Little-Known Kansas City History

Early Kansas City home, possibly belonging to Bernoist Troost. Slave cabin in rear.

To dispel any notion that Kansas City was anything but a Confederate city, one has only to take a look at the town settlers. The first company, formed in 1839, consisted of 14 men and was spearheaded by John C. McCoy, William Gilliss, and a fur trapper from Kentucky named William Sublette. Town founder McCoy, according to the 1850 census, owned five slaves at his home on Pearl Hill. Gilliss, born in Maryland, was a slaveowner. The 1850 census shows he owned three male slaves, ages 18 -36. Although banished by Ewing in 1863, Gillis was allowed to stay, perhaps due to his age, wealth, position in the community, and by showing evidence that he had freed his last slave in 1862.

Fry P. McGee was a son of early settler James Hyatt McGee of Kentucky, reputed to have brought the first slaves to Kansas City in the late 1830’s. The 1860 slave census shows that Fry McGee, his brothers and his mother owned slaves. Jacob Ragan of Kentucky arrived in Jackson County in 1837. He was a known Confederate and was included on at least one of the Provost Marshal’s lists of “bad men.” William Miles Chick was born near Lynchburg, Virginia. He came to Kansas City in 1836. Chick, too, was a known Confederate and was one of the Provost Marshal’s “bad men.” Chick’s warehouse was located next to Jesse’s on the levee. Both were burned by Union soldiers in 1862. Col. Chick was was John C. McCoy’s father-in-law.

Five men of the 1839 company were farmers and slaveholders residing in Blue Township, Jackson County, just east of Kansas City:

Oliver Caldwell arrived in Jackson County in 1833. He farmed at Blue Valley and organized the Christian Church in Independence. The 1840 census shows that he owned 9 slaves; the 1850 census shows Oliver 58, wife Ann 54, 3 children 17-24, and 11 slaves.

George Washington Tate arrived in Westport in 1838. He became a Missouri state legislator in 1842. The 1850 census for Blue Township identifies Tate as a 53 year-old merchant, residing with his wife Lovey 46, and 3 children 14-27 and 1 male slave, age 15.

William Collins was a Kentucky native who lived in Liberty. The 1860 census for Liberty Township shows him with 4 slaves. James Smart of Virginia was a farmer who came to Jackson County 1834 with his brother Thomas and became Jackson County judge in 1846. He was a founder of the Christian Church in Independence and was Oliver Caldwell’s brother-in-law. The 1850 census for Blue Township shows Thomas 53, Nancy 48, and 3 children aged12-20. The 1860 slave census show that he owned 15 slaves.

Russell Hicks of Massachusetts came to Jackson County around 1827. He was a teacher, lawyer and judge who was called “one of the most eccentric members of the Kansas Town Company.” After the war he practised law in Sedalia and was counsel to Senator Thomas Hart Benton. The 1850 census places Hicks, 65, in Blue Township with two female slaves, ages 4 and 23.

The vast majority of the personal wealth in Jackson County prior to the war was contained among men who had been born in Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee. These men and their families supported the Confederacy and its institutions. The children of the original town members were coming of age during the years leading up to the Civil War, as were the children of the thousands of southern settlers who came to Jackson County in the 1840’s.

--Text by John Dawson

More Americans Need to Read--and Follow--the Words of Robert E. Lee

More people in this nation need to read and apply and live Robert E. Lee's own words.

These, on our nation and fellow countrymen:

"I can anticipate no greater calamity for the country than a dissolution of the Union."

"Obedience to lawful authority is the foundation of manly character."

"Madam, don't bring up your sons to detest the United States government. Recollect that we form one country now. Abandon all these local animosities, and make your sons Americans."

And this, on war itself:

"It is well that war is so terrible -- lest we should grow too fond of it."

The American History We Don't Want to Know

Lynching was a form of terrorism used against Blacks during that time period, where mobs of Whites would hang, burn, shoot, and beat Blacks to death as a form of intimidation and control.

One of those who lost their lives was soldier William Little.

An excerpt:

"The year 1919 was a time of resurgence by the Ku Klux Klan. Seventy-six Blacks lost their lives to mob violence in southern states that year. One of them, Private William Little of Blakely, Ga., was apparently lynched precisely because he was wearing his uniform.

"The accounts of the time state that a few days after being mustered out, he took a train home and was beaten by local Whites for wearing his uniform around town.

"The mob made him remove it.

"A couple of days later, he was caught wearing it again -- Little protested that he had no other clothes -- and was beaten to death and left at the end of town."

EJI plans to build memorials and monuments to the slain throughout the South in an effort to not only dignify the dead but force Americans to face their history.

Read more and listen to jazz singer Billie Holiday's ode to those who lost their lives during that time here:

Lynching in America - Equal Justice Initiative

https://face2faceafrica.com/article/lynching-in-america

Links:  10 Outrageous Reasons Black People Were Lynched

American Experience . The Murder of Emmett Till

Musarium: Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography

Albert Einstein, with Lessons for Kansas City and Missouri and the Nation

EINSTEIN: THE NEGRO QUESTION (1946)

by Albert Einstein

I am writing as one who has lived among you in America only a little more than ten years. And I am writing seriously and warningly. Many readers may ask:

"What right has he to speak about things which concern us alone, and which no newcomer should touch?"

I do not think such a standpoint is justified. One who has grown up in an environment takes much for granted. On the other hand, one who has come to this country as a mature person may have a keen eye for everything peculiar and characteristic. I believe he should speak out freely on what he sees and feels, for by so doing he may perhaps prove himself useful.

What soon makes the new arrival devoted to this country is the democratic trait among the people. I am not thinking here so much of the democratic political constitution of this country, however highly it must be praised. I am thinking of the relationship between individual people and of the attitude they maintain toward one another.

In the United States everyone feels assured of his worth as an individual. No one humbles himself before another person or class. Even the great difference in wealth, the superior power of a few, cannot undermine this healthy self-confidence and natural respect for the dignity of one's fellow-man.

There is, however, a somber point in the social outlook of Americans. Their sense of equality and human dignity is mainly limited to men of white skins. Even among these there are prejudices of which I as a Jew am clearly conscious; but they are unimportant in comparison with the attitude of the "Whites" toward their fellow-citizens of darker complexion, particularly toward Negroes. The more I feel an American, the more this situation pains me. I can escape the feeling of complicity in it only by speaking out.

Many a sincere person will answer: "Our attitude towards Negroes is the result of unfavorable experiences which we have had by living side by side with Negroes in this country. They are not our equals in intelligence, sense of responsibility, reliability."

I am firmly convinced that whoever believes this suffers from a fatal misconception. Your ancestors dragged these black people from their homes by force; and in the white man's quest for wealth and an easy life they have been ruthlessly suppressed and exploited, degraded into slavery. The modern prejudice against Negroes is the result of the desire to maintain this unworthy condition.

The ancient Greeks also had slaves. They were not Negroes but white men who had been taken captive in war. There could be no talk of racial differences. And yet Aristotle, one of the great Greek philosophers, declared slaves inferior beings who were justly subdued and deprived of their liberty. It is clear that he was enmeshed in a traditional prejudice from which, despite his extraordinary intellect, he could not free himself.

A large part of our attitude toward things is conditioned by opinions and emotions which we unconsciously absorb as children from our environment. In other words, it is tradition—besides inherited aptitudes and qualities—which makes us what we are. We but rarely reflect how relatively small as compared with the powerful influence of tradition is the influence of our conscious thought upon our conduct and convictions.

It would be foolish to despise tradition. But with our growing self-consciousness and increasing intelligence we must begin to control tradition and assume a critical attitude toward it, if human relations are ever to change for the better. We must try to recognize what in our accepted tradition is damaging to our fate and dignity—and shape our lives accordingly.

I believe that whoever tries to think things through honestly will soon recognize how unworthy and even fatal is the traditional bias against Negroes.

What, however, can the man of good will do to combat this deeply rooted prejudice? He must have the courage to set an example by word and deed, and must watch lest his children become influenced by this racial bias.

I do not believe there is a way in which this deeply entrenched evil can be quickly healed. But until this goal is reached there is no greater satisfaction for a just and well-meaning person than the knowledge that he has devoted his best energies to the service of the good cause.

On This Day

The treasonists surrendered.

Robert E. Lee surrenders - Apr 09, 1865

World History That Just Isn't Taught in America

There's a great and even important article out from last Fall to which more Americans---young and old---should all be exposed:

Top 6 Countries That Grew Filthy Rich From Enslaving Black People

I can't and won't post the entire article, of course, but this little snippet, on America alone, is pivotal:

Slavery transformed America into an economic power. The exploitation of black people for free labor made the South the richest and most politically powerful region in the country. British demand for American cotton made the southern stretch of the Mississippi River the Silicon Valley of its era, boasting the single largest concentration of the nation’s millionaires.

But slavery was a national enterprise. Many firms on Wall Street such as JPMorgan Chase, New York Life and now-defunct Lehman Brothers made fortunes from investing in the slave trade the most profitable economic activity in New York’s 350 year history. Slavery was so important to the city that New York was one of the most pro-slavery urban municipalities in the North.

According to Harper’s magazine (November 2000), the United States stole an estimated $100 trillion for 222,505,049 hours of forced labor between 1619 and 1865, with a compounded interest of 6 percent.

_______________________

This, I think, on top of what the Atlantic Monthly wrote some months ago, keeps making more and more powerful cases for reparations for blacks and African-Americans in this country.

On this, the 186th birthday of Leo Tolstoy, I'm reminded of this qutoe:

"I sit on a man's back, choking him and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by all possible means - except by getting off his back." 

Link:    The Case for Reparations - The Atlantic

More on Black History Month

And you thought you knew.

American History and why we need a Black History Month

 

That's why.

A brief history of race in America

First, we owned African-Americans in the United States. They were brought over by boat, sold into slavery and that's where they stayed, their entire lives, until they died. If they were "lucky", their master(s) weren't completely horrible and abusive and/or tortuous to them while in this state.

Keep in mind, too, that, during this lifetime of slave work, besides being paid nothing, they were also almost entirely uneducated, formally. Most didn't know how to read or write. The ones who did were taught how to read and/or write if and only if it helped their master(s).

Then we "freed" them, after 200 years of this slavery, in 1863 with the "Emancipation Proclamation." Of course, they weren't really freed as they owned nothing--nothing--and most had nowhere to go. Besides the fact that the defacto social and political system still held them very much down. Many black men, especially, in the South, were arrested for "vagrancy" and sold to corporations for their labor. Still in slavery. That lasted until the 1940's, too. (See link below).

All during this time, they were at least under-educated, still, if not uneducated, as the masses would have it. "Separate but equal" was declared the law of the land and everything was hunky-dory.

Then, finally, in the 1960's, they were, again, officially, given the right to vote and the right to "fair housing." Of course, this was only on paper and segregating this minority to its own side of town still went on, as we have learned or as we know.

So deep-seated racism permeated our country from our inception right up to today and yet still, so many people across the nation--mostly white but other races, too--think that somehow, some way, African-Americans are not supposed to have any problems today, culturally, socially, economically or otherwise.

Isn't that just a nice, tidy, convenient conclusion?

Links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_Proclamation

http://www.slaverybyanothername.com

American history Americans don't know--and don't want to know

There is a terrific article at Alternet now virtually all Americans should read but that few will: "Why the White South Is Still in Denial About Slavery" On a trip through the South, Civil War culture is presented as "authentic." They just leave out the slavery part. Please trust me when I say that first, it's good and second, it's important we know this history. It's a great, far from dry read. too. Link: http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/153598/why_the_white_south_is_still_in_denial_about_slavery/?page=1. Another great and associated article: What You Didn't Know About the South: Surprises from a White Southerner “The South” is an idea too often wrapped in a fog that emanates from the left as well as the right. Link: http://www.alternet.org/culture/153608/What_You_Didn%27t_Know_About_the_South%3A_Surprises_from_a_White_Southerner/

Quote of the day

"When the Civil War ended, there were no truth and reconciliation commissions formed to process memories, no Nuremberg Trials to enable reflection, no Great Emancipator to free the future from the past — only ghosts and the ravenous politics of memory. The need for national reckoning was quickly subordinated to the political imperative of reunification, and on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line, forgetting became more valuable than remembering." --Peter Birkenhead, from his article "Why the White South Is Still in Denial About Slavery" on Alternet. Link: http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/153598/why_the_white_south_is_still_in_denial_about_slavery/

Big "oops" at Missouri Southern University on the internets right now

Ouch. Those mistakes hurt, don't they? There's a big story on the Associated Press (AP) and Yahoo! News right now about--well, read it: Mo. university chief sorry band played 'Dixie' SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) — Missouri State University is apologizing after its band performed "Dixie" at a site where three black men were lynched in 1906. Ow. Someone needs to pay more attention to details down at SMU.

Today's 150th Anniversary of the beginning of the US Civil War

Today is the 150th anniversary of the Southerners and their "Confederacy" waging war on the US so they could attempt to secede from the Union.

Lessons to be learned (I repeat):

--It was to fight for slavery

--It was wrong

--They lost.


Note:  When PBS' series "Slavery by Another Name", based on Douglas A. Blackmon's book comes out, don't miss it.  It's the history and education the country doesn't want us to know but that we owe to African-Americans and ourselves, frankly, to know and understand.  It isn't pretty but it's important we see and know it.  Unfortunately, it's not coming out until 2012.

It can't come out soon enough.

Links:  http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history
http://www.slaverybyanothername.com/
http://www.slaverybyanothername.com/homepage-feature-1/coming-to-pbs-%E2%80%93-fall-2011/
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_newsroom/20110412/us_yblog_newsroom/rare-civil-war-photos-document-life-between-battles
http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Rare-Civil-War-Photos/ss/events/us/041211civilwarphotos

A wonderful, true, perplexing and ultimately frustrating, possibly to the point of maddening "Quote of the day"

Americans are wondrous optimists, looking to the upper class and expecting to join it someday. In 1860, many subsistence farmers aspired to become large slave-owners. So poor white Southerners supported slavery then, just as many low-income people support the extension of George W. Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy now.    --James W. Loewen, The Washington Post


Links:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/five-myths-about-why-the-south-seceded/2011/01/03/ABHr6jD_story.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/16/AR2010121606200.html

Ignorance, then and now

"...Americans are wondrous optimists, looking to the upper class and expecting to join it someday. In 1860, many subsistence farmers aspired to become large slave-owners. So poor white Southerners supported slavery then, just as many low-income people support the extension of George W. Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy now."  --James W. Loewen, from his article "Five myths about why the South seceded" in The Washington Post


Idiots.


And for clarification, both groups (the poor, subsistence farmers, aspiring to be large quantity slave-owners one day and low-income people today, thinking they should support the George W. Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, in case they become wealthy one day, too.)


Link to article:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/07/AR2011010703178.html

Could we stop this?

 

I mean, after all, they did lose.