Black Wall Street! A History Lesson to Learn from and Re-Build on!

[Dr. F. A. Young, Esq.]

Reality check: the only things keeping Black people in the condition that we are in center around failures. Our failing to remember how to confront and overcome various types of fear; our failing to remember how to confront and effectively neutralize the power that oppresses, seduces and robs us of dignity; and our failing to remember how to effectively use the individual and collective power we possess to change our condition and the condition of our people. There was a period when we awoke but then the oppressor came with a Plan B that put us back to sleep again and sent us to dreamland! Now is the time for the Reawakening of our people and the gathering for the harvest! The alternative is to watch our youth kill each other, starve in the streets and wither and rot in lock down institutions! A planned matrix of Spiritual, mental and physical death!

We empower the oppressor by not being what we should be – by not remembering how great we are; by not remembering and promoting the dynamic movements the freed men and women – slaves and descendants of slaves - Negro Black Americans initiated; We do not need to dig in the ruins of Egypt or any other African country to know how brilliant, creative, powerful and innovative our people – the Sons and Daughters of Africa and their descendants around the planet were and still are. We need only to look closely at our true Negro Black American History – African-Caribbean History that took place right here in America and the Caribbean. Before we trip on 3000 BC we must understand true Negro Black American History from 1600 A.D. to 2009 A.D.!

Reality check: Start with Tulsa Oklahoma. An example of what was and what the beast will do to destroy and stop economic empowerment and community development. I have posted four videos that are extremely important:

The Tulsa Riots Part 1 click here
Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma - Pt. 1 click here
Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma - Pt. 2 click here
Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma - Pt. 3 click here

These videos feature the people who lived the history - true Griots - sharing truth - not a Hollywood version of Greenwood. They present a vivid chapter of Negro Black American History that we must review, remember and learn from. There were numerous ‘Black Wall Streets’ – numerous thriving Black communities established throughout America. They were self sufficient thriving communities with businesses, schools, houses of worship. In these days there was ‘nation building’ going on!

Reality check: We were a segregated and superior community. Our HBCUs were turning out brilliant teachers, doctors, and lawyers that were teaching and treating our people – thriving in segregated communities. Segregation created prosperity for us – necessitated self reliance – forcing us to spend our money with our people – 90 percent of our money circulated in our communities!

Negro Black American is not a history of a weak cowardly, lazy people as the White version of history would have our children and the world believe. The form of chattel slavery practiced and supported by the European was the most vicious dehumanizing form of servitude ever perpetuated – the African Holocaust! Yet we are still here.

Ask yourself: What happened? – why have we been in such a terrible state of socio-political economic condition for the past 80 years; why have so many of our HBCUs deteriorated and have so few Negro Black American students graduating; why have the Black farmers loss millions of acres of land – a close look at history from 1700’s to date will answer all questions and also point the way to Where to go from here!

After reviewing the Tulsa videos kindly re-read Dr. Martin Luther King’s historic speech Where Do We Go From Here? Also click here and review the video of his speech on Economic Power which I have also posted. Make sure to share this information with your children so that they understand that Negro Black America has always fought for change – that fighting for change and transformation of America did not start with the Obama run for political office, it started with the first African slave and first freed slave’s run for his life – fight for his freedom and justice in this hate filled land they found themselves marooned in!

Anyone who reads and understands Dr. Kings speech "Where Do We Go From Here?" delivered at the Ebenezer Baptist in Atlanta, Georgia to the 11th Convention of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference on August the 16th 1967 will see that Dr. King was moving beyond a Civil Rights Dream to Economic Empowerment. He was throwing down the ‘gauntlet’ to what I like to call the Economic Empowerment Warriors. These are individuals, true Warriors, who are not blinded by the glitz nor deafened by the noise or silent about what is going on in America today or the international financial meltdown. Warriors who have and will continue to focus on the paths to Economic and Political Empowerment Dr. King charted and highlighted in this speech.

I have included excerpts from Where Do we Go From Here? The entire speech can be downloaded at: http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/popular_requests/voice_of_king.htm Our failure to remember and continue on the path has been costly!

.Perhaps the area of greatest concentration of my efforts has been in the cities of Chicago and Cleveland. …….
….The most dramatic success in Chicago has been Operation Breadbasket. Through Operation Breadbasket we have now achieved for the Negro community of Chicago more than twenty-two hundred new jobs with an income of approximately eighteen million dollars a year, new income to the Negro community…..[Applause]….; there was another area through this economic program, and that was the development of financial institutions which were controlled by Negroes and which were sensitive to problems of economic deprivation of the Negro community. The two banks in Chicago that were interested in helping Negro businessmen were largely unable to loan much because of limited assets. … And I can say to you today that as a result of Operation Breadbasket in Chicago, both of these Negro-operated banks have now more than double their assets, and this has been done in less than a year by the work of Operation Breadbasket. [applause]

……….. And finally, the ministers found that Negro contractors, from painters to masons, from electricians to excavators, had also been forced to remain small by the monopolies of white contractors. Breadbasket negotiated agreements on new construction and rehabilitation work for the chain stores. These several interrelated aspects of economic development, all based on the power of organized consumers, hold great possibilities …….. The kinds of requests made by Breadbasket in Chicago can be made not only of chain stores, but of almost any major industry in any city in the country.

…..And so Operation Breadbasket .…. It simply says, "If you respect my dollar, you must respect my person." It simply says that we will no longer spend our money where we can not get substantial jobs. [applause]

…The problem indicates that our emphasis must be twofold: We must create full employment, or we must create incomes….

…..we are likely to find that the problem of housing, education, instead of preceding the elimination of poverty, will themselves be affected if poverty is first abolished. …. Negroes, who have a double disability, will have a greater effect on discrimination when they have the additional weapon of cash to use in their struggle……

Peace Power and Blessings will come from Back to Black

[TheArtiste Hassan]

Thank you Dr. Young,. I followed you throughout this whole blog, read every word, listen to Dr. Kings words and watched every video. There is no doubt that we had and still have what it take to get the job done if and when we only make up our minds to do it.

[Dr. F. A. Young, Esq.]

Brother Raheem I know you have been on the path and there are many of us who like yourself are striving to pull it together. May we all be rewarded for the good we do and strengthened by each others words and resolve. We are living in dangerous times that call for all of us to be on guard on the physical and spiritual. Peace Power & Blessings

[Havinah Zari Aur]

Greeting Dr Young,
You are without a doubt a man of wisdom, knowledge, and truth. The information on "BLACK WALL STREET" and others like it should be part of a school curriculum taught in the elementary grades. Every Black Child shoud know this info. It should also be taught in every Black and White Church across America because we have Black People who don't know that they are part of the Black Race. It should be taught in such a way that the facts would pierce their consciousness like a bolt of lightning and jolt them back into reality. I agree with you totally. We shouldn't have to go back to Egypt to discover our greatness. If our People would just look and focus on Our-story during the last 400 years, the evidence of our greatest should be convincing enough to awaken their consciousness. I guess the lesson to be taught first is to get them to have an inner-standing that this is not the Real World. This matrix was created out of the sick minds who control it. If we can just get our people to know and know that they know that they have the same power to create a NEW PARADIGM and witness the old one crumble into ashes. As long as the fear base consciousness of the ego continues to control our people, the awakening process will remain a slow process. Poverty Consciousness has a tight grip on the Planet and the powers that feed this monster is none other than the very people who live in poverty consciousness. The negative energy that rises into the cosmic waves of the Universe is from the minds of people who focus on lack and limitations. The job of Light Workers is to get the masses to focus on abundance, prosperity, peace, love, joy, unity, harmony, and a holistic lifestyle for all of the inhabitants on this Planet. As the masses began to focus on patterns of perfection for Earth and all of her inhabitants, a major change will take place and bring balance back into the Universe. This planet should be flooded with information on how to shift the consciousness to only focus on GOOD THINGS FOR ALL. The more we focus on the GOOD, the quicker the BAD will lose its power and no matter what illusions the BAD throw at us the less likely we will fall into the trap of having a fear based consciousness. In the world of illusion, the illusionist must keep the audience hypnotized into believing that what is seem and heard is real. The mass media is the mechanism that the illusionist use to reach so many minds, while keeping the world of illusion in tack and the believers slave to its magical potions of war, destruction, greed, sickness, death, social upheavings, etc. It is time for our people to join the real world. The world that we must create for ourselves. No more of this vicious cycle of allowing someone else to define the role of freedom for us. We must define and step into the New Paradigm that we create for ourselves and for all the inhabitants of the Earth.

The Spirit of Havinah

[Dr. F. A. Young, Esq.]

Spirit of Havinah, your words run deep as still water runs so deep. We must shine the Light on the Darkness and drive all negative and evil forces into the open so all can see the reality - and deal with it. We are living in very dangerous times and must not let the evil hold sway over the physical or cosmic worlds. Peace, Power & Blessings