Black footprint in America came way before slavery

At auction some years ago, I stumbled across a worn, beaten-down and scruffy book whose title faintly included the word “Negroes.”

Opening it, I saw that it was children’s book titled “The First Book of Negroes” and written by Langston Hughes. It was published in 1952, and Hughes followed it with five other books with similar “The First Book of” titles: rhythms, jazz, West Indies, Africa.

The book was a great find for me, despite its appearance. It related the story of African American history, from its queens, kings and mighty kingdoms in Africa to enslavement in the Americas, along with the contributions of black people around the world. Most importantly, Hughes told of a black explorer in the 1500s who was among the discoverers of the area that is now Arizona and New Mexico.

That was something you rarely read about in history books, which equated black history in America purely with slavery. As some of us commemorate the 400^th year after the arrival of enslaved Africans at Jamestown, VA, in 1619, we should also remember that slavery is not all that defines black people.

The history of black folks in America extends nearly a century before that arrival when some came as explorers on Spanish ships and as African explorers on their own (including Abubakari II, a ruler of the Mali Empire in West Africa). In his book, written at a time when blacks were made to feel like a nation of people without a country, Hughes puts black history in Africa and America in its proper place, recounting a story of resiliency in the face of enormous odds. More than 50 years later, the Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington does the same.

Hughes relates the tale of Estevanico, a brave explorer who came to this new land with other Spaniards in the 1500s searching for the Seven Cities of the Indians that were built of gold. He was “a strong, very dark Negro born in Morocco. He became an explorer, fearless and full of spirit and adventure. More than four hundred years ago he sailed from Spain in a group of five hundred men seeking new lands beyond the seas. They landed on the coast of Florida.”

Life wasn’t easy for the crew (they were attacked by Native Americans and disease), and they moved on. Later, a shipwreck killed all but Estevanico and three others, and they wandered the country living among the native peoples, according to the book. He was sent out with Native American guides on his own to find the cities of gold and came across an area that is now the state of Arizona. There, he found grand pueblos with doorways decorated in turquoise.

Other accounts of Estevanico’s explorations state that he was among several Spaniards who came upon the area that is now Arizona and New Mexico. They also tell of his life: born in Morocco, sold into slavery like many of his people, treated well and joined Spanish explorers on an expedition to new lands.

Hughes wrote the book during a difficult time in his life. It was the McCarthy era when anyone linked to communism was considered suspect and blackballed. Like Paul Robeson and others, he was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee to acknowledge or deny  that he was a communist. Robeson refused to answer. Hughes said no.

Even before Hughes was contracted to write “The First Book of Negroes,” the publisher Franklin Watts required him to sign a document stating that he was not a member of the Communist Party. Watts published a series of first books.

The book is a testament to the accomplishments of black Americans. Besides black history, it also told of famous black men and women, athletes and more. Part of “The First Book of Negroes” is presented through the eyes of a young boy named Terry who lives in Harlem with his mother and father who came up from the South. It speaks of life for blacks in the South in language that a child can understand.

During that time, books about black children were full of stereotypes, and Hughes was all-too-familiar with them. In a 1944 letter, he lambasted a children’s book whose manuscript was sent to him:

“Concerning ‘Jump Lively Jeff’, I think the reason most Negro readers would not like the book is because it seems to perpetuate almost all of the old stereotypes that have been used for many years to caricature the Negro people.

The first two words of the first chapter are enough to make Negroes dislike it; naming a little colored boy after a rebel general, Jefferson Davis. Then comes persimmons and very shortly thereafter watermelon, and then an old Aunt Car’line. This particular fruit, and many varieties of Aunties have been used lo these many years to make Negroes a funny picture race. Then you turn a few more pages and lo and behold there is Mammy. Most Negroes nowadays loathe Mammy.

Perhaps the story may be a good one, but from my modern American Negro viewpoint there are so many unfortunate surface nuisances, so many comic strip names like Abslinoun, and so many pappys and mammys and aunties, plus the dialect that one only has to glance through the book to see why Colored people today would not like it. It would seem to me the kind of book that would encourage perfectly nice little white children to mistakenly address a perfectly nice little Colored child in broad dialect, under the impression that that is the language Colored people speak now.”

These early books were not written for black children. That’s why books like “The First Book of Negroes” and others like it were so important. They gave the children a heritage that included history-makers and showed them that slavery was part of it and not all of it. The book ends on a somewhat positive note with Terry proclaiming his love for this country and his father noting that “our country has many problems still to solve, but America is young, big, strong and beautiful.”

Indeed – if only she would embrace all the people who make her so.