Life

The Negro Motorist Green Book was a travel guide that listed lodgings, tailors and other businesses that welcomed black patrons during Jim Crow.

The guide, which was launched in 1936 and published for nearly 30 years, found a readership because while blacks knew which businesses were friendly in their hometowns, it could be difficult to discern which restaurants, beauty shops and night clubs were off-limits or hostile when they were on the road.

Civil rights leader Julian Bond tells NPR's Neal Conan that he remembers his family using the Green Book "to travel in the South, to find out where we could stop to eat, where we could spend the night in a hotel or in somebody's home."

Green Book Helped Blacks Travel Safely

Artist: Zaccheus and The 5th General
Song: Mississippi Tears 
Album: The Example (Later 2014)
Produced By: The 5th General

Twitter: @The5thGeneral
Twitter: @Zaccheus36

Zaccheus and The 5th General - Mississippi Tears (Free Download)

Life Stories: Janet Mock

Chris Lee is a master of transformation and helping people realize the greatness inside of them. On this episode of the School of Greatness, Lewis Howes and he discuss the 10 principals that everyone can use to realize their own abundance and live a life aligned with their vision.

Chris Lee: 10 Principals of Abundance and Prosperity

► iTunes: http://geni.us/KimieiTunes
► Amazon: http://geni.us/KimieAmazon
► Google Play: http://geni.us/KimieGP
► CD & Merch Packages: http://www.KimieMiner.com

Kimie Miner

New Day

With a master of midrash as our guide, we walk through the Exodus story at the heart of Passover. It's not the simple narrative you've watched at the movies or learned in Sunday school. Neither Moses or Pharaoh, nor the oppressed Israelites or even God, are as they seem. As Avivah Zornberg reveals, Exodus is a cargo of hidden stories — telling the messy, strange, redemptive truth of us as we are, and life as it is. 

See more at www.onbeing.org/program/avivah-zornberg-the-transformation-of-pharaoh-moses-and-god/6258

Avivah Zornberg — The Character of Pharaoh

Serial food entrepreneur Michael Jacober recently fell in love with that mainstay of Caribbean cooking: that blend of Jamaican spices called jerk. But he wanted to do it right. So, he went and learned from the masters of jerk in Jamaica. Then, he came back and opened a restaurant in Brooklyn called Glady's. He tells us his story.

How to make jerk that even your Jamaican neighbors will love

In collaboration with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Stop-and-Frisk. Voter ID laws. Jim Crow Redux. Reparations.

2014 has more similarities to 1964 than we care to admit. We can't forge ahead without looking back at a nation birthed in genocide and slavery, and marked by state-sponsored terrorism, debt peonage, lynchings, and redlining. How can we confront this history as a way forward? What is the new civil rights agenda? Who will lead today's movements for racial justice?

New America NYC: The New Civil Rights Agenda

It has been 50 years since the Freedom Riders boarded buses, trains and planes bound for the Deep South to challenge that region's outdated Jim Crow laws. The Freedom Rides were intended to highlight the South's non-compliance with a U.S. Supreme Court decision that prohibited segregation in all interstate public transportation facilities. This week, many of the estimated 350 Freedom Riders who put their lives on the line are making their way to a reunion in Chicago — and to join in the taping of a show about the Freedom Rides on the Oprah Winfrey Show, set to air May 4. Nevada City resident and longtime peace activist Mary Jorgensen, 94, plans to be on hand.

Mary Jorgensen - The Freedom Riders

Listen to Jean-Martin Fortier discuss micro-farming, young farmers, and what it takes to successfully operate a market garden. 

A Conversation with Jean-Martin Fortier

Janet Mock

Why is the human female the only female animal to have curves and how do these curves influence not only sexual selection but also social hierarchy and self-image? 

Curvology: the origins and power of female body shape by Dr David Bainbridge at Hay Festival

Annotations and transcribed highlights: http://www.brainpickings.org/2015/06/16/neil-gaiman-how-stories-last

Recorded at the Long Now Foundation (http://longnow.org/) on June 9, 2015. 

Follow @https://soundcloud.com/longnow and subscribe to the podcast of their excellent seminars on long-term thinking on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/seminars-about-long-term-thinking/id186908455?mt=2

MORE / TRANSCRIPT

Neil Gaiman on how stories last

Professor Jay Driskell of Hood College, author of "Schooling Jim Crow," traces the roots of black protest politics to early 20th century Atlanta and the fight for equal education.

The Roots of Black Protest Politics

I woke up this morning and I was thinking I was gonna be clever about this, but I decided I’m just gonna be honest, ‘cause I don’t wanna have to lie.

I’ve spent all of my adult life up to this point in a big city, but I always felt out of place. Never had much space. I left home at 15 with a dream in my head, a few hundred dollars and enough courage to take a chance. I spent 3 years on Broadway, which opened the door to many wonderful things like my publishing deal with Sony/ATV. Then, England started calling my name and so off to London I went.

I made my first record, Wasted In Jackson, there. I was able to take the distance from my birthplace (Tennessee) and find a way to make it sound like my hometown in an album. After (too) many years of trying to make my work and personal life work in the hustle of Los Angeles, New York City and London I realized that I had never been in my happy place. I’m a tough bitch but I’m not a miserable bitch –  I like to be happy! So, it only made sense to move my life back to the place that makes me happy— Jackson, Tennessee, the place I was born.

It's a funny little town because there’s so much music that stemmed from here. Carl Perkins, who is pretty much single-handedly responsible for making The Beatles & Elvis Presley happen with the songs he wrote, was born here. George Harrison was a pallbearer at his funeral. Paul McCartney didn’t come to his actual funeral and requested a private service with his body beccause he didn’t want to take media attention away from Carl on the day of his funeral. People like Ray Charles used to come to my hometown just to play some music with him. They sometimes wouldn’t even charge money! I saw Ray play for $5 when I was NINE years old. I was a girl growing up on Music Highway (the stretch of Interstate 40 between Memphis and Nashville). The blues are in my blood— I can’t and I won’t help it.

I moved back to Jackson to find what was real to me again, and what inspired me to leave in the first place— the music. I hadn’t been lying all those years before but I was missing something. I was missing the food, missing the culture, missing the dirty, late night, front porch, beer-drinking part of my life that I can’t find anywhere else. This place has always kept me honest and it led me back to the music I made recently that I’m going to share with you now. I’m happy to be free of the fucking city life, happy to be free of the fucking stress, I can finally fucking breathe. I don’t wanna have to lie to everybody about how I feel.

Here's a peek at the Comeback Queen EP, out July 17 

In Loving Memory of When I Gave a Shit

I Don't Wanna Have to Lie

Today On The Jay Severin Show, Jay discusses the fight to remove the Confederate flag from flying and the real motives this campaign. Jay also talks about race relations in today's America versus 50 years ago.  And, your questions & comments in 'The Court Of Truth'!  

All that and more on The Jay Severin Show!

The Jay Severin Show is LIVE weekdays from 2pm - 5pm ET, listen for free on The Blaze Radio Network www.theblaze.com/radio & iHeartRadio.com

Follow Jay on Twitter: @Jay_Severin

A 'Frank Conversation On Race' #FCOR

African American literature is over. With this provocative claim Kenneth Warren sets out to identify a distinctly African American literature—and to change the terms with which we discuss it.

Rather than contest other definitions, Warren makes a clear and compelling case for understanding African American literature as creative and critical work written by black Americans within and against the strictures of Jim Crow America. Within these parameters, his book outlines protocols of reading that best make sense of the literary works produced by African American writers and critics over the first two-thirds of the twentieth century.

http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674066298

Kenneth Warren asks What Was African American Literature?

http://www.npr.org/2012/04/26/151444474/party-of-reagan-no-party-of-falwell-writer-says

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

I'm Michel Martin and this is TELL ME MORE from NPR News. Now it's time for a special Faith Matters. That's the part of the program where we talk about matters of faith and spirituality, and often we talk about how politics and faith intersect. This year's presidential campaign has already caused us to have some of those conversations and another one has been sparked by the announcement by the likely Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, that he will give the commencement address this spring at Liberty University.

Now, that gesture was saluted by the people who watch the evangelical vote as a sign that the former Massachusetts governor has finally clued in to this important voting bloc since Liberty is the largest Christian fundamentalist university in the world. But Romney's liberal critics used the announcement to continue to press the theme that he will use his presidency to pander, in their view, to the far right.

Our next guest says there's something both sides should agree on. Romney's decision is a sign that evangelical leader and Liberty University founder Jerry Falwell has left an indelible mark on the Republican Party and the country. Religion writer, blogger and frequent guest on this program, Michael Sean Winters, takes a fresh look at Jerry Falwell's improbable rise from bootlegger's son to GOP power player in his new political biography "God's Right Hand: How Jerry Falwell Made God a Republican and Baptized the Religious Right." And he's with us now in Washington, D.C.

Welcome. Thanks so much for joining us once again.

MICHAEL SEAN WINTERS: Great to be here, Michel.

MARTIN: Now, Michael Sean, people who listen to this program know you as a person who follows the affairs of the Catholic Church closely. Why did you decide to write this book about Jerry Falwell, who was a southern Baptist?

WINTERS: Well, first of all, it was suggested to me and pointed out that my first book had been on Catholics and Democrats and said, you know, there's been no serious biography of Jerry Falwell since 1984 and why don't you take it on? So the fun part was every day was like waking up inside a photographic negative. I mean, I care about religion and politics. This was not my religion nor my politics, and the way they intersected you could make out the forms and see the issues, but everything was in the reverse of where I was accustomed to finding it.

MARTIN: So it was a journey for you?

WINTERS: Yes. Oh, absolutely.

MARTIN: But, you know, there's no question that, before his death in 2007, Jerry Falwell was surely one of the best known Christian leaders in America, you know, apart from his own specific denomination. But you're saying his influence on American politics continues, even though he's no longer here. How so?

WINTERS: Absolutely. And it's because of just what a different face of Christianity in the public square he was. When you think back to the '60s and the '70s, the face of Christianity were people like Dr. King, Father Drinan, the liberal member of Congress from Massachusetts, William Sloane Coffin, the, you know, celebrated liberal chaplain at Yale.

And now, in our own day, when you hear of religious involvement in politics, you almost instinctively assume it's conservative and Republican. And so Falwell's Moral Majority, which was only in existence for 10 years - from '79 to '89 - really changed the face of Christian political involvement.

MARTIN: So let's take a step backward and talk about Jerry Falwell's early life, the fact that his father was an agnostic, a very kind of light churchgoer, you know, if at all, that his father actually shot his own brother and killed him. Both of them were drinking. His father died of alcohol-related illness.

How did Jerry Falwell kind of go from that to being this kind of Bible-believing rock-ribbed Christian?

WINTERS: Right. Well, as is often the case, it was the influence somewhat of his mother, who was a churchgoer and a believer. But, really, it came from a singular event where he went one day to a Baptist church. He had been looking for a fire-breathing pastor like he had heard on the radio that his mother would play during breakfast. And he went there and that very night he was converted, met his wife and met Jesus on the same night and he never looked back.

MARTIN: But you also point out that he came of age at a time when, for conservative evangelicals like himself, there was a skepticism about being involved in politics. What changed?

WINTERS: Oh, absolutely. There was this traditional notion called the spirituality of the church, which said that you shouldn't be involved in moral reformation of your society and also said it was wrong to be yoked with unbelievers. And, by unbelievers, they meant anyone who was not a fundamentalist Christian.

One of Mitt Romney's real sources of indebtedness to Falwell is he got the evangelical movement not only active in politics, but got them over that idea that they could not be yoked. And he said that it was perfectly fine to be a cobelligerent with nonbelievers on behalf of certain social objectives.

MARTIN: But how did he become so engaged in the political process. As many people might remember, the Moral Majority was a very real force in, you know, political life. Many people think it contributed mightily to the election of Ronald Reagan, for example.

WINTERS: Oh, yeah. I mean, he...

MARTIN: So what changed his mind about the need to be involved in politics?

WINTERS: He was solicited by a group of conservative political activists who went and met with him. And he was very reluctant, and he thought that if pastors were involved, the people in the pews would be very resistant to that and so they came armed with a poll that showed that, in fact, the people in the pews were chomping at the bit.

MARTIN: If you're just joining us, you're listening to TELL ME MORE from NPR News. We're speaking with Michael Sean Winters. Most recently, he's the author of a newly-released biography of Jerry Falwell. It's called "God's Right Hand: How Jerry Falwell Made God a Republican and Baptized the American Right."

You know, you talk in the book about how he really showed an early gift for organizing in the way he built his first church. What would you say was his most significant gift, as an organizer, in politics?

WINTERS: Three things.

MARTIN: Mm-hmm.

WINTERS: One, he had great charisma. Two, he just had boundless energy. I mean he was somebody who didn't need a lot of sleep. And thirdly, he had a very strategic sensibility about this. He had often compared himself to Eisenhower and other great generals and he would motivate others to work with him in doing door knockings in Lynchburg to help bring people to church. But I wouldn't underestimate the charisma. I mean he also was very good on TV, you know, he became the person who a "Phil Donahue Show" or something like that - the first person they wanted to call because he was articulate, he was punchy, pithy...

MARTIN: Very media savvy. One of the things you point out, and in fact, Larry Flynt, the publisher of "Hustler" magazine, wrote a blurb for your book...

WINTERS: He did. Yeah.

(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)

MARTIN: ...which was interesting. They were frequent, kind of, friendly combatants on television. How did that come about? And they actually seem to have a very cordial personal relationship. I mean you often see the two of them kind of laughing, even though Larry Flynt is everything that Jerry Falwell did not believe in.

WINTERS: Right. And when Falwell died, Flynt wrote a very beautiful tribute in the LA Times about my friend Jerry Falwell. It came out of a lawsuit - somewhat improbably - in which "Hustler" had published a parody of Falwell that was particularly vulgar. Falwell sued. It ended up going all the way up to the Supreme Court. And then they began doing some college speaking gigs, a kind of dog and pony show, and then subsequently, every time Falwell was in Los Angeles he would always visit Larry Flynt. And he would say when Larry Flynt's time comes, I want to be there at his bedside to save him for the Lord. Well, of course, Falwell went first but they did have a genuine rapport.

Falwell also had a friendship with Ted Kennedy. I mean he did have this capacity for friendship with people that he was locked in disagreement with.

MARTIN: But I cannot help but note that none of those people seem to have been African-American.

WINTERS: That's true.

MARTIN: so talk to me about Falwell on race.

WINTERS: Falwell was, you know, grew up in the segregated South and his most famous sermon before the Moral Majority, was in 1965 called Ministers in Marches, where he denounced King and the political activism of the black clergy - specifically on this idea that clergy should not be involved in politics. In the late '60s and early '70s, he just said, you know, I was reading the Bible wrong and now I understand segregation was wrong.

What I was most concerned and interested by was that when he then flips on segregation, he would talk about the degradation that was perpetrated on blacks by Jim Crow. What many former segregationists never really reckoned with was that Jim Crow didn't just do bad things to blacks, it morally deformed them. And you would think, especially a minister, would have wanted to examine that. And I never found any evidence of that kind of self reflection about how had he been able to be so blind.

MARTIN: I think fair-minded people would praise his accomplishments in terms of, you know, creating a viable conservative base for the Republican Party, energizing of voting block, encouraging more people to be engaged in the civic life of their country. But you also note, at the end of the day you think Falwell's efforts were ultimately bad for politics and bad for religion. And that's a pretty harsh assessment. I'd like to ask why you arrived there.

WINTERS: I think it was bad for politics because he still brought that fundamentalist cast of mind with him. Twenty, 30 years ago, if those of us in the progressive community were arguing to raise the minimum wage, we had on the opposite side the National Association of Manufacturers, and they were opposed to raising the minimum wage because it meant more money out of their pockets. It was simply about interest. Today, it's about ideology that really has coarsened the debate and may compromise less likely. The reason...

MARTIN: Make compromise undesirable, or make compromise almost a dirty word, some would argue.

WINTERS: Oh, absolutely. And so if you are a moderate Republican now, you're not just a, you know, you're a Judas figure.

MARTIN: You say that the fastest growing religion in the U.S. is the religion of none. And you argue that the public image that he created and promoted has contributed a great deal to the growing numbers of people in this country who don't want anything to do with organized religion. Again, that's a very damning assessment. Why do you arrive there?

WINTERS: Well, I think - you know, when you conflate religion which has, you know, deals with the ultimate life questions into this kind of, you know, handy political card of how you should vote. When people that have questions about the politics and decide they don't like your politics, they're going to throw the political baby out with the baptismal water. You know, you need to have some mediating philosophies and mediating institutions between religion and politics, to make sure that they're kept separate.

The whole purpose of the Moral Majority was to conflate those in ways, and again, because of this fundamentalist mindset, often in very simplistic ways. And so when people said, you know, well, I just don't want to have anything to do with his politics, they almost felt they then had to abandon Christianity, because this is what Christianity had become in their mind. And I think he's very much responsible for that.

The other part that I argue is that he reduced religion to ethics. And so when people found themselves making different ethical choices, they lost the kind of other salvific message of the Gospel. Because if you have to leave your religion at the door and just go in and talk about ethics, you've still left your religion at the door.

MARTIN: Michael Sean Winters is the author of "God's Right Hand: How Jerry Falwell Made God a Republican and Baptized the American Right." He was kind enough to join us in our Washington, D.C. studios.

MARTIN: Michael Sean Winters, thanks so much for joining us once again.

WINTERS: Great to be here. Great to be here.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

NPR Radio on Jerry Falwell

Civil rights veteran Vincent Harding has a long lens of wisdom on contemporary divisions and confusions. He says America is still a developing nation when it comes to democratic encounter across real difference. But he finds hope in the young people he's been bringing into creative contact with civil rights elders for decades. They are his answer to the question that drives him: Is America possible?

Life

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