Speaker 1: Oh God, here we go.
Speaker 2: Nonam tom thumb thumb thumb.
Speaker 3: Sweet yes, Sweet Daddy Grace, wool sweete, sweet yeah, Sweet
Speaker 3: Daddy Grace.
Speaker 1: Hey, ain't in a shame. That's his name.
Speaker 2: It's not a shame, Daddy Grace. He comes in the morning,
Speaker 2: comes afternoon, comes in the d to get this fool.
Speaker 3: Sweet yeah, Sweet Daddy Grace.
Speaker 2: Hallelu yak ain't his name, He's got a name, Sweete.
Speaker 4: That's the voice of a civil rights activist in legend
Speaker 4: who for many years has lived in my hometown of
Speaker 4: New Bedford, Massachusetts. You may know him by the name
Speaker 4: he was given at his birth.
Speaker 2: My name is Jabriel Kazan, but my birth name is
Speaker 2: Ezelanda Blair Junior.
Speaker 5: As is is al Blair Junior.
Speaker 4: He was one of the four young black men known
Speaker 4: as the Greensboro for who in nineteen sixty walked into
Speaker 4: a Woolworths in the Jim Crow South and sat down
Speaker 4: at the lunch counter. Their sit in was a direct
Speaker 4: action protest of the store's policy of segregation in North
Speaker 4: Carolina and more largely the Deep South. This sit in
Speaker 4: is widely considered one of the mile markers of the
Speaker 4: movement for civil rights. I talked with Jabriel not only
Speaker 4: because of his legacy, but because of his own stories
Speaker 4: about Daddy Grace.
Speaker 2: Coreen. My mother was a country girl from southa the City,
Speaker 2: North Carolina. Mom gradu from high school, came to Greensboro.
Speaker 2: She live with a lady who attended Daddy Grace's church.
Speaker 2: So my mom went to see Daddy Grace at the church.
Speaker 2: So what was he like, Mama? She said, he was
Speaker 2: a very handsome man, plus that he could dress himmacreately,
Speaker 2: three piece soup like he was God. Men hold him
Speaker 2: on his shoulders and took him in. Wow. And then
Speaker 2: she said, Then I walked in the church and gets
Speaker 2: what I saw?
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 6: Mom?
Speaker 2: She said, five ten, twenty dollars bills on the floor
Speaker 2: and people were walking on to get the Daddy Grace step.
Speaker 5: I said, WHOA come talk to me?
Speaker 1: Oh what?
Speaker 2: Thousands of dollars on that floor. And the people took
Speaker 2: off his shoes and walked down that aisle the way.
Speaker 2: They took the money up and they put more money
Speaker 2: in the basket. That's Daddy Grace.
Speaker 4: But when other folks spoke about Daddy Grace and the
Speaker 4: money he and his churches raked in they weren't always
Speaker 4: so laudatory, so supportive. In fact, of all the things
Speaker 4: Daddy Grace was criticized for, the one that really seemed
Speaker 4: to bother people, including money in my family, was his
Speaker 4: and his church's relationship with money, because there appeared to
Speaker 4: be a lot of it, so much in fact, that
Speaker 4: the church was able to purchase an expansive real estate empire,
Speaker 4: much of which they still hold on to today. In
Speaker 4: the nineteen forties and fifties, this was unheard of for
Speaker 4: most Black Americans, and although he was primarily a man
Speaker 4: of God, I have to admit that what Daddy Grace
Speaker 4: did with real estate has always impressed me.
Speaker 5: Daddy Grace didn't.
Speaker 4: Come to America to be poor. He came to spread
Speaker 4: the word of God. It just so happened that he
Speaker 4: also found the word of God paid very well. I'm
Speaker 4: Marcy Depina and from iHeart Podcasts, Enforce and Media group.
Speaker 5: This is sweet Daddy Grace.
Speaker 7: Glad to be happy.
Speaker 4: All right. So the parade is over and I am
Speaker 4: walking down the street. I am seeing that a lot
Speaker 4: of the people that were.
Speaker 5: In the various bands are here. I am in Washington,
Speaker 5: d C.
Speaker 4: For the United House of prayers, annual Memorial Day celebration
Speaker 4: and parade. Making my way to the national head quarters,
Speaker 4: the main.
Speaker 5: Church to the faithful.
Speaker 4: It's called God's White House. And it's not lost on
Speaker 4: me that Daddy Grace chose the nation's capital for the
Speaker 4: headquarters of the United House of Prayer.
Speaker 5: Oh this church is she.
Speaker 4: Oh Wow, has a five pointed star at the top
Speaker 4: a gold dome. This church is truly notable. It's a
Speaker 4: building meant to cause a sensation. It's monumental. It's an
Speaker 4: impressive piece of real estate. Inside is home to an
Speaker 4: extensive public archive of the United House of Prayer history.
Speaker 4: There are countless photos of Daddy Grace, newspaper clippings, letters
Speaker 4: he wrote to the congregation, preserved copies of Grace magazine.
Speaker 4: It's like a museum. But the other piece of real
Speaker 4: estate I was struck by during my trip was right
Speaker 4: on Logan Circle, eleven Logan Circle to be exact. It's
Speaker 4: in the historically black Shaw neighborhood, which has been home
Speaker 4: to many prominent Black attorneys, judges, architects, politicians, and musicians,
Speaker 4: including Duke Ellington. Eleven Logan Circle is a majestic house
Speaker 4: boasting seven bedrooms and five bathrooms. It's currently estimated to
Speaker 4: be worth three point five million dollars, and it too
Speaker 4: is owned by the United House of Prayer starting in
Speaker 4: the nineteen thirties. It was where Daddy Gray stayed whenever
Speaker 4: he was in town. I cannot describe the feeling of
Speaker 4: pride that I felt when walking along with the parade,
Speaker 4: we rounded the corner and I first saw the house.
Speaker 4: The neighborhood is gentrified now and Daddy Grace's home is
Speaker 4: one of the few black owned properties in the circle,
Speaker 4: one of the last reminders of the prosperous black neighborhood
Speaker 4: that once was here. Smith the church opens it up
Speaker 4: to the public, they also know it something to show off.
Speaker 4: Eleven Logan Circle would be an impressive property for anyone.
Speaker 4: But here's the thing, both in Daddy Grace's time and
Speaker 4: for the House of Prayer today, it's just one of
Speaker 4: many real estate holdings, one parcel in a vast empire.
Speaker 4: This was very much on purpose. Daddy Grace's vision for
Speaker 4: his church was to make sure it could and would
Speaker 4: always keep growing, and he knew that meant money. Daddy
Speaker 4: Grace deeply understood that one of the best ways to
Speaker 4: build wealth in America was by owning real estate.
Speaker 5: Alvicente, who was born in.
Speaker 4: Kabovid and has also studied Daddy Grace, spoke directly to
Speaker 4: this point.
Speaker 1: He bought.
Speaker 8: Huge complex in Manhattan that didn't rent the Negroes, and
Speaker 8: he bought it through you know, channels at that time,
Speaker 8: was one of the big purchases in Manhattan.
Speaker 4: The fact that Daddie Grace was able to purchase properties
Speaker 4: that would not even rent to black tenants, never mind
Speaker 4: sell to them, was remarkable. He hired white real estate
Speaker 4: agents and attorneys to make the arrangements for him. This
Speaker 4: sprawling business empire he built with church funds and donations.
Speaker 4: It wasn't just here in America, it was also an
Speaker 4: international empire of real estate.
Speaker 8: He had a coffee farm in Brazil and egg farm
Speaker 8: in Cuba, so he was pretty dynamic. He was a bright,
Speaker 8: bright guy and an astute businessman.
Speaker 4: This was all the more impressive when you consider the
Speaker 4: world he was operating in a black man in the
Speaker 4: nineteen thirties, forties and fifties.
Speaker 6: As a black person in America, he does not have
Speaker 6: the access to credit and capital that white people have.
Speaker 4: Doctor Hassan Jeffries is an associate professor of history at
Speaker 4: the Ohio State University, where he teaches courses on the
Speaker 4: civil rights and Black power movements. He's also of cathe
Speaker 4: Verdian descent.
Speaker 1: He's not being given access to credit.
Speaker 6: Line for the most part, mortgages are not really available,
Speaker 6: and so a lot of what he's having to leverage
Speaker 6: is just cash.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 6: So this is where so the cash coming in by
Speaker 6: the church becomes really important, because you're buying stuff outright, and.
Speaker 4: The properties Daddy Grace wanted to buy, they were often
Speaker 4: expensive and big in wealthy areas.
Speaker 1: And so how did a black person do that?
Speaker 6: It wasn't enough just to have the money, right, You
Speaker 6: then have to negotiate, and not one on one negotiate,
Speaker 6: I'm saying, negotiate the color line.
Speaker 1: In order to actually do.
Speaker 6: The thing that allow you to purchase, you got to
Speaker 6: have some white bankers. You got to have some white
Speaker 6: front people, right who were willing to do these negotiations
Speaker 6: on your behalf.
Speaker 1: Because a lot of these not.
Speaker 6: Just real estate brokers, but homeowners, business owners would not
Speaker 6: sell to an African American period the Rockefellers, they had
Speaker 6: to worry about that, like if they had the money,
Speaker 6: they just showed up. They got better deals than anybody else.
Speaker 6: Right because of the name. That doesn't hold for black folk,
Speaker 6: that doesn't hold for Daddy Grays.
Speaker 4: But Daddy Grace seemed to thrive in this environment, buying
Speaker 4: up the property of rivals like Father Divine and Harlem
Speaker 4: and Prophet Jones in Detroit right from under them. He
Speaker 4: bought a theater in Newark, mansions in New Bedford, Montclair Bridgeport,
Speaker 4: the sort of places that require staff to take care
Speaker 4: of them, the sort of places where white neighbors complained
Speaker 4: when they found out.
Speaker 5: Who the new owner was. And in nineteen.
Speaker 4: Fifty three he bought the crown jewel of his achievement,
Speaker 4: the El Dorado, an Art Deco apartment building right on
Speaker 4: Central Park in New York City. At the time, it
Speaker 4: was called the tallest apartment building in the world, some
Speaker 4: thirty stories high with two pinnacled towers, It's an iconic
Speaker 4: structure part of the backdrop of the park. Daddy Grace
Speaker 4: claimed it was one of the largest real estate transactions
Speaker 4: of its kind on record. The El Dorado had thirteen
Speaker 4: manual elevators and a lobby full of murals statues and
Speaker 4: fourteen carrot gold decorations. It housed more than two hundred apartments,
Speaker 4: and as Daddy Grace well knew, all of his renters
Speaker 4: were white. As he told the press, the income from
Speaker 4: the property would be used as an investment for the
Speaker 4: betterment and welfare of his congregation. Daddy Grace knew how
Speaker 4: to take care of his people, and the congregation was
Speaker 4: proud their church. Daddy Grace's church owned one of the
Speaker 4: grandest buildings in one of the most famous cities in
Speaker 4: the world. It was such a point of pride that
Speaker 4: many of the United House of Prayer churches, not just
Speaker 4: in New York but around the country, had framed photos
Speaker 4: of the El Dorado at the altar right next to
Speaker 4: the picture of Daddy Grace himself. Daddy Grace seemed to
Speaker 4: be untouched by the cold hand of faith by economic ruin.
Speaker 4: He and his church endured. If anything, they prospered. But
Speaker 4: although preachers like Daddy Grace seemed to be getting rich,
Speaker 4: much of their congregations were just trying to hold.
Speaker 5: On to what they had.
Speaker 4: Meanwhile, Daddy Grace wore fancy suits, custom hats, and expensive jewelry.
Speaker 4: He drove or had others drive him around in a
Speaker 4: brand new car. In Daddy Grace's view, the Bible clearly
Speaker 4: says that the riches of the Kingdom of Heaven should
Speaker 4: be found on earth too. But it wasn't just that
Speaker 4: he was rich and lived well. There was also much
Speaker 4: talk about the spectacles of money to be seen inside
Speaker 4: the church. For instance, the dollar bills all stacked up
Speaker 4: in the shape of a house or a full size
Speaker 4: money well that his follower's bill and presented to Bishop
Speaker 4: Grace as a love offering when he was in town.
Speaker 4: None of this was ever mentioned in the Bible. Yet
Speaker 4: there was Daddy Grace telling his faithful congregants during services
Speaker 4: that he didn't want to hear the sound of jingling
Speaker 4: coins being dropped into the donation basket. He wanted to
Speaker 4: hear the sound of paper. People outside the church would
Speaker 4: sometimes ask Daddy Grace about this, about the money they
Speaker 4: figured that he had. He said personally that he didn't
Speaker 4: care about money, that he only had a small salary
Speaker 4: or none at all. It was enough of a sticking
Speaker 4: point that he'd even sometimes address it in his sermons.
Speaker 4: How he wasn't there because of any financial incentive.
Speaker 9: I'm the only poor man going and charge these people
Speaker 9: a dying I ask him, man, see why chide, I'm
Speaker 9: gonna die?
Speaker 4: And he repeated over and over that the money collected
Speaker 4: from the congregation belonged to the United House of Prayer, which,
Speaker 4: of course was technically true, And it was equally true
Speaker 4: that as the head of the church, under the church's bylaws,
Speaker 4: the bishop was given funds for personal use, funds for travel, food, housing, clothing,
Speaker 4: and servants. All of that to say, Daddy Grace's lavish
Speaker 4: lifestyle was all above board, But was it out of line?
Speaker 4: There is a cultural discription and that needs to be clarified.
Speaker 4: For many people of faith in America, it might seem
Speaker 4: obscene for a religious leader to spend church funds on
Speaker 4: a luxurious lifestyle. Many Christians would not recognize a holy
Speaker 4: expression in Daddy Grace's chauffeured cars and expensive manicures, But
Speaker 4: among the faithful in Black America, this isn't always the case.
Speaker 4: We often expect our religious leaders.
Speaker 5: To be doing well.
Speaker 4: If anything, it was a sign of God's blessing to
Speaker 4: speak to this truth of life in the black faith communities.
Speaker 4: I spoke with someone who knows the criticisms and the rationale.
Speaker 4: Bishop Talbert Swan.
Speaker 1: The preacher is often caught in a catch twenty two.
Speaker 10: If the preacher is lacking in resources and destitute, it
Speaker 10: has to seek help himself to support his own life
Speaker 10: style in his family. Then he's mocked and the question
Speaker 10: is asked, what kind of God do you serve when
Speaker 10: you can't even take care of yourself.
Speaker 4: Bishop Swan is the prelate and the Bishop of the
Speaker 4: Church of God in Christ in Springfield, Massachusetts. He's also
Speaker 4: an activist, an author, and the president of the local
Speaker 4: NAACP chapter. His own style is more understated, but he
Speaker 4: recognized the internal dilemma a man like Bishop Grace might
Speaker 4: have faced the ways Daddy Grace made much of his
Speaker 4: money often rubbed people the wrong way. He had a
Speaker 4: whole product line blessed by his touch and bearing his
Speaker 4: name Daddy Grace, soap, Daddy Greces, toothpaste, hair creams, face powder,
Speaker 4: and cookies, emblems, badges, buttons, banners. This capitalistic promotion of
Speaker 4: himself for a lot of people didn't seem right. For
Speaker 4: a man of God, it seemed the opposite. But it's
Speaker 4: important here to recall Daddy Grace's Catholic roots the Catholic
Speaker 4: Church has stacked cash for centuries, growing rich by selling rosaries, handkerchiefs.
Speaker 5: Photos of the Pope, statues.
Speaker 4: Of saints, any and all blessed by the Pope, and
Speaker 4: for sale in the gift shops and at the Vatican.
Speaker 4: So I can see the criticisms of Daddy Grace. I
Speaker 4: see how he presented himself. I understand how his way
Speaker 4: could be offensive to someone. But I also see someone
Speaker 4: who was attempting to create a lifestyle really an entire
Speaker 4: faith based ecosystem, one that operated pretty similarly to the
Speaker 4: Catholic Church, with the same kind of money.
Speaker 5: And so for Daddy.
Speaker 4: Grace, just like for the Pope, if you asked him,
Speaker 4: there was no doubt he was a man of God
Speaker 4: and just speaking to our modern moment, Daddy Grace should
Speaker 4: rightly be considered one of the forefathers of contemporary megachurches,
Speaker 4: the religious movement best exemplified by Bishop td Jakes craftlow Dollar,
Speaker 4: and Joel Ostein these prosperity gospel evangelists have all built
Speaker 4: large followings as well as political power and of course,
Speaker 4: multimillion dollar business verticals. While Bishop Swan isn't part of
Speaker 4: this group of prosperity Gospel ministers. He understands why Daddy
Speaker 4: Grace may have chosen this path.
Speaker 10: He was the prosperity preacher before it was such a thing.
Speaker 10: And I believe that the preacher ought to be an
Speaker 10: example of what they're preaching to the people. So if
Speaker 10: I'm telling you that you need to get into a
Speaker 10: position where you're debt free, or you need to conduct
Speaker 10: your life in such a way that you can secure
Speaker 10: a future for your family and pass on generational wealth,
Speaker 10: well I've got to be the first example of that.
Speaker 10: And for some reason, folks think that the preacher should
Speaker 10: teach those things, but then not be the example of
Speaker 10: those things that he or she teaches.
Speaker 4: It's inarguably true that sweet Daddy Grace didn't mind a
Speaker 4: little bit of flash or a flare of style, and yes,
Speaker 4: he certainly had that swagger and bravado. He clearly took
Speaker 4: great care in terms of how he presented himself to
Speaker 4: the world and to his congregants. But what also made
Speaker 4: him special was the little things that set him apart
Speaker 4: from his followers. Like he insisted that no one in
Speaker 4: the church could grow fingernails as long as his or
Speaker 4: there were the big things that set him apart, like
Speaker 4: the boasts that he spoke twenty eight languages, or his
Speaker 4: far more incredible boasts like that he alone ended World
Speaker 4: War Two. You have to understand Daddy Grace had to
Speaker 4: constantly contend and combat how other people, especially the press,
Speaker 4: doubted him. The press, when they did write about him,
Speaker 4: would often put his title bishop and quote, or would
Speaker 4: focus far more on the money he raised than and
Speaker 4: what he actually preached from the pulpit. Even Ebony Magazine
Speaker 4: was guilty of this mistreatment. The magazine made for black readers,
Speaker 4: It too, seemed to believe some of the rumors. In
Speaker 4: one article, the journalist wrote that Grace is not his
Speaker 4: real name, but serves a symbolic purpose. This is something
Speaker 4: that was said a lot about Daddy Grace, that he
Speaker 4: made up the name to sound more legit, but it
Speaker 4: just wasn't true. Grace was the Anglicized version of Daddy
Speaker 4: Grace's cap Verdian birth name, the Grassa. It was also
Speaker 4: the name he'd been using way before he started his church.
Speaker 4: But the notion that he'd changed his name to sound
Speaker 4: more godly it definitely helped perpetuate the myth that Daddy
Speaker 4: Grace was a con man or worse.
Speaker 5: A joke.
Speaker 6: It is not a surprise nor a coincidence that we're
Speaker 6: talking about the depression era, and the depression doesn't begin
Speaker 6: just in early thirties people African Americans.
Speaker 1: We see it through the twenties and lasting through the
Speaker 1: nineteen forties.
Speaker 5: That's Professor Jeffries again.
Speaker 6: And so people are searching for something and they're finding
Speaker 6: a bit of salvation here on earth. But for white
Speaker 6: people to look at that, that's particularly troubling. If white
Speaker 6: people can dismiss Daddy Grace, if they can dismiss him
Speaker 6: as a charlatan, then they can dismiss all of the
Speaker 6: other things that he's actually doing. When we think about
Speaker 6: the big personalities with large followings during the first couple
Speaker 6: of decades of the twentieth century, you know, I think
Speaker 6: we have to put it into the sort of broader
Speaker 6: context of the power of performance, the power of the
Speaker 6: big ego.
Speaker 4: This is something far more common now. We almost expect
Speaker 4: the big ego to be highly visible and the sccessful
Speaker 4: black man. In that era, you most certainly had to
Speaker 4: have a big ego, and you had to put it
Speaker 4: on display where it could cost you your life or
Speaker 4: at the very least your livelihood.
Speaker 1: I mean, we saw the same thing with Marcus Garvey. Right.
Speaker 6: If you can convince people not to take the person
Speaker 6: who is speaking seriously, then you can dismiss the people
Speaker 6: who'll find resonance in the message that is being offered.
Speaker 4: Marcus Garvey, the Jamaican immigrant and political activists, advocated for
Speaker 4: black self determination and unity between the African diaspora and Africa.
Speaker 4: He championed ideas like Black pride and Black nationalism, and
Speaker 4: like Daddy Grace, he was also charismatic and a polarizing figure.
Speaker 4: But not everyone, including those in his own community, approved
Speaker 4: of his approach and his focus on the needs of
Speaker 4: the everyday black.
Speaker 6: And yet Garvey says, the people need it, the people
Speaker 6: need the celebration, and there's something to be said when
Speaker 6: we go back to the history of enslaved folk having parades, right,
Speaker 6: having these ceremonial elections, right, which of course draw on
Speaker 6: West African traditions. I think we're too quick sometimes to say,
Speaker 6: oh that this was just a play the ego, Like no,
Speaker 6: I mean, there was a value and understanding of the
Speaker 6: power of this kind of performative rhetoric and performative action
Speaker 6: in the service of religion and community building. That wasn't
Speaker 6: just oh, you know, I'm playing a role. This is
Speaker 6: a way of communication that is resonating because my people.
Speaker 1: See the value in this.
Speaker 6: Especially, I would add at a time when black folk
Speaker 6: people of color are told to be seen and not
Speaker 6: her having a.
Speaker 4: Big ego, it was an act of strength and rebellion.
Speaker 6: The louder you were, the more attention you drew, the
Speaker 6: more danger you drew. Because the most dangerous place to
Speaker 6: be for a person of color was in the presence
Speaker 6: of white people. So we are conditioning ourselves and our
Speaker 6: children to survive, to be silent, to be unseen. And
Speaker 6: here you have somebody who was standing up like.
Speaker 1: No, you are going to see me.
Speaker 6: And by people, that is an attraction in and of
Speaker 6: itself because they're like, boy, that's daring, that's bold, that's
Speaker 6: the vine, and that's what we like because we don't
Speaker 6: get enough of it.
Speaker 4: The thing is, despite all this controversy surrounding him, theologically,
Speaker 4: the United House of Prayer fit pretty soundly into other
Speaker 4: Black Pentecostal and Apostolic churches, and Daddy Grace knew his
Speaker 4: Bible as well as any preacher, maybe even better. Those
Speaker 4: long fingernails he had, he said it was proof that
Speaker 4: he he was a prophet, referencing an obscure Bible verse
Speaker 4: about a prophet with horns growing.
Speaker 5: Out of his hands.
Speaker 4: And the name of his church was taken directly from
Speaker 4: Isaiah fifty six to seven, from my house shall be
Speaker 4: called a house of.
Speaker 5: Prayer for all peoples.
Speaker 4: He impressed people by how often he quoted scripture verbatim,
Speaker 4: But maybe even more impressive were the connections he fostered
Speaker 4: within his church. As is common in the Black faith communities,
Speaker 4: Daddy Grace supplied his congregants a way to be fully
Speaker 4: immersed in church life. For many House of Prayer members,
Speaker 4: the church became the central part of their spiritual and
Speaker 4: social lives. The services which are held every day are
Speaker 4: lively and full of music, especially shout music. The call
Speaker 4: and response with the repetitive sounds enraptured the congregants. They
Speaker 4: spoke in tongs filled by the Holy Ghost. And there
Speaker 4: were and are still to this day, various clubs for
Speaker 4: different interests for all different ages, band choir, literature, banking,
Speaker 4: junior nurses, scouts, and there were also rewards in the
Speaker 4: form of cash, titles and positions. It was a major
Speaker 4: privilege to be a Graceguard, Grace Queen, or a Grace
Speaker 4: made personal attendance for Daddy Grace when he came to town.
Speaker 4: All of this was intentionally designed to keep House of
Speaker 4: Prayer members fully submerged in a life where God was
Speaker 4: at the center and the forefront. But more than that,
Speaker 4: it was a reminder of their own importance to God,
Speaker 4: a message they often didn't receive outside of the church.
Speaker 10: The first Black denomination was founded as a result of
Speaker 10: the inability of white folks to accept our full humanity.
Speaker 4: As Bishop Swan can speak to and knows well, Black churches,
Speaker 4: including the United House of Prayer, have always been both
Speaker 4: foundations and load bearing pillars of their communities.
Speaker 10: They have provided services in black communities. They have spoken
Speaker 10: on behalf of black people, and done all of this
Speaker 10: with only the support of their congregates. We're not talking
Speaker 10: about endowments, We're not talking about grants and loans.
Speaker 1: We're talking about.
Speaker 10: Chicken dinners and tag sales and people giving to support
Speaker 10: the minister, to support the church.
Speaker 4: In short, the Black Church gave people opportunities that they
Speaker 4: weren't allowed to have outside in the wider world.
Speaker 10: Black people as we are today wouldn't be where we
Speaker 10: are today without the Black Church. The Black Church honed
Speaker 10: our leadership, trained our leaders. You could be the janitor
Speaker 10: somewhere in the world with the head of the trustee
Speaker 10: board in the church. You could be without a job
Speaker 10: in the world with the head of the deacon board
Speaker 10: in the church. And so our churches helped our people
Speaker 10: see their own self worth. It was the one stop
Speaker 10: plaza for everything.
Speaker 4: By nineteen forty nine, the United House of Prayer claimed
Speaker 4: to have two million members. This may or may not
Speaker 4: have been an inflated count, but regardless of the numbers,
Speaker 4: the church served the needs of its followers, people who
Speaker 4: were only too happy to tithe and to contribute their
Speaker 4: time and efforts to something that was so meaningful to
Speaker 4: them and their community. They gave to the House of Prayer,
Speaker 4: and as far as they were concerned, the House of
Speaker 4: Prayer it gave back. After World War Two ended, America
Speaker 4: began to imagine its place in the world and to
Speaker 4: adjust its domestic agenda, its balances of power, its traditions
Speaker 4: of exclusion. As the United States grew and changed, so
Speaker 4: did the world of black Americans. In the post war period,
Speaker 4: black gis returned home having seen how others might treat
Speaker 4: and respect them as full human beings, and they returned
Speaker 4: home trained by the armed services in terms of how
Speaker 4: to fight a war against racial intolerance.
Speaker 5: They brought that fight back.
Speaker 4: Home to America and began a new era in the
Speaker 4: fight for civil rights. Daddy Grace was not at the
Speaker 4: center of that fight, nor involved in any public way
Speaker 4: at least, but Professor Jeffrey says that really that wasn't unusual.
Speaker 4: Not everyone is a Malcolm or a Martin.
Speaker 6: I think we have an outst understanding of what the
Speaker 6: black church was in the civil rights movement.
Speaker 1: The vast majority of churches never took part in civil
Speaker 1: rights actions period.
Speaker 6: It's like the vast majority of black people never took
Speaker 6: part in civil rights protests, civil rights demonstration, civil rights actions. Now,
Speaker 6: to be sure, the church space becomes very important to
Speaker 6: civil rights organizing. Right, the beedifics itself becomes important because
Speaker 6: it's one of the few spaces that black people had.
Speaker 1: Autonomous control over.
Speaker 6: Right, but in all of these local communities where we
Speaker 6: see movements emerging, you might have one hundred churches and
Speaker 6: four opened their doors. And so in a way, the
Speaker 6: fact that you know, Daddy Grace is not a frontline
Speaker 6: activist as a member of the clergy, it's actually not
Speaker 6: that surprising.
Speaker 4: Especially after death, this perceived in action has been for
Speaker 4: some people a mark against Daddy Grace.
Speaker 6: I mean, the criticism comes because they're like, oh, man,
Speaker 6: if you're this powerful with access to these many resources,
Speaker 6: could you and should you be doing more?
Speaker 1: Like that's a separate question.
Speaker 6: I think then, you know, should you be doing more
Speaker 6: as a preacher, because in a sense it's kind of.
Speaker 1: Along the lines of where most were. King was an exception.
Speaker 6: Yet we look back and we say, oh, everybody, all
Speaker 6: the preachers were like King, No.
Speaker 1: They weren't right. They were like, look, we're not getting
Speaker 1: involved in this message.
Speaker 6: Y'all gonna burn down my sanctuary, right, y'all are gonna
Speaker 6: come after me. I ain't dealing with that. And so
Speaker 6: it really was the rare few. But you know, we
Speaker 6: look back now, it's like, oh, you should have been
Speaker 6: in it.
Speaker 4: This is always important when assessing history to measure the
Speaker 4: people against the standards of their time, not ours.
Speaker 6: I think we have to we just have to look
Speaker 6: at the universe of possible actions, rather than just saying, oh, well,
Speaker 6: you weren't with.
Speaker 1: King and Selma, so therefore you had nothing. You did
Speaker 1: nothing at all.
Speaker 4: I don't think it's in either or, and ask doctor
Speaker 4: Jeffries points out this same calculation was made by another
Speaker 4: prominent religious leader of the day.
Speaker 6: You know, we see a very similar and perhaps even
Speaker 6: more extreme decision being made by Elijah Muhammad and the
Speaker 6: Nation of Islam. We think about the Nation of Islam,
Speaker 6: which gives us Malcolm X as being sort of these
Speaker 6: radical activists. Well, the Nation of Islam, as a small
Speaker 6: group in the late nineteen thirties nineteen forties are conscientious
Speaker 6: objectives to World War Two, and Elijah Muhammad and others
Speaker 6: go to jail and the Nation of Islam almost implodes.
Speaker 6: And so when Elijah Muhammad comes out, he says, we're
Speaker 6: never doing that again, and so they stay on the sideline.
Speaker 6: I mean, part of his rip with Malcolm X in
Speaker 6: the mid nineteen sixties is that Malcolm wants to get
Speaker 6: involved in civil rights. Elijah Muhammad was like, we took
Speaker 6: too much heat in the past. We're not going to
Speaker 6: deal with that in the present. In order to preserve
Speaker 6: what had been built. It was just too much of
Speaker 6: a risk to take that heat by being front.
Speaker 1: And center in a particular way.
Speaker 4: As we wrapped up our conversation, I was thinking about
Speaker 4: Daddy Grace's legacy, what he meant to not only his
Speaker 4: congregation but to Black America.
Speaker 1: I think Daddy Grace's principal legacy.
Speaker 6: Was about institution building, about you have to build something
Speaker 6: more than that which you just enjoy for yourself. And
Speaker 6: so he had a very expansive understanding, I think, of
Speaker 6: what needed to be done to create security for people.
Speaker 6: And he also, I mean, he was living in a
Speaker 6: capitalist society and he understood that. He made so the
Speaker 6: surveying the land, It's like, okay, what do we have
Speaker 6: here and how does this work?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 6: And then he said, oh, I get it. It's all
Speaker 6: about acquiring assets. And he did that in order to
Speaker 6: insulate the organization that he was building that really was
Speaker 6: committed to Some might dismiss as utopian, but really was
Speaker 6: committed to building a better society for people. And I
Speaker 6: think there's real value in that for us today.
Speaker 4: Alphacente said something that struck me too, self.
Speaker 11: Help, building from within, creating generational wealth, and your self
Speaker 11: from age and say, hey, you can have here as
Speaker 11: beautiful as mind. If you use Daddy Grace from you
Speaker 11: can have the best coffee in the world if you
Speaker 11: buy Daddy Grace coffee.
Speaker 1: You know, stuff like that.
Speaker 11: But he he's learned from what I gathered from Walker,
Speaker 11: where people were given some of his products and they
Speaker 11: sold it and got some of the proceeds from it
Speaker 11: so that they can build up themselves. But he had
Speaker 11: Senior Citizens Center where he said people, daycare center. All
Speaker 11: were involved in his churches because he believed in promoting
Speaker 11: self help.
Speaker 1: So I think that's that's the biggest part of his legacy.
Speaker 4: I tend to agree with Alvicente and doctor Jeffries, people
Speaker 4: who've studied Daddy Grace and understand what he was up
Speaker 4: against and what he accomplished. But I can see why
Speaker 4: his behavior could rub members of my family the wrong way.
Speaker 4: Keith Verdians as a general rule, are humble, they're conservative
Speaker 4: and have always done their best to stay under the
Speaker 4: radar to protect themselves and their families. Particularly with my
Speaker 4: family being associated with a man like sweet Daddy Grace
Speaker 4: who was not not only highly visible, extremely controversial and
Speaker 4: had multiple run ins with the law, it felt dangerous.
Speaker 4: We can't forget that Cape Verdians in America were foreigners,
Speaker 4: African immigrants who always ran the risk of being on
Speaker 4: the receiving end of racism or being deported back to
Speaker 4: a life of abject poverty and famine. My folks were
Speaker 4: just trying to make a life for themselves and being
Speaker 4: caught up with the wrong people or situations could completely
Speaker 4: derail their lives and the lives of their families. But
Speaker 4: it wasn't only my relatives that thought that Daddy Grace
Speaker 4: was dangerous. The US government did too, and so Uncle
Speaker 4: Sam tried to have him stopped. That's next time. Sweet
Speaker 4: Daddy Grace is a production of iHeart Podcasts and Force,
Speaker 4: a media group. This show is hosted by Me Marcy
Speaker 4: de Pina and produced by Marissa Brown and Me. Our
Speaker 4: story editors are Darryl Stewart, Duncan Riedell, and Zarren Burnett. Editing,
Speaker 4: sound design and theme music by Jonathan Washington, Additional editing
Speaker 4: by Matt Russell. Show cover art by Viviana Salgado of
Speaker 4: Studio Creative Group. Fact checking by Austin Thompson. Our executive
Speaker 4: producers are Marcy Depina and Jason English. Special thanks to
Speaker 4: Will Pearson, Nikki Ettore, Ali Perry, Tamika Campbell, and Lulu
Speaker 4: Phillip of iHeartMedia, and all of my family members who
Speaker 4: talked to me for this show, my ancestors, the United
Speaker 4: House of Prayer for All People, and the countless number
Speaker 4: of people who shared their memories of Sweet Daddy Grace
Speaker 4: with me. Thanks also to doctor Marie Dollam and doctor
Speaker 4: Danielle brun Sigler, whose academic work on Sweet Dayaddy Grace
Speaker 4: has been incredibly helpful. And finally, I want to thank
Speaker 4: Bishop Grace himself for choosing me to tell his story.
Speaker 4: For more information on Bishop Charles M. Grace, check out
Speaker 4: the website Sweet Daddy Grace and follow me at Marcy
Speaker 4: Depina on all social platforms