Speaker 1: Hey, y'all, Eve's here. I know you're ready to get
Speaker 1: into this episode, but really quick. We have been loving
Speaker 1: connecting with y'all over black storytelling, and if you've really
Speaker 1: been loving the show, then we would really appreciate it
Speaker 1: if you would leave us a rating and review, subscribe
Speaker 1: to the show, and share it with your friends. Thanks y'all,
Speaker 1: Now time for the episode. On Theme is a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
Speaker 2: In the past couple of years, I've talked to a
Speaker 2: bunch of people while reporting my book about black bookstores
Speaker 2: pro to the people out early twenty twenty five. One
Speaker 2: of those people is Brother y'all or Hokee S. Lover
Speaker 2: the Third.
Speaker 3: My name is Brother Yao Hope Gus Glover the Third.
Speaker 3: I'm chair of the Language, Literature and Cultural Studies program
Speaker 3: at Buois State University. I've written two books of poetry,
Speaker 3: and prior to working at the university, I was the
Speaker 3: co owner of Caibu Books, one of the nation's largest
Speaker 3: book stores.
Speaker 2: At one point, Brother y'all co owned the most successful
Speaker 2: black bookstore chain in the country, Caribou Books, Kaboo Clothes,
Speaker 2: and the Late Oats. We're on that in prose Now.
Speaker 2: Brother y'ao is up at Bouoi State in Maryland and
Speaker 2: the co author of Crazy as Hell, a refreshing, insightful,
Speaker 2: and irreverend take on African American history. Crazy as Hell
Speaker 2: just came out this week, and what struck me most
Speaker 2: about it was how funny it was. As a student
Speaker 2: of black history, I found it. It's often taught in
Speaker 2: somber and CPA tones, and of course some of it
Speaker 2: is somber, but some of it is funny, some of
Speaker 2: it is poignant, and some of it makes you go,
Speaker 2: I'll come on now, wait a damn it.
Speaker 1: Today on our show, we're sharing the mic with archivists
Speaker 1: from across the country and archivists who give us stories
Speaker 1: that they're tired, they're poor, and they're blackfishing musicians. On
Speaker 1: today's episode, we're passing the mic to authors and archivists
Speaker 1: to hear their take on little known black history. I'm
Speaker 1: Eves and I'm Katie. Today's episode Archive Alive. Here's a
Speaker 1: crazy as Hell story about a crazy as Hell rebel,
Speaker 1: read by Yau.
Speaker 3: Not much is known about Denmark Vessey. We do know
Speaker 3: that he was a literate slave, like another of our
Speaker 3: craziest hell heroes, not Turner, and we know that more
Speaker 3: than one hundred years later, a white supremacist would slaughter
Speaker 3: nine people at Vessy's church, mother, emmanuel A and me
Speaker 3: and Charleston, South Carolina. You can look it up if
Speaker 3: you want to to know more about the connection. Denmark
Speaker 3: VESSI won the powerball on the South Carolina State lottery
Speaker 3: in eighteen hundred, purchases freedom and began stockpiling weapons and
Speaker 3: organizing folks for a slave vote. Of course we're kidding.
Speaker 3: There wasn't a power ball back then, but the rest
Speaker 3: is true. At the age of thirty two, Vessy purchased
Speaker 3: his freedom with six hundred dollars after winning fifteen hundred
Speaker 3: dollars in the lottery. Think about that. Black folks played
Speaker 3: their numbers today, trying to win the lottery so they
Speaker 3: can purchase their economic freedom. Vessey's real claim to fame
Speaker 3: and what makes him crazy as hell, was his organizing
Speaker 3: what many considered to be the largest plan for a
Speaker 3: slave revolt in the history of the country. It is
Speaker 3: said that as he planned a revolt, Vessey even sent
Speaker 3: word to Haiti to begin to set up international relations.
Speaker 1: And that's just one of mini profiles that Hoak and
Speaker 1: his co author Via four Prince include in the book
Speaker 1: Crazy as Hell is organized into different archetypes. Here's y'ao.
Speaker 3: This idea of framing who black people people are with
Speaker 3: archetypes is really the way we get out of the oppositions.
Speaker 3: That's at the core of like the way we view race.
Speaker 3: Because a problem with black history is Black history is
Speaker 3: usually white people are just so important in Black history
Speaker 3: because of the oppositions, because of the binary. But the
Speaker 3: solution is to create archetypes within black history so that
Speaker 3: when black people are reading Black history, they're not simply
Speaker 3: looking at themselves as opposed to whites. But now they
Speaker 3: can say, I'm like the badass, I'm like the lawless,
Speaker 3: I'm like the funky, I'm like these particular people in
Speaker 3: Black history, And so that decenters this whole idea of
Speaker 3: the importance of white people when we're telling a Black
Speaker 3: history story.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this was one of my favorite profiles and Crazy
Speaker 2: as Hell, and I also think it shows like y'all fed,
Speaker 2: like black people are still playing the lottery hoping to
Speaker 2: get free. You know, it's not a different level, but
Speaker 2: you know, I'll be looking at that little mega a
Speaker 2: million sign and imagine in my life as a free woman.
Speaker 1: And you're not the only one, okay, and you know
Speaker 1: what else? What else? I would also take up arms
Speaker 1: that part too. It is aspirational when you look up
Speaker 1: at that sign and you're like that could be me.
Speaker 1: But yes, as a means of economic freedom, it's not
Speaker 1: just like we're doing this just for shits and gigs.
Speaker 1: It's like we're actually trying to survive. And yes, it
Speaker 1: is a hoarding of wealth, like it's far more wealth
Speaker 1: than we would actually need to persist. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I feel like in a way, yes it's more than
Speaker 1: we need, but it could feel like an accumulation of
Speaker 1: all of the wealth that we didn't have over time
Speaker 1: and what we're owed. So technically it is what we
Speaker 1: need to survive well.
Speaker 2: And in Denmark Vessi's case, I mean, I don't know
Speaker 2: the translation in today's money, but he took that money
Speaker 2: and was like, I'm talking piling weapons. I'm getting in
Speaker 2: contact with Haiti and we're going to free more than
Speaker 2: just me, which I just really respect, Like, you know,
Speaker 2: you got to take folks with you, and I think
Speaker 2: that's what people are really scared of, like when black
Speaker 2: people not only get it for themselves but help other
Speaker 2: people get it too.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean that money clearly is enough to go
Speaker 1: beyond his own reach. And that was only half of
Speaker 1: the money that he had. Yeah, I think lesson half,
Speaker 1: lesson half.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So amusing. Yeah. And you know, in addition to
Speaker 2: speaking to people like brother Y'ao, I also found myself
Speaker 2: in different archives across the country while researching parts of
Speaker 2: the People. I was at the Shawanberg and Harlem, the
Speaker 2: Auburn Avenue Research Library in Atlanta. I've worked with Afro
Speaker 2: Charities at Baltimore, So I was all over the place
Speaker 2: and I had this new found like appreciation and respect
Speaker 2: for the archivist I encountered. So I found some funny
Speaker 2: stuff in the archives. I found people's bills passed due
Speaker 2: then running from their bill collectors, the law everybody. And
Speaker 2: I was wondering, like, what other funny things that are
Speaker 2: out there that these archivists who spend a lot of
Speaker 2: time helping people find things, like people like me researching books,
Speaker 2: are just doing their own research.
Speaker 1: What else is in there? So today we are passing
Speaker 1: the mic onto archivists to hear some of those stories
Speaker 1: more after the break.
Speaker 4: Up.
Speaker 2: Next, Britney Newberry, music and popular culture archivist at Georgia
Speaker 2: State University Library, she highlights a pioneering incident of auditory blackface.
Speaker 5: It started with a voicemail, a voicemail that took me
Speaker 5: back to nineteen forty four.
Speaker 4: Hello, I have a podcast and I am going to
Speaker 4: be featuring a song that Johnny Mercer had recorded called
Speaker 4: I Lost My Sugar in Salt Lake City.
Speaker 5: Savannah born and raised lyricist Johnny Mercer was voted the
Speaker 5: most popularly Young Colored Singer on the Radio from the
Speaker 5: Abraham Lincoln Junior Club, an all black organization based in Chicago.
Speaker 5: Johnny Mercer was soaring high. His radio program, Johnny Mercer's
Speaker 5: Chesterfield Music Shop, was sponsored by Chesterfield Cigarettes. Johnny songs Jeepers,
Speaker 5: Creepers and One for My Baby and One More for
Speaker 5: the Road received acclaim and he was writing songs for
Speaker 5: films and musicals. He would later go on to write
Speaker 5: lyrics for Grammy and Oscar, winning songs like Moon River
Speaker 5: and The Days of Wine and Roses. According to the
Speaker 5: ad execs for this radio show, this award for most
Speaker 5: Popular Young Colored Singer on the Radio, certainly must be
Speaker 5: his signal honor. But there was a problem. Johnny Mercer
Speaker 5: was white. There was no evidence indicating he gave the
Speaker 5: award back due to the error or even wreck.
Speaker 1: Did the mistake? And why is that?
Speaker 5: How did this happen? I go back to the voicemail.
Speaker 5: As Georgia State's music and popular culture artists, I received
Speaker 5: various requests from people looking for something in the archives.
Speaker 5: Can I get a copy of the sheet music for
Speaker 5: this song or that song? What information do you have
Speaker 5: on the Atlanta Symphony Youth Orchestra. Can I see the
Speaker 5: performance contracts you have from the Atlanta International Pop Festival?
Speaker 5: And on and on, And this day was no different.
Speaker 5: The caller was looking for information on the song I
Speaker 5: Lost My Sugar in Salt Lake City, sung by Johnny Mercer.
Speaker 5: According to the researcher, the original recording had a unique
Speaker 5: change to it that was not present in other recordings,
Speaker 5: a distinct patter section in the middle of the song.
Speaker 1: Salt Lake City is renowned for its beauty.
Speaker 3: The snowcapped Washsatch Mountains are nearby.
Speaker 5: After returning the call, the research question came down to this,
Speaker 5: did Johnny Mercer sing like he was black, and is
Speaker 5: the power section of this song evidence of that. I
Speaker 5: put my archivist hat on and I went searching, pulling
Speaker 5: boxes and searching folders, and I found the original correspondence
Speaker 5: and postcard notifying him of winning the award. It's one sentence.
Speaker 5: The Abraham Lincoln Junior Club of this city has this
Speaker 5: date voted you the most popular young colored singer on
Speaker 5: the radio. Harris Owens, secretary. The letter from the radio
Speaker 5: show AD executives called it the award for most Popular
Speaker 5: Singer on the Radio, leaving out colored. It even references
Speaker 5: receiving a lot of mail congratulating the AD company. He
Speaker 5: won the award in nineteen forty four, and the song
Speaker 5: was released in nineteen thirty four. I gave this information
Speaker 5: as well as copies of the lyrics, to the researcher
Speaker 5: and let them decide. Johnny Mercer was born in nineteen
Speaker 5: o nine to an upper class family. His family employed
Speaker 5: black housemaids, who sparked his interests in jazz and blues.
Speaker 5: As a child, he played with black friends and learned
Speaker 5: to speak Geechee, the African Creole dialect of Savannah. As
Speaker 5: a teenager, he listened to what were called Race records
Speaker 5: by Bessie Smith, Louis Armstrong, and Maul Rainey at the
Speaker 5: record stores in Savannah's Black business district. My job as
Speaker 5: an archivist is not to form and give my opinions,
Speaker 5: but to provide information so that researchers can make informed
Speaker 5: decisions and interpretations. So I invite you to do the same.
Speaker 5: Listen to I Lost My Sugar in Salt Lake City
Speaker 5: and other songs by Mercer and decide for yourself. Was
Speaker 5: Johnny Mercer part of the time honored American tradition of
Speaker 5: stealing from black people or was he simply influenced by
Speaker 5: the culture and people around him. What does it mean
Speaker 5: for him to win an award not meant for a
Speaker 5: white man? And what does it mean to sound black? Anyway?
Speaker 2: I Lost My Sugar in Salt.
Speaker 1: So what did you think about mister Mercer? Mister Mercer
Speaker 1: was giving contemporary times, Okay.
Speaker 2: He said, I mean, I don't know if he was
Speaker 2: ahead of his time, because you know, I wasn't you
Speaker 2: know around back then.
Speaker 1: Maybe they were just doing that. But I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: you would have fit in Yes, you would fit twenty four. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he was really trying hard to make himself seem like
Speaker 1: he was somebody who he was not.
Speaker 2: Okay, But here's the realty. And I spoke with Brittany
Speaker 2: about this, and for the record, Brittany absolutely disagreed with
Speaker 2: this take that I'm about to share. But I thought
Speaker 2: that the reason that he accepted this award is because
Speaker 2: he was passing. Okay, because, as she said that he
Speaker 2: grew up in Savannah. Yeah, was around the Gulla Geechee folks.
Speaker 2: We'll go to the black record store. She completely disagreed.
Speaker 2: She said he was from a very prominent family. Everybody
Speaker 2: knew his family, everybody knew they were white. But I'm like,
Speaker 2: that's exactly what a prominent white family would do. The
Speaker 2: mother would sneak off, have her a little black baby
Speaker 2: and be happy that it could pass. And he knew.
Speaker 2: And black people be clocking people that are passing. They
Speaker 2: don't be saying too much. They let them live, but
Speaker 2: they're like, I know you're black.
Speaker 1: Okay. So two things. One, I looked at a picture
Speaker 1: of him and I did wonder, not even gonna lie.
Speaker 1: I was like, these features be black, Yes they could.
Speaker 1: It was giving m a lota Okay. But my question
Speaker 1: for you is if the theory is that he was passing.
Speaker 1: Why would he want to out himself in a way
Speaker 1: by accepting the award as being a colored person.
Speaker 2: I think it's just like a little nod, a little wink,
Speaker 2: like yeah you saw me, okay, And cause it could
Speaker 2: be like ohl, like they think I'm black, they don't
Speaker 2: know I'm white, but really they know the truth.
Speaker 1: But Brittany said like that wasn't true.
Speaker 2: He was kind of one of those white people that
Speaker 2: were like hung out with other black musicians, but only
Speaker 2: because they were the quote unquote good blacks, and would
Speaker 2: say stuff like that, like little problematic things like that
Speaker 2: he was the most racist guy out there. But you
Speaker 2: know he wasn't no civil rights activist or anything like that, right,
Speaker 2: So that was my take on it. That's what I
Speaker 2: thought might be going on. But yeah, there's so many
Speaker 2: artists that be white and you think they're black.
Speaker 1: But is that on us or is said on them?
Speaker 1: Is that them being performatively black or is that just
Speaker 1: us not understanding that other people can like work within genres.
Speaker 2: I don't know, because nobody listening to himinem go think
Speaker 2: he's black even though he's in a black genre. Like
Speaker 2: no one's going to listen to that and be like,
Speaker 2: that's a black man, you know what I'm saying. So
Speaker 2: you can be in the genre and still sound white.
Speaker 1: I think that's tough because I mean, there are plenty
Speaker 1: of times when I hear people and I don't know
Speaker 1: what race they are, but you don't know what race
Speaker 1: they are.
Speaker 2: But I think there is a difference between being like, oh,
Speaker 2: I can't place this voice versus like, the way this
Speaker 2: person talks is like a black person.
Speaker 1: They're affecting a black dialect in their language and black intonation. Yes,
Speaker 1: and that's what mister Mercer was doing, I believe.
Speaker 2: So.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can see that. I mean, yes, he is
Speaker 1: an archetype or a prototype for all of the people
Speaker 1: who are doing that today because there are so many
Speaker 1: people in hip hop who do it. So I think
Speaker 1: there is also an element that the first time you
Speaker 1: hear somebody, unless they're like markedly white, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, Right, the first time you hear somebody performing rap,
Speaker 1: if they have a voice, even if they aren't putting
Speaker 1: on any sort of affects or dialects, you assume that
Speaker 1: they're black. Because it is a genre that we created
Speaker 1: and we are more prominent in it and more numerous.
Speaker 2: But Johnny Mercer's song wasn't a rap song. No, they
Speaker 2: thought the Lincoln Group, the All Boys, all African American group,
Speaker 2: thought he was black. But I do think that it's
Speaker 2: probably like something that occurred more during that time, because
Speaker 2: now we're like a very celebrity centric society, at least
Speaker 2: here in the United States. So if you hear somebody,
Speaker 2: you might go, you know, look them up, see who
Speaker 2: their kids are, see who their parents are, like, try
Speaker 2: to learn all these things about him. But if you
Speaker 2: just like hear a guy on the radio, like in
Speaker 2: the thirties, you're going to be like, okay, And that's
Speaker 2: kind of it. So it might be easier to mistake
Speaker 2: people's identities maybe race, maybe gender, and all all types
Speaker 2: of things you get confused because you just hear them
Speaker 2: on the radio and then go about your day.
Speaker 1: So I'm imagining Mercer as a child listening to records
Speaker 1: and loving them and not having a consciousness around race
Speaker 1: except for probably all the racist things that he was
Speaker 1: starting to be in viute with. But Brittany talked about
Speaker 1: how he listened to race records, and I'm thinking about
Speaker 1: how popular those were So I'm imagining Mercer listening to these,
Speaker 1: falling in love with them, hearing them around the house,
Speaker 1: having people, adults who were in his life, playing this,
Speaker 1: and he starts to sing that way, the same way
Speaker 1: as he heard other people sing. At some point I
Speaker 1: would imagine he developed a consciousness around race. Is it
Speaker 1: okay for him to continue to sing in that style
Speaker 1: of music regardless of race? Or should he have pulled
Speaker 1: back on trying to imitate those people that he might
Speaker 1: have considered people who really influenced the his style of
Speaker 1: singing as he got older and started putting out his
Speaker 1: own records.
Speaker 2: I mean it proved okay for him. He went on
Speaker 2: to be very successful. That wasn't the only award he
Speaker 2: was winning Chile. So other people liked it, and to
Speaker 2: be fair, I haven't you know, went and listened to
Speaker 2: his whole catalog. So maybe this is the only song
Speaker 2: where he let his little black percentage pop out, you know,
Speaker 2: so he could be founding like a regular white man
Speaker 2: and all his other discography. I don't know, but yeah,
Speaker 2: it was giving a precursor to Danny lay.
Speaker 1: Meme reference for the online girlies. Is that a meme?
Speaker 2: Oh, it's a white woman who's pretending to be a
Speaker 2: black woman. A singer, maybe R and B pop, but
Speaker 2: he was definitely laying the groundwork for the black fishing.
Speaker 1: So to answer Brittany's question, what does it mean to
Speaker 1: sound black anyway?
Speaker 2: I think it's not something that you can really like
Speaker 2: quantify with words. Yeah, do you think I sound black?
Speaker 1: No? Well, I feel like that's not the best.
Speaker 2: No, it's not.
Speaker 1: That's what was funny to me. Yeah. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's something.
Speaker 2: That you can truly quantify. And that's why AI will
Speaker 2: never replace humans.
Speaker 1: I think we have a special lay on it as
Speaker 1: black people though. Yeah, I think we know it better
Speaker 1: than anybody else what a black person would say or
Speaker 1: would sound like.
Speaker 2: Right, So that's why I'm saying that group that heard
Speaker 2: him and then gave him that award, I think they
Speaker 2: were really picking up on something that was, you know,
Speaker 2: underneath the surface.
Speaker 1: For our last story, we're getting into some no.
Speaker 6: No, I will go to jail behind this.
Speaker 1: That's after the break. Stay with us.
Speaker 6: My name is Tiffany Atwater Lee. I'm the head of
Speaker 6: Research Services at the Atlanta University Center Robert W. Woochef
Speaker 6: Libraries Archives Research Center. So I'm gonna tell a story
Speaker 6: about the widow of my favorite archable character here at
Speaker 6: the aec witch Off Library, and that is Miss Virginia Hope.
Speaker 6: Mister Virginia Hope was an organizer and a community activist,
Speaker 6: but she was also the wife of the first African
Speaker 6: American president of a Morehouse and Atlanta University, doctor John Hope.
Speaker 6: After his passing in nineteen thirty six, she did some
Speaker 6: interesting things to ensure that the legacy of her husband
Speaker 6: was maintained, and that included some controversy with the Atlanta
Speaker 6: University Center or the Atlanta University President. So around nineteen
Speaker 6: thirty seven, right after the passing of her husband, she
Speaker 6: starts to write about getting access to these personal files
Speaker 6: that her husband gave her keys to and said one
Speaker 6: day you may need these. And so she's writing to
Speaker 6: the president of the Board of Trustees, asking can I
Speaker 6: get these files? I've gotten some files from his personal secretary,
Speaker 6: but I know that there's more, like there has to
Speaker 6: be more, and so the Board of Trustees president can't
Speaker 6: really help, you know, he's the Board of Trustees president.
Speaker 6: And so she decides after about a year and a
Speaker 6: half of waiting and really not getting anywhere. She's just
Speaker 6: going to take them. So she bypasses the president at
Speaker 6: the time, and she goes to the administration building, the
Speaker 6: President's office when she knows that both the president his
Speaker 6: secretary as well as the former president in the interim
Speaker 6: period is not in the city of Atlanta, and she
Speaker 6: finds a custodian and she basically says, I left my
Speaker 6: person there. Can you help me get in there? And
Speaker 6: everybody knows Virginia Hope, she's the former first Lady, so
Speaker 6: they let her in. Then they start to get a
Speaker 6: little skeptical when they realize she has movers downstairs and
Speaker 6: so what the supervisor of the custodian is like, she's
Speaker 6: taking file cabinets. So he writes a telegram to the
Speaker 6: president of the university, who's rufus Clement at the time,
Speaker 6: and it's like Ms. Hope is stealing or not stilling.
Speaker 6: He didn't say stealing, he said she's taking these files,
Speaker 6: and so Clement stops his trip and hurries back to Atlanta,
Speaker 6: and of course the files are missing, and Leginia is ghost.
Speaker 6: He cannot find her. He is calling everywhere trying to
Speaker 6: find out. Luckily, he finds what moving company she used
Speaker 6: and goes to the moving company and says, you know,
Speaker 6: I get that she paid for this storage unit, so
Speaker 6: you can't give the materials to us, but can you
Speaker 6: limit access so she can't get in there until we
Speaker 6: find out essentially who owns these materials. So the movie
Speaker 6: company is like, sure, we can do that. So in
Speaker 6: this time, they're still trying to write to miss Hope
Speaker 6: get to understand where she is, and she's not answering anything.
Speaker 6: She eventually goes to the movers to try to sort
Speaker 6: through these materials herself, and the movers are like, no,
Speaker 6: you can't. You can't look at these files. So then
Speaker 6: she calls Clement. In that discussion, which he talks about
Speaker 6: in a correspondence to the President of the Board of Trustees,
Speaker 6: he basically says that missus Hope said, I didn't want
Speaker 6: to involve you in this because they had nothing to
Speaker 6: do with you. It was before your presidency, and these
Speaker 6: files belonged to us or to me and my family,
Speaker 6: and so he has said, you know, we can go
Speaker 6: through these files together and look through them and anything
Speaker 6: that belongs to the university. We keep anything that you
Speaker 6: need you have, and so she's like, no, no, I
Speaker 6: will go to jail behind this and I will lift
Speaker 6: everything out on the stand and for everyone to see it.
Speaker 6: If AU doesn't want that, you all need to go
Speaker 6: ahead and let me go through these materials myself. And
Speaker 6: so he's like no, He's still trying to compromise, and
Speaker 6: so at one point she says, I'll give you back
Speaker 6: the files if you change all the locks and you're
Speaker 6: the only person that can have the key, and so
Speaker 6: he's like, why would I do that when the only
Speaker 6: other people who would have access to this are the
Speaker 6: people who already had access to this, including your husband's
Speaker 6: former secretary. And so Virginia doesn't like that, so she
Speaker 6: basically stops talking to them again. So he's writing to
Speaker 6: the board of trustees and is like, we need to
Speaker 6: get these files back, but we don't want to cause
Speaker 6: a controversy because that could do a disservice to our
Speaker 6: institution as well as the reputation of Mishope, And so
Speaker 6: word starts to get out. There's even a telegram from
Speaker 6: the Pittsburgh Courier. They write to Clymt and is like,
Speaker 6: we heard y'all about the sue Virginia Hope, what's going on?
Speaker 1: With that.
Speaker 6: So they're going through this process and then someone has
Speaker 6: an idea stop Virginia's checks, don't let her get any
Speaker 6: pension from her husband. And so when they stop the checks,
Speaker 6: Virginia of course pops back up and so now she's
Speaker 6: willing to talk and say, okay, how can we get
Speaker 6: these files? And so, long story short, they decided to
Speaker 6: go ahead and have it where Leginia Son, the former
Speaker 6: secretary of her husband, as well as the President Rufus
Speaker 6: Clement go through these records and divide up the materials.
Speaker 6: Those that belong to doctor Hope goes back to his family,
Speaker 6: those that belong to AU stay with AU. After all
Speaker 6: of this, AU thinks that this was a victory. They're
Speaker 6: able to maintain the relationship with Missus Hope, They're able
Speaker 6: to not have any controversy, get out and get the
Speaker 6: files back. However, Virginia doesn't feel that way, and so
Speaker 6: she writes to a huge benefactor of AU and says, essentially,
Speaker 6: I just lost the will to fight, and so I
Speaker 6: just still feel like justice wasn't served and I don't
Speaker 6: have all of my materials. And the reason why this
Speaker 6: is such an important thing that I found was because
Speaker 6: all of this stuff was inaccessible. This was in a
Speaker 6: huge envelope marked with red stamps confidential, confidential, confidential. It
Speaker 6: said not to be used or looked at unless under
Speaker 6: the permission of the president of Atlanta University. And I
Speaker 6: found this back in let's say, maybe twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen,
Speaker 6: so you know, Atlanta University doesn't exist. It consolidated with
Speaker 6: Clark College back in nineteen eighty eight. So I'm like,
Speaker 6: what is this? So I'm looking through it, and essentially
Speaker 6: what I believe I have discovered are files that eventually
Speaker 6: become the John and Legenia Hope collection that is accessible
Speaker 6: on microphone, that we have that not only their personal
Speaker 6: relationships and personal papers, but also that of the institutions
Speaker 6: in which and organizations in which they were active members in.
Speaker 6: We also have materials related to the AU presidential records.
Speaker 6: And so to me, what this really signifies is one
Speaker 6: the ability for institutions to see humanity and understand this
Speaker 6: woman essentially just wanted her husband's papers, but also we're
Speaker 6: an organization. You can't just be still in our papers, right.
Speaker 6: And then there's also the understanding of at that time,
Speaker 6: this is nineteen thirty seven, nineteen thirty eight. Historically, black
Speaker 6: institutions are already kind of given side eyes, right their
Speaker 6: thought of as not being equipped or professional and things
Speaker 6: like of that nature. So if this got out, this
Speaker 6: really disturbed the reputation that they have been building. I mean,
Speaker 6: a woman literally walked out with two file cabinets from
Speaker 6: the President's office. But also I really like it because
Speaker 6: it kind of just shows, you know, Legia Hope has
Speaker 6: some position. Again, most importantly, it's providing access to these
Speaker 6: stories because they're everyone. Everyone has a story, maybe not
Speaker 6: where they stole papers from an administration building, but taking
Speaker 6: matters in their own hand and getting what they want,
Speaker 6: but also preserving the legacy of their loved ones for
Speaker 6: those who come after us.
Speaker 2: Okay, so put yourself in Mishope shoes. Okay, would you
Speaker 2: be ready to go to jail about some papers by
Speaker 2: your your late husband's papers?
Speaker 1: You know, I want to believe that I would. So
Speaker 1: I don't know if me saying yes I would would
Speaker 1: be the honest thing, Like I'm trying to imagine being
Speaker 1: in that time as well in doing it. But I
Speaker 1: want to say that I would you it. I feel
Speaker 1: like I would. So you are still from the university.
Speaker 1: I feel like I would, I'm my God, just because
Speaker 1: I know how like important my family's papers that I
Speaker 1: do have are to me now. I think because of
Speaker 1: the perspective that I have now, like I have so
Speaker 1: many of my mom's papers and she's not anymore. I
Speaker 1: cherish those papers. So I'm like wondering the links that
Speaker 1: I would go to to get them now, dealing with
Speaker 1: administrations and official things. I don't know that to be truthful,
Speaker 1: you know, whether I would do it, but because I
Speaker 1: do care about having papers, and I like collect old things,
Speaker 1: you know, I like to collect old things. I collect
Speaker 1: old things of people that I don't even know, So
Speaker 1: I feel like I might with asterisks maybe, well, what did.
Speaker 2: You think the papers would be like in like more
Speaker 2: I don't want to say, like safer hands, but maybe
Speaker 2: more like, I don't know, secure hands with the university,
Speaker 2: because the university is gonna outlive you, and you know,
Speaker 2: maybe even outlive anybody in your family who would care
Speaker 2: to keep up with these papers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's a valid point. I think from
Speaker 1: a sentimental perspective, not a logical one, though I might
Speaker 1: want to have them in my.
Speaker 2: Hands because I was asking Tiffany, I was like, why
Speaker 2: was she going to work for these papers? Like I
Speaker 2: don't think I'd be doing all that, you know, I
Speaker 2: truly don't think I would be doing all that. I
Speaker 2: was like, what was she doing? Like why was she
Speaker 2: doing this? So you know, where did these academic streets
Speaker 2: are that within these papers was evidence that he had
Speaker 2: a mistress or two.
Speaker 1: Between that story and the one you gave at the
Speaker 1: beginning about Mercer passing you, you really want some extra
Speaker 1: drama in these situations. You want a whole reality TV show.
Speaker 1: It's humans. Like that's the thing with archives.
Speaker 2: You think like, oh, these people are you know, these
Speaker 2: you know just historical figures. These are people and they
Speaker 2: were into some drama, and you gotta think like this
Speaker 2: upstanding lady, you know, well known in the community, well respected,
Speaker 2: you talk about I'll go to jail about this. Maybe
Speaker 2: why because you didn't want people know about them mistresses?
Speaker 1: So how did they already know about the mistresses? Though?
Speaker 1: So if this is word on the street, she just
Speaker 1: didn't want to have confirmation of them.
Speaker 2: No, we're in the academic streets. So people who like
Speaker 2: research after the five right, you know, if your man
Speaker 2: got a mistress because it was a mix of university
Speaker 2: papers and personal papers.
Speaker 1: That's one idea. I think I have no idea if
Speaker 1: that's true or not. But do you think that she
Speaker 1: would still go to those same lengths just for that,
Speaker 1: Like I don't know if we also know that the
Speaker 1: was Luginia's character, like she wouldn't have wanted that out there,
Speaker 1: that was something that was important to her. But do
Speaker 1: you think that she would have gone to those lengths
Speaker 1: to cover up personal misgivings like that, Like that would
Speaker 1: have justified her doing that still?
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, I don't know her personality, but just
Speaker 2: kind of thinking of like the time and like, you know,
Speaker 2: they're high society people and it's just like embarrassing. So
Speaker 2: I can definitely see this prim proper lady kind of
Speaker 2: being like, you know, you're.
Speaker 1: Still mourning your husband just died.
Speaker 2: You're like, I don't want everybody know like all his
Speaker 2: business like that, and then you know, by the transit
Speaker 2: of property my business.
Speaker 1: I was imagining the whole Mission Impossible theme in my
Speaker 1: head in the background of her going inside. I mean,
Speaker 1: she didn't even do a that she was basically just
Speaker 1: walked in and got them cabinet and said, can you
Speaker 1: let me? It's social engineering. People do it all the time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: just like ask for what you want.
Speaker 2: And then they were like, oh no, she's breaking the
Speaker 2: law now, but too scared to actually stop her.
Speaker 1: So hey, I left something in the room.
Speaker 2: You know something, But you don't play if like someone
Speaker 2: is afraid to stop you and you're clearly doing something wrong,
Speaker 2: you send it a telegram instead.
Speaker 1: She was on those people's heads.
Speaker 2: But yeah, now that which your library at the AAC
Speaker 2: has her husband's papers and her papers, so I'm sure
Speaker 2: there's there's more tea and drama throughout those archives to
Speaker 2: be discovered.
Speaker 1: But people can't access those papers, no they can.
Speaker 2: Yeah, sometimes when you go to the archives, you can
Speaker 2: tell that no one has seen or like looked in
Speaker 2: these boxes since they've been put in the boxes. Man
Speaker 2: Tiffany even said she found the folder and it was
Speaker 2: like wrapped up like top secret, like you know.
Speaker 1: Do not read. It's just like I gotta look, I
Speaker 1: gotta see what's going on. Blew the dust stuff got
Speaker 1: the asbestis going. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so there's so many things to still be discovered,
Speaker 2: even if they're in archives, and you know, catalogs and everything,
Speaker 2: and people just like don't look or like don't put
Speaker 2: two and two together.
Speaker 1: So yeah, they're available. I liked this story because it
Speaker 1: feels like it's kind of a microcosm of what you're
Speaker 1: saying here, is that if you go through the archives,
Speaker 1: you can find all these stories. And it's also about
Speaker 1: a person's archive of their life, and we get to
Speaker 1: see how Lucinia really cared for that archive, whether or
Speaker 1: not it was for scandalous reasons, like she cared for
Speaker 1: an archive and for like protecting the legacy of his
Speaker 1: work and the things that he said in his own words.
Speaker 1: So I really like this story for that perspective that
Speaker 1: she gave us.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like even if you don't agree with her methods,
Speaker 2: even if she broke the law, Yeah you know, it
Speaker 2: was passionate.
Speaker 1: Yeah it was. And sometimes passion trump's all. So the
Speaker 1: ends always justifies the means. Okay, ask for forgiveness, not permission. No,
Speaker 1: that's right.
Speaker 2: So next time you find yourself in an old library
Speaker 2: or museum, take a moment to slow down and really explore.
Speaker 2: You never know what quirky, poignant, or downright bizarre stories
Speaker 2: archives might hold. After all, as these authors and archivists
Speaker 2: have shown us the most fascinating histories are often the
Speaker 2: ones that have been tucked away patiently awaiting the right
Speaker 2: person to uncover them and share them with the world.
Speaker 2: And now it's time for role credits, the segment where
Speaker 2: we give credit to a person, place, or thing that
Speaker 2: we've encountered during the week eves. Who are what would
Speaker 2: you like to give credit to?
Speaker 1: I would like to give credit to the Black Archives
Speaker 1: in Amsterdam. I was only able to visit them for
Speaker 1: a little while when I was in Amsterdam recently, but
Speaker 1: I got to look through the books that they had
Speaker 1: a lot of them were in Dutch, so I could
Speaker 1: not read them. But they had a nice exhibit up there,
Speaker 1: and we're very friendly and yeah, they have loss of
Speaker 1: cool stuff to see and I think if you go
Speaker 1: with the group you can get a tour of the archives.
Speaker 1: The archives are not available for research, but it's nice
Speaker 1: to walk in. I think they do different exhibits there
Speaker 1: from time to time and host lot of events that
Speaker 1: are super interesting, so I like to give a shout
Speaker 1: out to them.
Speaker 2: I'd like to give credit to greeting cards, which is
Speaker 2: something you often find in archives. I used to be
Speaker 2: really into making greeting cards and giving them, and I
Speaker 2: was like, that's a practice that I want to pick up,
Speaker 2: not making them. Actually, I just want to pick up
Speaker 2: giving greeting cards for like different occasions, you know, like
Speaker 2: thinking of you, happy birthday.
Speaker 1: Of course, just hey, we're pals, like let's keep in
Speaker 1: touch type.
Speaker 6: Ye.
Speaker 1: It's the physical mail of it all.
Speaker 2: Whenever I get mail, it is junk mail and I
Speaker 2: am angry that I've gotten it, or it's a bill.
Speaker 2: You don't want those coupons. I don't want those coupons.
Speaker 2: I don't be going to bow Jangles. I don't need
Speaker 2: a Bogo thank you. But knowing that someone like sat down,
Speaker 2: thought of you, got a stamp put.
Speaker 1: It in the mail is really nice.
Speaker 2: So I think I want to get back into the
Speaker 2: practice of sending greeting cards.
Speaker 1: Cool, and we will see you next week. Bye. Hi.
Speaker 1: On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
Speaker 1: This episode was written by Eves Jeffco and Katie Mitchell.
Speaker 1: It was edited and produced by Tari Harrison. Follow us
Speaker 1: on Instagram at on Themeshow. You can also send us
Speaker 1: an email at Hello at on Theme dot show head
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