Past Event - August 4, 2017

The Black Side of Rockdale County History:

An Interactive Experience

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and writer, E.R. Shipp was a writer for the New York Times for 13 years, and taught at both the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and Hofstra University. Shipp currently teaches at Morgan State University and writes for the Baltimore Sun. She hosted the event “The Black Side of Rockdale County History: An Interactive Experience", to share her family history, as well as the history of black people in Rockdale County. This is the Rockdale County Channel 23 vimeo recording.

The Black Side of Rockdale County Presentation by E. R. Shipp, presenter for the evening.

WHAT I LEARNED SINCE LAST TIME — As some of you may have noticed, I haven’t done a weekly summary for a couple of weeks. First, I was preparing for the visit to Conyers and the program held Aug. 4; then I went to New Orleans for the annual convention of black journalists. I’m back in history mode now. I thank all who came out for the presentation at J. P. Carr. A special thanks to one of my partners in this project, Katrina McCollum Young, and to Shelli Baker Siebert of the Conyers-Rockdale Council for the Arts, for putting the program together. I learned that there is a hunger for knowledge about the Black Heritage of Rockdale County by blacks as well as others. I also saw an effort to find commonality — whether in shared family names, shared stories of our forebears registering for the World War I draft or shared stories about picking cotton to make money to be able to go to the county fair. Especially in these times, this is encouraging. I learned that for a younger generation, perhaps more so younger people who are transplants to Conyers, the building that is now the J. P. Carr Services Center is just that. They have no idea that this was a school and, indeed, the pride and joy of the black community for two decades. Nor do they know who John Phillip Carr was and why anything is named for him. That means that we have a lot of work to do: to educate ourselves AND to educate others.

If you haven’t done so already, you might test your knowledge by taking the quiz that we had fun with at the presentation. It was posted by me on August 7. Scroll to find it. Or, in the search bar, put in the word “knowledge”. If you’d like the answers, just send me a message. If you prefer email, our address is blackrockdale@gmail.com.

While visiting Conyers, I went out to Milstead and learned, as many of you must have known for some time, that the Mt. Olive Baptist Church no longer exists and has been succeeded by the Living Water of Christ Church. I hope some of you know the history of Mt. Olive, or at least bits of it, so that we can properly memorialize it on this page.

On my visit, Judy Bond, president of the Rockdale Historical Society, graciously gave me, my sister Norma and our nephew Christian a tour of the museum, which was once the county jail. I recommend it to all of you. But I was struck by what is NOT there: the black presence. That is most pronounced in the room dedicated to telling the story of the county’s agricultural past. Cotton is there. Implements are there. Photos of mills are there. The black people who planted and picked cotton and who worked in the mills are not there. Nor are the black community leaders of that era. That is a challenge for all of us truly interested in the Black Heritage of Rockdale County: let’s find ways to make sure that part of the story is reflected there. That means joining the historical society. Perhaps just as importantly, that means contributing items and information for the exhibits.

In preparation for my visit, I did a bit of research on “Miss Patience,” whose actual name was Mattie Cox Price Moon, and on Mrs. Louise Bass Hendrix, the teacher so many of us remember, but in varying ways. I will share that information in separate posts later and invite you to add to what I found in a rather cursory review of public records.

As we together explore the Black Heritage of Rockdale County, we won’t sugarcoat it. That was apparent in our gathering on Aug. 4, as we shared some stories that were funny, some that were uplifting and, yes, some that showed the darker side of Southern life from slavery through Jim Crow. When I visited the “jail,” I couldn’t help recalling that some of the earliest documents I came across when I began my research in 1990 were 1909 criminal court records showing a whole bunch of folks being arrested for rioting. Among those arrested were my kinfolks of an earlier era — my grandfather’s older sister Mary Shipp, her daughter Jennie Gilbert and her aunt Dolly Garrett Mays. My post-civil rights era brain thought, “Wow! There must have been some kind of uprising or civil rights action going on even that far back in time. Right on!” Truth is, as I learned, they’d been hauled in after a Saturday night of, shall we say, spirited socializing. That, too, is part of history.

In closing, I am reminded of something the late scholar John Hope Franklin said: “Whatever you do, it must be done in the spirit of goodwill and mutual respect, and even love. How else can we overcome the past and be worthy of our forebears and face the future with confidence and hope?”

Presentation Played while the people gathered

OUR FIRST EVER BLACK HERITAGE OF ROCKDALE COUNTY QUIZ

1. Bald Rock Baptist Church is older than Rockdale County. _____True _____False 2. A building on Bryant Street was home to all of these businesses except one. Which business was NOT located there? ____Levett’s funeral home ____Mrs. Queenie Smith’s Café ____The barber shop ____A dry cleaner’s 3. When girls "walked the line" in Milstead, they were modeling the latest fashions in an annual charity fashion show at Mt. Olive Baptist Church. ____True ____False 4. Hosea Williams was principal at the Bryant School School before he met Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. ____True ____False 5. Who started the band at J. P. Carr and led it to a state award in 1966? ____Curtis Bell ____Lamar Gilstrap ____David Hudson ____Louise B. Hendrix 6. "The Cut" was: ____A hair style that most teenage boys were getting at the Triple L Barbershop in the late 1960s ____A neighborhood recreational area where some serious baseball was played on weekends ____A shortcut many kids took from the J. P. Carr gym to Hardee's ____An initiation ritual required of boys in Boy Scout Troop 97 7. Which community calls itself “The Hood that Stood”? ____Griggs Street projects ____Milstead ____Shady Grove ____ Rena Court Black Heritage of Rockdale - 20170804 https:/www.facebook.com/groups/blackrockdale/ J.P. Carr Community Center 8. The Progressive Club got organized initially to do what? ____Register blacks to vote ____Provide a playground for kids ____Get rid of the hogs on Rockbridge Road ____Provide a social outlet for adults 9. One of the first African American pilots for Delta and one of its longest-serving was: ____Santana Flanigan ____Calvin Flanigan ____Marvin Flanigan ____Willie A. Flanigan 10. The first African American funeral home in Rockdale County was: ____Levett and Sons ____Mann & Walden ____C. Milsap & Sons ____Davis & Son 11. This person taught music to legions of kids, was a graduate of Clark College and was part of The Gospel Choraleers, a group that regularly sang on WAOK radio. ____Donna Young ____Maggie Lue Flanigan ____Theresa Hamm-Smith ____May Gladys McCollum 12. This woman preacher , known for warning, “We’re living in perilous times!” was considered an evangelist ahead of her time. ____Rebecca Baker ____Martha Gates ____Mattie Moon ____Queenie Smith 13. What did these people have in common: Mamie Peek, Willie Otis Dardy, Robert Sawyer, Raleigh Hamm, Louella Luke, Lon Flanigan, Johnny Lester and Duffy Miller? ____They sang with The Gospel Choraleers. ____They served on the biracial commission to desegregate the schools. ____They were local entrepreneurs. ____They were chaperones at The Rap House. 14. The first “Miss Black Teenager” in Rockdale was: ____Patsy Milsap ____Neodesha McCollum ____Michelle Curry____Sherry Hamm 15. In their church histories, which claim Rev. Toney Baker as an early pastor? ____Macedonia Baptist Church____Peek’s Chapel Baptist Church ____Shady Grove Baptist Church ____Rock Temple A. M. E. Church