Richard A. Courage - Roots of the Black Chicago Renaissance: New Negro Writers, Artists, and Intellectuals, 1893-1930

The editors of this collection gratefully acknowledge the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), its award of a thirty-month collaborative research grant, and our NEH project research collaborators: Brian Dolinar, Sandra M. Frink, Bonnie Claudia Harrison, and Claudia Jacques de Moraes Cardoso. We thank the contributors to this volume and our acquisition editors at the University of Illinois Press, Dawn Durante and Larin McLaughlin (now at University of Washington Press), for their astonishing efficiency, sound advice, and solid commitment to this book. We are also grateful for a publication grant from the Howard D. and Marjorie I. Brooks Fund for Progressive Thought.

Richard A. Courage also benefitted greatly from research travel grants provided by the American Philosophical Society, Black Metropolis Research Consortium, National Endowment for the Humanities, Vivian G. Harsh Society, and Westchester Community College Federation of Teachers. He is indebted to a long list of colleagues and friends who contributed in many and complex ways, direct and indirect, to the success of this current project. Among them are Lena Ampadu, Timuel D. Black, Valerie Gerrard Browne, Beverly Cook, Sammie Dortch, the late Michael Flug, the late Joseph N. Hankin, Patricia Hills, Dolan Hubbard, Dewey Roscoe Jones II, Beatrice Julian, Daniel Klein, Janice A. Knox, David Levering Lewis, Robert Luckett, Frank Madden, Barbara McCaskill, Robert Miller, Jay Mulberry, Helen Othow, Pearlie Peters, Michal Safar, Daniel Schulman, Una Shih, Amritjit Singh, Frances Jones Sneed, Jim Smethurst, Rhondda Thomas, John Edgar Tidwell, Jianping Wang, Jim Werner, Sonia Williams, and the late Susan Cayton Woodson. And a final word of gratitudebeyond measurebelongs to Claudia, who is both life partner and professional collaborator, companion and muse. Muito amor e carinho, minha querida. Este livro para voc.

Christopher Robert Reed thanks the following persons for the collaborative spirit in which these colleagues in the Black Chicago History Forum and at Roosevelt University supported the literary portion of this project. Forum stalwarts Clovis Semmes, John A. McCluskey Jr., Clinee Hedspeth, Robert Howard, and other, unsung contributors at the forum's regular public sessions deserve our immense gratitude as well. At Roosevelt University, kudos are extended to Michael Ensdorf, Jeff Helgeson, Svetozar Mincov, and Catherine Campbell for their assistance in moving this project forward with writing analysis and intellectual encouragement. Lastly, the pioneering research on King Daniel Ganaway conducted by John Gruber, founder and past president of the Center for Railroad Photography and Art, is gratefully acknowledged.

Auditions

JOHN MCCLUSKEY JR.

Editors Note: The first literary selection is a previously unpublished novel chapter by John McCluskey Jr. Auditions draws on the same body of research that was the basis for his essay on Frederick Douglass's participation in the Columbian Exposition (see of the current volume). Auditions employs resources of the literary imagination to augment archival research and dramatically engage the questions that preoccupied the aging leader as he contemplated the high stakes in planning the Colored American Day celebration to be held at the fair on August 25, 1893. These questionsabout the meaning of civilization, the goals of art, the relationship between high and low, classical and vernacular expressive formswould continue to trouble the waters for black writers, artists, and intellectuals and are reflected in many of the events, visual and literary works, debates, and manifestoes described throughout the current collection.

Chicago. August 1893

The march of those last grey August days in Chicago was the relentless march of doubts in Frederick Douglass, former slave, citizen of the world, and patriot through his bones. In a second-floor meeting room, he watched a fly circle the heads of two men sitting at a table, light on the back of the hand of the meeting's convener, then seek the open windowsill. There was not even a flutter through the leaves among the tall maples outside. Around the long oak table ten men, half in shirt sleeves by now, were putting the best face on the race. They were placing carefully, though urgently, the finishing touches on the program for Colored American Day, just one week away. Two earlier meetings had been given over to what would be the proper image to present before the World's Columbian Exposition there in Chicago. There had been little consensus on what should be presented or who should be invited. That the spirit of the day should be dignified and restrained was the unanimous agreement among the planners. By the second meeting a few invitations had gone out. This was the third meeting and with the afternoon program so close the talk was growing louder. Earnest and finger-waving speeches replaced deft comments and civil suggestions.

Douglass was sitting in a large stuffed chair away from the table. The highest-ranking black official at the Fair, Douglass had nonetheless preferred not to sit at the table with the younger men. They had protested this at the first meeting, but Douglass would not budge. He was seventy-six years old and unafraid of the heavy collar of his own legend. Or so he had struggled every day to believe. His goals were simple now: to give a good speech on Colored American Day, to complete the construction of the house on Chesapeake Bay, to discover the true date of his birth, to surrender long, uninterrupted hours with his grandchildren, and to live into the next century.

You are the next generation of leaders, he had told them. We older ones should step aside and let our legacies bloom in the weather you bring.

With that he had attended every meeting, taking one or two of the men aside to discuss the finer points of the mounting of such an event. Afterwards and invariably, one of the young men would walk him to his next appointment. Despite the fact that he had agreed so late to play a discreet part in its planning, he was now among those who worked so hard for the special daya sop someone had scornfully called it. In the minds of all, his speech at the close of the day's ceremony would be the crowning achievement, but all that lay ahead. The discussion was stalled at completing the roster of speakers and performers. Professor Alphonso Turner, an English instructor from Fisk University, raised his hand.

I wish to nominate Professor Hallie Quinn as an addition. As you recall, I did so at the close of the last meeting, but we were unable to vote because of the time constraints.

I do not know her, someone said. Awaken my memory, please. Is she a writer? A singer of some repute?

Professor Turner shook his head. An elocutionist. She is trained at Wilberforce, our wonderful school in Ohio. She has travelled widely throughout the States, as far West as the Dakotas, I've learned. Indeed she has the distinction of being named Professor of Elocution at Wilberforce just last spring.

Forten, a neat man with a crisp and well-groomed goatee, cleared his throat, then spoke. I had the good fortune of sitting in the audience during one of her performances in Indianapolis last spring. She did Lady Macbeth and was remarkable. Regardless of color, she is among the best in the country.

Turner smiled. As you know she is conveniently close by and is again a visitor at the Fair. Then he glanced at Douglass. Mr. Douglass, can I presume?

She has been a guest at the Haitian Pavilion on two occasions, yes, Douglass said. We have spent an enjoyable time there together.

She will do then, Robinson, the chair, said. Let the record show that she passed with flying colors. He nodded to the recording secretary, then wiped his brow with a limp handkerchief. Now, finally, what of the Jubilee Singers?