Al Edwards, former state rep behind bill that created Juneteenth, dies at 83

Photo: Rep. Al Edwards, D-Houston, left, talks to (then) Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston, during a session Thursday, May 15, 2003, at the Capitol in Austin. (AP Photo/Kelly West)

(Houston Chronicle) Al Edwards, the former Houston legislator who introduced the bill that made Juneteenth a state holiday, has died. He was 83.

The news of Edwards’ death was first announced Wednesday (April 29, 2020) by Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, who served in the Texas House with Edwards for two decades. Edwards, a Democrat, represented House District 146 in south Houston from 1979 to 2007 and again from 2009 to 2011.

The sixth of 16 children, Edwards was born in Houston in 1937, attended Phyllis Wheatley High School, and received a bachelor’s degree from Texas Southern University. He marched and demonstrated during the civil rights movement alongside Jesse Jackson, and served as Texas chairman of Jackson’s presidential bids in 1984 and 1988. In between his time in the Legislature, Edwards worked as a real estate broker and ordained minister.

Edwards’ best-known legislative accomplishment came during his freshman term, when he authored a bill commemorating June 19, 1865, the day slaves in Texas first learned they were free. (more)


The History Behind One of America’s Most Beloved Desserts

The origins of the praline candy can be traced back to enslaved black women in Louisiana.

pralines

Jaye Cuccia, owner of Evans Creole Candy Factory Inc., makes pralines in the confectionary store in the French Quarter section of New Orleans, Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2011. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

(The Atlantic) The end of the holiday season and the beginning of the new year feels like a natural time to reflect on familial traditions. Holidays, inasmuch as they are illustrated by their ornaments and decorations, are also hallmarked by their customary foods, which spangle around festive table centerpieces as the true spectacle of the occasions. Recipes are handed down and prepared for generations, and it’s in these practices that heritage and communion exist.

My mother’s pralines, the sweet pecan candy with a buttery, brown-sugar smell, remind me of the winter as much as the scent of pine does. But I had never thought of the dessert as more than a simple delight until I learned how to make it myself. Once I had stood over the pot full of caramelized sugar and pecans, tracing the surface of a Dutch oven with my wooden spoon and constantly checking the candy thermometer that hung just above the pot’s metallic floor, I wondered why pralines were so beloved among southern families—namely black families in New Orleans.

When I began to research the praline’s origin story, reading food-history books, cookbooks, and academic articles about colonial Louisiana, I saw a story of black pastoral brilliance. Retracing these threads allowed me to recognize all the cultural influences that played a factor in the innovation of the candy in the American South. (more)


Experience 1930s Europe Through the Words of Two African American Women

In the pages of the “Chicago Defender,” the cousins detailed their adventures traversing the continent while also observing signs of the changing tides

defender travelers

Cousins Flaurience Sengstacke (left) and Roberta G. Thomas (right) regaled readers with tales of their travels in some 20 Chicago Defender columns published between July 1931 and August 1932. (Screenshots via ProQuest Historical Newspapers / Illustration by Meilan Solly)

(Smithsonian Magazine) Five years before the publication of the first Negro Motorist Green Book—the beloved guide of destinations deemed safe for African Americans in a nation segregated by Jim Crow—two cousins named Roberta G. Thomas and Flaurience Sengstacke chronicled what life was like for two young, African American women traveling abroad. Published in the pages of the Chicago Defender, a weekly newspaper published by their uncle Robert Sengstacke Abbott, the cousins’ columns regaled readers with tales of the duo’s travels throughout Europe, as recounted in some 20 articles penned between July 1931 and August 1932. They experienced highs, like watching the indelible Josephine Baker perform in Paris, and lows, including an encounter with racism on an Italian train ride. The pair’s words bore auspicious warning, particularly as they witnessed the rise of “oppression and paranoia” during the dying days of Germany’s Weimar Republic.

By sharing stories with the largely black readership of the Defender, the cousins sparked remembrance of fond memories among those who had similarly traveled abroad and provided an escapist fantasy for those who had “not yet seen the grandeur that is Europe.” The Defender, like other black newspapers at the time, used overseas correspondents to report on news, encouraging those traveling abroad as performers, tourists and students to report on their experiences. Rather than focusing exclusively on local or domestic issues, the publication hoped to establish African Americans’ presence on the world stage. (more)


TIPHC Bookshelf

Yakety Yak_Gardner bookPublished scholarship on black history in Texas is growing and we’d like to share with you some suggested readings, both current and past, from some of the preeminent history scholars in Texas and beyond. We invite you to take a look at our bookshelf page – including a featured selection – and check back as the list grows. A different selection will be featured each week. We welcome suggestions and reviews. This week, we offer, “Carl Gardner: Yakety Yak, I Fought Back,” by Veta Gardner.

Written by Gardner’s widow, the story in this book is about a young man who left his home and family in Tyler, Texas at the age of twenty-three and moved to Los Angeles to follow his dream of becoming a big band singer or to be another Nat King Cole or Billy Eckstine. Like fate had it, instead, he became the lead singer and founder of the first vocal group to be inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987, along with other members, Billy Guy, Will Jones and Cornell Gunter and performed over five decades internationally before many large audiences.


This Week in Texas Black History

Apr. 29

J. Edward Perry

This date marks the birth of physician J. Edward Perry in 1870 in Clarksville, Texas. Born to former slaves, Perry graduated from Bishop College in Marshall in 1891 then from Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tenn. in 1895. On November 1, 1910 he founded the Perry Sanitarium and Training School for Nurses (and doctors) to tend black patients in Kansas City. The sanitarium was renamed Wheatley-Provident Hospital in 1915 and Dr. Perry served as its superintendent from 1910 until 1930. At age 76, Perry came out of retirement to serve as executive director of the Houston Negro Hospital in March 1947. Through his dedicated efforts, the hospital became accredited and affiliated with Baylor College of Medicine.

Apr. 29

Carter W. Wesley

In 1892, Carter W. Wesley, newspaperman and political activist, was born on this day in Houston. Wesley received a B.A. degree from Fisk University in Nashville in 1917, entered the Army and became one of the first black officers in the U.S. military. After serving in World War I, he earned a law degree from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois and in 1927 returned to Houston where he bought into a newly formed publishing company which owned the Houston Informer newspaper. In 1934, he became publisher and used the paper as a platform to battle racism and to speak on behalf African Americans. Wesley was also a founder of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, a federation of more than 200 black community newspapers across the United States.

Apr. 29

Carl Edward Gardner

Carl Edward Gardner, an original member of the 1950’s R&B/Rock and Roll group The Coasters, was born on this day in 1928 in Tyler. Gardner moved to Los Angeles in 1952 and sang with The Robins, a group that included Bobby Nunn, from 1954-1955. Gardner and Nunn left the Robins to help form the Coasters in the fall of 1955. Gardner led on such Coasters’ hits as ‘Poison Ivy,’ ‘Yakety Yak‘ and ‘Charlie Brown.’ The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on January 21, 1987 as the first vocal group receiving that honor. The Coasters had six gold records (million sellers).

May 1

Marcelite Harris

On this day in 1991, Marcelite Harris became the U.S. Air Force’s first African-American female general. Harris is a Houston native who graduated from Kashmere Gardens High School in 1960. Among her many other “firsts,” she was also the first woman aircraft maintenance officer, one of the first two women air officers commanding at the U.S. Air Force Academy, and the first woman deputy commander for maintenance. She was the highest ranking woman in the U.S. Air Force and the highest ranking black woman in the entire Department of Defense when she retired in 1997.

May 1

Ollie Matson

Olympic sprinter and National Football League running back Ollie Matson was born on this day in 1930 in Trinity, Texas. At age 14, he moved with his family to San Francisco, and in 1952 earned a bachelor’s degree in history from the University of San Francisco. In 1951, he led the nation with 1,566 yards rushing and 21 touchdowns and was named an All-American as a defensive back. The next year, he won a bronze medal in the 400-meter dash and a silver medal as part of the 4×400-meter relay team at the Olympic Games in Helsinki, Finland and was the No. 3 overall pick in the NFL Draft by the Chicago Cardinals. In his 14-year career, Matson set a league record with nine career touchdown returns and retired with 12,884 combined net yards (rushing, receiving, and returns), an NFL record at the time. He also played with the Los Angeles Rams, the Detroit Lions and the Philadelphia Eagles. The Rams traded eight players and a draft choice to the Cardinals to get Matson in 1959, in one of the biggest deals in league history. Matson was a six-time All-Pro and shared Rookie of the Year honors in 1952 with San Francisco 49ers running back Hugh McIlhenny. In 1972, the first year he was eligible, Matson was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and in 1976 was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

May 2

William H. Fleming

On this day in 2009, the Texas Medical Association (TMA) elected Houston neurologist William H. Fleming III as its 144th president and the first African American to lead the group. A native of Memphis, Fleming was named a Texas Super Doctor by Texas Monthly magazine In 2005 and 2006, and Top Doctor by Houston magazine in 2007.


Blog: Ron Goodwin, Ph.D., author, PVAMU history professor

Ron Goodwin is an assistant professor of history at Prairie View A&M University. Even though he was a military “brat,” he still considers San Antonio home. Like his father and brother, Ron joined the U.S. Air Force and while enlisted received his undergraduate degree from Texas Lutheran University in Seguin, Texas. After his honorable discharge, he completed graduate degrees from Texas Southern University. Goodwin’s book, Blacks in Houston, is a pictorial history of Houston’s black community. His most recent book, Remembering the Days of Sorrow, examines the institution of slavery in Texas from the perspective of the New Deal’s Slave Narratives.

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Submissions wanted

Historians, scholars, students, lend us your…writings. Help us produce the most comprehensive documentation ever undertaken for the African American experience in Texas. We encourage you to contribute items about people, places, events, issues, politics/legislation, sports, entertainment, religion, etc., as general entries or essays. Our documentation is wide-ranging and diverse, and you may research and write about the subject of your interest or, to start, please consult our list of suggested biographical entries and see submission guidelines. However, all topics must be approved by TIPHC editors before beginning your research/writing.

We welcome your questions or comments. Please contact Michael Hurd, Director of TIPHC, at mdhurd@pvamu.edu.