If a photograph of Ellen Valenton ever existed, it didnโt survive nearly two centuries.
So I have no idea if she left her house in New Orleansโ 10th Ward wearing a tignon.
But Ellen was exactly who Tignon Laws were designed to oppress.
New Orleansโ femmes des couleur libreโfree women of colorโheld a unique social status. They owned their own property and businesses, exercised their legal rights, and some achieved a net worth upward of $10,000.
With all this access, theyโd become white menโs companions, white womenโs competition, and total chaos to a social hierarchy established on skin color.
And Ellen DID leave a glimpse of that chaos behind.
Starting with the 1860 U.S. Census, she and her daughters are magically โwhiteโ then โnegroโ over and over again.
So, since they werenโt always clearly identifiable and could all use a visible reminder of their place, women of color โ whether light or dark, free or enslaved โ were forced to identify as a โslave classโ whose hair would be covered in public with โtignons.โ
But the moment Empress Josรฉphine Bonaparte saw women of all skin colors wearing gorgeous tignons and started wearing one of her own, the femmes des couleur libreโs Scarlet Letter was suddenly mainstream fashion.
So I canโt know for sure if Ellen wore a tignon for the culture, for the style, or if she refused altogether.
But Iโm absolutely certain of the rest.
Because Ellen Valenton is my great-great-great-grandmother.
So I walked into @fanmdjanm (Haitian Kreyol for โstrong womanโ) less focused on spending money than what I had to gain.
Rich silk, crisp cotton, and buttery jersey lined a full wall like paint samples of both vibrant color and vivid history, with each one calling to mind some photograph, painting, or real life experience with women across the African diaspora.
But I can only imagine Ellen.
And when I do, a portrait comes to mind: Jacques Amansโ “Creole in a Red Headdress.”
I wonder how many other women walk into Fanm Djanm with that same vision.
And how many more walk out completely unaware that their paper bag is carrying a crown.
BLACK BAGS, Vol 3. โ BLK MKT Vintage | SUPPLEMENTAL
Iโve got over 15 years of education and experience in Advertising.
That makes me Old Head and Baby Girl at the same damn time.
Still, enough that I should have known the name โCharles Dawsonโ WAY BEFORE this vintage Slick Black Hair Color broadside from BLK MKT Vintage arrived at my door.
During the Great Depression โ nearly 40 years before โBlack was Beautifulโโ Black designer Charles Dawson created gorgeous packaging targeting Black and Latino consumers for Chicagoโs Jewish-owned Valmor Products.
And not just a handful of niche hair pomades.
Valmorโs subsidiaries included Lucky Brown, Peachy Brown, Sweet Georgia Brown, Madam Jones, King Novelty, Famous Products Company, and many, many more.
Hundreds of face creams, hair products, perfumes & body oils, toothpastes, lotions, and home goods spanning global mail-order catalog, direct-to-consumer, and national drugstore distribution.
With people of color front and center on nearly every label.
Headquartered in one of the cities that put advertising on the map.
Charles Dawson was more than a graphic designer.
He was the Black beauty blueprint.
And I had to stumble across an 80-year-old+ rarity to even learn his name.
Yesterday, I dropped a term that might be unfamiliar: SANKOFA.
Itโs a Ghanian word whose literal translation is โit is not taboo to fetch what is at risk of being left behind.โ
Put simply, โgo back and get it.โ
Since the day BLK MKT Vintage introduced me to Charles Dawson, Iโve collected several of his originals, each one highlighting his stunning illustrations, signature primary colors, and exceptional talent at balancing bold design and a staggering amount of copy.
An assortment of Charles Dawson’s illustrations and labels, courtesy of the Made In Chicago Museum.
Nobody ever taught me about Charles Dawsonโs work. Let alone his successor Jay Johnson.
And if I had a dollarโฆ Iโd be a billionaire.
Because theyโre just a couple among countless legends nearly erased by who gets to tell the story.
And among many reasons Iโm thankful to BLK MKT Vintage for helping me go back and get them.
BLK MKT Vintage has seen more of my paychecks than the other three BLACK BAGS shops combined.
Theirs is also the only one Iโve never actually set foot into, and just one reason I try to avoid the phrase โnext time.โ
I meanโฆ I WAS IN BROOKLYN AND EVERYTHINGGGG!
And then NY street photographer Louis Mendez said he wanted to get a picture of me with Spike Lee. ๐คท๐ฝโโ๏ธ
I regret (almost) nothing.
It even felt like fate that when I went looking for Brooklynโs Black history, it found me instead.
(TSA and my bank account were also fully on board with fate, tbh.)
Untilโฆ BLK MKT Vintage closed their gorgeous brick-and-mortar, home to โcollectibles, cast-offs and curiosities, which represent the richness of Black history.โ
My inner antiquer will NEVER recover.
Sure, thereโs no shortage of antique piles to comb for treasures.
Those treasures, though, so rarely reflect ME.
Discarded drawers overflow with beautifully illustrated Victorian postcards, maybe five of which feature a dignified representation of Blackness.
Gibson Girls, Norman Rockwell families, and feathered blonde hair grin from vintage ads, as if Coca-Cola and Budweiser bottles were labeled โWhites Onlyโ too.
But BLK MKT Vintage curates ephemera that specifically bears witness to the Black lived experience.
In my case, thatโs an original Angela Davis FBI wanted poster and a 1930โs Slick Black hair product ad, two of my most prized BLK MKT Vintage finds.
But they also sell books, photographs, movie memorabilia, home decor and other meaningful cultural objects.
BLK MKT Vintage is the repository where thereโs more to Black Americana than Bojangles, pickaninnies, and Aunt Jemima.
Itโs a library of the Black diaspora from afros and Maya Angelou to Zambian art and Ziggy Marley.
Scattered throughout, general antiques like Kodak cameras, mid-century tins, even tourism bumper stickers, give BLK MKT Vintageโs inventory added depth that mirrors the Black American experience in itself โ we stand at the intersection of American culture. So do they.
And nothing would please me more than helping discover something that fits you at blkmktvintage.com ๐ค
Itโs also home to my favorite place to indulge in a tradition thatโs been almost entirely erased.
But it’s not exclusive to Atlanta.
It fits in a teacup.
So, how is tea Black History when the only drink more common is water? (And maybe Coca-Cola?)
Itโs community. Comfort. Contemplation.
Itโs all the things enslaved Black people were forbidden.
But today, the husband/wife duo at @justaddhoney are reclaiming all of that.
Their tea room, steps from the Eastern Beltline, is only 7 years old, but thereโs centuries of subversion behind it.
I didnโt know that when I stepped in or out with my very first cup and bag.
MOST people donโt because like so many Black traditions, this one grew in secret.
All that remains of it are stories handed down by a few surviving families, a handful of objects, and the businesses born from its legacy.
Every February 15th, after the enslaversโ lavish Valentineโs events, Black Americans held their own tea parties.
But they werenโt allowed to gather en masse so invitations took clever shape.
While the ladies prepared to host, the men visited neighboring houses to โborrow a tea cup.โ
One-by-one, guests arrived with their plantation china hand-me-downs for a simple pleasure nearly everyone else in the world freely enjoyed.
But even โfreedomโ didnโt mean moving freely.
Between southern slave patrols and Jim Crow laws, there was no safer place to meet, whether with white abolitionists or each other, than over an intimate cup of civilization.
A six-piece tea & coffee service set owned by Edwin Frederick Howard and Joanna Louise Turpin Howard, prominent members of the free African American community of Boston, who used it to serve abolitionists Frederick Douglass & Wendell Phillips. Courtesy of NMAAHC Smithsonian.
And when the Black church became a pillar for the Civil Rights Movement, it wasnโt the only service turned strategy.
Segregated tea rooms transformed a practice once secret by necessity into a public revenue stream for Black women, Americaโs first working experts in the household arts.
Teaโs significantly shaped every corner of the world we live in.
But after today, Iโm certain your next cup hits just a little differently, especially filled by people whose ancestors always tasted its power.
Black Historyโs served in all sorts of varieties at justaddhoney.net. ๐ค
Look closely in my โBlack Bagsโ posts and youโll find the occasional Easter egg.
This might be my favorite of them.
In my last post, peeking from behind my neatly wrapped @denimtears parcel, very real postcard photographsโsome even embossed with the studioโs logoโhave stories of their own.
These are the faces of the Met Museum’s Superfine exhibit and Denim Tears, hidden behind the veil of American History.
An immaculate gentleman, fitted even to the buttons on his heeled shoes.
Sisters in satin and lace, gazing from a beautiful Victrola.
Loversโmaybe even honeymooners?โriding a donkey cart in Mexico.
A bespectacled musician accessorized with elbow-length gloves, perhaps to hide the wear to her hands?
A woman dressed all in black, whose ruffled lace waistcoat is only outdone by the exquisite jeweled bracelet and ring on her hands.
Photographs of Black people from days past already seem rare.
Photographs of them dressed in and surrounded by such luxury feel priceless.
But these five only scratch the surface of my collection.
And Superfine, hosted in the Met Museumโs premier gallery, only housed a fraction of the finery owned, made and inspired by Black Americans.
Denim Tears is their legacy.
And all threeโthe photographs, the exhibit, and the brandโbear witness that creative, adventurous, romantic, bespoke, affluent, and deserving have never been synonymous with โwhite.โ
KEEP GOING BLACK IN HISTORY:
Get your African Diaspora Goods at denimtears.com
For more photos like these, follow curator at the @schomburgcenter and author, Kimberly Annece Henderson at @emalineandthem.
Just around the corner from the likes of Chloรซ and Alexander Wang, a simple, black sign stands in sharp contrast to its Spring Street neighbors, holding space for an unexpected commodity:
โAFRICAN DIASPORA GOODS.โ
There wasnโt a matching sign outside of Gallery 999 at the Met Museum, but my involuntary double-take was surely the same.
Especially after Iโd barely escaped the museum gift shop with my life.
Spanning multiple tables outside of the Superfine: Tailoring Black Style exhibit, @denimtears wouldnโt even let me come up for air.
Union Jack and American flag sweaters redesigned in Pan-African green, red, and black.
Plush, leather watermelon wallets in collaboration with Commฤs des Garรงon and logo baseball hats reminiscent of 1990s Ralph Lauren.
A single t-shirt featuring Andre Leon Talley, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Andre Walker, makeup-smudged at the collar, hung deep on a rack.
I snatched it like the last loaf of bread before the apocalypse.
And despite being almost that poorโฆ NEXT STOP: 176 Spring Street.
Between the Met Museum merch table and a Denim Tears ensemble featured in the Superfine exhibit (which remains in the Metโs permanent collection), the thread was clear.
Bespoke, imaginative clothing in luxurious fabrics, designed for Black bodies but accessible to anybody with swag (and the money to pay for it).
But on Spring Street, brand new themes like a Black Poseidon threatening a schooner daring to sail the Middle Passage, or cheeky Cotton Club dancers, come to life on shirts.
The brandโs signature cotton wreath design adorned sweats in every color, a symbol of cottonโs significance to the fashion industry, and a tribute to the enslaved people who made that possible.
Even the Denim Tears name honors the trials and tribulations Black people have overcome while still serving as the standard in fashion and culture.
If money and carry-on capacity were no object, Iโd have taken one of everything.
Before I even walked into Denim Tears, I was a fan.
Since I walked out, thatโs MS. Princess of Black Power, you ragamuffins.
Death looms so large over Georgia’s Lake Lanier that people say itโs haunted.
Since it was filled in 1956, itโs estimated that nearly 700 people have lost their lives in its waters or at its banks in boating accidents, drownings, and unexplained events. Official reports list at least 24 people as โmissingโ there because what lies below the lakeโs surface makes searching it nearly impossible.
Beneath those unrecovered souls, wrecked boats, discarded nets, and silty waters lie the charred remains of the Africa-American community of Oscarville, GA.
Before 1912, Oscarvilleโs people thrived as farmers, teachers, ministers and tradespeople of all sorts.
Harrison, Rosalee, Bertie, Fred, Naomi, and Minor Brown were among the thriving residents of Oscarville, in a photo taken in 1896.
Their world started to unravel on September 5th of that year, when a white woman accused a Black man of entering her bedroom and attempting rape. When a local preacher mentioned that perhaps the woman had not been entirely forthcoming in her account, suggesting the encounter may have been consensual, he was nearly beaten to death right in front of the Oscarville courthouse.
Tensions between the segregated populations of Forsyth County were so high that the Governor of Georgia activated the National Guard to stand patrol and keep the peace.
Just 4 days later, that fragile peace was shattered when another white woman was found dying in the local woods, an apparent victim of yet another sexual assault.
The only evidence police turned up was a pocket mirror claimed to be property of a 16-year-old boy named Ernest Knox. Hardly a smoking gun, but enough to satisfy the white folks of Oscarville, especially when Ernest confessed to the crime and gave up the people who were going to help him dispose of the body. Suppose it didnโt matter much that Ernest made that confession from the bottom of a well just before he was nearly drowned in it.
Ernest and 3 supposed co-conspiratorsโOscar Daniel, Oscarโs 22-year old sister Trussie, her boyfriend Big Robโplus an alleged witness, were all transported to the county jail in Cumming, GA. But there was no point. A mob estimated in the thousands stormed the jail, killed Big Rob, and dragged his body into the street. He was hung from a light post and used as target practice while the others inside could only listen to their potential fate.
A newspaper photo depicts all of the suspects for the rapes of two white women were still alive in their custody. Left to Right: Trussie Daniel, Oscar Daniel, Tony Howell (defendant in the first case), Ed Collins (witness), Isaiah Pirkle (witness for Howell), and Ernest Knox.
Trussie accepted a plea bargain in exchange for testifying against her brother Oscar and was forced to be his executioner (see the sub-headline in the article above). Charges were dropped against the witness. But Big Rob was already dead, and Ernest and Oscar were doomed to the same fate.
On October 25, 1912, Oscar Daniel and Ernest Knox were publicly lynched before a crowd estimated at as many as 8,000 spectators. People gathered around the gallows for picnics, and PBS reports that one of the boys was so small a special noose was created to ensure the momentum wouldnโt decapitate him and splash anyoneโs Sunday dress with blood.
You donโt even have to imagine the scene. Youโve probably seen the images of vast crowds gathering under the feet of a Black man. Though these images are rarities now, in 1908, they were so frequently mailed, the U.S. Postmaster was forced to ban them. โEven the Nazis did not stoop to selling souvenirs of Auschwitz,โ TIME Magazineโs Richard Lacayo writes.
A postcard shows the sprawling crowd gathered for the 1893 lynching of Henry Smith in Paris, TX.
But the terror didnโt end with two lynchings. Over the next few months, each sunset brought nightmares to Oscarville.
โNight ridersโ went door-to-door demanding that Black people vacate the town. When some people didnโt comply, the threat escalated. Their homes were shot into, animals killed, crops destroyed. Anyone who remained after that fled their property in the middle of the night as it went up in flames. Nearly 1,100 African-Americansโaround 98% of Forsyth Countyโs Black populationโwere forced out of Oscarville, some still paying on property theyโd abandoned until it was foreclosed.
Of course, all of that land was immediately seized by you-know-who.
And nearly just as quickly, things started going wrong.
In 1915, a boll weevil infestation killed crops on Oscarvilleโs land that was illicitly seized by white farmers and banks. Though they ultimately survived the weevils, being one of the few regions in the state to escape total decimation made them eager to share their methods. (It was chicken poop. They got a bunch of chickens to poop in the soil.) Perhaps too eager. They gained the attention of the mayor of Atlanta, who was developing a dam to ensure the cityโs water supply, hydroelectric needs, and flood control. He spent 2 years working with the Army Corps of Engineers to seize nearly all of that recovered farmland. What little was actually purchased was far undervalued, and left the handful of African-Americans left who owned their land through generations with nearly nothing.
When the dam was complete, the waters completely submerged charred buildings, cemeteries, bridges, and any trace left of those who lived and died in Oscarville. Then they named those waters after a Confederate soldier. Though Oscarville is the only Black community under Lake Lanier, it wasnโt the only one Black people were run out of. Towns, Union, Fannin, Gilmer and Dawson Counties all have a history of violently exiling its Black residents. Even today, only 4% of Forsyth Countyโs almost 250,000 residents are Black.
So is Lake Lanier haunted? No one can truly answer that question.
A diver captures footage of some of the structures lost under Lake Lanier, both visually and on sonar.
Local news coverage shows the efforts to keep African-Americans and their civil rights out of Forsyth County still alive and well in 1987.
Learn more about the tragic history of Forsyth County, GA in Patrick Phillips’ book, Blood at the Root, then pick up a copy from our friends at Marcus Books.
Get more local articles and historic sources from a story originally published by the Forsyth County News.
The terror in Oscarville and ongoing racial terrorism documented in Forsyth County and throughout the South is detailed at History.com
Read more about the taking of Oscarville and the forming of Lake Lanier at CNN.
Forsyth County church leaders took it upon themselves to create the Forsyth County Descendants Scholarship, “simply an act of love that will be helpful to some descendants whose families have suffered. Is it enough? Of course not. But it is a step.” Learn more & donate here.
Explore an interactive map and see the stories of documented racial terror lynchings throughout the States created by the Equal Justice Initiative.
Writers, photographers, dancers, artists, musicians and so many others Black creatives are represented here at The American Blackstory.
Today, we recognize the keepers of all that Black magic.
Marcus Books is the nationโs oldest Black-owned bookstore, serving San Francisco, Oakland, and now, the world, for over 60 years.
For any small business to survive for that length of time is extraordinary.
For a humble bookstore to do so amidst government suppression, a number of foreign wars, several waves of American social sea change, San Francisco gentrification, technological advances, and many economic recessions is almost unbelievable.
And it all started by accident.
Julian and Raye Richardson met each other at Tuskegee University back in the 30s where Black creativity was thriving around them. Booker T. Washington and George Washington Carver were among the universityโs professors at the time, and Julian attended classes with Ralph Ellison. When the couple moved to San Francisco, Julian opened a print shop while Raye earned her doctorate in literature at UC Berkeley. Rayeโs love for books spilled onto the Richardsonsโ friends and neighbors, and soon they found themselves loaning her collection out from the back room of Julianโs print shop. The operation grew until Marcus Books, named for Marcus Garvey, was born.
โMy dad in his print shop would want to share books with his friends and never got his books back so he said, โLetโs start selling books,โโ the Richardsonsโ daughter Karen Johnson said. โI asked him, โWill white people let you sell Black books?โ He said, โItโs not about them. This is what we need.โโ
Blanche, another of the Richardsonsโ daughters, explains the urgency behind that need. โThey shared a love of reading Black books and found them difficult to find and purchase. They realized that for a Black community to be progressive, it must have its own bookstore as a source of information about itself.โ
Blanche Richardson, daughter of Julian & Raye, manages the Marcus Books in Oakland.
A simple, admirable, and aspirational goal, no doubt, but some didnโt see it that way.
Hoover’s memo on “black extremist bookstores”
In October 1968, J. Edgar Hoover issued a COINTELPRO memo warning against โincrease in the establishment of black extremist bookstores which represent propaganda outlets for revolutionary and hate publications and culture centers for extremism.โ In response to the perceived threat, Hoover ordered every FBI office nationwide to โlocate and identify black extremist and/or African-type bookstores,โฆ determine the identities of the owners; whether it is a front for any group or foreign interest; whether individuals affiliated with the store engage in extremist activities; the number, type, and source of books and material on sale; the storeโs financial condition; its clientele; and whether it is used as a headquarters or meeting place.โ Marcus Books was absolutely one of those places, as within its walls organizations like the Black Firefighters Association, the Association of Black Policeman, the Black Nurses Association, and many more were formed to support the Black working class.
Proudly proclaiming that their โvery existence was born out of an awareness of anti-Blackness plus a sense of duty to provide a space where we are not simply respected but affirmedโ has always put Marcus Books squarely in the sights of American white supremacists. Marcus Books is a family-owned and operated business, and even the Richardsonsโ granddaughter Jasmine Johnson says that the bookstoreโs entire staff has been met with โwhite-only-water-fountain-level racismโ often. When Marcus Books was supported in 2020 through a GoFundMe after they couldnโt raise the several million dollars to purchase the Fillmore Street location that housed their first official storefront, they were met with racial aggressions, including but not limited to people hiding behind Twitter profiles trolling and undermining their posts with comments like โWhy canโt a Black owned bookstore save themselves?โ
Kids from an Oakland school hold their selections donated by Marcus Books, in front of a mural on the shops building depicting Malcolm X armed next to a shelf of Black literature. It alludes to his quote: “Armed with the knowledge of our past, we can with confidence charter a course for our future. Culture is an indispensable weapon in the freedom struggle. We must take hold of it and forge the future with the past.”
The folks at Marcus Books have an answer to both the question and the racism they face. โโItโs pretty deeply connected to what happens when you qualify anything as Black. Youโre met with suspicion or dismissal. The publishing industry has had a history of framing us as a โdiversity section,โโ Jasmine explains. The African-American Literature Book Club listed over 200 Black-owned bookstores in the 90s. Today, that number is only 118. And Marcus Booksโ experience in San Francisco is only further proof that America doesnโt truly value literary diversity. Though many other San Francisco bookstores have been listed as historical landmarks, despite all of the history and culture built there, Marcus Books has never been awarded that designation.
But with authors like Malcolm X, Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Terry McMillan, Walter Mosley, Muhammad Ali, Ishmael Reed, Michael Eric Dyson, Tannarive Due, Randall Robinson, Nikki Giovanni, E. Lynn Harris, and so many more whoโve passed through their doors and graced their shelves, Marcus Books isnโt just a Black bookstore; itโs an American treasure that celebrates Blackness, in a culture thatโs actively censoring that celebration in literary spaces elsewhere. In times like these and many other tumultuous eras, Marcus Books endures, inspires, and encourages us to do the same, reminding us that the โcall to write our own story, now more than ever, continues.โ
KEEP GOING BLACK IN HISTORY:
A PBS short documents Marcus Books through a tour of the store, interview with the owner, and bits of the business’s history.
In the spectrum of great black publications like JET Magazine and EBONY, thereโs one often left out of the conversation: Sepia Magazine.
For almost 40 years, Sepia pushed the boundaries of design, content, and photography in black publications, positioning itself as a LIFE Magazine for black readers.
Where Jet covered a wide range of general interest topics, and Ebony documented current events in news, culture and entertainment, Sepia took a decidedly different tack, turning its pages into a in-depth, photojournalistic view into the lives of everyday black people and celebrities in arts, music and civil rights in particular.
First published one year after Ebony in 1946, Fort Worth, TX headquartered Sepia entered the black publishing landscape during a curious time for America. Although theyโd suffered racism in their own armed forces, black soldiers and the valor with which they fought for a country that still hadnโt afforded them full civil rights had been recognized globally and back in the States. Those unexpected but significant gains in equality, and the fact that a newly enfranchised black populace naturally wanted to be more informed about its government, led to one of the biggest black publication booms in American history.
And while Ebony and later, Jet, had things covered on the national front, the pages of Sepia were where black Americans could feel seen and heard. Headlines like โThe Black School Thatโs the Best in Los Angeles,โ โThe Ghetto Through the Eyes of Youthful Photographers,โ and โThe Black Chinese: How Africa and the Orient mixed in the U.S.โ are just a small smattering of the diverse topics Sepia featured. So keenly were they attuned to the mindset of the middle-class black American that they soon became the highest selling magazine among that demographic. That targeting strategy paid off two-fold in that black soldiers still fighting wars abroad could browse its pages for a true temperature check on the state of affairs at home, and vice versa.
Sepiaโs dual and rather polar audiences provided the opportunity to establish a dialogue unlike that of any American publication. Their column โOur Men in Vietnamโ gave black soldiers a platform to sound off about their experiences in the United States military. Whether writing about the continued racism in their ranks, or having personal reservations about their role in white Western imperialism, black soldiers found a safe space in Sepiaโs column that encouraged them to send their โexperiences, heartaches and joys while fighting communismโ and black Americans could sympathize with them like never before.
Although Sepiaโs staff and content was primarily black, its original owner was a Jewish man, and that culturally rich start to the magazine led to content that eventually expanded to include Hispanic and Asian Americans as well, as their communities often faced the same institutional racism. It also gave Sepia an interesting new perspective from which they could tackle issues of racism โ one they pushed to its absolute limit in their stunning exposรฉ, โLife As a Negro.โ
After controversially semi-permanently darkening his skin, a white Sepia contributor named John Howard Griffin traveled the Deep South for 6 weeks as a black man, and so eye-opening was the experience that when the magazine series ended, he expanded upon it in his iconic 1961 book, Black Like Me. John himself admitted that upon undertaking this โanthropological studyโ as he called it, he was embarrassed to find that even โ[his] own prejudices, at the emotional level, were hopelessly ingrained in [him].โ In response, one black reviewer wrote โsince there are white people who doubt everything a Negro says, perhaps now they will hear us when we say the plight of the American Negro is a disgrace.โ In the 1977 reprint of his book, Johnโs epilogue astutely and mournfully pointed out that in the years since that original printing, his โpersonal experience was that whites still didn’t hear.โ
The 7-month long series further solidified and legitimized Sepiaโs place in the American landscape and the black American experience it so richly captured. With its ambitious journalism alongside beautifully photographed moments, Sepia simultaneously shared the essence of black America and exposed a quintessentially American contradiction that John Howard Griffin himself articulated so well: โthose who embrace the strangely shallow dream of white supremacy are the true killers of society based on freedom, equality and justice.โ Sepia published its last issue in 1983 after being bought out by Ebony and quietly shut down, but in the 37 years that it graced newsstands, black households, and trenches worldwide, the magazine carved out a space where blackness had permission to be complex, curious, and most of all, authentic.
THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 