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Genealogy has become very popular in the United States. The Black community has also become interested in their family history as a result of Alex Haley’s “Roots”, and Dr. Henry “Skip” Gates’ PBS series entitled “Black American Lives”. NBC has just started a third season of the show “Who Do You Think You Are?”
All of these shows are interesting, but they all focus on the rich and famous. Febone1960.net thought that it would be nice to give a forum to not so rich and famous people who’ve worked studiously on their family history for a number of years.
These folks know that it isn’t as quick and easy as it appears on these shows, to research your history. They do know something that these celebrities don’t know as a result of someone else doing the work. They know the hard work that goes behind it, and they also know the exhilaration when they actually make a connection to their past. Whether it’s good or bad, it’s still exciting to unfold the mystery of the family’s past.
Terri Cardozo decided to take us up on our offer to discuss her exciting discovery about her maternal grandfather, Charles Howard Matthews.
Below, Terri reveals some of the process of searching your family roots. Above she talks about her discovery on her grandfather and the time period in which he lived in a video. Take a read and a look. Download the podcast to access the video above and read Terri Story to find out about her method of research.
Terri Cardozo’s Story:
It has been a rewarding experience working with Febone1960.net on this project.
I became intrigued with the history of my grandfather, Charles Howard Matthews, when I read his Obituary, many years after his death. With the help of my sister Janice, we began our research.
Slowly we fitted the pieces together, creating a picture of his life – as if we were working on a crossword puzzle.
Fortunately,our Aunt Jean, (Geneva, his youngest daughter) was still alive. Though in her 90′s, she was still able to answer our questions – give names to people in photo’s and recite stories that helped to add color to the documents we found.
We asked family members to look for old photo’s, most shared, some did not.
The more questions answered, the more they generated.
We accept the fact that this will be a life long quest.
Genealogist – Librarians were extremely encouraging, helping us to think outside the box, pointing us in new directions.
TIP: LABEL PHOTO’S WITH NAMES, DATES & LOCATION.
We would be most grateful if anyone who has any knowledge of our grandfather’s career, would share it with us. Please contact me, TerriCardozo@febone1960.net
Are you interested in discovering your family history? Have you already started and would like to share one of your stories by video? Email us at familyhistory@febone1960.net.
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Posted 1 year, 3 months ago at 7:46 pm. Add a comment
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1963 was a very prominent year for the Civil Right s struggle.
Jessie Bailey was just one out of numerous young African Americans in the Unites States who took to the street protesting in a non-violent manner the segregation practices in the south.
The violence encountered by the non-violent protesters in Birmingham, Alabama prompted President John F .Kennedy to propose a Civil Rights bill. A, Phillip Randolph who had organized the black Pullman porters along with Bayard Rustin organized a march on Washington.
African Americans all over the United States emerged on our Nation’s Capitol and heard
Martin Luther King, Jr., give his famous I Have A Dream Speech.
African Americans returned from Washington re charged in their quest for freedom. On
September 15, 1963, a cloud darkens that enthusiasm as a result of a bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. There had been many bombing
Throughout the movement b but this one was the most despicable crimes of the Civil Rights movement. Four young girls attending Sunday school Denise McNair, Cynthia Wesley, Carol Robertson and Adie Mae Collins ages eleven through fourteen were killed when a bomb exploded at the Church. Twenty others were injured. The Church was a center for civil rights meetings and just a few days earlier, the courts had ordered the desegregation of Birmingham schools.
The violence did not stop there. On November 22, 1963 the civil rights movement received a severe blow, when President John Fitzgerald Kennedy was assassinated in
Dallas, Texas.
Jessie Bailey thought she was fighting against segregation in Greensboro N.C. Little did she know that her actions would lead to the United States Supreme Court ordering the re-opening of the schools in Farmville, Virginia in 1965, so that her unknown relatives could receive an education.
Associate Justice Felix Frankfurter retired after suffering a stroke in 1962. Lead by Hugo
Black, the United States Supreme Court ordered Prince Edwards’ county schools to reopen in 1965. In writing the opinion for a unanimous Court, Black stated that the time
for mere deliberate speed had run out and that the phrase can no longer justify denying
these children their Constitutional rights.
Following upon P resident Kennedy’s recommendation, President Lyndon Baines Johnson over-came southern resistance and achieved the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Passed under the Interstate Commerce clause, the Act prohibited discrimination in public facilities, government and employment. It abolished the Jim Crow laws of the south and made it illegal to compel segregation of the races in schools, housing, and hiring.
In 1964, the world would learn about another despicable act carried out by cowards
hiding behind white hooded bed sheets. On June2 1,1964,three political activists were murdered outside Philadelphia, Mississippi for their participation in the voter registration of blacks.
The killing of James Chaney, a 2l years old black man from Meridian, Mississippi,
Andrew Goodman, a 20 years old anthropology student from New York, and Michael
Schwerner, a 24 years old Jewish social worker also from New York occurred one day
After the three men arrived in Mississippi after attending a week long training in regards
to black voter registration strategies.
The three men were on route to Longdale to inspect the ruins of black civil rights active
Church destroyed by arson when they were pulled over for an alleged speeding violation.
They were released after being held for several hours, and Chaney the driver was fined.
After a $25,000.00 reward w as offered, the FBI found their bodies two months later just
6 miles southwest of Philadelphia, Mississippi. Goodman and Schwerner had each been shot in the heart, while Chaney had been shot three times following a severe beating.
On June21, 2005 on the 41st anniversary of their murders an appropriately named Edgar Ray Killen was convicted of three counts of manslaughter.
This atrocity coupled with the unprovoked attack on March 7, 1965 in Selma, Alabama
by state troopers on peaceful marchers on route to the state capitol as they crossed the
Edmund Pettis Bridge and the beating death of James Reed a catholic priest by white
Supremacist persuaded the President and Congress to overcome southern legislators
Resistance to effective voting rights legislation.
President Johnson signed into law on August 6, 1965, the voting rights act that applied a nationwide prohibition against the denial or abridgement against the right to vote based on literacy test. Although the act did not prohibit poll taxes, the U.S. Supreme Court held poll taxes to be unconstitutional under the 14th amendment.
100 years after the Civil war, 100 years after the signing of the emancipation
Proclamations, southern Blacks through a horrendous civil rights struggle finally regained the civil and political rights they had obtained through Congress during the reconstruction era.
The clip was narrated by radio journalist, Robert Lorei.
For Spanish and hearing impaired versions, please go to the Febone1960.net Black History Month Calendar
FEBONE1960.NET IS EXPERIENCING TECHNICAL PROBLEMS WITH THE HEARING IMPAIRED AND SPANISH VIDEOS. TO COVER THOSE AREAS WE HAVE PLACED THE WRITTEN TEXT ON THE BLOG IN ENGLISH AND SPANISH. WE WILL WORK TO GET THE VIDEOS BACK ON TRACK AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. WE APOLOGIZE FOR YOUR CONVENIENCE.
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Posted 3 years, 2 months ago at 5:16 am. Add a comment
Podcast: Download (16.5MB)
Had he not been gunned down in the Audubon Ball Room on that dreadful 21st day in February of 1965, Malcolm X would be celebrating his 84th birthday on this upcoming Tuesday May 19, 2009 with his children, grandchildren and great grandchildren.
Manning Marable who insist that The Autobiography of Malcolm X was a memoir and not an autobiography speculates through his books on who Malcolm X was and what he would have become but for his assassination.
However, nothing speaks greater as to who Malcolm X was and may have become than his his eldest daughter Ambassador Attallah Shabazz who at the tender age of six, witnessed the assassination of her father.
Today, Ambassador Shabazz carries on the work of not only her father, but her ancestors of whom she is part of the sum. Ms. Shabazz doesn’t feel burdened by her fathers legacy. “I am not under a shadow,” she told Los Angeles Times writer Lawrence Christon. “I’m under a light.”, and although she has chosen a different medium to express herself, she remains “under his light.”
Hear for yourself as Ambassador Shabazz describes in her own words, the Malcolm X she knows with Febone1960.net Presents Conversations With Ambassador Attallah Shabazz.
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Posted 4 years ago at 4:24 am. Add a comment
