#ImWithKap: A Lesson My Father Taught Me

Posted on February 6, 2019 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

I did not watch Super Bowl LIII in my hometown of Atlanta, Georgia largely in protest of the NFL’s mishandling and mistreatment of Colin Kaepernick, the former quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers who decided to kneel during the National Anthem in protest of continuing police brutality and murders of Black people and other peoples of color. Soon his friend NFL player Eric Reid joined him. Reid is back at work playing football, but Kaepernick is still without a job in the prime of his life.

Now, I don’t expect Kaepernick to be strapped for cash or without friends, even though he has been vilified by many people. The seven Atlanta artists that painted murals of him all over my beloved city of Atlanta in what artist Fabian Williams (aka @occasionalsuperstar) named #KaeperBowl, are certainly a testament that a lot of us think what Kaepernick did was right. (And the artwork of him is stunning, just visit: #KaeperBowlMurals.) Yet, I know that in many ways Kap is alone. No one else has lost a job for doing something like kneeling during the National Anthem. In the midst of all that #ImWithKap hashtagging, I never forget that he’s really by himself in a lot of ways. So I will explain why I boycotted the Super Bowl and will continue to boycott the NFL.

I could say many things about the abuses heaped on my people, Black people, the historic abuses of slavery and rapes and beatings, as well as the abuses that seem to never end, such as police brutality. These certainly factor in my protest, but they really are not the reason why #ImWithKap.

Back in 1973 when I started Saint Joseph High School on Courtland Street, the boys’ varsity basketball team, The Hawks, lost a lot of games. It wasn’t until my second year that we saw improvement. My Dad always took me to these games and in many instances, Daddy was a lot of my classmates’ ride to and from the game. My father spent more time with me than the average soccer Moms of today spend with their children. He was always present and accounted for.

Well, I remember one night St. Joe’s boys’ varsity basketball team was just a few minutes away from actually winning a game. We were going crazy in the bleachers. I don’t even remember the name of the school or the team we were playing, but I do recall that there wasn’t enough time on the clock in the fourth quarter for the opposing team to ever catch up and possibly force the game into overtime or win outright. Victory was ours; and then it happened. Daddy started cheering for the other team. “Come on now, you can do this!” “Let’s go! Let’s go!” I looked at him like he had lost his mind; and I prayed that none of my friends saw him give these pep talks and cheers to a team that was playing against us.

When we won, we all ran around screaming and jumping and shouting. I headed back to the bleachers to ask Daddy what in the world was he thinking cheering for the other team. He stopped me from finishing the question and looked me dead in the eye and said this. “Joy, look over there at how that team’s fans have left. No one is cheering for them. No one is in their corner. Never, ever forget that when someone or a group of people have done their best, have given their all, but it’s obvious they are not going to win and not going to prevail, that they still deserve to have someone standing with them always in their corner.” I’ve never forgotten that lesson. Daddy cheered for the underdog his entire life.

Colin Kaepernick had Eric Reid to join him in taking a knee against police brutality. My Daddy would have loved Eric Reid for that. As I trekked around Atlanta to take a look at all the murals painted of Colin Kaepernick by some of our most brilliant Atlanta artists, I knew that if Daddy was alive he would not have simply gone with me, he would have gone out ahead of schedule to watch these artists paint these murals. I know my Daddy. He was always ready for an adventure, and particularly one steeped in protest for the protection, respect and benefit of our people. So…

I’m not solely “with Kap” because, as a historian I can dredge up 400 plus years of offenses against Black people; nor am I specifically “with Kap” because there have been so many instances of police abuse against Black people in these last several years. I’m “with Kap” because my Daddy loved us as a people. #ILoveUs✊🏿✊🏾✊🏽✊🏼. #ImWithKap simply out of respect for my father. Àṣẹ.

This blog was written by Leslye Joy Allen and is protected by U. S. Copyright Law and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Any partial or total reference to this or any blog authored by Leslye Joy Allen, or any total or partial excerpt of this or any blog by Leslye Joy Allen must contain a direct reference to this hyperlink: https://leslyejoyallen.com with Leslye Joy Allen clearly stated as the author. All Rights Reserved.

I Owe Ted Turner and my Maternal Grandmother

Posted on October 12, 2017 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

by Leslye Joy Allen

Back in the day in Atlanta, Ted Turner, the TV mogul, was keen on making sure television shows like Jacques Cousteau’s nature shows stayed on the air. Turner believed in the preservation of our natural environment. He drove an economy car and at one time he had an office without air conditioning. This was his contribution to not contributing to dirtying up our environment. When I was a teen, I thought he was just another eccentric White multi-millionaire. Yet, when I listened to his reasoning about cleaning up the environment, he made so much sense.

Now, my late maternal grandmother, Lorena Wilkes Wilson was born in 1886. She lived through the Atlanta Race Riot of 1906 when she was a student at Clark College (now Clark Atlanta University). I remember that sunny, warm, Fall day when I was in my teens. A large flock of birds swarmed our front yard. I heard them. “Some bad weather is coming,” Grandma said. “It’s probably going to snow,” she said. I looked at her confused, “Grandma, it’s almost seventy degrees outside. Where is the snow coming from?” She stared back. “The birds know. They plan for bad weather. So when you see a swarm of them, you can be sure some bad weather is on its way.” Well…

right after that week of unseasonably warm temperatures, the snow came just as Grandma predicted. A well-read, well-educated Black woman from a small Georgia town she was. I remembered that my grandmother was born before there were any weather men and women on TV. She relied on nature to tell her how to prepare for bad weather, when to plant, and how to dress. I also remembered how cool Ted Turner was talking about saving animal populations and not disturbing the food chain. Yet, I also remember people being turned off by things like recycling and driving economy, rather than luxury, cars. Most people I knew then really didn’t want to hear any of this.

As I currently watch reports about one hurricane after another, about how deforestation has destroyed our natural speed bumps, I am grateful to Grandma and Ted Turner. I wonder what people would think or say if I told them that I recently spoke with a scientist who told me that almost all of us are consuming tiny bits of plastic every time we eat seafood because we have dumped so much plastic on the ocean floor that the fish are now infested with much of this plastic. The scientist said there was a guy working on some technology to clean up that ocean dumping ground. Yet, I honestly hope that what I just wrote made you a little sick to your stomach.

I hope you will recycle your bottles and cans and papers rather than throw them in the trash. I hope you will think about the health and well-being of future generations. And I hope someday that one of your children or grandchildren writes about you and thanks you the way I have to thank Ted Turner and my maternal Grandmother. They both taught me to pay attention to and to respect all of creation on and in the only home we have; and to treat this home like the temporary home that it is and one that I must share with all of creation. I hope you will too! Àṣé!

I’m still not blogging as much for a while…So, you are welcome to read my older blogs until I return later (trust, there is some good stuff in my archives at my blog)…I have to get my dissertation finished, and blogging and responding to every little detail is not on the agenda…In the meantime, stay focused, and stay woke, and for God’s sake don’t fall for the easy answers because the news media is full of “easy answers.” Do your research. Think for yourself. Peace and Blessings. I will see you when I see you. — Leslye Joy Allen

Remembering Belinda (Lynn)

Posted on August 12, 2017 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

(In memory of Belinda E. Fanning, August 1952 to August 2017)

A good friend

was laid to rest,

one who could

make you laugh

until your sides

split open,

one who could

play-the-dozens

until it drew a

crowd of

laughing witnesses,

one who nicknamed

“Yellow Biscuit,”

and

whose father

nicknamed

“Mosquito,”

one who my late Drew

loved and always

razzed,

DELIBERATELY.

Her laughter was

never muffled,

but

contagious and

deliberate

and natural.

To this

day,

I don’t trust

any

Black person

so prim and proper

that they suppress

their laughter.

As Drew used to say,

“If they don’t feel

better

after

having been around Lynn,

if they don’t like Lynn,

then something’s

wrong with them.”

I’m so glad I got

to tell her

over and over

again that he

was right.

Still taking some time away from blogging for a while…So, you are welcome to read my older blogs until I return later (trust, there is some good stuff in my archives at my blog)…I have to get my dissertation finished, and blogging and responding to every little detail is not on the agenda…In the meantime, stay focused, and stay woke, and for God’s sake don’t fall for the easy answers because the news media is full of “easy answers.” Do your research. Think for yourself. Peace and Blessings. I will see you when I see you. — Leslye Joy Allen

No Ordinary Man

Posted on October 27, 2016 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

By Leslye Joy Allen

Left to Right: Actor & Cultural Architect Charles Reese, Historian Leslye Joy Allen, and Actor-Director-Drama Professor Keith Arthur Bolden (Copyright © 2016 by Leslye Joy Allen. All Rights Reserved.)

When I learned that Mrs. Margarette Bolden passed on to the ancestors on Wednesday, October 26, 2016, I immediately thought of her son, my friend Keith Arthur Bolden. I never met Keith Arthur’s Mama, but I knew her through him. He spoke of her lovingly and often. But then, that is Keith Arthur’s nature. (I call him by his first and middle name.)

An actor, director, Professor of Drama, and director of the amazing Spriggs Burroughs Ensemble at Spelman College that contains actors from all-female Spelman and all-male Morehouse College, I am highly familiar with Keith Arthur’s phenomenal work with young actors. I had the good fortune to act as a Historical Consultant for him and this group; and the adventure was a lot of fun, and his asking me to do so was a supreme compliment. But on Wednesday, October 26, 2016, Keith Arthur lost his Mama. Yet…

In an act of unwavering devotion to his art and craft, he was up at 1:00 AM on October 27, 2016 for a late night/early morning rehearsal with his actors in the Spriggs Burroughs Ensemble. One day after his amazing mother passed away from her third bout with cancer, Keith Arthur stated that his Mama would want him to keep working and perfecting his art. This behavior might sound unreasonable to an ordinary man or woman, but Keith Arthur Bolden is not an ordinary man.

I have listened to him rave about how good his wife Tinashe Kajese is at acting. “If you want to know how to get into a scene, you watch my wife,” he has said on so many occasions. He could routinely brag about how beautiful his wife is (and she is a real beauty), but he praises her work all the time. In that respect he is quite different from a lot of men. Many men will praise a woman’s cooking and will talk about how pretty she is, or how supportive she is, but rarely do we women get praise for our professions unless the man has discovered some personal use of his own for our particular skills. Even more rare is the man or husband who brags about his wife’s abilities in her chosen profession. Keith Arthur Bolden is proud of his wife—as he should be, because Tinashe is a powerhouse of an actor. He doesn’t mind telling everybody how proud he is of her as a professional. In addition to that, he remains one of the most thoughtful men I have encountered…

When my cousin and theatre veteran Billie Allen passed to the ancestors in December of 2015, one of the first people to contact me was Keith Arthur. When I had no money to attend the theatre, Keith Arthur made sure I saw Tinashe Kajese in the phenomenal play “Serial Blackface” about Atlanta’s late 70s-early 80s missing and murdered child cases; and actor-playwright Terry Burrell in her one-woman show “Ethel” about the life of the late Ethel Waters. (I have to add that Atlanta actor Margo Moorer is also another one of my theatre angels. Margo came and picked me up and took me to the theatre to see Gabrielle Fulton’s “Uprising” and made me take some money.) Keith Arthur adds even more love and light to the best in the theatre tradition. He thought of me and got me tickets all while he managed and directed a college theatre group, while he taught classes, acted in a variety of television roles, while he had the regular duties of husband and father, and while he went back-and-forth to L. A. to check on his ailing mother. I WILL NEVER FORGET HIS THOUGHTFULNESS. So…

When I learned his mother passed away, I thought of the value of good parenting, the value of raising a boy to look for substance in a woman. Mrs. Margarette Bolden had to have been one hell of a woman and Keith Arthur’s dad was probably pretty smart for having married her…and now she has left the earthly plane to join the ancestors…

Keith Arthur would probably tell me that he has made some mistakes and that my compliments here are a bit over-the-top. I would have to disagree. Ordinary men rarely understand much about women, not always because women are that complicated, but often because ordinary men never really ask women any real questions, at least not any questions about what a woman wants to do for a living, particularly if what she wants to do professionally has nothing to do with the man asking the questions. Keith Arthur Bolden is not so self-absorbed and does not fit that description…

I suspect that his mother had a lot to do with his thoughtfulness and genuine respect for a woman’s ambitions and talents. I have little doubt that his tenacity and belief that “the show must go on” (which explains his early A.M. rehearsal) not only comes from the theatre tradition, but also from his mother who battled cancer like a champion, always with a smile and positive attitude. I looked at the photos Keith Arthur would post of her smiling, even though her health was declining. So I thank Mrs. Margarette Bolden for her shining example and also because she raised a man who is not ordinary by any definition of the word. One day at a time, Keith Arthur…Rest in Peace Mrs. Bolden. Àṣé.

Remembering Dr. Edward B. Allen and the Laws/Allens

Posted on July 31, 2016 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

by Leslye Joy Allen

Photo taken by Billie Allen in 1994 (Copyright © Leslye Joy Allen Photo & Document Collection. All Rights Reserved.)

I did not meet my cousin Dr. Edward B. Allen until I was well in my twenties. He was the third and last born of three children born to William Roswell “W. R.” Allen and Mamie Wimbish Allen. His sister Lamay was the eldest, then came Wilhelmina (bka “Billie”) and then there was Ed. He and I met for the first time at his eldest sister Lamay’s home in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His sister Billie Allen and I had long been partners-in-crime, but I had not yet met Ed. All I knew about him was that he was a dentist. When I saw him he reminded me of my late father Thomas Charles Allen who was also not very tall, tan-complexioned and balding. Now, allow me to clarify something that Ed and his two late sisters needed clarified: I, Leslye Joy Allen, share the same “Allen” surname as Ed, but my last name comes from an entirely different Allen family, as I am biologically related to two unrelated sets of “Allens,” all on my father’s side of the family. Let me explain.

The original family surname was “Layende.” The Layendes were slaves from Cuba that arrived in the mainland United States. As a historian, I feel obligated to remind people that the Southern region of the USA and Latin America and the Caribbean were quite fluid and did business with one another all throughout the era of chattel slavery. This surname “Layende” was later anglicized to “Laws.” Ed’s paternal great grandfather Milton Laws’ sister Mollie Laws-Maddox was my great grandmother. They were the son and daughter of slaves David and Sarah Laws. Sometime before American chattel slavery ended, Milton Laws was sold, and he acquired the last name of “Allen,” and became known as “Milton Allen.” How he got this last name is not clear, but it is highly probable that Dr. Edward Bowden Allen would have been named Dr. Edward Bowden Laws had this slave sale not taken place.

Not long after Billie Allen asked me to do some family research, I had been searching for two men, one named “Milton Laws” and the other named “Milton Allen” only to discover from our mutual cousin Mittie Ann Tillotson that “Milton Laws” and “Milton Allen” were the same person. Cousin Mittie Ann was the great granddaughter of Richard Laws, the brother of Milton and Mollie. When Billie sent me photos of she, Ed, and Lamay’s paternal great grandparents Milton and Laura Allen, the first thing that struck me was how much my paternal grandmother Minnie Belle Maddox-Allen looked like her maternal Uncle Milton Allen (formerly named “Milton Laws.”) And then things began to click. Stay with me, now…

Now, Mollie Laws-Maddox’s daughter named Minnie Belle Maddox-Allen was my grandmother (My grandmother also named her daughter, my paternal aunt “Minnie Belle,” so I am also related to two “Minnie Belles.” Whew!!) My grandmother Minnie Belle Maddox married a man named Will Allen who was not related to my cousin Edward Allen. Will Allen, my paternal grandfather is where my own surname “Allen” comes from. You can imagine my early confusion at trying to figure out how my paternal grandmother was related to Ed, Billie and Lamay Allen when “Allen” was her married name, not her maiden name. But such is the case with African American genealogy. There are hundreds of descendants of slaves whose family surnames were chosen by newly freedmen and women themselves; they made-up some names; and in many instances the maternal and paternal surname was identical because both slave husband and slave wife belonged to the same owners and both bore the same surname.

This research journey began when Ed’s sister Billie could not remember the name of their paternal grandfather, so off I went to look up their father William Roswell “W. R.” Allen’s Social Security application. On that application were the names of his parents: Doc Roswell Allen and Mary Willie Jones. Doc Roswell Allen and my paternal grandmother Minnie Belle Maddox-Allen were first cousins. Soon after this discovery, and with some prodding from his buoyant wife Shelagh (who l instantly liked), Ed wanted to know more about the family tree. After, acquiring some more information from Billie I discovered that the physician Dr. Edward G. Bowden, who was my paternal grandmother’s physician, was the man Ed was named for. Dr. Edward G. Bowden married Elizabeth Allen who was the sister of Doc Roswell Allen and daughter of Milton and Laura Allen. Doc Roswell Allen’s sister Virgil (who later renamed herself “Virginia”) bore one son out of wedlock, and his name was John Wesley Allen and he was a dentist, the first of many dentists in the family. All of these “Allens” were members of that rather complicated “Laws/Allen” family tree.

I only saw Ed about four times in my life. Yet, each time I saw him, something he said to me gave me some nugget of information. I still remember when he told me he recalled a “John” from his childhood who came to visit but then seemingly disappeared. I told him Dr. John Wesley Allen was killed in a car accident in the late 1930s. In the late 1990s, I mailed Ed a report of everything I knew about our family. I don’t think I even knew about the origins of our slave ancestors the “Layendes” from Cuba when I sent that report to Ed, but he was grateful to receive it. I still have the “Thank You” note he sent me, a “Thank You” note that his sister Billie said was uncharacteristic of her brother. I laughed because I got the sense that Ed knew that the work I did was much more time-consuming and tedious than most people realize.

I remember Ed as a renaissance man who loved the good life, who could be aloof, who was often funny with a dry wit, who was a man who loved a good drink, but one who also yearned to know more about the home and people he left when he journeyed North to escape some of the harsher realities of life for Black people in the South that colored much of the 20^th century. Although we did not know each other well, I consider it my privilege to have known him and to have been able to help him answer some of the questions about our family tree and heritage. We always yearn for home, that sense of understanding where and from whom we have come. We yearn for home, no matter where we go. And now Ed has gone home (May 27, 1926 to July 18, 2026). Àṣé.

"Thank You Note" from Dr. Edward B. Allen to Leslye Joy Allen, July 1997. ((Copyright © Leslye Joy Allen Photo & Document Collection. All Rights Reserved.)

This blog was written by Leslye Joy Allen and is protected by U. S. Copyright Law and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives-4.0 International License. Any partial or total reference to this or any blog authored by Leslye Joy Allen, or any total or partial excerpt of this or any blog by Leslye Joy Allen must contain a direct reference to this hyperlink: https://leslyejoyallen.com with Leslye Joy Allen clearly stated as the author. All Rights Reserved.

Leslye Joy Allen

Social Commentary, History, Theatre, Jazz, and the Environment

Category Archives: family

No Ordinary Man