Example is an Invaluable Teacher

A Father Helps His Daughter Experience Black History

By Dave Arnold

In schools across the country, teachers and students will honor Black History Month. In some communities, though blacks may be few, their stories are vital.  

Leaders in the black community will visit thousands of schools during Black History Month and tell their stories of success. They are role models for all of us, and living examples of racial progress in this country.

"Example isn't the main teacher in life, it is the only teacher," said Albert Schweitzer.

Unfortunately, in my small town of Brownstown, Illinois, our teachers will depend on books and videos to tell students about black culture. In Brownstown, blacks are not just a minority. They are a rarity.

I was confronted with this predicament when my daughter was in school many years ago. So, to complement the stories she learned in school about heroic black people in business, science and the arts, I took her on a journey to surrounding towns in search of more black history.

Life's Lessons

We started with the restaurant where my sister worked 40 years ago. I explained how black people would be required to come to the back door of the restaurant and ask for permission to enter. At that time, I explained in a hushed tone, blacks were prohibited from entering many public places.

I then showed my daughter a neighboring town where a small sign once stood. I was too young to read it at the time, but I remember my older brother telling me that it said: "N--  don't let the sun set on you here." Standing there with my little girl, I struggled trying to explain the n-word.

Slave House

We then drove to southern Illinois to a house near Old Shawnee Town. We visited a three-story southern mansion known as The Old Slave House.

The house has a secret staircase that goes from the basement to the third floor. It is said that the owner's henchmen would capture runaway slaves as they crossed the Ohio River from Kentucky into Illinois. The slaves would be transported to the driveway of the house, then hauled through the basement and up the secret stairway.

The third floor resembled a medieval torture chamber. It contains small sleeping cells with no windows, thick iron bars, leg irons, neck collars, and chains. Two whipping posts are stained with blood.

At the time we were there, in mid-July, it was 95 degrees outside, 100 inside. I could easily visualize what it would have been like for 12 or more slaves to be cramped in this hellish place. I did not have to tell my daughter much. The place spoke for itself.

Family Tragedies

We drove to Kentucky and came back into Illinois at the city of Cairo. As you cross a nearby bridge, you see the waters of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers collide in violent confusion.

Historians say it was in Cairo that Abraham Lincoln first witnessed a family being auctioned off as slaves to different masters. It is believed that from then on he was committed to putting an end to slavery. He did just that when he issued the Emancipation Proclamation that freed slaves in war zones during the Civil War.

In Cairo, I told my daughter about a race riot that occurred there in September of 1969. Leading up to the riot, a black teenage boy was arrested on a minor offense and placed in jail for the night. He was found dead in his cell the next morning hanging by his belt.

Upon hearing the news, townsfolk split down the middle on whether it was a suicide or murder. A riot broke out with gunfire from both sides. The National Guard was called in to establish order. To this day it remains a touchy subject in Cairo.

Long Road Home

In so many words and gestures, I could see that my daughter felt the horror and injustice that had been dealt to the blacks we learned about on our journey. Over the years, she developed a sense of the long road that blacks had traveled in trying to achieve racial equality.

My daughter is a preschool teacher today with students from a variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds. She tells me how much she loves each one of them and tries to treat each equally.

By this, I believe that the examples of black pride and struggle that she learned on our short drive many years ago made a lasting mark.

(Dave Arnold, a member of the Illinois Education Association, is head custodian at Brownstown Elementary School in Southern Illinois.)

The views expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NEA or its affiliates.