemic aspects of official racism were defeated in what could be called a second civil war. It was a strange war waged on one side by churches, children and young people and waged on the other by murderers, there arists, snarling dogs and fire hoses. Despite assassinations and too many martyrs, Voting Rights were achieved, and jim crow was officially dismantled. By 1973 the thety of atlanta the city of atlanta, the city that famously became too busy to hate, had a black mayor, and former students of the Atlanta University manifesto were now in charge of the municipality. Although the 1970s were personally mournful years for lena who lost her father and husband and son between 1971 and 1972, the 1980s saw another extraordinary change in the career of moses calhouns great granddaughter. She opened in a onewoman broadway show that brought her every honor and accolade known in the theater. The 1980s were a decade of horns for black calhouns north and south. In march 1981, the same month that saw lenas triumphant broadway return, dr. Homer nash, the great grandson of moses sister, died at the age of 94. In the words of the atlanta constitution, dr. Ohio her nashs ho her gnashs death ends in error. He was the longest practicing black doctor in georgia and the longest practicing doctor of any race in atlanta. You could call the black calhouns lucky, but they were never selfish achievers. They shared their Bountiful Gifts and achievements with their community and their country. It is fair to say the black call kinds is as much the story of america as it is of a family. Thank you. [applause] oh, i move down for questions . [inaudible] anybody have questions . You come to the center . The microphone is here. [inaudible] i can hear you, yes. [laughter] i grew up in flatbush. Where did you live . Well, i was born in pittsburgh, and i grew up in california, but my mother grew up on chauncey street in bedford stuyvesant. It was then called stuyvesant heights. Right. And it, she grew up on chauncey street. She went to brooklyn Girls High School, and she went to Catholic Church in brooklyn. She was a total she adored brooklyn. She was a total brooklyn girl. I grew up in the 30s and 40s in brooklyn which were great years yes. To grow up in brooklyn. Thank you very much. Thank you. Any other nonbrooklyn questions or [laughter] id like to know what favorite story you have with your mother. Oh, of my mother . Oh, my goodness. Thats a difficult question. Well, the james bond story is one of them, because she didnt even, like, say hi. She just said youve got to read this book when i walked in the door. So thats one of my favorites. She was a good, a fun mother. We had fun. I mean, i didnt see her all the time, but when i saw her which was always on summer vacation, christmas, big holidays it was total fun. So that was a good part. Yes. You come to the microphone . The microphone is off, we couldnt hear you. Its on now. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible] [laughter] aside from james bond, what was your mothers favorite reading she loved reading histories, especially french history. She knew about all the queens of france. Yes, loved that. And she was a voracious reader because she always felt she was uneducated because her mother took her out of school at the age of 16, put her in the cotton club. And she always everybody around her was so bright, she felt, and she was really uneducated, and so she read and read. She was selftaught, basically. I mean, though shed had in a funny way, in the south she was the teachers pet even though the children hated her. They hated her accent, everything about her. But she was always the teachers pet, so she didnt really receive a bad education. Thank you for your question. Would you please repeat the questions . We cant hear them. Would you share the way your mother did Stormy Weather during her onewoman show . I saw the lady in the music . Stormy weather two times [inaudible] yes, yes. The question is why or how did my mother sing Stormy Weather twice in her onewoman broadway show . She did it twice because she sang it the first time the way she was told to sing it in the hollywood which always said, lena, pretty lips, lena. She was you always sang, you spoke to the sound recording, and you had to make your face very perfect. And she was always told to think of irene dunn. [laughter] so the second time she sang it in the show was how she would sing it herself at her age then. So it was a much richer, fuller version. And the critics all noticed that. [inaudible] [laughter] brought down the house. And about 5 minutes later she 45 minutes later she said now heres the real [laughter] thank you. [applause] any other questions . Well, i hope youre going to buy books [inaudible] very little. [laughter] i sing christmas carols, thats about it. Finish. [laughter] so i think were going to go across the street. [applause] thank you. [applause]
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