Racist Family Members Circa 1960s

One of my great uncles was a rich man. He wore expensive clothes and drove an expensive car, a Cadillac that he replaced each year with the new model, paying cash. Once he did that in front of me in my small Indiana city. He traveled to faraway big cities like Chicago and he bought property there. When he came to town he schmoozed all the woman and bought us dinner wherever we went. He was funny, handsome, smart, and a racist.

For laughs he brought black licorice miniatures, "Tar Babies," he called them. He gave them to all the kids. I never ate one.

There was so much to love about him, but his racism drowned the rest out to a dull noise bothering my mind's quiet. But, all my family seemed to adore him, except my mom. She laughed at him with the others, ate the free meals at nice restaurants, enjoyed the fancy car rides, but there was an air of dark silence about her even at those times. I was not yet 10 years old, it was the early '60s before the Chicago riots and German Shepherds trained to attack black men and hoses made to power over humans. My uncle was beginning to bother my young brain. My mom's dark silence was bothering me even more.

The words my uncle used, horrible words, SPEAK UP, Mom! Mom! YOU would never use those words. But, that was not my mother's way. She liked his male flirting, his money, his polished leather shoes. "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?" was a new movie in town. My mom and I took in all the movies, "The Godfather," "Valley of the Dolls," if there were ratings I could have gone to any movie with Mom. My maturity outpaced most kids. (And Mom had no friends.) Our family's women goaded my uncle into seeing "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?" He didn't like the subject one bit. We teased that he was acting just like Spencer Tracy's character.

One night-out dinner, the family and uncle were seated four tables away from a mixed race couple. Immediately my uncle began saying bad things. None of the other diners even glanced our way. I watched the quiet couple as they just kept calmly eating. My uncle would not let up, even his sister who used his vile words herself, said, "That's enough," in a low voice. He kept on and grew louder, VERY LOUD. I grew very angry. I was ready to let him have it. Then a miracle happened.

My mom stood up, throwing her napkin to the table. She looked my uncle straight in the eyes and gave him her 'angry mom' glare, "Shut up! I will NEVER eat with you in public again! I am sorry (she glanced these words at the young couple) and (glancing back at my uncle) ASHAMED of you!" With that she started to storm out. I had stood up at "I am sorry..." and was right on her heels. I am crying now as I recall the feelings of pure pride I felt in that moment. 

Mom must have driven there that night, because I remember us complaining to each other and by golly we were angry all the way home. There was a change in our home after that. That uncle never made his racists jokes again, not in front of me. My mom stayed away most of the time, and whenever he was around---on his best behaviour. The times were changing too. Matter of fact, I can't recall white people talking in public like they had just a year before. It went and remains, not dead, but behind closed doors.

These memories are flooding me today. Obama, Martin Luther King, Jr., I so wish my uncle had lived to see this day. My mom has Alzheimer's, so I am not sure what she understands, but she was very happy when Obama first became president and I know if she were healthy her car would proudly display an Obama bumper sticker.

In our quiet, we can mold our children. In our loud voice we can mold our world.