30. My take on uncovering Reconstruction Era resources

African American History Monument at The State House, Columbia
by Robin Foster

I was so happy to be able to attend Tony Burrough's seminar his past Sunday at the Robert Mills Courthouse in Camden.  I have his book, Black Roots,  and I have used it faithfully for almost a decade.  It will never become obsolete.


I have been researching for over 20 years, and I still learned so much.  The greatest thing that I remember he said was, "If you want to locate information about a slave ancestor, research Reconstruction records."








Well, I have only skimmed the surface when it comes to Reconstruction Era records.  A light bulb somehow went on, and now I am on a mission to find all I can.  I am having a great deal of success. It is as if the resources have just been waiting for me.  I am learning so much about this period in our history that I did not know.


A study of Reconstruction can be quite challenging because there are so MANY contradictions and opposing viewpoints.  Freedmen who struggled to exercise and keep their new found freedoms were seen as shiftless, criminals, and less than equal.  You must be able to keep the proper perspective as you trudge through these records.  They are useful to those who have slave owner as well as slave ancestry.


I can certainly see why anyone would want to avoid having to use them in genealogical research, but doing so may result in never finding that link back to slavery (see Reconstruction Era records are neglected genealogical resources).  I have been very successful in locating a few of my ancestors so far.


Even though I have struggled a little this week and had to do some major soul searching, I feel a significant change as come over me.  I understand so much more about the complexities of being African American.  I understand so much more the purpose for me being taught to have integrity and to "NEVER use the word, can't." when I was growing up.


I am understanding more about the responsibility I have to share these perspectives and the resources that can help others find documentation.  Yes, we are working to find evidence to document our ancestry, but in the process we are really discovering ourselves.  Reconstruction was in many respects harsher than slavery.


Freedmen had no monetary value to former slave owners and were even more expendable.  How did they do it?  What were they made of?  I hope I will understand better as I go along.  I will continue to share my feelings here, but I will share resources and how you can access them in a more formal way here:  Columbia Ethnic Community Examiner.  I have written 3 articles this week so far.    Click the "subscribe" button at the top of any of the articles so you do not miss any resources.

Read Full Story...

20. Amanuensis Monday: Sweet Aunt Cat

Catherine T. Harrison (1917-1999)

This is an oral history interview with Catherine T. Harrison, my great aunt, on February 12, 1996. Aunt Cat is the daughter of George Anderson Tucker and Daisy Chick Tucker. This is the first interview I had ever done. I was encouraged through a class I was taking at Chicago State University on African American genealogy by Tony Burroughs, a famous genealogist who recently appeared on the PBS Series African Ancestors' Lives.


Aunt Cat was very supportive and kept in touch always with family members. She was truly a family historian. From the information that she shared, I was able to eventually find the census records from 1870 to 1930 for the Chick-Tucker and Sims-Talley families.

 

Question: Where did you go to school?

Catherine Tucker Harrison: 


" I went to school back in Buffalo, South Carolina...a grammar school...at a little school that was about a mile from our home. I went to rural school. I was there from the first grade through the seventh grade. I was pretty alert, so my older sister, who is your grandmother, ...she was married then and living in Columbia, South Carolina, and so she took me to Columbia, South Carolina, and I started school in the eighth grade there at Booker T. Washington High School.


I finished high school there in 1937. Then after I finished high school, there was a college in the same town, Benedict College, and I enrolled in Benedict College. I spent four years there, and I graduated from Benedict College with magna cum laude. Then after that, I taught at various places in South Carolina."




Read more at Suite101: Interviewing Extracts Rich African American heritage

Read Full Story...