Abstract 
 
 
Title:   RAISING BLACK DREAMS: REPRESENTATIONS OF SIX 
GENERATIONS OF A FAMILY?S LOCAL RACIAL-ACTIVIST 
TRADITIONS   
 
John Patrick Cansler Daves, PhD., 2007 
 
Directed By   Professor John L. Caughey, Department of American Studies   
 
 
 
How do local African American leadership traditions develop and change? How do they 
compare to and connect with national African American leadership traditions? This 
dissertation explores some answers to these questions through an examination of the 
history of one middle-class African American family?s communal activist legacy. It is 
built first, on my research into my adopted family?s local, evolving communal leadership 
ideology, which extends from the antebellum era to the present; and, second, on my 
examination of how my family?s leadership tradition compare with and connect to 
patterns in national black leadership conventions.  
In the chapters, I lay out the basic issues I will investigate, discuss the literature on black 
leadership, contextualize my study, and introduce and define the concepts of racial 
stewardship, local racial activism, local racial ambassadorship, and racial spokesmanship 
which are central to my exploration. I conclude the dissertation with a summation of my 
work, and how my research contributes to existing scholarly conversations about black 
leadership traditions found in African American Literature, history, and the social 
sciences. 
 
                
             
RAISING BLACK DREAMS: REPRESENTATIONS OF SIX GENERATIONS OF A 
FAMILY?S LOCAL RACIAL-ACTIVIST TRADITIONS 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the 
University of Maryland, College Park, in partial fulfillment 
of the requirements for the degree of  
Doctor of Philosophy 
2007 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Advisory Committee: 
Professor John L. Caughey, Chair 
Associate Professor Sharon Fries-Britt 
Associate Professor Sheri L. Parks 
Professor Nancy L. Struna 
Assistant Professor Cotton Seiler 
  
 i
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
PREFACE .......................................................................................................1 
 
INTRODUCTION:..........................................................................................4 
CHAPTER 1 
 
LIVING WITH UNSPOKEN EXPECTATIONS.........................................46 
CHAPTER 2 
 
THE STORY OF A RACE MAN .................................................................81 
CHAPTER 3 
 
WILLIAM B. SCOTT?S DREAM ..............................................................149 
CHAPTER 4 
 
THE EMERGENCE OF J.HERMAN DAVES ..........................................206 
CHAPTER 5 
 
CONCLUSION............................................................................................260 
CHAPTER 6 
 1
 
Preface 
 When I was a little boy, I used to crawl up the stairs of our two story colonial 
home and look up at the imposing portrait of Charles Warner Cansler (1871-1953). The 
crawl up the stairs was difficult because of the protruding nails that emerged from 
underneath the carpet. I often had little cuts on my knees, but my parents were impressed 
that I kept going up to look. Learning to walk and to speak were curiously melded to 
Cansler?s legacy. One of the first questions that I remember asking my father?and he 
says I asked a number of times?was about the man in the picture at the top of the stairs. 
My father Charles Warner Daves (1930- ) would respond something like this: 
He was my grandfather and your great-grandfather. He was a local leader for 
black people in Knoxville, Tennessee where I was born. When you?re older I will 
give you his book and you will learn more about his life.  
My father?s words did not make much sense to me then. I obviously did not understand 
notions of race or the meaning of words like local leader. But from his tone I knew the 
man in the picture was important.  
Beginning to discover Cansler?s life, and his role in my family?s history, would 
become important in how I came to define myself and my relationship to society. I 
remember sneaking into my father?s closet when I was three years old, putting on his size 
12 wing tip shoes and sliding around in them. I wanted to be him. In much the same way 
my father considered his grandfather to be his teacher and his role model. Cansler was 
my father?s guide to our family?s tradition of educational achievement and racial 
leadership and activism.  
 2
 As my father?s mentor, Cansler advised my father to go to the North for his 
education. Prior to the civil rights movement, he went to Northfield Mount Hermon, a 
prestigious New England preparatory school in 1948; he graduated from Cornell 
University in 1952 with a degree in American Civilization; he earned a Masters degree in 
American Civilization from the University of Pennsylvania in 1954; and he received a 
Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of Minnesota in 1965, thus fulfilling the 
educational goals his grandfather set. He did not abandon his family?s and his 
grandfather?s leadership legacies. In between his masters and doctoral degrees, for 
example, he taught at Fisk University and Morehouse College. He eventually left the 
South and accepted a tenure track position in the English Department at the University of 
Rochester in New York. He remained in the North when later in 1968 he decided to 
accept an executive position at the Educational Testing Service in Princeton, New Jersey. 
I was born two years later and was raised in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, a suburb of 
Princeton. 
When my father gave me my own copy of Three Generations: The Story of a 
Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee (1939) in high school, I learned about Cansler?s 
grandparents? and parents? lives. It is a blue book of 250 pages published privately by 
Kingsport press. The book is not a stereotypical family history. Cansler does not present a 
mundane chronicle of family births and deaths. The book is an unusual and compelling 
narrative that blends memory, fictional imagination, historical truth, and philosophical 
insight. He wrote the text to instruct and inspire members of the family, Knoxville?s 
black community, and black and white readers more generally.  The key text of my 
family?s legacy reaches in two directions. It reaches back in time to vividly describe the 
 3
lives and characters of the earliest generation of my family, the Scotts, the second 
generation, the Canslers, and the third generation of the Canslers my great-grandfather?s 
generation. He brings these individuals to life through novelistic devices like dialogue, 
and scenes which colorfully convey the feelings and the thoughts of these free black 
individuals as they sought to define themselves among slaves, other free black families, 
and white society. In the second chapter of Three Generations, ?Planning to Leave North 
Carolina,? Cansler constructed a complex image of my great, great, great grandparents. 
His depiction of their lives formed a powerful image of the origins of the family?s 
existence in-between black and white worlds in the 1840?s. 
While Scott alone would have had little trouble due to the fact that he was more 
than three fourths white, with all the features and mannerisms of those of the 
white race, his wife was dark brown in color with Negroid features, yet with a 
culture that showed that she must have had careful training unusual to members of 
her race of that period.     
Given its construction, intensity and philosophical underpinning, the book not only 
reaches back to describe the past, it also reaches forward into the future. As we shall see, 
the book is, in an important way, a kind of teaching story. It is an imaginative effort 
designed to communicate a particular call to readers. Many of my family members, 
including my grandfather and father, took up this call. However, it was a call that I would 
struggle with for many years of my life.   
 
 
 4
Raising Black Dreams: Representations of Six Generations of a Family?s Local Race 
Leader Traditions 
 
John Daves 
Chapter 1: Introduction 
 
 How do local African American leadership traditions develop and change?  How 
do they compare to and connect with national African American leadership traditions? 
This dissertation will explore some answers to these questions through an examination of 
the history of one middle-class African American family?s communal activist legacy. It 
will be built, first, on my research into my adopted family's local, evolving communal-
leadership ideology which extends from the antebellum era to the present and, second, on 
my examination of how this family?s leadership tradition compare with and connect to 
patterns in national black leadership.   
 There are many studies of black leadership, including Ronald W. Walters? and 
Robert C. Smith?s African American Leadership (1999), Mark V. Tushnet?s The 
NAACP?s Legal Strategy Against Segregated Education 1925-1950 (1987), and  Society?s 
July/August 2006 set of essays on Black Leadership Today. However, most scholars 
readily admit the definitional problems. It is difficult to achieve consensus on how to 
define black leadership because the concerns, contradictions, characteristics, roles and 
activities of African Americans who advise and lead others have varied tremendously 
across the divergent social and cultural contexts and moments of American history. 
Nonetheless, from a historical and cultural perspective there are definite processes by 
which some people gain recognition as leaders by groups of people within black 
communities and by the wider society, including influential white social circles and 
organizations. From this historical and cultural viewpoint, black leaders are individuals 
 5
who are recognized as such by their particular social constituencies and who see 
themselves as performing this role. Consequently, I used historical, literary and 
ethnographic techniques to explore what these individuals are concerned about, what they 
understood themselves to be doing and trying to accomplish within particular historical 
and social situations, and how their intended audiences and other commentators 
interpreted their efforts. Important dimensions of black leadership culture emerged and 
developed from African Americans? struggle for freedom and citizenship privileges. 
These patterns of black leadership culture included particular survival strategies for 
blacks and tactics to improve the social situations of the race.   
 The central concern of this dissertation is to describe and analyze one family?s 
local black leadership legacy and how an examination of their lives compare to and 
connect with the activities of some of the most revered black public figures? perceptions 
of themselves as national leaders of the race. The following analytic concepts will be of 
primary importance: stewardship, local racial activism, local racial ambassadorship and 
the race?s spokespeople tradition. I developed my views on local racial activism and 
stewardship from Todd Boyd?s book Am I black Enough for You?: Popular Culture from 
the Hood and Beyond (1997) and The Covenant with Black America (2006), a collection 
of essays on race leadership with an introduction by Tavis Smiley. These texts document 
the existence of and need of racial uplift sensibilities. Boyd interpreted the racial uplift 
vision as influential black public figures like Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington 
and W.E.B. Du Bois using their autobiographies, essays and speeches to model conduct 
for educational and social development opportunities within American society for 
African Americans and to represent the race?s case to America. Boyd defined this 
 6
practice of black leadership as the race men vision. Boyd interpreted the race men view 
of black leadership as black public figures literary and social construction of their lives. 
He argued that these race men used their lives to model moral codes on how blacks can 
gain educational and social opportunities despite America?s social, systemic, and legal 
practices of racism. 
1
   
Similarly, Edmund Wilson?s essay in The Covenant with Black America helped 
me understand my ancestors? roles as local racial activists. In his essay, Wilson displayed 
The National Urban League?s eight kinds of Capital Table. He presented The National 
Urban League?s Table to describe the type of skill sets that are necessary to establish 
successful black communities. The Scotts? and the Canslers? legacy resembled several of 
the National Urban League?s Kinds of Capital Table: Financial, income, wealth, family, 
community, and societal economic resources available for education; Human, the talents 
and educational preparation one receives from their families, schools and communities; 
Social, the social network relationships a family cultivates to obtain educational and 
employment opportunities for themselves, other family members and the community; 
Institutional,  developing or helping to facilitate the establishment of educational and 
socializing institutions like public and private schools and black colleges and  
universities. The Scotts, the Canslers, and other local racial activists acquired the human 
capital necessary to take on local racial activist responsibilities, but they had to decide to 
take on these important positions within their communities.
2
 
Stewardship is essentially educated middle class black individuals? decisions to 
take on advisory roles for black communities. Local racial activism and local racial 
ambassadorship are the roles that educated black individuals play within black 
 7
communities. Frequently the primary functions of local racial activists and local racial 
ambassadors are to coordinate racial uplift programs within black communities and to 
seek valuable resources from influential whites for black communities. As we shall see, 
local racial activist traditions both differed from and connected with national race 
leadership conventions.  
In this study, I will focus on patterns of black leadership that individuals in the 
family took up from the antebellum era to the present. As we shall see, these individuals 
were all concerned with their own particular educational and career development, with 
taking care of and advancing their own family situations by facilitating educational 
opportunities for their children, but they were also recognized as leaders within their 
black communities because they developed strategies to obtain better educational 
facilities for individuals within their communities. In this way they were unlike national 
race leaders whose orientations were largely focused on speaking on behalf of the race to 
white society and to the race.    
I argue that national race leaders are basically individuals who successfully use 
their life stories to help other people understand their own times, while they 
simultaneously utilize their own experiences to articulate many of race?s desires in 
relation to the larger society. I formed my interpretation of national race leadership from 
Richard Wright?s review of Langston Hughes? memoir The Big Sea (1940). Wright wrote 
a review of Hughes? memoir for A Journal of Opinion in October 28, 1940. He described 
how Hughes used his poems, plays, short stories and novels to represent the Negroes? 
case to American society. I also used Manning Marable?s work Black Leadership: Four 
Great American Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights (1998) to establish my 
 8
interpretation of the race?s spokespeople tradition. The race?s spokespeople tradition 
refers to nationally recognized race leaders? techniques of turning their life stories into 
racial-identity scripts that speak on behalf of the race and to the race. However, in the 
introduction to his work, Black Leadership: Four Great American Leaders and the 
Struggle for Civil Rights, Marable questions the extent to which national race leaders? 
successes can facilitate the race?s progress. He believes that the true measure of blacks? 
progress will be blacks? ability to move away from the charismatic and authoritarian 
race?s spokespeople sensibilities toward the goal of group-centered leaders and grassroots 
empowerment.  
The intersection of these concepts provides the foundation for my exploration into 
a family?s local racial uplift values and their association with some of the personalities 
that have formed national black leadership culture. My dissertation is not designed to 
represent a comprehensive view of all the major figures and characteristics of black 
leadership culture. My limited objective here is to profile the Scotts,? the Canslers,? and 
the Daves? roles as local racial activists, and to examine how their lives compared to and 
connected with some of the prominent national race leaders? representations of 
themselves as the race?s spokespeople.  
Aspiring national race leaders relied on their success stories to reach white and 
black audiences. They viewed their representations of self-made man and uplift stories as 
the best ways of addressing the limited opportunities for black empowerment in a 
predominately white society that established a culture of racial exclusion and values of 
white supremacy. As we shall see, while my ancestors? admired national race leaders that 
they came in contact with, my ancestors,? and other local racial activists, realized that 
 9
national race leaders? representations of themselves as the race?s spokespeople would not 
meet the specific needs of blacks in bondage and later within segregated black 
communities.  
During the antebellum era and the Civil War, the Scotts and the Canslers drew on 
existing local racial development practices that they encountered in Statesville, North 
Carolina and Eastern Tennessee to develop ways of defining themselves in social spaces 
between free black and slave communities and white society. I explore how my free 
black ancestors? applications of local racial improvement principles were recorded in a 
literary text, oral histories, a Library of Congress book on the white and the black 
Canslers, a book on black culture in Knoxville, and in several articles. I will compare 
their communal racial uplift legacy with national race leaders? heritage as the race?s 
spokespeople, and I will examine how my own relationship with the family?s legacy 
informed my racial self consciousness and life choices. As we shall see, a key text in the 
family?s history is Charles Warner Cansler?s book Three Generations: The Story of a 
Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee (1939). 
In Three Generations, Charles Warner Cansler (1871-1953) described how he and 
his ancestors utilized their understanding of local racial activism ideologies to define 
themselves between various racial and social class worlds. From oral histories and local 
and national newspapers and his own cultural perspective, Cansler developed biographies 
of his grandfather William B. Scott (1821-1885); his mother Laura Ann Scott Cansler 
(1846-1926); and his father Hugh Lawson Cansler (1835-1919), as well as his own 
memoir. His hybrid text explained how the Scotts and the Canslers created their 
communal uplift beliefs and practices from other free black families? perceptions and 
 10
implementations of communal-minded principles. Moreover, he demonstrated how each 
generation embraced the race conscious rituals and adapted them to address their 
ambitions and the needs of Knoxville?s black community. His efforts enabled him to 
produce images of a family?s roles as middle class black advisers for black communities 
that conveyed a legacy, a living legacy that has evolved from the 19
th
 century antebellum 
era into the middle of the 20
th
 century?and which called on its readers to continue the 
tradition into the future.  
My dissertation also examines Charles Warner Cansler's son-in-law J. Herman 
Daves? (1898-1978) related family text, A Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, 
Tennessee, a 1926 sociological study of Knoxville?s black community. I explore his and 
his children?s participation in the family?s traditions; that of his oldest son J. Herman 
Daves Jr., (1923-2005); his daughter Carolyn Lillian Daves Reinhardt (1925-) and his 
youngest child and my father Charles Warner Daves (1930-). Explorations of the lives of 
Canslers? grandchildren will illustrate how the Scotts and the Canslers? advisory role for 
black and integrated communities became a living black history. I will concentrate on 
how members of the family became racial advisors by influencing the thoughts and 
actions of a number of black and white individuals. 
3
 I will show how they embraced the 
practice of using educational gifts, vocational skills, family name, social-class status and 
personality to coordinate communal movements between various black and white 
individuals and institutions for grassroots development. 
4
 Placing their advisory 
performances of themselves for black and integrated communities alongside national race 
leaders? representations of themselves also provides me with an opportunity to explore 
 11
prevalent performances of the race?s spokespeople tradition throughout one hundred and 
fifty years of American history.  
As I contemplate these issues, a variety of questions emerge. How did my 
ancestors and African American artists and intellectuals conceive the predicament of 
African Americans in the US, and how did they create ideological racial ascendancy 
performances of themselves that speak for the race and to the race? How did their lives 
educate white readers and inspire the race to adopt their performances of themselves as 
models of black pride and leadership? What is it that an individual, a family, or a group 
of black artists and intellectuals deems important enough to pass down to the next 
generation as the most significant characteristics of black leadership culture, and how do 
they seek to convey this legacy? How did the next generations of my family and African 
American artists and intellectuals respond to the previous generations' performances of 
themselves: To what extent did the next generations embrace the older generations? 
interpretations of black leadership culture, and to what extent did they revise, reject or 
rebel against them? How did Charles Warner Cansler?s Three Generations contribute to 
the race?s spokespeople tradition found within African American Literature? The 
common thread among these questions is the complex existence of educated middle-class 
blacks, and their development of middle-class-minded black leadership traditions to 
address their struggle with living in between contrasting black and white social realities. 
Educated middle-class national race leaders had to develop a collective purpose 
from slavery and its legacy if they were going to help the race. Their task involved 
establishing commonly held views of slavery that provided hope, but there were 
obviously conflicting perceptions of slavery and its legacy among educated middle-class 
 12
blacks. Some late nineteenth-century black leaders referred to slavery as a kind of 
historical void.
5
 For many other national race leaders this perception flew in the face of 
experience and memory. The most well-known national race leaders realized that recently 
freed people understood that they had lived productive lives in bondage; they knew that 
former slaves were keenly aware of what they had built and that they remembered what 
they had imagined.
6
 They also recognized that many of these survivors had found 
Christianity in bondage, and their faith enabled them to believe that they were part of a 
purposeful history.
7
 Still, they were keenly aware of the fact that many others had to face 
a past that stifled their minds and ravaged their bodies.
8
 Educated middle-class black 
activists were able to devise representations of slave experiences that addressed blacks? 
divergent perceptions of slavery?s legacy. They were able to rely on their social and 
educational training to explain the race?s complicated relationship with whites that were 
both horrible and endearing and enriched because they were in the perfect situation to 
respond to how slavery affected blacks? perceptions of themselves and their relationship 
with their own families and communities.
9
 Nevertheless, prominent black intellectuals of 
the late nineteenth century differed, often fiercely, over just how historically minded their 
people ought to be.
10
 
For example, two of the most well-known national race leaders were using their 
accomplishments to advocate for two entirely different approaches to the legacy of 
slavery. Alexander Crummell, an Episcopal priest educated at the abolitionist Oneida 
Institute in Upstate New York and at Cambridge University in England in the 1840?s, 
was dedicated to the promotion of emigration to Liberia.
11
 He made a distinction between 
 13
recollection which he considered to be a natural unavoidable part of group consciousness 
and recollection which was an active matter of choice and dangerous in excess.
12
 
 Frederick Douglass had an entirely different view of recollections of slavery.  
Douglass used his own recollections of life in bondage to establish himself as the race?s 
spokesman.
13
 He used his life story to argue that remembering slavery created a felt 
history that was the moral and legal foundation upon which the race can demand 
citizenship and equality. Not surprisingly, Crummell and Douglass had different 
experiences with the institution of slavery.
14
 
Crummell spent most of the Civil War in West Africa.
15
 And while Douglass was 
a slave, he had more access to his wealthy and middle-class white masters than most 
slaves. Moreover, he had more access to the elite than even most whites. He learned to 
read and write from his masters and whites he came in contact with in Baltimore, and he 
acquired cultural refinement from his exposure to the Lloyd family, one of the prominent 
families in Maryland.
16
 His experiences in bondage made him the perfect spokesmen for 
the cause of abolition. He was able to use his recollection of slavery to convince whites to 
join the abolitionist movement such that abolitionists sent him across the country and to 
Europe as their spokesman, and they published his famous slave narrative in 1845. 
Crummell and Douglass had remarkable talents, experiences, and social mobility 
opportunities that separated them from even educated middle-class blacks. The majority 
of educated middle-class blacks were not interested in becoming local racial activists. 
They felt that they had to be more concerned with their own survival.   
When educated middle-class blacks did decide to pursue careers as local racial 
activists, they also could not agree on how to address slavery?s legacy. They were aware 
 14
of local, federal, and state governments? refusal to recognize blacks as citizens. They 
understood that the local, state and federal governments? promotion of white supremacist 
policies meant that blacks would struggle with severe forms of racial discrimination for 
the foreseeable future. The black clergy emerged as one of the most influential local 
racial activists in many southern and northern cities.
17
 In 1875 Reverend I.F. Alderidge 
promoted a conservative racial-uplift philosophy. He believed that if blacks obtained 
property, money and education that they would eventually achieve citizenship.
18
 He 
counseled against agitation for civil and political liberty, but AME bishop Henry McNeal 
Turner advocated leaving the country and emigrating to Africa.  
Most educated middle-class blacks sided with Howard University Professor B.K. 
Sampson, however. He believed that blacks would realize citizenship in this country 
because Christianity and civilization were on their side.
19
 Still, Sampson?s well- 
intentioned thoughts did not address the needs of many disadvantaged blacks in rural 
areas and in small and major cities. Some blacks were disappointed with middle-class 
blacks? indifferent response to taking on advisory roles for black communities, or their 
adoption of careful and conservative interpretations of local racial activism. Moreover, 
many other blacks believed that middle-class blacks were only interested in realizing 
social class mobility for themselves, or passing for white.   
Throughout American history several black writers, and many black and white 
historians, sociologists and political scientists, have argued that educated middle-class 
black culture merely involved imitation of white middle- class- to- upper- middle- class 
standards of cultural refinement and accommodation to white supremacy, often at the 
expense of themselves and the race. Intellectuals? and artists? examination of middle- 
 15
class black culture has specifically focused on their obsession with imitating upper-class 
white norms of behavior and the rituals of passing.  
In Neither Black nor White yet Both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial 
Literature (1997), Werner Sollors argued that light or white-skinned blacks who were 
well educated, and who had achieved middle- to- upper- middle- class status, passed for 
white. He surmised that culturally refined mulatto individuals may pass full time or part-
time for job purposes on a daily basis (a form of commuting out of and back into the 
race), or for avoiding segregation in transportation, hotels, restaurants, theatres and 
clubs.
20
 Moreover, he felt that the culturally refined mulatto person who reinvents 
themselves as an embodiment of white middle- class- to- upper- middle- class norms may 
be doing so for a variety of purposes: the opportunity to escape from slavery; interracial 
marriage and to break away from the rigid restrictions that Jim Crow and segregation 
imposed on black life.
21
 Thus for many well-educated mulattoes and blacks, middle class 
black life became characterized by deception because passing involved secretive behavior 
of the individual alone or with some confidants, family members, friends, protectors and 
sponsors.
22
  
Elite black communities? passing rituals led to a genre of ?passing? literature. 
Mulatto and black writers familiar with this culture wrote novels that described how 
siblings passed (in Charles W. Chesnutt?s The House Behind the Cedars) and even a 
whole family (in Edith Pope?s Coltcorton). Some writers went as far as writing novels 
about entire towns and groups of people passing (in George Schulyer?s Black No More).
23
 
Most of the well-known writers of passing novels revealed how their protagonists felt 
like cowards and race traitors, or they felt that they had made a bad deal (as in James 
 16
Weldon Johnson?s The Autobiography of an Ex Colored Man).
24
  In Passing, Nella 
Larsen presented her character Claire Kendry?s passing and marriage to a bigot as a 
public success, but a private social misery, and ultimately a violent death.          
?Passing? literature revealed the anxiety not only about skin color but also about 
social-class mobility found within interpretations of educated middle-class black 
leadership traditions. Some blacks in black communities across the country felt that 
middle-class-minded race leaders were participating in a form of passing for prestige and 
social-class mobility. This form of passing was not focused as much on skin color 
privileges that allowed prominent mulatto individuals to pass for white within society; it 
had more to do with developing strategies of social accommodation with whites in 
exchange for career advancement and financial opportunities. It often involved adoption 
of white middle-class cultural customs as well. Thus middle-to-upper-middle-class 
mulattoes? decisions to pass enabled them to seek social-class mobility opportunities, but 
their efforts were often at the expense of other blacks within black communities. For 
instance, influential white individuals became adept at finding educated mulatto and 
black individuals who they were able to nominate as leaders for black communities. They 
appointed them as administrators for black schools and colleges. Whites wanted their 
selected race leaders to promote appeasement to white supremacy. Moreover, they 
wanted their appointed race leaders to gain valuable information on what was happening 
in black communities across the country and report back to them. 
 My study complicates this commonly held view of educated middle-class black 
leadership culture by exploring the lives of six individuals including myself. I will focus 
on how six generations of my family relied on local-racial-activist principles to define 
 17
themselves and their association with various black and white social-class worlds, how 
they discovered ways of maneuvering in the social spaces in between divergent racial and 
social class realities, how their participation in local racial activism enables us to 
understand what they wanted for themselves and the race, and how their legacy compared 
and connected with nationally recognized middle-class, and often mulatto, race leaders. 
Writing a dissertation that involves my self, my family, and canonical African 
American artists? and intellectuals presents special challenges. I have sought to use an 
interdisciplinary approach to study the family's legacy and their involvement with other 
communal activists and nationally recognized African American artists and intellectuals. 
My study will examine the differences between and connections among communal- 
oriented practices of local racial activism and individualistic-minded race?s spokespeople 
traditions, including the writings by and about communal activists and national race 
leaders? representations of themselves. First, I realized that I had to present a general 
understanding of leadership. Second, I had to explain how intellectuals used their works 
to gain recognition as leaders. Finally, I had to represent a specific definition of black 
leadership culture that I would be using, and how this definition compared to and 
connected with my family?s legacy. 
Individuals who successfully motivate people to realize their potential in various 
ways gain recognition as leaders within middle to upper-class society. They emerge as 
anointed leaders in fields that range from coaches of athletic teams, to teachers and 
school district administrators, and to executives for businesses, local, state and national 
governments. While these influential people often appear to be ?natural leaders,? they 
regularly have to adapt their styles for different people?s personalities, situations, and 
 18
cultures to earn recognition and to achieve common goals.
25
 They often learn to evaluate 
themselves as leaders by realizing the following objectives: acquiring money, social 
status, the commitment of their supervisors, peers, and those that they are responsible for, 
to realize agreed-upon objectives, but what if, however, the goals are more abstract and 
have more to do with influencing people?s thoughts, values and conduct than they do 
with inspiring people to meet certain quantifiable markers?
26
  
Intellectuals and writers must seek to create effective forms of communication 
such as speeches, essays, autobiographies, short stories, poems, and novels to inspire 
their intended followers. Their use of literature enables them to influence the ideals that 
govern our understanding of ourselves and our relationship with society.
27
 When we turn 
to how varied scholars, writers and communal activists interpret ideals of African 
American leadership, in general social science literature the concept of leadership has 
been used in such diverse ways to characterize such varied phenomena that there is a lack 
of agreement regarding even the basic properties of leadership.
28
  
Consequently, I am working with the definition of black leadership that focuses 
on the role and significance of individuals who use their life stories to promote and to 
coordinate social action.
29
 This interpretation of black leadership has been referred to in 
many different ways from the antebellum era in which abolitionists and prominent blacks 
referred to Frederick Douglass as the Representative American to black artists and 
intellectuals? ability to emerge as cultural interpreters of race pride during the Harlem 
Renaissance in the 1920?s.  
Unlike the successful portrayals of individualistic minded black leadership and 
educated blacks? ability to represent the promise of the race, Sociologist E. Franklin 
 19
Frazier used his text Black Bourgeoisie: The Rise of a New Middle Class (1957) to raise 
awareness of the absence of collective race leadership traditions within middle-class 
black communities. Frazier?s view shaped many people?s perceptions of the black middle 
class? refusal or inability to facilitate educational opportunities for poverty stricken and 
working class blacks. Many black scholars adopted the mistaken belief that educated 
middle-class blacks did not take up black leadership roles until the late 1960?s. Many 
black intellectuals who came of age as scholars during the black power movement felt 
that the black public figures of the 1960?s were set apart from previous generations of 
black leaders.  
Nonetheless, some of the 1960?s black social scientists referred back to what I 
classified as the spokespeople of the race model to articulate the significance of civil 
rights activists and black nationalists leaders. They applied this definition to Martin 
Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali, but earlier generations? awareness of 
the spokesperson model undermined their agenda to separate civil rights activists and 
black nationalists leaders from the origins of the racial spokespeople and integrationists 
conventions. From slavery to World War II several generations of African Americans 
learned about the spokespeople of the race convention in black churches, in schools, and 
in conversations with their parents.    
Consequently, black social scientists? definitions of terms like the ?functional 
approach to leadership? to articulate the purpose of civil rights activists and black 
nationalists leaders were not new. They were relying on rather old interpretations of 
national black leadership to define prominent 1960?s race leaders? roles such as 
?designating the individual actor as a leader who for some period of time overtly 
 20
identifies with the effort of the race to achieve stated goals.?
30
 Social scientists during the 
1960?s argued that the individual?s behavior and representation of his story was designed 
to establish patterns of behavior within black communities.
31
 While many blacks born 
prior to the 1960?s would not know specific terms such as the ?functional approach to 
leadership,? they would be familiar with the idea of a black individual?s narrative 
designed to establish patterning behavior for the black community?s struggle for racial 
improvement. Moreover, they would recognize the selection of a black individual as the 
spokesman for the race. My study challenges the belief that most middle-class black 
leaders embraced principles of racial accommodation prior to the civil rights movement. 
For instance, Charles Warner Cansler had reservations about the selection process 
of the race?s spokesman. In chapter 8 of Three Generations, ?Leaders of Another 
Decade,? he referred to Booker T. Washington?s emergence as the black Moses.  
Booker T. Washington became nationally famous after an address he delivered at 
the Cotton States Exposition in 1895. That address was so eminently sane and 
practical and pointed the way so clearly to adjustment of the race problem in the 
South and the country, that the white people of the country, well nigh universally, 
and many of the colored people, saw him as the new leader, the Moses, destined 
to lead his people out of the wilderness of their difficulties.
32
  
Cansler?s analysis of Washington?s famous speech indicated that some local racial 
activists were familiar with the concept of the heroic, Moses-like, black individual as the 
representative of the race well prior to the 1960?s. As will be discussed later in much 
more detail in chapter 3, Cansler criticized Washington?s representation of himself as the 
spokesperson of the race and influential whites and blacks support of him. 
 21
Nevertheless, the almost instantaneous success of Washington?s speech provided 
him with the type of fame that symbolized the hope for improved race relations between 
blacks and whites. In Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory (2001), 
David W. Blight documented how Washington?s contemporary local and national black 
intellectuals responded to his emergence as the new race leader. ?The free -lance 
journalist and self- styled Black Nationalist John Edward Bruce informed Washington 
that ?You hold the key to the solution of the problem of the century.? 
33
 ?And in New 
York one of Washington?s prot?g?s informed his leader: ?It looks like you are our 
Frederick Douglass and I am glad of it.?
34
 Blight also discovered a quote from Cansler?s 
older brother William Cansler. ?Indeed, William Cansler, a black teacher from Knoxville, 
Tennessee, was so inspired that he suggested to Washington that his expression, ?separate 
as the fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential to human progress,? be inscribed 
on a lapel button, ??as worn by Grand army men? and sold on Exposition grounds at the 
Negro exhibit.?
35
 Nonetheless, Blight agreed with Charles Warner Cansler?s earlier 
assessment in Three Generations of the speech. Blight argued, ?Washington?s speech 
seemed to embody sweet reason and excited many supporters. Indeed, many black 
admirers responded to the possibilities in the speech, not to its dangers.?
36
 Still, 
Washington?s initial popularity confirmed the prominence of a national race leader 
ideology within black communities and the larger society. 
 In Black Leadership in American: from Booker T. Washington to Jesse Jackson 
(1990), John White stated that by 1900 Washington had a dual career as an educator and 
the race leader. His position as an educator and founder of Tuskegee Institute enabled 
him to represent to black communities a racial self-improvement philosophy, but his 
 22
power came from the white establishment in the South and the North. White argued that 
in the South, Washington formed alliances with influential whites by ingratiating himself 
with successive governors of Alabama, promoted health measures for Negroes, and the 
establishment of such economic ventures as black own-and-operated cotton mills and 
land purchase schemes.
37
 In the North, White discovered that Washington founded the 
National Negro Business League to promote Black entrepreneurship and to advertise the 
success some blacks had achieved to promote his accomplishments as the new race 
leader.
38
 
Washington?s mastery of a campaign for public relations as the new race leader 
provided him with financial support in the major cities in the North. His strategy for 
recognition as the new black Moses provided him with opportunities to be invited to 
dinner at the White House by Theodore Roosevelt and to travel extensively abroad and to 
receive guests from Europe at Tuskegee Institute, but he never traveled to Africa, Asia or 
the West Indies. Moreover, in Europe in 1910, he resolved not to enter any art gallery, 
museum or palace as a means of promoting his devotion to industrial education for 
Negroes.
39
 
 Washington?s contradictory behavior did not go unnoticed. Northern blacks began 
to question his status as their new black Moses. They began to express their reservations 
about his approach to race relations and his industrial education philosophy. W.E.B. Du 
Bois? critique of Washington philosophy or racial accommodation is well known, but 
there were other prominent black journalists who also challenged Washington. Julius F. 
Taylor, Negro Editor of the Chicago Broad Ax declared that Washington was ??the Great 
Beggar of Tuskegee? and ?the greatest white man?s Nigger.??
40
 Moreover, he warned, 
 23
?The time is not far distant when Booker T. Washington will be repudiated as the leader 
of our race, for he believes that only mealy mouthed Negroes like himself should be 
involved in politics.?
41
 Taylor?s view resembled the sentiment of some northern Blacks 
who felt that Washington?s performance of his status hurt as much as it helped the race 
because they felt that Washington was willing to promote appeasement to white 
supremacy for political power and status.  
Nevertheless, Washington privately sponsored court cases that challenged 
segregation, and he became ardent in his views against white supremacy as he realized 
that America was taking dramatic steps backwards in its recognition of black humanity, 
but Washington?s philosophy of racial accommodation and narrow-minded obsession 
with economics as the solution to the race problem were adopted by many middle-class 
blacks. Thus Washington?s legacy confirmed many astute working-class blacks? poor 
perceptions of educated middle-class blacks.  
 Most black historians and intellectuals suggest that Washington?s critics were 
largely from the North, but Cansler?s Three Generations documents that their were critics 
of Washington in the South as well. Cansler realized that the idea of the heroic black 
individual advocating principles of racial accommodation to lead the race to freedom and 
citizenship would produce limited results. Furthermore, he understood that national race 
leaders such as Washington and Douglass had social-class mobility opportunities that 
most blacks did not have in the North, and especially, not in the South. The absence of 
awareness of Cansler and other southern local racial-activist views in black communities 
prevented the race from acquiring a more sophisticated view of educated middle-class 
blacks? local racial activism in black communities then and in black communities today. 
 24
To really understand the history of the divisions that existed between working-class 
blacks and educated middle-class blacks, it is important to explore how contrasting work 
cultures led to the creation of divergent social-class existences within many black 
communities. 
In One Drop of Blood: the Misadventure of Race (2000), Scott L. Malcomson 
demonstrated that from the antebellum era through to the Great Depression, the race was 
primarily working class, tenant-farmers, or servile (as domestics, porters, waiters and 
maids).
42
 Ambitious and well-educated black families had limited means to realize social-
class mobility within segregated black communities. They had to achieve financial 
prosperity by creating markets for themselves.
43
 Many of these black families acquired 
middle-class status within black communities by developing real estate businesses, 
funeral parlors, or shops in those communities.
44
  However, their success created some 
tension within diverse black communities because middle-class blacks needed working-
class blacks to survive and prosper, but they frequently maneuvered within social circles 
that often excluded working-class and poverty-stricken Negroes. If educated middle-class 
blacks did associate with working-class blacks, they habitually had very paternalistic 
attitudes towards them.  
Nevertheless, in the 1920?s the term New Negro became popular although it was 
used earlier. For instance in 1916, William Pickens published The New Negro: His 
Political, Civil and Mental Status.
45
  Pickens embodied many of the principles of the 
New Negro sensibility. He was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Yale University in 1904, 
where his prize-winning oratory won him a lucrative offer from New York speaker?s 
bureau to undertake a three-year lecture tour of the United States. Comparable to 
 25
Cansler?s local racial activist beliefs, Pickens ultimately decided to relinquish his position 
as vice president for Morgan College (now Morgan State University) in Baltimore in 
1918.  He wrote a book about his family and a memoir entitled Bursting Bonds: The 
Autobiography of a New Negro (1923).  In the 1920?s, he took a more activist role in the 
racial improvement struggle by joining the NAACP as the institution?s executive 
secretary under James Weldon Johnson?s leadership, Johnson being the first African 
American to head the famous organization. Cansler, Pickens, and Johnson observed how 
Negroes perceptions of themselves dramatically changed into what can only be described 
as race pride.
46
 Negroes looked to other ways of defining themselves during the 1920?s.
47
 
Many Negroes were more interested in their own culture and its creation of Ragtime and 
Jazz than emulating European culture.
48
 Still some educated middle- class Negroes 
continued to reject Ragtime and Jazz, and many of the Negro elite continued to rely on 
Western European models of cultural refinement to define themselves.  
However, numerous Negro communities became black communities in their 
thinking, particularly in major southern and northern cities.
49
 They began to reject the 
belief that mulatto or lighter-skinned Negroes were closer to cultural refinement and 
humanity than dark-skinned Negroes. Moreover, they were not as concerned with the 
absence of free Negro ancestry as the means of establishing themselves within black 
communities.
50
 Consequently during the 1920?s and the 1930?s the most recognized 
national Negro leaders? roles as spokespeople created tension within many Negro 
communities because their lives were often viewed by various Negroes as separate from 
most working-class Negroes? existences within segregated black social worlds.
51
 Their 
success often resembled the accomplishments of middle-class Negro families who were 
 26
members of Negro communities but were often perceived as being separate from the 
working-class and poverty- stricken Negroes. 
The emergence of a new form of cultural race pride within black communities 
during the 1920?s required artists to make the transformation from Negro artists to black 
artists. For example, Alain Locke and Langston Hughes were educated middle-class 
nationally known literary figures who decided to form folk-minded artistic sensibilities to 
situate themselves within this new form of grassroots racial consciousness, but this 
approach did not indicate that they had intimate contact with the working-class black 
culture that produced Ragtime and Jazz.
52
 They were the definers of the music?s 
importance for largely white audiences and segments of working-class blacks and 
culturally refined middle-class blacks, but they remained largely separate from the day- 
to-day lives of blacks in diverse working and middle-class black communities.
53
 
Cansler also had to respond to the shift in racial identity formation within his own 
community, but he did have day-to-day interaction with the varied population of 
Knoxville?s black community. He recognized the need to develop a family history that 
spoke to the community?s interest in race pride and encourage subsequent generations to 
take on the role of stewards within the black community by working with like-minded 
blacks and whites, because whites had resources that Knoxville?s black community 
required for their own survival. 
Unlike Cansler, Locke and Hughes wrote about everyday black culture, Jazz and 
blues but they continued to promote individualistic-minded autobiographies, novels, short 
stories and poems of racial heroism.  Their literary endeavors enabled them to gain 
recognition from white critics and elite white and black social circles as the spokespeople 
 27
of the race. The evaluation of the tradition entailed: the individual?s ability to use his or 
her life history to display the value of African American experiences and cultural 
expressions within American history; his or her capacity to convey a journey to self 
awareness as a critique of America?s practices of systemic racism, while simultaneously 
representing him or herself as a model of the race?s artistic contributions and commonly 
held American values of Christian morality, democracy, liberty and social equality. 
Individualistic-minded National race leaders often create speeches and narratives that 
turn into racial identity scripts.  
The race?s spokespeople scripts were designed to demonstrate their learned 
insights into the socially constructed racial inferiority stereotypes imposed on them by 
American society.
54
 Their performances of these racial identity formation scripts became 
the prevailing representations of the racial self for their intended audiences. Prominent 
black artists had to entertain and educate foreign white readers for their own financial 
well being, while they simultaneously had to convince black readers that their narratives 
were racially authentic and addressed their plight. The forefathers of this method of 
representing the racial self to the public and to interested blacks were Douglass, 
Washington and Du Bois. They were able to cultivate valuable sponsorship networks 
with moneyed white patrons and admiration from segments of black communities across 
the country. Their associations with influential whites afforded them with unique status 
as the race?s spokespeople.  
Although, as we shall see, my family?s roles as advisors for black and integrated 
communities enact somewhat similar views of themselves, they focus more on how their 
awareness of themselves emerged from their decision-making counsel to Knoxville?s 
 28
black community in the struggle against racism and later in integrated communities 
across the country. While individualistic-minded national race leaders were also 
interested in reaching local black and white audiences, aspiring racial spokespeople often 
directed their efforts to gaining the attention of influential white benefactors and largely 
middle-to-upper- class readerships. 
As we shall see, the role of national spokespeople of the race and black families? 
roles as counselors for black and integrated communities have important similarities, 
connections and differences. While national race leaders used slave narratives, 
autobiographies, essays and speeches to lobby the nation to extend principles and 
practices of liberal democracy to include blacks, I contend that Cansler?s Three 
Generations sought to show how black families did the day- to-day work of helping local 
communities survive and hopefully overcome racial and social class adversity.
55
 He 
described how it was the local teacher, social worker, principal and lawyer to whom 
black communities first turn for help when faced with moments of crisis, uncertainty or 
doubt. He also showed that it was the familial and communal-minded black individual 
who builds the local infrastructure for national race leaders to gain quicker access to the 
black masses for grassroots efforts.
56
 He displayed how his family?s legacy of taking on 
the role of advisers for the black community provided them with opportunities to earn 
acceptance in Knoxville?s black community. Black public figures? representations of 
themselves were designed to achieve similar objectives.   
For instance, Douglass, Washington, Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X 
created images of themselves in their various writings including slave narratives, 
autobiographies, essays and speeches as messianic figures who would lead the entire race 
 29
to freedom and to citizenship.
57
 They displayed paternalistic images of themselves as 
Moses figures destined to discover the path out of the wilderness of America?s history of 
slavery and racial oppression to the promise land of freedom and American citizenship.  
Du Bois, Locke, Johnson, Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison 
and James Baldwin developed a different representation of black leadership culture. They 
built on Douglass? antebellum slave narrative tradition and Washington?s 
autobiographical convention of the race?s spokespeople culture to make America 
conscious of the need for social and moral change. This literary approach was designed to 
educate white society about American racism and to demonstrate racial solidarity for 
African Americans.
58
 Whereas Three Generations emerged from literary models, Cansler 
was searching for a new type of leadership that I define as stewardship.  
I argue that Cansler believed that communal principles were needed to provide 
blacks with skills to survive and prosper within their own communities. Unlike the 
individualistic-minded national race leadership?s emphasis on establishing a universal 
understanding of racism, migration to northern cities and social class mobility, Cansler 
believed that racism took many different forms and that educated middle-class blacks 
should remain in their southern neighborhoods. He noted strange paradoxes: 
There are almost as many variations on the race question and race prejudices as 
there are cities in the South, where racial prejudice is considered general and all 
of a kind. In the Southern city where I live, Negro police officers have been part 
of the police force of the city for more than fifty years, but we are unable to get 
any Negroes in the fire stations as fire fighters. In a neighboring city less than two 
miles distant, the Negroes of that city, despite many efforts, have been unable to 
 30
secure Negro policemen, although they have a fire station well manned by 
Negroes.
59
  
I argue that Cansler wanted educated Negro youth to abandon ?city life?the gay 
midnight revelries of drink, of song and dance.?
60
 He hoped that talented black youth 
would discover ?fulfillment in building the foundation for a nobler and a better race.?
61
  
Cansler?s criticism of drink, song, and dance was a product of his genteel southern 
upbringing, but Cansler?s encouragement of talented black youth to take on mentoring 
roles for black communities in the mid 20
th
 century resembled what many contemporary 
black intellectuals and black public figures have called on this generation of talented 
black youth to do today.  
As we shall see, in Three Generations, Cansler used his ancestors? life stories to 
show that black communities must not rely on messianic-minded racial representatives. 
He believed that individualistic-minded national race leaders would not provide blacks 
with freedom and full citizenship. He realized that many working-class blacks would not 
have the resources to travel and access to the same social class mobility avenues that 
aspiring racial spokespeople exhibited in their narratives. Consequently, he used Three 
Generations to advocate that blacks must discover ways of helping themselves within 
their communities by working with and alongside prominent black figures and whites. He 
recognized that the battle for American citizenship would have to be fought at the local 
level as well as the national level. Cansler may not have been well-known nationally but 
he was an important figure locally, and his own life established images of stewardship 
that many of his younger colleagues, as well as my grandfather J. Herman Daves and his 
children, adopted to define themselves within American society.  
 31
The Daves family became largely responsible for carrying on the Scotts? and the 
Canslers? local racial improvement practices. Charles Warner Cansler's only child with 
his wife Lillian Webber Cansler, Willard Wilson Cansler, met Herman J. Daves at 
Knoxville College. They married in 1922.
62
 When Willard and Herman J. Daves? 
children eventually left Knoxville, Tennessee, they embraced the Scotts and the Canslers? 
familial and communal principles to define themselves. The Daves family became active 
coordinators of racial development at various educational, social, religious and 
international institutions, including Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia, Fisk 
University in Nashville, Tennessee, the University of Rochester in upstate New York, 
and the Educational Testing Service in Princeton, New Jersey, the College of New Jersey 
in Ewing, New Jersey, the Washington, D.C. Public School system, through to the 
Washington Cathedral in D.C. and a US ambassadorship to Nigeria. Cansler?s 
representations of the family?s lives enables readers to examine the origins and the 
evolutions of a family?s local race leader principles, and how their leadership strategies 
compare to and connect with the foundations and progressions of national race leaders 
practices. 
Cansler?s account of the family?s lives provides us with an opportunity to place 
the family?s vision, activities and achievements within a historical and a political context, 
and it also offers a revealing history of how a family and a black community struggles to 
overcome Jim Crow, segregation and institutionalized racism. Cansler?s account of his 
ancestors? life stories, and his own experiences as stewards, respond to the literary 
representation of the racial self in antebellum slave narratives and black autobiographies.   
 32
Whereas the most well-known slave narratives and black autobiographies were 
models for Cansler, in Three Generations he moved away from their emphasis on 
individualistic representations of black heroism. He focused on how members of each 
generation dedicated their lives to their families? and the community?s educational and 
social development. Prominent black male writers in particular did not usually present 
their roles as African American family men as central themes in their performances as 
literary racial spokespeople. The Scotts? and the Canslers? lives as superintendents for the 
black community, and as ambassadors with whites for themselves and the race, replies to 
African American writers? emphasis on gaining recognition as the race's spokespeople. 
Cansler?s representation of his family?s communal racial ascendancy ethos within black 
communities created images of how educated middle-class black families helped 
facilitate economic and social improvement opportunities.  
For my study, I draw on available sources about six generations of race leaders in 
my family. The sources on the family?s racial activist heritage are quite varied. For 
instance, Robert J. Booker?s Two Hundred Years of Black Culture in Knoxville, 
Tennessee 1791-1991(1993) is a useful because it provides the historical context for the 
family?s legacy. It documents how many free blacks, slaves and whites were in Knoxville 
from the antebellum era through to the Civil War. He also provides valuable information 
about Cansler?s and other local race leaders? creation of a social and an educational 
infrastructure in Knoxville from the antebellum era, the Civil War, and Reconstruction 
through to the Depression. Booker?s articles ?The Canslers: Educational Leaders in 
Knoxville? (1990) and ?New YMCA honors Historic Cansler Name? (2003) provide 
additional information on the family that explains the Scotts? and the Canslers? 
 33
participation in collective racial uplift practices and what has been done in Knoxville to 
preserve their history. William Clifford Roberts, Jr.?s text The Cansler Family in 
America: the Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip W. Gentzler of North Carolina (2001) 
is another extensive study of the Cansler family. His work deals with both the white and 
the black Canslers. He acquired information about the black Canslers from Three 
Generations, living family members and from his own historical research, but his work is 
quite different from Three Generations. While he provides some useful information, 
Roberts is mainly interested in providing an extensive lineage of the white Cansler 
family. Moreover, he acknowledges that he does not have the expertise to properly tell 
the black Canslers? story. In addition to those publications, I have had the opportunity to 
learn about the Canslers and the Daves family through personal documents, including 
letters and photographs, through oral histories and interview approaches, and through my 
own experiences as a person raised in the family.  
I recognize that my involvement with the family may complicate my analysis of 
their lives and their local racial activist legacy, but being adopted into the family enabled 
me to develop both an insider/outsider perspective of my family?s lives and activist 
traditions. Thus I was able to evaluate the unspoken and spoken expectations of being a 
member of the family as well as the privileges.
63
  
This was a difficult endeavor because I had to examine my own subjectivity. I had 
to learn and write about how my family?s legacy helped shape my understanding of my 
personal identity and my social identity.
64
 Their lives informed the ways I came to 
understand myself and my relationship to other family members, blacks and other races 
from diverse social class backgrounds. Moreover, I had to write about how I came to the 
 34
decision to eventually take an active role in my family?s unconscious and conscious 
?subjectification? of my identity.
65
  There were instances throughout my early and young 
adult life where I passively adopted my parents? interpretations of who I should be and 
there were various stages of my life where I actively resisted their efforts. My passive-
aggressive resistance and outward defiance were responses to the unspoken expectations 
of being adopted into this remarkable family. Obviously my maturation was painful at 
times, but I was able to make the conscious choice to define myself within my family?s 
local racial-activist traditions. My awareness of my insider/outsider status helped me to 
understand my own subjectivity and to develop the important critical distance needed to 
examine my family?s complex life histories.
66
 
Keeping in mind Michel Foucault?s theory of subjectivity as a means to present 
my insider/outsider status, I decided to utilize a cultural biographical /autobiographical 
approach. Drawing on work in anthropology, American Studies and literary criticism 
such an approach seeks to discover and interpret the cultural systems individuals employ 
to represent themselves, their situations, and or their topics to their audiences.
67
 I found 
that this approach could be applied to letters, literary and historically published works, 
interview transcripts and other personal statements, including my own understandings of 
my own experiences.
68
 
This cultural biographical/autobiographical perspective is useful to discern the 
larger significance of Cansler?s construction of his immediate ancestors? lives and how 
their lives informed his perception of himself. Moreover, this method is the most 
appropriate means of presenting Three Generations? contribution to the study of black 
leadership culture, and the role it plays in representing middle-class racial identity 
 35
formation experiences within American society. Consequently for my family, the key 
primary text, Three Generations, functions importantly but quite differently for our 
understanding of each generation.  
Because my study requires that I use a cultural studies approach to examine my 
family?s ways of defining themselves, it also requires that I utilize texts from a variety of 
fields to explore Cansler?s treatment of his immediate ancestors? lives. For instance, 
Charles Chesnutt?s novel The Marrow of Tradition (1901) and James Weldon Johnson?s 
first person novel The Autobiography of an Ex Colored Man (1912) are helpful aids for 
examining Cansler?s representation of William B. Scott?s interracial heritage. Chesnutt?s 
historically based novel and Johnson?s first-person novel provide a racial and social- 
class context to explore interpretations of my family?s experiences as mulatto middle- 
class racial activists. Historical texts such as To Make Our World A New: A History of 
African Americans, edited by Robin D.G. Kelly and Earl Lewis (2000), David W. 
Blight?s Race and Reunion: the Civil War in American Memory (2001), Dickson D Bruce 
Jr.?s The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865 (2001) and William 
Pickens? Bursting Bonds: The Autobiography of a ?New Negro? (1923) are useful texts 
for placing Cansler?s perception of educated middle-class black racial uplift conventions 
within a literary and socio-historical context.  
Additional texts like Werner Sollors? Neither Black nor White Yet Both: Thematic 
Explorations of Interracial Literature (1997) and Scott L. Malcomson?s One Drop of  
Blood: The American Misadventure of Race (2000) provide historical analysis of the role 
skin color played in how middle-class mulattoes lived and defined themselves in between 
divergent black and white worlds during my ancestors? lifetimes. These texts are helpful 
 36
in analyzing what racial and social circumstances Cansler had to confront to develop his 
parents? biographies.  
I also consider African American literary theory found in such works as Marlon J. 
Ross? Manning the Race: Reforming Black Men in the Jim Crow Era (2004) to identify 
Three Generations contribution to interpretations of middle-class minded black manhood 
and racial uplift conventions. In considering another key family text?s representation of 
activism and middle-class black reality, J. Herman Daves? 1926 sociological study of 
Knoxville?s black community, I frame it in comparison with other sociological texts and 
prominent middle-class minded black literary figures, including W.E.B. Du Bois? 
sociological research. 
 In addition, I use literary texts such as Frederick Douglass? slave narratives, 
Dickson J. Preston?s biography of Frederick Douglass Young Frederick Douglass: the 
Maryland Years (1980), Booker T. Washington?s autobiography Up from Slavery (1901) 
and African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up From Slavery 100 Years 
Later: Uncle Tom or New Negro (2006) edited by Rebecca Carroll to form a comparative 
dialogue between my family?s legacy of middle-class minded local racial activism and 
prominent black figures? portrayal of themselves as middle-class minded race?s 
spokespeople.  
Charles Warner Cansler personally knew nationally recognized African American 
writers and intellectuals such as Washington, Johnson and Carter G. Woodson, and had 
met with Douglass. Moreover, his older brother William Cansler had worked with and 
alongside Washington and Du Bois. Cansler used his experiences with them and his 
understandings of their works to represent his family's history as local racial activists as 
 37
well as his own experience with the tradition. Thus I will seek to locate Cansler?s 
enactment of the family?s legacy within the larger discussion about literary performances 
of black middle-class leadership culture in African American slave narratives and 
autobiographies  
Moreover, I will show that Cansler?s Three Generations belongs in conversations 
about the study black leadership within African American Literature and history. 
Cansler?s Three Generations is a text that black scholars, teachers and students can use to 
examine a local racial activist?s interpretation of himself and his family within the social- 
action-minded African American literary tradition. Contemporary critics of African 
American Literature are beginning to argue that African American Literature and history 
needs to be taught and studied from both a public and a personal perspective. This is what 
I seek to do in this study.   
For instance while Three Generations was written and privately published in 
Knoxville, Tennessee in 1939, as I mentioned earlier, it resembled the literary sensibility 
of many of the black writers from the Harlem Renaissance such as Du Bois, Locke and 
Hughes. Cansler?s biographies and memoir were developed to respond to the political 
realities that blacks faced in American society. Like the Harlem Renaissance?s Great 
Migration roots and promotion of the New Negro Ideology, Cansler?s biography of his 
grandfather William B. Scott is a migration narrative. He employed this mode to describe 
how his great grandfather overcame free black alienation by moving from Statesville, 
North Carolina to discovering a prosperous free black community in Knoxville, 
Tennessee in 1845.  He chronicled how his grandfather?s adoption of race pride and 
middle class sensibility enabled him to emerge as a prominent local racial activist in 
 38
Knoxville?s small free black, slave and prominent white communities. He concluded his 
biographies with a construction of his father?s, Hugh Lawson Cansler, and his mother?s, 
Laura Ann Scott Cansler, ability to form a loving marriage based on familial and 
communal racial uplift principles. Cansler described how their lives became the context 
for his artistic, cultural, political and psychological journey of self discovery as a local 
racial activist.  
Three Generations will also remind one of the humanistic-minded protest 
sensibilities that dominated African American literary circles from the Great Depression 
to the 1960?s.
69
 Three Generations bears a resemblance to the movement away from the 
individualistic minded ?talented tenth? critics of the Harlem Renaissance to black 
intellectuals making conscious decisions to situate their lives and work within the 
struggle of the black masses.
70
 Cansler?s representations of his immediate ancestors and 
his own life formed images of middle-class-minded black families committed to fulfilling 
leadership positions as institution builders, teachers, school administrators and politicians 
for the black community. His documentation of his family?s achievements enabled him to 
develop his own interpretation of the protest tradition that can be compared with Richard 
Wright?s ?Blueprint for Negro Writing? (1937), ?The Ethics of Jim Crow? (1938) and 
Native Son (1940), Johnson?s Along this Way (1938) and Hughes? The Big Sea (1940). In 
addition, Cansler?s life story was in conversation with Charles S. Johnson?s and 
Benjamin Mays? careers as black intellectuals and managers of prominent black 
educational institutions. Cansler shared a belief in preparing the next generation for social 
action and advancement with these men, but Cansler?s hybrid text documented that his 
experiences with practices of racial activism dated back to the Civil War and 
 39
Reconstruction. Thus Three Generations can provide necessary historical context for 
scholars,? teachers? and students? research on the positive and negative affects of the loss 
of these local racial-activist figures in black communities across the country.  
Cansler?s literary sensibility looked ahead to black nationalistic sentiment found 
within the Black Arts Movement of the 1960?s and 1970?s. For instance in his memoir 
Cansler promoted the work of Carter G. Woodson. I discovered that Cansler?s perception 
of Woodson The Mis-education of the Negro (1933) raised the issue of how Woodson?s 
race-conscious interpretation of black history lends itself to the literary politics of the 
1960?s?a Black Aesthetic, an aesthetic that largely criticized educated middle-class 
blacks? decision to only look to Eurocentric sensibilities to define their self worth. Amiri 
Baraka, Addison Gayle Jr., Stephen Henderson and Harold Cruse were just a few writers 
and intellectuals that promoted the need to continue to promote race pride within black 
communities. They stressed Black History and black institution building as the primary 
characteristics of black leadership culture. I discovered that Cansler interacted with 
largely middle-class black men and women who also denounced middle-class blacks? 
obsessive dependence on Western European culture to assess themselves. His group of 
middle-class- minded blacks was a precursor to the Black Aesthetic Movement. He was 
part of a cadre of local black activists and intellectuals who preached race pride, the 
merits of Black History and community activism as the primary means of judging one?s 
value. Therefore Three Generations contributes to conversations about black 
communities association with Black Nationalistic sentiments prior to the 1960?s.  
My dissertation also adds to scholars? current approaches to studying the literary 
construction of the racial self and its association with enactments of black leadership 
 40
culture. This dissertation focuses on a middle-class black family?s means of developing 
local racial identity formation principles from group-oriented racial uplift ideologies and 
literary presentations of national black leadership culture. Thus I also place my 
dissertation in conversation with recent black scholars? works such as the renewed 
interest in late diplomat Ralph Bunche?s philosophy of Negro Leadership and his recently 
published work A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership (2005), African 
American Lives (2004), edited by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Evelyn Brooks 
Higginbotham and Manning Marable?s Living Black History: How Reimagining the 
African American Past Can Remake America?s Racial Future (2006).   
My study builds on Gates? contemporary view for analyzing black history and the 
literary representation of middle-class black leadership culture. In the January/February 
2006 issue of the Crisis magazine, Gates argues ?[t]hat scholars and teachers need to 
teach black history by teaching black family history from the ground up. This makes 
African American history personal and real.?
71
 Gates emphasizes that it is no longer 
sufficient to merely teach and to study black history from a broad social history 
perspective and a few super people such as Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, 
W.E.B. Du Bois, Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X.
72
 My dissertation responds to 
Gates? current vision by placing several generations of a family?s life history in 
conversation with broad social movements, events and influential literary representations 
of the race?s spokespeople convention.  
Chapter Overviews: 
Chapter 2, Living with Unspoken Expectations: Reflections on Being Adopted into my 
Family?s Middle-class- minded Local Racial Uplift Traditions, examines the journey my 
 41
parents embarked on to adopt me and my own struggle with my family?s middle-class-
minded local racial activist philosophy and rituals.  
Chapter 3, the Story of a Race Man, investigates the meaning of Charles Warner 
Cansler?s (1871-1953) life and his construction of his immediate ancestors? lives in his 
book Three Generations: the Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee (1939). As 
such, this chapter offers important recovery work of a family?s racial advancement 
philosophy and strategies for working with various white and black people divided by 
race, class, gender and access to cultural currency skills, traditions and networks.  
Chapter 4, William B. Scott?s Dream (1821-1885), considers how Cansler?s 
biographical portrait of his grandfather dealt with the value of beneficial interracial 
relationships and the larger significance of the black family man as the model of race 
leadership in African American literature. I will use Cansler?s construction of his 
grandfather?s life as means of addressing the crisis of middle class minded black 
masculinity within the national racial ascendancy novels and narratives.  
Chapter 5, The Emergence of Joseph Herman Daves (1898-1978): A Local Race 
Activist?s Analysis of the Scott and Cansler Families? Racial Uplift Traditions, examines 
Joseph Herman Daves? quest for belonging within the Scotts and the Canslers? local 
racial-activist traditions. His efforts to gain acceptance represent a shift in the families? 
local racial activist traditions. His struggle for recognition from the Cansler family 
symbolized a twist in the Scotts? and Canslers? legacy because Daves not only has to gain 
acceptance from the family by demonstrating his ability to see himself through the eyes 
of the Cansler family, the race and influential whites in Knoxville, but he must also 
 42
utilize his heightened consciousness to emerge as a successful scholar and agent for 
social change in Knoxville.  
 
                                                 
Notes 
 
1
 Todd Boyd. Am I Black Enough For You?: Popular Culture from the Hood and Beyond. (Bloomington: 
Indiana University Press, 1997) 18, 19. 
 
2
 Edmund W. Gordon. ?Introductory Essay? The Covenant with Black American. Chicago: Third World 
Press, 2006) 23, 24. 
 
3
 Ralph J. Bunche. A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership. (New York: New York University 
Press 2005) 2, 3. 
 
4
 Bunche, A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership, 2,3. 
 
5
 David W. Blight. Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory. (Cambridge: Harvard 
University Press 2001) 311-313. 
David Blight?s work was extremely useful for placing the Scotts? and the Canslers? local race leadership 
legacy within a historical context because his text focuses on national race leaders? perceptions of 
themselves as spokespeople for the race. He employs Frederick Douglass? and Martin Delany?s roles within 
abolitionist movement and debates about emigration to represent black leaders? diverse opinions on slavery 
and race relations. Moreover, I borrowed language from Blight?s assessment of Booker T. Washington?s 
philosophy of racial accommodation. I also built on his use of one of the Cansler?s views of Washington?s 
representation of himself as the race?s spokesman to form a dialogue between local racial activists? 
interpretations of black leadership culture and national race leaders? desire to acquire status as the leaders 
of the race.  
 
6
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 311-313. 
 
7
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 311-313. 
 
8
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 311-313. 
 
9
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 311-313. 
 
10
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 314-317. 
 
11
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 314-317. 
 
12
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 316-319. 
 
13
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 316-319. 
 
14
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 316-319. 
 
15
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 316-319. 
 
16
 Dickson J. Preston. Young Frederick Douglass: The Maryland Years. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins 
University Press, 1980) 24, 25. 
 43
                                                                                                                                                 
 
17
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 310, 311. 
 
18
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 310, 311. 
 
19
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 310, 311. 
. 
20
 Werner Sollors. Neither black nor white yet both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature. 
(Oxford: Oxford University Press 1997) 250-253. 
Werner Sollors work provided me with valuable information about the cultural traditions of free blacks and 
mulattoes who found themselves in-between socially constructed black and white worlds. Moreover, his 
text enabled me to place the Scotts? and the Canslers? methods of defining themselves in-between black 
and white worlds within a larger literary tradition, particularly Sollor?s study of the development of passing 
novels in African American Literature.   
 
21
 Sollors, Neither black nor white yet both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature, 250-253. 
 
22
 Sollors, Neither black nor white yet both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature, 250-253. 
 
23
 Sollors, Neither black nor white yet both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature, 250-253. 
 
24
 Sollors, Neither black nor white yet both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature, 250-253. 
 
25
 Manning Marable. Black Leadership: Four Great American Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights. 
(New York: Columbia University Press 1998) xiii. 
Manning Marable?s work provided me with the language to develop my own definitions of black leader 
traditions and a model of how to compare my ancestors? experiences to black public figures? perceptions of 
themselves as the race?s spokespeople. 
 
26
 Manning Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great American Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, 
xiii. 
 
27
 Stuart Hall. ?Cultural Studies: Two Paradigms.? What Is Cultural Studies: A Reader. Ed. John Storey. 
(London: Arnold 1996) 38. 
  
28
 Ronald W. Walters and Robert C. Smith. African American Leadership. (Albany: State University of 
New York Press 1999) 7, 8. 
Ron Walter?s and Robert C. Smith?s texts enabled me to situate my definitions of local and national black 
leadership traditions within a historical and a political context.   
29
 Ronald W. Walters and Robert C. Smith. African American Leadership, 7, 8. 
 
30
 Ronald W. Walters and Robert C. Smith. African American Leadership, 7, 8. 
 
31
 Ronald W. Walters and Robert C. Smith. African American Leadership, 7, 8. 
 
32
 Charles W Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. (Knoxville: 
Kingsport Press 1939) 162. 
 
33
 David W Blight. Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory. (Cambridge: Harvard 
University Press 2001) 328, 329. 
 
34
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 328. 
 
35
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 328. 
 
 44
                                                                                                                                                 
36
 Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory, 328. 
 
37
 John White. Black Leadership in America from Booker T. Washington to Jesse Jackson. (London: 
Longman 1990) 35. 
 
38
 White, Black Leadership in America from Booker T. Washington to Jesse Jackson, 35, 36. 
 
39
 White, Black Leadership in America from Booker T. Washington to Jesse Jackson, 35, 36. 
 
40
 White, Black Leadership in America from Booker T. Washington to Jesse Jackson, 39, 40.  
 
41
 White, Black Leadership in America from Booker T. Washington to Jesse Jackson, 39, 40. 
 
42
 Scott L Malcomson. One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race. New York: Farrar Straus 
Giroux, 2000) 230- 233.  
Scott Malcolmson?s book provides an excellent overview of the social constructions of race. His text 
describes how black people internalized America?s culture of racism. I used his text to support my analysis 
of ambitious mulattoes? struggle to define themselves as part of the black communities in their campaigns 
for recognition as spokespeople for the race while they simultaneously sought various forms of support 
from influential whites who also played instrumental roles in anointing the race?s spokespeople. 
43
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race, 230- 233. 
  
44
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race, 230- 233. 
 
45
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race, 230- 233. 
  
46
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race, 230- 233. 
 
47
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race, 230-233. 
 
48
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race, 230-233. 
 
49
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race, 230-233. 
 
50
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: the American Misadventure of Race, 230-233. 
  
51
 Malcolmsom, One Drop of Blood: the American Misadventure of Race, 230-233. 
 
52
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: the American Misadventure of Race, 230-233. 
 
53
 Malcolmson, One Drop of Blood: the American Misadventure of Race, 230- 233. 
  
54
 William L. Andrews. ?Narrating Slavery.? Teaching African American Literature: Theory and Practice. 
Ed. Maryemma Graham, Sharon Pinealut-Burke and Marianna White Davis. (New York: Routledge 1998) 
24. 
William L. Andrews? article offers an overview of the process in which black public figures turn their life 
stories into slave narratives and autobiographies to gain support from blacks and recognition from whites as 
the spokespeople of the race. His text provided me with the language to develop my own interpretation of 
national black leadership, which I was then able to compare to my family?s decision and ability to define 
themselves as local racial activists and local racial ambassadors.   
 
55
 Ralph J. Bunche. A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership. (New York: New York University 
Press 2005) 4, 5. 
 
56
 Bunche, A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership, 4, 5. 
 45
                                                                                                                                                 
 
57
 Bunche, A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership, 4, 5. 
 
58
 Manning Marable. Black Leadership: Four Great American Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights. 
(New York: Columbia University Press 1998) xv. 
 
59
 William L Andrews. ?Narrating Slavery.? Teaching African American Literature: Theory and Practice. 
Eds. Maryemma Graham, Sharon Pinealut-Burke and Marianna White Davis. (New York: Routledge 1998) 
17. 
 
60
 Charles W. Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 172. 
 
61
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 172. 
62
 William Robert Clifford, Jr. The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip 
W. Gentzler. (Baltimore: Gateway Press 2000), 441. 
 
63
 John Caughey. Cultures and Identities: A Life History. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press 2006) 1-5. 
 
64
 Michel Foucault. The Foucault Reader. Ed. Paul Rainbow. (New York: Pantheon Books 1984) 7. 
 
65
 Foucault, The Foucault Reader, 7. 
 
66
 Foucault, The Foucault Reader, 7. 
 
67
 Foucault, The Foucault Reader, 7. 
 
68
 Foucault, The Foucault Reader, 7. 
 
69
 Angelyn Mitchell. ?Introduction: Voices Within the Circle: A Historical Overview of African American 
Literary Criticism. Within the Circle: An Anthology of African American Literary Criticism from the 
Harlem Renaissance to the Present. Ed. Angelyn Mitchell. Durham: Duke University Press, 1994) 12-13. 
70
 Mitchell, ?Introduction,? 12, 13. 
 
71
 Henry Louis Gates Jr. ?A Journey through Time.? In the Crisis Magazine. January/February, 2006. 9. 
    
72
Gates ?A Journey through Time.? In the Crisis Magazine. January/February, 2006. 9. 
  
 46
Chapter 2 
Part 1 
Living with Unspoken Expectations: Reflections on being adopted into My Family?s 
middle class minded local racial uplift traditions   
I was born on December 28
th
 1970 in Neptune, New Jersey though my birth 
certificate reads ?Trenton.? My birth mother, Debra, was a nineteen-year-old black 
woman. When she became pregnant with me, she was a first year student in college 
whose grand design for her life had just been drastically altered. College was supposed to 
be where she would finally have control over her life and liberate herself from her mother 
and father.  
Debra had learned about college from her older sister Leah who in 1968 had gone 
to Hampton University, a historically black university with a largely middle-to- upper-
middle-class student body. Leah returned home after just one year. She felt out of place at 
Hampton as Black Nationalism took hold with some of the students on campus, and she 
felt out of place with the black middle-class sons and daughters of doctors, lawyers and 
undertakers who, I imagine, may have snubbed their noses at Leah?s working-middle- 
class roots. But I know that their mother, and my biological grandmother, tried to create a 
similar black-middle class existence for them within a small suburban black enclave in 
Neptune, although she made sure that her daughters lived within the world of middle-
class respectability in Neptune?s version of black debutante balls in the late sixties. Leah 
did not feel comfortable in the new black setting of Hampton. She returned home, 
married a black man named Ned and still resides in a working-middle-class suburb of 
Neptune. But my birth mother continued to dream of college as the place where she could 
 
 47
escape from her parents and the life she had known. She thought that she had made her 
dream come true by turning herself into an honor student throughout high school. She 
earned an academic scholarship to Montclair State College in New Jersey, but because 
she had little experience with boys, and was not allowed to date in high school, her first 
real dating experience turned into a pregnancy.  
Debra came home in disgrace. Fearful of neighbors? and family friends? 
judgments of her daughter?s illegitimate pregnancy, her mother kicked her out of her 
home. Debra told me that she knew her illegitimate pregnancy shattered her mother?s 
illusory dreams of middle-class existence. Her mother?s only sense of security was the 
portrait of the American Dream: two beautiful daughters and a nice home in a working-
to- lower-middle- class black neighborhood. My birth mother understood at an early age 
that her chronically abusive father provided merely the appearance of such stability by 
starting a small but modestly successful trucking business. Her mother had sacrificed her 
dignity and well being for the appearance of a wholesome black family. So when my 
birth mother came home pregnant with me, she knew her pregnancy jeopardized her 
mother?s carefully constructed existence. My birth mother, Debra, left home and was 
taken in by her older cousin in New Brunswick, New Jersey.  Debra rarely spoke about 
my biological father. I know little more than that I resemble him and that his nick name 
was Hank.  
 
 
 
 
 
 48
Part 2 
Raised with Black Excellence: Coming of age with my family?s Academic Legacy 
and Local Race Leader Traditions 
Some of my readers looking at this story will think to themselves that the 
beginnings of this life are reminiscent of Richard Wright?s Native Son (1940), Black Boy 
(1945), and many other narratives of young black boys growing up poor without fathers. 
Today, some of my readers have heard this story on the radio in Hip Hop lyrics by the 
late Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls. Other readers know it well because they live it; and 
still others may know it because it has become a defining characteristic of the cultural 
stereotype of what it means to be a black man in America. The story usually describes 
how a poor and uneducated young black boy in a rural or urban setting searches for black 
manhood but only discovers crime, incarceration, and death.  
However, my life would develop far from the stereotypical narrative of black 
manhood.  I was adopted at three months; I obviously do not remember being adopted. I 
learned about my birth mother?s life years later in 1998 after she embarked on a six-year 
search to find me. It took me another two years to agree to meet her and to accept her as 
part of my life. My birth mother remembered how she carried me to term, gave me up for 
adoption and returned to school. She eventually earned a master?s degree in Education 
from New York University, and she currently runs her own educational consulting 
business in Chicago. She told me that the cousin who took her in earned a Ph.D. in 
Education from Rutgers University and was the assistant superintendent of the New 
Brunswick School District. Learning of her achievements eventually helped me feel more 
 
 49
comfortable with my family?s local race-leader legacy, but I was twenty five when my 
birth mother found me. 
What I do remember is growing up in my adopted family?s home with role 
models of academic excellence and local racial activism. My home was like a classroom. 
I learned as much about race, class, gender, and access to cultural currency at home as I 
did when I actually went to school. When I was at the Pennington School, a small private 
school twenty minutes from Princeton University, and when I would come home from 
college on vacations, my father, a former professor of English and now a retired 
executive of the Educational Testing Service, would leave articles on my bed from The 
New Yorker, The New York Times, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Black Issues in 
Higher Education and The Atlantic Monthly. Sometimes I thought he was preparing me 
for the demands of living between poverty stricken black communities and affluent and 
predominately white social settings. After giving me the articles, he would say, ?Did you 
read them?? I always responded, ?Yes.? He then posed several questions about the 
articles that made me think about how the articles and our talks emphasized the 
importance of education. One day I thanked him for readying me for the challenges of 
life in-between racial and social worlds. He responded by saying, ?It?s gratifying that you 
saw it that way. I just thought you would be interested in the articles.? The assumption 
was that I should and would be interested. My preparation for inheriting my family?s 
academic legacy, local racial activist and stewardship traditions began when I was just a 
boy, but it took me years to embrace it. 
Twenty five years ago, my father would wake me up at 6:30 am and take me to 
the Chapin School in Princeton, New Jersey. I would fight him. He normally had to come 
 
 50
to my room at least five or six times before I would get up and get into the shower. We 
lived in a two-story Colonial home in a predominately white middle-to-upper-middle-
class neighborhood in Lawrence, New Jersey. On my street no one really needed a clock 
because everyone could discern the time of the day by the routines of suburban life. 
Husbands and some wives were in the cars and off to their white-collar offices by 7:30. 
On the weekends, husbands were picking up the morning paper by 8:00 and mowing the 
lawns by 9:30.  
I witnessed this routine every morning as my father drove me down the street to 
the Chapin School, or when my father took me to my Mercer County soccer and 
basketball league games on the weekends. The Chapin School is an exclusive, almost 
entirely white, private school for elementary and middle school students in Princeton, 
New Jersey about twenty five minutes from our home. After dropping me off at school 
my father would drive another 10 to 15 minutes to his office at the Educational Testing 
Service in Princeton. He would return to pick me up at 5:30 at Chapin after my soccer or 
basketball practice. Whenever we had home games, he was always there. I was an athlete, 
who lived for soccer, basketball, and track and field. The weekend Mercer County soccer 
and basketball league games and track and field programs allowed me to learn about the 
black section of Lawrence, New Jersey.  
I realized when I visited some of my teammates? apartments in Lawrence?s small 
black projects that my parents? provided me with access to divergent white and black 
realities: a white middle-to-upper-class world, with a few Asian and black families, 
where children received quality public school educations or were admitted to some of the 
most prestigious private schools in the country, and a black and a Latino impoverished 
 
 51
reality where very few received quality educational opportunities. These divergent 
realities coexisted in Lawrence, New Jersey within 5-7 miles of each other. I remembered 
many of the black and Latino friends I met from Lawrence?s projects were directed to 
remedial courses at Lawrence High School whereas my white, Asian, and black friends 
from Lawrence?s suburban neighborhoods were admitted to college prep and AP courses 
and went on to college.  
I know my father was proud of my athletic achievements, and that I was learning 
about these divergent black and white worlds, but I also know that he was disappointed 
when he received my C+ and C- grades each semester. My parents wanted me to carry on 
their legacy of academic achievement, but I felt intimidated by their academic pedigrees. 
I was adopted into the family. How would I fulfill the unspoken and spoken expectations 
of their academic accomplishments? 
Nonetheless, in 1986 I was accepted at the Pennington School, another prestigious 
mostly white school. Pennington had as part of its mission assisting students who 
displayed academic promise but needed more individual instruction. My father enrolled 
me at the Pennington School from the 9
th
 grade through my graduation. Chapin and 
Pennington cost my father about 15,000 dollars a year. My father was constantly giving 
me speeches that it was my responsibility to do well in school so that I could have a 
better life. I failed to listen. In 1988 during my sophomore year my father had had it.  
One night he barged into my room and said, ?The way you?re going you will be lucky to 
get into a community college. You are ruining your opportunities!? I could hear my 
mother crying in the background. She had a much softer approach to my reluctance to 
apply myself in school. She talked to me constantly and tried to figure out why I did not 
 
 52
want to do well. She had graduated from high school in Durham, North Carolina at the 
age of sixteen, from North Carolina Central and earned a masters degree in history from 
the University of Minnesota. Later she pursued doctoral studies at Ohio State University. 
She left graduate school and taught at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul to help 
support my father as he pursued his Ph.D. in English Literature at the University of 
Minnesota. I was intimidated by their accomplishments, especially after I learned at the 
age of seven that I was adopted. I doubted that I could fulfill the high expectations of my 
family?s academic legacy and local- race-leader traditions, and I was not sure that I 
wanted to.  
My father tried to encourage me by reminding me of my interest in my great-
grandfather when I was a child. He gave me my great-grandfather?s book to read, hoping 
that it would inspire me to do well in school and take more responsibility for my future. 
But after reading Three Generations: The story of a Colored Family of Eastern 
Tennessee, I felt more intimidated. Moreover, I did not see myself in the family?s local 
racial-activist legacy. I grew up within the self-indulgent culture of the 1980?s. I rejected 
the idea of taking responsibility for myself and the race. I found an escape within media-
driven images promoting instant gratification and in my friends? belief in focusing on 
what would make us happy at the moment.   
Thus I avoided my family?s academic legacy, by joining the party scene at 
Lawrence High Schools? middle-to-upper-middle class social landscape, weekend parties 
given by wealthy students from the Hun School of Princeton, Stuart Country Day School, 
Princeton Day School, and the Lawrenceville School. My athletic ability, and my 
family?s access to the ruling cultural currency skills, traditions, and networks allowed me 
 
 53
to be one of the few ?honorary blacks? in predominately white and affluent social worlds. 
I was part of a small black circle that lived among members of the white generation X 
establishment. We were granted access to this rather exclusive club in Princeton because 
we had what sociologist Orlando Patterson would describe as a ?thin racial 
consciousness? rather than a ?thick black consciousness.? During our formative years as 
the minority within a minority in elite private schools, we interpreted our blackness as an 
ambiguous social marker imposed on us from the outside, by racists. We felt that our 
mission was to prove that those who rendered us racially inferior were wrong by meeting 
elite social standards. We wanted acceptance within this world of extravagance and 
privilege. We were not that interested in the value of thick black consciousness that 
promoted racial difference and racial solidarity.  
My experiences contrasted with my ancestors? perceptions of themselves and their 
associations with whites. Furthermore, my na?ve and narrow minded view of my 
interracial interactions conflicted with the articles that my father gave me. I decided to 
ignore the narratives of black journalists who came of age during the post- civil rights era 
and President Lyndon B. Johnson?s Great Society. I was not prepared to learn from their 
beliefs that they were not only venturing into a white world for themselves, but also for 
the black community.  
 Nonetheless, my father gave me Roger Wilkins? autobiography A Man?s Life 
(1982), Henry Louis Gates Junior?s Colored People: A Memoir (1994), and Shelby 
Steele?s The Content of Our Character (1990). Despite my resistance to these black 
autobiographies, and their use of their life stories to promote racial uplift, I later decided 
to add to the collection by buying Sam Fulwood the III?s Waking from the Dream: My 
 
 54
Life in the Black Middle Class (1996), Vernon E. Jordan, Junior?s Vernon Can Read: A 
Memoir (2001) and Horace A. Porter?s The Making of a Black Scholar: From Georgia to 
the Ivy League (2003). My birth mother also sent me an early edition of Barack Obama?s 
autobiography Dreams of My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (1995).  I would 
later enjoy reflecting on how the generation that came of age after the civil rights 
movement defined themselves and their success, but I also realized that their perceptions 
of themselves would not exactly represent my experience because I was part of younger 
generation that came of age not in the late sixties and seventies but in the eighties.  
The previous generation used their life stories to define the significance of the 
civil rights movement and their relationship to it. I did not have direct contact with the 
movement. The eighties was a backlash of the movement. I had more in common with 
other books I found like Brent Staples? representation of himself in his memoir Parallel 
Time: Growing Up in Black and White (1994) and Jake Lamar?s Bourgeois Blues (1991). 
Their work focused on America?s retreat from programs and policies designed to provide 
blacks with access to the American mainstream and blacks? from generation X rejection 
of academic excellence as a means of entering the American mainstream. Black 
journalists from my generation were also describing how America?s increased worship of 
materialism, and how with the obsession with wealth came more subtle and overt forms 
of institutionalized racism. Nonetheless, even before reading memoirs of writers from my 
generation I knew my story, and some of my black friends? stories, would not be found 
within their narratives.   
For instance, Marcus Mabry, an African American graduate of the Lawrenceville 
School, Stanford University and currently the Chief of Correspondents for Newsweek 
 
 55
magazine, wrote a memoir largely about his experiences at the Lawrenceville School 
entitled: White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age Black in White American 
(1995).
1
  He currently oversees staff in Newsweek?s domestic and international bureaus. 
He had been a correspondent for Newsweek in Paris and more recently a senior editor for 
Newsweek International since 2001. His career embodied the traditional rags to riches 
success story. Moreover, his ability to excel at one of the most prestigious private schools 
in the country mirrored the hope that my generation would finally receive admission to 
the American mainstream based on our talent, not our skin color. The hope was that 
Mabry?s success would then be viewed as a model of individualistic hard work and 
determination, but many blacks? belief in meritocracy did not bear financial rewards and 
social class mobility opportunities in the 1980?s and 1990?s.  
My family?s legacy diverged from the traditional version of the American Dream, 
however. They were involved in establishing infrastructure for collective racial self 
improvement. Nevertheless, their perception of community development appeared 
outdated to me then. I came of age within the culture that Mabry described in his memoir.  
Mabry?s White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas is a revealing work. ?White bucks? of 
the title referred to a specific type of suede shoe worn by the white blueblood members of 
American society. ?Black eyed peas? referred to a type of peas blacks have eaten since 
arriving to this country on slave ships. Placing white bucks and black eye peas together 
raised the issue at the heart of Mabry?s memoir: his existence between these two 
divergent racial and social worlds. Mabry began by locating his identity within America?s 
legacy of racial discrimination, contemporary American history and the rags to riches 
success stories of generation X?s elite black males: 
 
 56
I was born in 1967, the year before Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. One  
of the riot years. I started school in the Post Civil Rights Era of the 1970?s. For  
the eight years I was in high school, college and graduate school, Ronald Reagan  
was President of the United States. I belong to a class of African Americans who  
came of age in the 1990?s. I belong to that minority within a minority that is  
college educated?and that minority within a minority that is male. We are almost  
a class unto ourselves: twenty-something, black, professional and bound for  
success.
2
  
 
Note how Mabry situated his identity within the racial constructions of twentieth century 
America. He located his birth with the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr, the race 
riots of the late 1960?s and early 1970?s. He presented his coming of age within Ronald 
Reagan?s ?Morning in America? and defined himself within ?the minority within a 
minority of elite black males,? a class unto themselves between blacks? poverty stricken 
reality and the affluence of America?s most privileged.  
Mabry observed the ways in which access to the ruling elite?s cultural currency 
skills, traditions, and networks contribute to our notions of racial identity. His 
explanations of his life in-between divergent black and white worlds formed an important 
contrast to my own experiences. While Mabry represented the isolation of successful 
black males, I learned about my racial identity from my great-grandfather Cansler?s 
Three Generations. I would gain my racial consciousness from Cansler?s documentation 
of a successful black family?s efforts to facilitate opportunities for blacks in Knoxville 
and across the country.   
 
 57
  Mabry described himself as one of the chosen few poor blacks to earn access to 
the Lawrenceville School. More than ten years ago when Mabry attended Lawrenceville, 
day tuition for parents was 18,000 dollars and boarding tuition was 23, 420 dollars a year. 
While Mabry grew up in a world distant from that of the school, I grew up near the 
campus.  
Our house was about five miles from the Lawrenceville School. When I was a 
young boy my father would take me to their ice hockey rink. He enrolled me in an ice 
hockey league at the school every Saturday morning at 5:30 am when I was six years old. 
I later traded in my skates to join the basketball league held at Lawrence Townships? 
public middle school. Nevertheless, my father told me about how wealthy southern 
families often would send their children to Lawrenceville because it was considered to be 
a pipeline to Princeton University, which is about six miles down the road from 
Lawrenceville?s campus. The other popular colleges for Lawrenceville graduates are 
Brown, Columbia, Duke, Georgetown, Harvard, University of Pennsylvania, and 
Middlebury College.
3
 
 I always felt comfortable at Lawrenceville. My father and I knew people on 
campus. Some of my friends from Chapin and family friends? children were students 
there. And my father knew the resident black English Professor at the School, Max 
Maxwell. He also knew the history of the school and the campus. He told me that the 
school was founded in 1810, and the campus? facilities compete with most of the elite 
liberal arts colleges and public universities. My father introduced me to the host of 
auspicious Victorian classroom buildings, dorms and the chapel. The school has its own 
golf course, indoor and outdoor track, squash courts, a large cafeteria and student center 
 
 58
overlooking the campus, and a state-of-the-art music building and fitness center. We 
would go to the campus for soccer, basketball and lacrosse games. When my mother died 
of breast cancer, my father arranged for her funeral to be held in Lawrenceville?s Chapel.  
But Mabry, and more than half of the black students at the Lawrenceville School, 
had a different experience. One of the dominant themes in his memoir is his movement 
away from an understanding of himself within sociologist Orlando Patterson?s view of a 
thick black consciousness to the construction of his identity within a thin racial 
consciousness. He focused on how the imposed label of racial inferiority from the outside 
made it difficult for him to form a thin racial consciousness of himself to gain acceptance 
at the Lawrenceville School.
4
 He wanted to separate himself from the despair of his 
family and black community by excelling at Lawrenceville and creating a new life for 
himself. But prior to Mabry?s first day at Lawrenceville, he recalled only seeing this 
world on TV: ?NBC, ?The Facts of Life,? Thursday nights at nine.?
5
 Mabry had to 
struggle to gain acceptance within the elite world of the Lawrenceville School. By 
contrast, I was fluent in the Lawrenceville School?s cultural traditions.  
My parents provided me with the social skills to gain acceptance within this 
world. I knew more about the Lawrenceville School?s culture than those who were 
viewed as the representatives of it. I relied on the knowledge that my parents gave me to 
develop a deeper understanding of myself and my relationship to the privileged elite 
within American society. I realized early in my teenage years that although my parents 
had remarkable pedigrees that we would never be fully accepted within America?s elite 
environment. Mabry was a believer, however.   
 
 59
Mabry?s portrayal reminded me of Richard Hoggart?s scholarship boy.
6
 Mabry is 
scouted by public school teachers and principals for access to the Lawrenceville School. 
He is raised by a single black mother and drawn to her because he sees in her eyes his 
own determination to succeed, yet he also wants to separate himself from her reliance on 
him. He recognized that her plans for the future largely depend on his success.
7
 He 
abandoned his mother?s life and that of his working-class black community for his 
teachers? and students? lives at the Lawrenceville School, only to learn that they would 
not be able to understand him. This realization would force him to return to his mother 
and try and help her fulfill her dreams. He knew that he had to succeed not only for 
himself but also for his mother. One day his mother will look to him to take care of her. 
Moreover, unlike many scholarship boys who are smart but not talented enough to 
overcome being caught between the worlds of home and school, Mabry?s brilliance 
eventually enabled him to gain access to a much larger community invested in 
establishing social circles of ideas that resembled the world of my family.  
Still, I did not have the same type of pressure Mabry encountered at the 
Lawrenceville School, but my father knew that I was not ready for the rigorous demands 
of the School. He sent me to a school where I could grow academically at my own pace. 
He recognized that at that time I needed to be protected from the rigorous academic 
nature of the Lawrenceville School. He understood that I had more time to gain access to 
the ruling elite?s cultural currency skills, traditions, and networks represented on the 
Lawrenceville School?s campus. Moreover, my parents wanted me to succeed 
academically and to live a socially responsible and productive life, but they never 
expected to depend on me financially. 
 
 60
I was part of a different black world at these schools. Mabry briefly mentions the 
world I came from in his chapter ?The Way of the Wasp:?  
He remembered that,  
About half of the black students came from poor families in cities like Trenton, 
Newark, or New York, but a few guys hailed from upper-middle-class 
backgrounds, the sons of doctors or Foreign Service officers and had gone to 
better schools.
8
  
Mabry does not mention this later black world again. My family came from the world 
Mabry barely mentions.  
Adopted into this world by my parents, I became the son, grandson, and great-
grandson of college professors, and teachers, a lineage that dates back to before the Civil 
War. To take another example of the legacy that I was presented with, my father?s sister, 
my aunt Carolyn Lillian Daves( 1925-) married Dr. John Reinhardt (1920-) in 1947. A 
year after their marriage, John Reinhardt earned a doctorate in English Literature from 
the University of Wisconsin. He taught briefly at Virginia State University, a historically 
black university, but he left academia and worked in the United States Information 
Agency and the Foreign Service for twenty years. He was a kind of predecessor of former 
Secretary of State Colin Powell and current Secretary of State Dr. Condoleezza Rice. He 
was the ambassador to Nigeria in President James Carter?s administration, and he was the 
Director of the U.S. Information Agency.
9
 Their oldest daughter and my cousin Sharman 
Willard Reinhardt (1948-) sent her children and my second cousin John Stuart Lansfield 
to Choate Rosemary Hall. John graduated from Harvard with a BA in English and 
Economics. She sent her youngest son, Daniel, to Reed College. He is currently a medical 
 
 61
student at the University of California Medical School in San Francisco. And my aunt 
and uncle?s youngest daughter and my cousin Carolyn Cecile Reinhardt (1957-) sent her 
oldest son, Paul Fenstermaker, to Phillips Andover Academy. He is currently a 
sophomore at Harvard. Their younger son Andrew is a sophomore at St. Paul?s School. 
These two cousins married influential white men. Their children know their racial 
heritage, but some of them can clearly pass for white. The middle daughter is divorced 
from a black Harvard Law graduate and is a successful realtor in Washington. 
At least two of my second cousins not only inhabit affluent white worlds but they 
also can live as white men. This is not a new phenomenon in my family. My ancestors 
were free black mulatto sons of white women and free light skinned mulatto men and 
enslaved black men from the 1830?s, but most of the mulatto men declared themselves 
black men. Because of their social-class status and education the world will perceive 
these cousins of mine as upper- middle-class white males. Thus they may privately 
possess a racial consciousness that many whites do not have, but they may not be seen as 
black, or accepted as black by other blacks. Most likely they are recognized by whites 
and blacks as successful whites.  
I do not fault Mabry for not describing this world to his readers in more depth; 
first because he did not have access to this world, and second because his description of 
his relationship with this elite black world and interracial existence would undermine the 
dominant paradigm of his memoir: his experiences with divergent black and white worlds 
and his journey to move from the impediments of a thick black racial identity to a thin 
racial consciousness. His memoir, and many others like it, relied on the reduction of 
black reality to an almost undifferentiated bloc of persons.
10
  
 
 62
Clearly Mabry recognized the rising black middle class since emancipation that 
had gradually become differentiated from the black masses, but he probably knew any 
real discussion of his relationship with this world of the black elite would threaten his 
performance of himself within the contemporary black male elite?s rags- to- riches 
success story. Mabry knew, too, that his poverty-stricken-to-working-class roots are 
considered as the authentic black experience; he knew that his perceived racial 
authenticity would allow him to argue that the black underclass clings to a false black 
romanticism, which masked feelings of debilitating racial self hatred and insecurity. His 
critique presented the emergence of a new theme in the post-civil rights generation?s 
black elite: some influential black writers growing ambivalence to their roles as the race?s 
and America?s spokespeople.
11
 Unlike the race?s spokespeople tradition found in 
Frederick Douglass,? Booker T. Washington?s, W.E.B. Du Bois?, James Weldon 
Johnson?s, Langston Hughes,? Richard Wright?s and James Baldwin?s narratives, Mabry, 
like Ralph Ellison, rejected the idea of successful black writers? roles as the race?s 
spokesmen. Mabry?s rags- to-riches story represented the promise of the race, but he did 
not find much inspiration in national black leaders? promotion of the ideal that individual 
achievement symbolized collective racial advancement. His view resembled the 
perceptions of many black men from my generation.   
I could identify with Mabry?s interpretation of his racial identity. I was often the 
only black student in the class who had to speak for or represent the entire race. I only 
encountered connections to the race from my parents? stories and from reading articles 
that they gave me and from Three Generations. The idea of being a representative of the 
race was a burden that I had no intention of carrying. In prep school, I believed in 
 
 63
revealing my capabilities only when I needed to. I felt that this was the best way to avoid 
the racial responsibility that came with striving for academic excellence. Also, I realized 
that athletic achievement, not academic excellence, offered me acceptance from various 
black and white social worlds.  
In the late 1980?s I was drawn to Patterson?s idea of a thin racial consciousness. I 
was more of a member of my private schools? white communities than my private 
schools? small black communities. Most of my close friends were white and went to the 
Hun School of Princeton, the Lawrenceville School, Notre Dame High School, or 
Lawrence High School. They were not thinking about my experiences with racism or 
their own realizations of it. My friends were much more interested in sports and partying 
than school work.  
Nonetheless, I received letters of acceptance from Susquehanna University, 
Moravian College, and McDaniel College, formerly known as Western Maryland in 
1990, largely because of my success in track at the Pennington School. I remembered that 
my father cut out the coverage of my track and field meets in the local newspapers and 
put them in a scrapbook. He also sent them to track and field coaches at small liberal arts 
colleges. But I could see the look of concern on my parents? faces. As they wondered if I 
would even graduate from college. Head track and field coaches from Susquehanna 
University, Moravian College, Saint Joseph?s University and Montclair State University 
sent me recruiting letters. Saint Joseph was the only division 1 school that sent me a letter 
of interest, but after meeting with the head coach I realized that I did not want to run for a 
division 1 program.  
 
 64
I chose Susquehanna University because of the beautiful campus and the small 
size of the school reminded me of the Pennington School. I also felt at home because on 
my recruiting visit the black track and field athletes I stayed with seemed comfortable on 
campus. They appeared to have formed their own community while knowing how to 
become part of Susquehanna?s largely white community. But I would later learn that their 
lives on campus were contrary to the portrait they presented during my visit. Many of the 
black students were divided along social class lines. The black students from inner city 
backgrounds formed their own community and the black students from the suburbs 
assimilated into Susquehanna?s community, particularly with white students from the 
second-tier new moneyed families that dominated the social scene at this small school: 
Susquehanna?s student body in 1990 was about 1,450. There were only two bars and a 
few restaurants near the rural campus in central Pennsylvania. The middle-to-upper-
middle-class students in the fraternities and sororities were the hub of the social scene. 
These students were largely from Northern New Jersey. They seemed to resemble the 
students from The Pennington School, the Hun School, and the Lawrenceville School, 
but I would discover that many of these students did not have any real experiences with 
social class and racial difference.  
On my first night on campus in September of 1990 I realized how different some 
of the students were. I was walking across campus with some white students I had 
recently met, when three large and drunk football players walked towards us and shouted 
in our direction, ?Look, a nigger is on campus. We hate niggers.? My new friends were 
small. The football players were big, about 6?4, and 250 pounds. I saw the fear and shock 
in my new acquaintances? eyes. They immediately said, ??That?s fucked up.??  
 
 65
Then they tried to comfort me with this; ??You are not black anyway so don?t worry 
about it.?? I did not say anything, but I was outraged. What do they mean I am not black? 
From my recollections of that night, I know now that I was partly to blame for their 
assessment.  
I had formed such a good thin racial consciousness of myself that they had 
accepted me as an exception to the rule. These white students from Summit, New Jersey 
thought I was not black because of how I conducted myself and because I came from a 
middle class background. When we got back to the dorm, I left my new friends and went 
to my room. My white roommate was not there. Tears trickled down my face as I called 
my mother and screamed into the phone. I told her what happened and shouted that I 
wanted to come home immediately. My mother?s soft approach changed dramatically. 
She told me in a stern voice,  
You can only come back home after you have your degree in your hand. You are 
in a fight that we have tried to prepare you for from the very beginning of your 
life. We have given you all of the educational opportunities we could. Now it is 
up to you.  
I did not comprehend everything that my mother was trying to tell me. And I did not 
know then that she had just learned that she had breast cancer and the cancer had spread 
throughout her body. She knew she was facing certain death, and therefore she knew that 
did not have much time to teach me how to overcome the racial barriers I would face as a 
black man.  
After my conversation with my mother, I began to discern the differences 
between my experiences within upper-middle-class neighborhoods a few miles from the 
 
 66
world of elite private schools that were pipelines to Princeton University, the other Ivy 
League Colleges and Universities and highly selective liberal arts colleges, and the 
student body and culture of a regional liberal arts college in central Pennsylvania. Many 
of the students at Susquehanna University never had any interaction with a black person, 
especially not a black person from my worlds. Most of them came to Susquehanna 
University from small working-class and middle-class towns in Central Pennsylvania and 
middle-to-upper-middle-class suburban landscapes in Northern New Jersey.    
Learning of my mother?s illness forced me to grow up quickly. I thought my 
social development and academic achievements could help my father cope with the pain 
of losing his wife of over thirty years. I had joined a white fraternity, Theta Chi, seeking a 
semblance of home with the popular crowd at Susquehanna and the hub of the social life 
at the school. Some of my fraternity brothers tried to help by traveling three and half 
hours during the spring exam period to my mother?s funeral at the Lawrenceville School, 
but I was numb.  
Furthermore, I did not stay in touch with any of my fraternity brothers from Theta 
Chi after I graduated from Susquehanna; because while I appreciated their gesture, I 
never felt that they understood what life was like for me as the only black Theta Chi 
brother in the house. I quit the track team and I began focusing more attention on 
academics. I told my Dad I was going to graduate with my classmates. I also began to 
recognize the need to develop my sense of racial consciousness in my interactions with 
divergent black and white worlds. I did not realize it at the time but I was beginning to 
take steps that would help me accept and work within my family?s legacy of academic 
achievement and local racial activism. 
 
 67
During the summer of my sophomore year after my mother?s funeral, my father 
asked me if I needed to take some time off from school. I told him ?no.? I also knew that 
I wanted to get into a graduate program in Political Science, my major. The death of my 
mother made me realize that it was time to take responsibility for my future. I knew that 
this would be difficult because my grades had dropped substantially. While I did not get 
into any doctoral programs at the end of my senior year in 1994, I was determined to find 
my way to grad school.  
But I told my father that before I went to graduate school program, I wanted to 
learn more about a black world that I had little contact with growing up in Lawrence. My 
father encouraged me to become an intern at Operation Fatherhood, which is a privately 
funded agency in Trenton, New Jersey. I knew that I would probably get the job because 
it was an unpaid internship and my late mother was on the Board of Trustees.  
The agency was responsible for men who were unable or unwilling to pay their 
child support. Before President Clinton?s welfare reform bill, the law in New Jersey was 
that negligent fathers would go to jail. Operation Fatherhood enabled the fathers to stay 
out of jail as long as they were in the program and earnestly seeking employment 
opportunities. I was only supposed to observe the program, but I decided to get involved. 
I requested a meeting with Joe Thomas, the Director of agency, and told him that I had a 
plan. I said, ?I could help the men learn how to dress more appropriately for interviews, 
prepare resumes and take them in the agency?s van to meet with employers.? He liked the 
idea, but was a bit concerned about a young man taking on so much responsibility.  The 
mostly black men in the agency were old enough to be my father. I recognized that for 
my plan to work I had to learn how to become part of their worlds, while I 
 
 68
simultaneously found ways of making them attractive candidates to largely white 
employers. I did not know that I could do it, but it was better than the men just sitting at 
the agency or reporting to the agency that they went on job interviews. Many of the black 
men were anxious, because I was taking them outside of Trenton to the suburbs where 
there were more job opportunities. One day I discovered how detached the men were 
from life outside of Trenton.  
When I got everyone in the van, I could hear the men saying I was going to do 
some more ?magic? today. Later that day I learned that my form of magic was talking to 
white men and getting the fathers job interviews. My magic trick was that I informed 
employers that hiring even one of the men offered state tax incentives. Many of the black 
men had never been beyond the city limits and most of the men told me that they had not 
even spoken with a white person. When I would come home and tell my father stories 
about my day, he said, ?I am proud of you because you are using your abilities to learn 
how to move between black and white worlds and help people.?  Whenever I had a 
difficult time interacting with the black men from poverty-stricken neighborhoods, or the 
white employers from largely middle class or affluent communities, my father would 
often say, ?You must learn how to be a chameleon; you must learn how to present 
yourself in a variety of social situations.? When I asked him more about this, he would 
often say, ?Language is like clothes. Just make sure that what you say, and how you say 
it, matches the situation you happen to be in.? 
I worked hard, became friends with some of the men and initially assisted most of 
my clients in obtaining jobs. Joe Thomas, the acting Director of the Agency, then offered 
to pay me $10.00 an hour. My early successes at Operation Fatherhood, and my father?s 
 
 69
advice, made me keenly aware of the role my presentation of my self would play in 
interactions with various black and white worlds. Looking back at my experiences at 
Operation Fatherhood, I realize that this was an important moment in my young adult life 
because it helped me understand the larger significance of my family?s cultural currency 
and local racial activist beliefs. I had several tangible examples of why my parents? 
stressed critical thinking skills as the most valuable resource in learning how to live 
within various conflicting social settings and how to help people. Although most of the 
men I helped did get jobs and stayed out of jail, I was not able to really help them move 
beyond their poverty-stricken existence in Trenton. More than half of the men had lost 
their jobs as I left the agency during the summer of 1995. 
I learned how the men in the program were victims of two social forces. First, 
they did not want to work five days a week. Often the men would ask me to negotiate a 
hustle day on Wednesday or Thursday for them when I talked with their white employers. 
Second, I discovered that it made more sense not to have a full-time job. Initially I 
assumed that they had not been exposed to the blue collar or the lower- middle-class 
protestant work ethic, but I learned that it was more complicated than that. Many of the 
jobs that the men qualified for would not enable them to eat, to pay their bills and to pay 
their child support. If they took a full-time job and paid their child support, then they 
would lose many of their unemployment benefits. I discovered that in that situation 
staying on welfare and not paying their child support actually made more sense.  
In the fall of 1995, I developed a new plan. I decided to change my major from 
Political Science to English. My interest had changed. I enrolled at Rider University as a 
continuing-education student. I took three English classes a semester for three semesters. 
 
 70
I made the Dean?s List each semester and then in 1996 I applied to Masters of Arts in 
Teaching in English Literature and Masters of Education programs. I was pleased to get 
acceptances from several good schools. I chose Colgate.  I will never forget the look of 
pride in my father?s eyes when I gave him the acceptance letters.  
 My decision to become a continuing education English major at Rider University, 
and to attend Colgate University?s Masters of Arts in Teaching program in English 
Literature, was a product of my experiences in Professor Susan Albertine?s classes at 
Susquehanna University. Her teaching style became my model when I began my teaching 
career.  
In 1993 during my junior year at Susquehanna, Professor Susan Albertine?s 
nineteenth-century American and African American Literature courses provided me with 
opportunities to understand the meaning behind developing academic cultural currency 
skills and the value of my parents? local-racial-activist legacy. Professor Albertine was a 
petite white woman with cropped hair around her oval shaped glasses. She was a soft -
spoken woman with a keen analytical mind. She was a brilliant professor and excellent 
teacher with an impressive academic pedigree. She had earned a BA from Cornell 
University and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in English literature. I came to her 
first African American literature class my junior year thinking that a white woman could 
teach me little about being black. I was wrong. The class discussions in Albertine?s 
course helped to make me more aware of the value of inheriting my parents? local race- 
leader traditions. As the only black student in the class I felt like I was able to confront 
the racial responsibility. I recognized I could not represent twenty two million black 
people, but I also understood that I had the opportunity to play an important role in the 
 
 71
class by helping to raise the white students? awareness of race in American life. Professor 
Albertine appreciated my papers, but what meant the most to me was that she said that 
the white students told her that I was a source of enlightenment and inspiration; that she 
frequently heard from white students how much they learned from me. She told me that 
my abilities in the classroom reflect my role as an ambassador for the African American 
community to students at Susquehanna University. Her affirmation helped me to begin to 
understand that I might fit within my family?s academic achievements and local- racial 
activist heritage.   
In my dorm room and at home on vacations I began to reread my parents? editions 
of Frederick Douglass? The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: Written By 
Himself (1845), Booker T. Washington?s Up from Slavery (1901), W.E.B. Du Bois? The 
Souls of Black Folk (1903), James Weldon Johnson?s The Autobiography of an Ex 
Colored Man (1912), Richard Wright?s Native Son (1940), Black Boy (1945), Ralph 
Ellison?s Invisible Man (1952), and James Baldwin?s Notes of a Native Son (1955). I 
realized that they constructed narrative voices that spoke for and to the race; that their 
narratives enabled them to perform as national race?s spokespeople who displayed 
middle- class- minded racial ascendancy as national race leadership and American moral 
uplift. My parents? lives, and my rereading of Three Generations alongside these 
canonical African American narratives, enabled me to understand professor Albertine?s 
perception of me as an ambassador for the black community at Susquehanna University.  
I also learned the value of my family?s legacy in Professor Robert Moore?s senior 
sociology seminar: Minorities. Professor Moore was the first African American teacher 
that I had at Susquehanna University and one of the few on campus. I could tell that this 
 
 72
was his first teaching position. His nervous introduction to the class on the first day 
revealed to me that he had just earned his Ph.D. He often had difficulty presenting his 
ideas to the class, but I could discern the arguments he was trying to express. So I 
decided to make an effort to translate what he was saying and support his perspective 
with personal experiences or illustrations of the arguments he presented.  
One day after class, he thanked me for the support and asked me to give a lecture 
on Affirmative Action to his introductory sociology seminar. I surmised that he was 
uncomfortable giving this lecture to his all-white first- year class. I also know now that he 
thought I was more fluent than he was in the cultures of the working, middle, and upper-
middle class white students at Susquehanna. Moreover, he wanted me to realize what I 
could do as an instructor. I accepted the extra assignment but felt somewhat overwhelmed 
by it. I took articles my father had given me to read over the years from The New York 
Times, The Chronicle of Higher Education and Black Issues in Higher Education on 
Affirmative Action and developed a presentation for the class. I began with a brief 
discussion about meritocracy as it related to college admissions. The students in class 
readily embraced the ideal of open competition for college admission, but I posed 
questions about the difference between myth and practice.  
Who are legacy students?  
They did not understand at first but then I explained the missions and cultures of elite 
private schools and how graduation from one of the schools provides one with 
advantages when applying to college. They then began to ask questions about the 
differences between prestigious private schools, and rural and suburban high schools.  
One student asked,  
 
 73
What happens if you have gone to a prestigious private school but your grades are 
not as good as the grades from someone from a lesser known rural and suburban 
high school? 
I responded,  
Students? performances at prestigious private schools may carry more weight 
because the private schools are designed to prepare students to excel at elite 
colleges and universities. And many of the private schools have established 
relationships with Ivy League schools and highly selective colleges and 
universities that date back to the mid nineteenth century.  
Another student raised the issue about whether wealthy parents can greatly increase their 
child?s chances of getting into any school if the parents are alumni and donate money to 
the schools?  
Sure, I said,  
Prominent families have always had ways of compensating for their children?s 
poor performances at private schools. 
I then argued that most elite colleges and universities do not adhere to myths of 
meritocracy. These types of colleges and universities perceive themselves as autonomous 
institutions. They make admission decisions primarily based on what they want the in-
coming class to look like each year. Test scores and grades are only two factors that they 
consider.   
Then one of the students stated,  
But most of the colleges and universities reject Affirmative Action because it 
lowers their standards. 
 
 74
I responded politely,  
No most institutions embraced Affirmative Action because Affirmative Action 
policies provide them with the diversity of students that they are looking for each 
year.  
I then described my identity as an example. I presented my self by stating:  
My racial identity is African American. Why does my racial identity impede my 
chances of acquiring certain advantages?  
While some of the white students immediately stated that I would benefit from 
Affirmative Action, other students argued that once I got on campus most students would 
think that Affirmative Action was the sole reason why I received admission to the 
college. I responded to these questions with a ten to fifteen minute explanation about how 
my middle-class background and experiences in private schools offered me social 
advantages to overcome those perceptions. I asked them to come up with some reasons 
why.  
After that ten to fifteen minutes of silence one student said, 
How many black people have my middle class social advantages and experiences 
in private schools? 
I also asked them,  
Who are the people in powerful positions?  
How many of the people who are in positions of power come from these private 
schools? How many of them who are in powerful positions in schools, in 
businesses and in law firms hire people that remind them of themselves?  
 
 75
Why would many African American, Asians, Latino, or working class whites 
have difficulty making themselves attractive to employers who probably feel 
more comfortable hiring people they know or are like them? 
From the look on many of my students? faces and their responses to the questions, I felt 
that I had reached some of them. After the class had ended a few of the first-year students 
told me they not only enjoyed the discussion, but that I had made them rethink some of 
their perspectives on Affirmative Action. I felt then that I was not only learning how to 
perform in the classroom as an ambassador of the African American community at 
Susquehanna University, but I was also learning how to be a critic of the systemic culture 
that affords or denies people access to the American dream. When I look back on that 
pivotal moment in my life, I realize that my parents had tried to provide me with 
opportunities to discover who I am. From that time on I began to identify myself within 
the family?s local race-leader and local racial-ambassador tradition. The self awareness 
that I gained in college also enabled me to develop more meaningful relationships with 
my prep school friends from home. 
For instance in 1976, I had met James Amberg Kuser (1971-2003) in the Mercer 
County soccer leagues. He was the embodiment of the ruling-elite world Mabry referred 
to in his memoir, but Jim did not fit the blueblood stereotype. He did not adopt the 
arrogance and racism that Mabry encountered at Lawrenceville. Jim was the son of Mary 
Kay and Rob Kuser. The Kusers are the exemplars of Central New Jersey?s aristocracy 
because their ancestry in Trenton dated back to before the Civil War. The Kuser mansion 
in Trenton, New Jersey is listed as one of the monuments to see when tourists and 
families come to the area. The Kuser?s home was in Lawrenceville in a neighborhood on 
 
 76
a hill above the Lawrenceville School off of Kuser road on Green Avenue. Jim went to 
the Lawrenceville School. He was a good student athlete who had the opportunity to use 
his family?s legacy at the Lawrenceville School to go to Princeton University. But Jim 
wanted to make a name for himself on his own.  
When Jim graduated from Lawrenceville in 1989, he turned down Princeton 
University, his father Rob Kuser?s Alma Mater, for Notre Dame, where he earned a BA 
in American Studies. He later earned a MBA from the University of Michigan, Ann 
Arbor in 1998 and became Vice President of Private Wealth management at Merrill 
Lynch. He died unexpectedly of a heart attack in 2003.   
Jim learned, as I did, how to interact with people who come from various social 
class backgrounds from his parents and experiences in Mercer County sports leagues. Jim 
looked like the model of the Irish Catholic elite. His jet black hair, chubby checks and 
sturdy athletic frame could be on Loyola College?s catalogue in Baltimore, Maryland or a 
University of Notre Dame?s brochure. He often wore khaki Ralph Lauren casual wear 
and loved to go to Princeton basketball and lacrosse games and Notre Dame Football 
games.  
I also knew Princeton University and the town of Princeton well. My father took 
me to Princeton University?s basketball, football, lacrosse and soccer games since I was 
old enough to walk. During my prep school days, we would often see the Kusers at the 
games. I would often go to the town of Princeton to meet with friends throughout my 
prep school and college years. We would eat at the restaurants and figure out what we 
were going to do over the weekend when we were in prep school, and we would meet in 
town to decide where we would be going when we came home for Christmas break in 
 
 77
college. My father moved from Lawrence to Princeton, and he remarried in 1998. When I 
came from my apartment in Philadelphia to New Jersey to visit him, going to Princeton 
was no longer the same. Most of my friends had moved away, gotten married, and started 
their families, but I was still trying to find my way.    
Nonetheless, I had graduated from college, received a Masters of Arts and 
Teaching in English Literature, and I was teaching at Friends? Central School. Most 
aspiring educators would be content, but I was not satisfied. I was thinking about going 
back to graduate school and about furthering my family?s local race leader legacy, but a 
Ph.D. program would put the normal middle-class routine of going to college, beginning 
your career and starting a family on hold. So when I came to Princeton to visit my father, 
I would often walk around alone looking in the high- end shops and stores in front of 
Princeton University?s campus thinking about the next step. 
I ran into Jim Kuser in Princeton on one of those nights in 1999. He was running. 
We immediately recognized each other. He lived in an apartment across the street from 
Princeton University. He was working at Merrill Lynch?s satellite office in Princeton. I 
had not seen him since we graduated from prep school and a few encounters at sporting 
events with our fathers in college. We talked for hours that night. Jim asked me questions 
about what it was like being an African American in these elite and often racist social 
settings. I initially gave him a pat answer that I often presented when I am not sure how 
much my white and wealthy friends really want to know. But Jim must have realized it 
because he said,  
I took several African American Literature courses at Notre Dame and I really 
want to know? 
 
 78
I told him,  
I had to learn how to live between worlds. I learned how to adapt my speech, 
mannerism and attitude based on the social situation I happened to be in. 
Jim listened intently. And he asked,  
How did I learn to do this? 
 
I smiled,  
 
Black people have been doing this since we arrived on slave ships. You may not 
think much about your ability to move between worlds because you really do not 
have to, but I am always reading the social situations I find myself in and 
carefully thinking about what I want to say and how to say what I want before I 
speak. And I have learned and studied about my family?s history of living this 
way from before the Civil War. I sometimes feel as if I am always auditioning for 
acceptance from both blacks and whites. 
After describing this further, when I looked in his eyes, it was as if Jim had been exposed 
to a new social reality. Jim had other black friends and acquaintances but they had told 
him little about how we as honorary black members of the ruling elite?s world live. 
Blacks from my world, if they do have any close white friends, usually keep the means of 
survival between worlds a carefully guarded secret. On another occasion, Jim asked me 
about something else he was struggling with. He told me about the terrible death of his 
former roommate from the Lawrenceville School. His prep school roommate was killed 
at Yale by a young and poor black man in New Haven. We talked about it for a few hours 
at his apartment, and he appeared to gain some consolation from our talk. In the summer 
 
 79
of 2000 during my initial year as a doctoral student in the American Studies Department 
at the University of Maryland, College Park, Jim was my first visitor.  
My experiences with Jim is just one example of how my family?s interactions 
with the white aristocracy provided me with the background to understand students who 
either came from this elite world or working- to- middle class students who wanted to 
earn recognition and acceptance within it. Understanding black and white social class 
worlds on college campuses provided me with the cultural currency to study and reach 
out to other minority groups such as Asian and Latino students. I designed literary- based 
courses on racial- and- social class diversity that offered students opportunities to learn 
about themselves and their relationship with American society. When I used family 
stories from Three Generations to enhance students? comprehension of the texts we 
covered in class, I realized from their reaction that I could turn this living black history 
into a scholarly endeavor. 
 I realized that my family?s history was an important and complex story that could 
shed light on middle class black leadership and that I personally wanted to know much 
more about this legacy.
 
 80
 
                                                           
Notes 
1
 Marcus Mabry. White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age Black in White America. (New York: 
Scribner, 1995) 14. 
Marcus Mabry?s memoir provided me with a use contrast to my own experiences between black and white 
worlds. I was able to present the larger significance of my experiences with my adopted family by placing 
my story alongside Mabry?s memoir. 
 
2
 Mabry, White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age in White America, 14.  
 
3
 Mike Allegra. Lawrentian. Winter 2006, Volume 70, Number 1. 
  
4
 Marcus Mabry. White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age Black in White America. (New York: 
Scribner, 1995) 75. 
 
5
 Mabry, White Bucks and Black Eye Peas: Coming of Age Black in White America, 75. 
 
6
 Richard Hoggart. The Uses of Literacy. (New Brunswick: Transaction Press, 2000) 224. 
  
7
 Marcus Mabry. White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age Black in White America. (New York: 
Scribner, 1995) 46. 
 
8
 Mabry, White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age Black in White America, 81. 
 
9
 Mabry, White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age Black in White America, 161.  
 
10
 Mabry, White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age in White America, 81. 
 
11
 Mabry, White Bucks and Black Eyed Peas: Coming of Age in White America, 91. 
 
 
 81
Chapter 3 
The Story of a Race Man  
Part 1  
The Story of a Race Man: Charles Warner Cansler?s Life as a Steward and as a 
Local Racial Ambassador  
Charles Warner Cansler was born on May 15, 1871 as President Andrew Johnson 
issued a reversal of the Republican-dominated Congress? vision of Reconstruction.
1
 Upon 
the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln in April 14, 1865, Vice President 
Andrew Johnson assumed the Presidency of the United States.
2
 Johnson was a former 
slave owner, but at least publicly he remained loyal to the Union.
3
 He had been a 
compromise candidate for the Vice Presidency in an effort to reconcile the tension 
between the North and the South. President Johnson referred to his plan for 
Reconstruction as ?Presidential Reconstruction.? He returned much of the land newly 
gained during the Civil War to former slave owners.
4
 Most whites agreed with President 
Johnson because they believed that the earlier land confiscation had been too harsh for 
southern whites.
5
 Northern whites in particular advocated fair labor contracts for newly 
freed blacks instead of opportunities for them to acquire their own land.
6
 Many of these 
?fair labor contracts? resulted in the continued exploitation of recently freed blacks.
7
  
Because Charles Warner Cansler?s grandparents were free blacks prior to the 
Civil War, this decision did not directly affect them. They had entered the free black 
middle class as merchants in the late 1830?s by acquiring artisan skills from their 
apprenticeships with white tradesmen. They could have easily created a more 
 82
comfortable existence with other free blacks in the North, but Cansler?s grandparents and 
parents felt responsible for cultivating racial progress efforts in the South.   
Cansler?s immediate ancestors began to adopt local racial improvement practices 
within the backdrop of the Civil War and Reconstruction. Cansler?s grandfather, William 
B. Scott (1821-1885), was the architect of the family?s legacy. He created the first black 
newspaper in Tennessee, The Colored Tennessean, in 1868, and he played a role in the 
creation of the second school for blacks in Knoxville, The Freedman?s Normal Institute 
in 1872.
8
 Cansler?s mother, Laura Ann Scott Cansler (1846-1926), created the first school 
in Knoxville for free blacks in 1863 when she was only 18. Cansler?s older brother, 
William Cansler (1863-1937), studied the law and was admitted to the bar in 1884.
9
 He 
taught at Austin High School for 12 years, and at intervals practicing as an attorney. He 
was the first principal of the Maynard School, a position he held for 35 years.
10
 And in an 
article published in Our Voice magazine in November, 1970, the contents of one of 
William?s scrapbooks were reviewed. The scrapbook revealed his role as a local racial 
activist and local racial ambassador and his interest in meeting and learning from national 
race leaders.
11
 He gave an oration to the Witherspoon Literary Society, and Tennessee 
Governor Tom Rye selected him to attend the Negro National Education Conference in 
Washington, D.C. He also had personal letters from W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. 
Washington. Charles Warner Cansler carried on the family?s academic legacy by 
attending the Freedman?s Normal Institute in Maryville, Tennessee before enrolling at 
Maryville College, which at that time admitted a few black students.
12
 
Cansler?s pedigree and academic success enabled him to earn recognition as an 
influential figure in Knoxville. Like his older brother William, he read law and passed the 
 83
Knoxville Bar at the age of 21.
13
 He was the Republican Candidate for the legislature in 
1892. Nonetheless, he gave up his law practice and his aspirations to become a politician, 
because he thought he could do more to help the black community of Knoxville as a 
counselor and a local racial ambassador with whites. He began this work by teaching at 
the all-black Austin High School in 1900. He was promoted to Principal there in 1911.
14
 
A year later, while continuing his duties as Principal, he organized the East Tennessee 
association of Negro teachers. He also began to display his abilities as a local racial 
ambassador for Knoxville?s black community by playing the major role in convincing 
Andrew Carnegie to finance a black public library on Nelson Street in 1917.
15
 And after 
retiring from Knoxville Colored High School, formerly known as Austin High School, in 
1928, he served as the first Principal of Beardsley Junior High School from 1937 to 
1938.
16
 Cansler had five other siblings who were educators and local racial activists in 
Knoxville. They all decided to adopt the family?s local racial activist traditions to define 
themselves. The Scotts and the Canslers performed as educators and builders of a social 
black infrastructure in Knoxville for nearly a century. The Scotts and the Canslers 
understood that most blacks not only had to remain in their local towns, but they also 
recognized that they did not have educational and social development opportunities 
within their local towns.  
Consequently, the Scotts and the Canslers were keenly aware of the need to create 
an educational and social infrastructure that would enable blacks to realize their 
scholastic potential and prepare them to be able to take care of themselves. They decided 
to develop roles for themselves as local race leaders that addressed the specific needs of 
Knoxville?s black community that dated back to before the Civil War. Comparing the 
 84
experience of his people with other immigrants, a former Tennessee slave thought ?every 
nationality in the United States had been given a distinct advantage over African 
Americans.?
17
 Many blacks during this time realized that knowledge enabled people to 
obtain better jobs and to see the world beyond their local town.
18
 Therefore during the 
antebellum era, the Scotts and the Canslers form of local racial activism responded to 
whites? concerted efforts to prevent blacks from finding ways of improving themselves. 
They understood that ?whites had sufficient incentives to maintain black illiteracy?or to 
place clear limits on how much knowledge blacks should acquire.?
19
 To respond to the 
existence of white supremacist beliefs in Knoxville, the Scotts and the Canslers realized 
that they needed help from other whites who rejected white supremacist beliefs. They 
also worked with other like minded blacks to establish racial stewardship traditions in 
Knoxville that would facilitate collective educational and social uplift for blacks.     
For instance, Cansler decided to take on the role of an adviser for some the black 
intellectuals in Knoxville. Prior to the writing and publication of Three Generations, 
Cansler served as a mentor for Bartow G. Wilson who was a former Staff-writer, 
Advertising Manager, Sports Editor, and Columnist for the Knoxville Herald. Wilson?s 
preface for his book, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress in 
Knoxville Today (1929), offered important insights about Knoxville?s black community 
at the time.
20
 
This volume has been compiled in the limited quarters of a photography studio?
which may, or may not be, a good excuse for any errors that may be found herein. 
It?s main purpose is to supply information to Negroes in particular, and the public 
generally, of the progress of the race.
21
 
 85
In pursuance of this purpose, we have tried to keep in mind five distinct 
objectives.  
The first has been to awaken the Knoxville Negro to the fact that he is enjoying a 
most remarkable era of progress.  
The second has been to fix responsibility for this great advancement through a 
Who?s Who section. 
The third objective has been to stimulate and encourage the Negro youth of 
Knoxville, and if possible, to create a better understanding among Knoxville 
Negroes. 
The fourth objective has been to emphasize the necessity of cooperation, and the 
fifth has been to offer proof of this advancement by means of illustrations and 
pictures of homes, people, and places of business. 
This book concerns itself wholly with the Knoxville Negro, and the book is 
intended primarily as a record of his progress. This effort is unprecedented in 
Knoxville, and it may seem, to many, incomplete. We have attempted, however, 
to portray the forces in all avenues of life that are contributing in any way to the 
progress of the Negro race in Knoxville.
22
 
 
Wilson?s objectives for his book leave him vulnerable to critiques of middle-class black 
elitism and na?ve confidence in racial accommodationism. This is particularly the case for 
black and white readers who use contemporary lenses to evaluate Barlow?s methods of 
documenting black advancement, but readers should remember that Barlow was working 
from the assumption that middle-class respectability was the most effective way of 
overcoming the dehumanizing affects of the legacy of slavery.
23
  
 86
Barlow would not have been aware of the notion of middle-class respectability 
being associated with the abandonment of the race because working-class blacks became 
middle class within socio-economically diverse black communities. Moreover, he 
responded to black men and women who wanted to learn because they were aware of 
their history. They remembered their ancestors? stories about the extraordinary measure 
whites adopted to criminalize black literacy and to insulate blacks from intellectual 
contamination.
24
 
Barlow?s depictions of the Knoxville Negro?s respectability emerged from the 
realization of educational opportunities in Knoxville?s black school system and Knoxville 
College, other historically black colleges and universities, and predominately white 
institutions of higher learning in the North, which a few attended. Thus even when they 
achieved degrees from northern liberal arts colleges, they frequently returned to make 
homes for themselves in their communities because they wanted to return or had limited 
alternatives. The Knoxville Negro?s achievement of materialism within the community 
was also considered as a tangible reflection of black progress and respectability, but the 
definitive expression of Negro respectability was the Knoxville Negro?s ability to 
perform as a steward in the community and as a local racial ambassador with influential 
whites.  
Wilson?s interpretation of communal racial identity values in Knoxville not only 
documented the Knoxville Negro?s decision to embrace the ?New Negro? ideology of the 
1920?s, but it also described how smaller southern black communities employed the New 
Negro ideals to define themselves. The New Negro ideology was a belief that the Negro?s 
subordinate attitude toward white supremacy was outdated; the time has come for the 
 87
Negro to demonstrate that he deserved full citizenship.
25
 This new belief system emerged 
from a class largely born after slavery. The new generation demanded liberation from 
social norms of race relations established during slavery. Their value system was a direct 
response to whites? assumptions that the Negro was a ?helpless subject? and ?child of 
nature? requiring the guidance and restraint of whites.
26
 The new generation wanted to 
assert their independence by demonstrating that whites did not need to protect blacks 
from themselves.
27
 Moreover, they wanted to display for themselves and whites that they 
were able to embody cultural refinement by establishing collective racial development 
strategies.  
Wilson identified Charles Warner Cansler as one of the most influential models of 
New Negro values in Knoxville.  
Since 1896 Prof. Cansler has been continuously in educational work in this city, 
serving as Principal since 1911. Under his leadership the high school grew from 
80 to 437. He advocated the moving of the High School off of Central Avenue to 
Payne Street: Urged the erection of the present Austin High School when only a 
wing of the old building was contemplated. Prof Cansler led the movement for 
parks and playgrounds for his race in Knoxville: conceived of an idea of a library 
for the Negro race in Knoxville, and aided materially in securing it and the tablet 
placed there by City Commissioner gives recognition of his efforts in this regard. 
He was also the author of the bill, and secured its passage, which gave all colored 
people in Tennessee the right to inherit real estate in the same manner as white 
people in the state. Some years ago Prof Cansler wrote and published a book 
entitled ?Cansler?s Short Methods in Arithmetic,? which was sold in many 
 88
northern states. Summing up this sketch, we see Prof. Cansler as an educator, 
lawyer, statesman and author. Few men have contributed as much to the progress 
of the Negro race as he. Doubtless, as some of his friends have said, he would 
have made a greater financial success in the field of law, but the great service he 
has rendered his race as an educator, and his other outstanding contributions, 
more than make up for any great financial prosperity that would have been his.  
Many men and women are making marks in the world as the direct result of his 
impressive teaching and wholesome inspiration. The many monuments of his 
efforts will forever stand in memory of this talented and useful man.
28
   
Wilson?s biographical sketch of Cansler?s life provided black and white readers with a 
model of the values of a local race man?s role as a coordinator of collective race 
advancement. The biographical sketch begins with Cansler?s achievements but it ends 
with the role he played in teaching and inspiring the next generation. Wilson wanted 
readers to understand the value of Cansler?s sacrifice for the greater good of Knoxville?s 
black community.  
Wilson asked Cansler to write a foreword for his book in 1929 because he clearly 
admired him. Cansler?s foreword displayed his wit, wisdom and his middle-class-minded 
ideology of black progress. 
In this day and generation, when we have the literal fulfillment of Solomon?s wise 
saying that ?of the making of many books there is no end,? any man who has the 
courage to attempt the compiling of a book needs encouragement, and perhaps 
deserves sympathy, for when he becomes an old man, he has his youthful efforts 
 89
and mistakes to confront him in the shape of the book that he attempted in his 
green and callow youth. 
Seriously speaking, we believe that the Knoxville public will find this 
volume compiled by Mr. Bartow G. Wilson, much that is valuable. It has been his 
effort to show in this book the worth-while people and achievements of the Negro 
race in Knoxville. How well, or how poorly, he has done this the reader may 
judge from the volume itself. He has had little in the way of precedent to aid him 
in his efforts, and has been the pioneer to blaze the trail for those that may follow 
him to do even better than he has been able to do, for ?it is not failure, but 
low aim, that is a crime.?
29
 
 
Cansler revealed his understanding of what is at stake when one decided to create a book 
designed to inspire the race and educate the public. He knew that such an endeavor would 
either in time make the author proud of his youthful vision or it would forever haunt him 
as he reached old age. I interpret the meaning behind ?it is not failure, but low aim that is 
a crime? as Cansler?s response to the struggle of Knoxville?s black community, and other 
black communities across the country, with racial inferiority issues that emerged during 
slavery and the promotion of white supremacists views in America. He took this quote 
from James Russell Lowell, an American poet, critic, editor and English professor at 
Harvard University. His selection of Lowell?s quotation not only reflected Cansler?s love 
of wit and literature, but also his belief in blacks? ability to realize the American Dream.    
 Cansler was pleased to help Wilson because his book as a whole, and more 
specifically his biographical sketches, embodied the Scotts? and the Canslers? vision of 
 90
local racial activist traditions and racial ambassador conventions. Take Wilson?s 
biographical sketch of Professor James L. Carey as an illustration.  
Professor Carey holds the Chair of the English Department at Knoxville College. 
He attended Alcorn A & M College, 1894-1896, and matriculated at Knoxville 
College, 1898 from which institution he was graduated with the degree of A.B. in 
1904, and from the Divinity School in 1909. He also holds the degree of A.B. 
from Indiana University, 1928, and the degree of M.A. from Northwestern in 
1925. He organized the Students? Interracial Committee of Eastern Tennessee and 
is a member of the state?s Interracial Committee.
30
  
Wilson?s biographical sketch of Carey defined the credentials and the roles of local racial 
advisors and racial ambassadors in Knoxville. Carey performed his advisory role as the 
Chair of the English Department at Knoxville College, and he accepted his function as a 
racial ambassador by coordinating the Student?s Interracial Committee of Eastern 
Tennessee and participating in the state?s Interracial Committees. Wilson?s biographical 
sketch of Carey embodied the general criteria for the local racial advisor and the local 
race ambassador of Knoxville. His book became tangible evidence that local racial 
activist practices were an integral part of Knoxville?s black community.   
  Wilson?s sketch of Dr. Henry M. Green, B.S., M.D., Ph.D. provided another 
important illustration. He began Dr. Green?s biographical sketch with a description of 
how a black man from humble beginnings became a doctor.  
Scholar, Financier, Scientist, and author, Dr Henry M. Green was born in 
Adairsville, Georgia, the son of poor but respectable parents, was educated in the 
public schools of his native state, Knoxville College, University of Michigan, and 
 91
Northwestern University. He is an example of the self-made man who has made 
good in spite of his handicaps, and who has reached the top of his undertakings 
and yet remained unspoiled by his signal success?.As president of his local,  his 
state and finally of the National Medical Association, he was ever mindful of the 
needs of Negro Physicians.
31
 
Prominently displayed on page 19, Wilson situated Dr. Green?s sketch within Benjamin 
Franklin?s social construction of the self- made man. He used Dr. Green?s life to provide 
black readers with an example of a man who reached social standing and economic 
prosperity despite inauspicious beginnings. His description of Dr. Green?s rags to riches 
success story was not just information. It was clearly designed to encourage the black 
community to strive to emulate Dr. Green?s academic achievements, acquisition of 
economic prosperity and cultural refinement. But Wilson did more than this. His 
biographical sketch of Dr. Green displayed Dr. Green?s realizations of his need to use his 
talents to act as a local race leader and a local racial ambassador. 
During Dr. Green?s tenure as president of the N. M.A. Green orchestrated the 
National Insurance Examiners which assisted Negro Life Insurance Companies by 
helping them develop and maintain their businesses. He also constructed the 
National Hospital Association which became the spoken head of All Negro 
Hospitals in the World.
32
  
Dr. Green rendered valuable service to his race particularly, and the public 
generally, while serving as Alderman from the fifth ward. It was during his 
incumbency as alderman that three new schools were built for Negroes, Negro 
 92
sections of the city were included in the city?s extensive improvement program 
and the Negro was recognized generally as a political factor.
33
 
At the heart of Wilson?s biographical sketch of Dr. Green was what J. Martin Favor 
referred to in Authentic Blackness: the Folk in the Negro Renaissance (1999) as ?race 
consciousness? or ?race pride.?
34
 Wilson described how Dr. Green used his talents, 
professional expertise, and the cultural currency those talents and professional expertise 
had within the world of the ruling elite, to perform a valued administrative purpose 
within the black community. Dr. Green accepted his role by creating black-run medical 
organizations that helped to develop and maintain black insurance companies, and as an 
alderman by working with whites to coordinate the implementation of social policies that 
benefited the race in Knoxville.   
Nonetheless, Dr. Green did not look like a local black civil servant and a local 
racial ambassador. He did not even look like a mulatto. He looked white. He could in 
many social settings pass for white. So why did he live as a black man and accept the 
responsibilities when he could have had a more comfortable and prosperous life as a 
white doctor? Even if he could not have passed as white in America, he would have been 
able to do so in Europe. Dr. Green traveled extensively in Europe and received post 
graduate credits for medical training in Vienna, Berlin, London and Edinburgh. He must 
have seen that he could have earned more money and lived more comfortably as a white 
doctor in Europe. Dr. Green?s decision to return home and fulfill a local racial activist 
role for the community symbolized the strong tradition of race pride, race responsibility 
and racial activism in Knoxville.  
 93
Wilson?s dedication of a page to influential white politicians and citizens that 
have been the Knoxville Negro?s allies was further proof of the prominence of the local 
racial activist conventions in Knoxville?s black community. In a section entitled ?An 
Introspective View of Greater Knoxville: Emphasizing the Executive Administration of 
City and County Affairs,? Wilson wrote, 
Knoxville is known far and wide for the splendid interracial aspects?individuals 
included in this section are advocates of the progressive development of the 
Knoxville Negro. They have manifested this by their stand on equality of 
opportunity for the Knoxville Negro.
35
 
We have as evidence of their sincerity the record of their acts in office. 
We endorse them as friends of the Negro; we endorse their records?their co-
operative method of aiding the Knoxville Negro to greater heights.
36
 
The Mayor Hon. Henry James A. Fowler, The Municipal Court Judge, Hon. Robert P. 
Williams, many of the Councilmen, Attorney General, Criminal Court Hon. J. Fred Bibb, 
and Councilman, City-at-Large Hon. James A. Trent were listed as important co-workers 
in the development of Knoxville?s black community. Wilson clearly presented their 
names and photos for blacks in Knoxville to see that there were influential whites who 
supported Knoxville?s black community.  
Critics may read Wilson?s decision to profile the success of Knoxville?s black 
community?s local racial ambassador practices as the promotion of Washington?s 
philosophy of accommodation and racial subservience. They may interpret his 
appreciation of white philanthropy as a contradiction to his earlier statements of race 
 94
pride. Some may even contend that he is merely another victim of America?s efforts to 
convince blacks of their inferiority and the superiority of whites.   
But I would argue that a more careful reading of Wilson?s book would reveal how 
he interpreted mastery of local racial ambassador conventions as evidence of racial 
sophistication. He understood whites had a monopoly over essential resources that the 
community needed to survive and flourish. He recognized that if educated middle-class 
blacks wanted money for schools and other social infrastructures that they had to 
cultivate networks with influential whites for themselves and for Knoxville?s black 
community. He, and many other local and national race leaders, recognized that the 
prominence of American racism made complete racial independence impossible.  
Racism was born from the institution of slavery, and it reached adolescence 
during Reconstruction with the continued grouping of individuals based on racial 
identification. The pervasive social-grouping practice made it almost impossible for 
individuals to define themselves independent of social constructions of race within 
American society and throughout the world. Interracial sexual liaisons, remarkable ability 
to master trades, or the traits of Western European culture like literacy and cultural 
refinement, were the only means blacks had to gain social-class-mobility opportunities. 
Acquiring vocational skills and literacy became the objective of most slaves because 
education aided slaves in their efforts to obtain self awareness, and many blacks realized 
that their inability to read and write would be used against them by whites.
37
 Wilson 
demonstrated how blacks in Knoxville managed to overcome the pervasive presence of 
racism in their lives. During the early twentieth century white supremacists? views and 
organizations such as the Klu Klux Klan had become more powerful in the South. The 
 95
prevalence of white supremacy led to a dramatic rise in lynching in the South and to 
additional suppression of blacks? dignity and access to mainstream American society.  
Many of Cansler?s faculty at Austin High School knew that the Canslers had a 
very rich local racial-activist legacy. When Cansler retired from the Knoxville school 
system, his most promising teachers at Austin High School, Darby D. Ervin and Henry H. 
Smith, finally convinced him to write biographies of his immediate ancestors and his own 
memoir. In the preface to Three Generations, Cansler described Ervin and Smith as 
surrogate sons. ?These young men for a considerable time had tried to impress me with 
the thought hat the story of my life and that of my immediate ancestry should be 
preserved in printed form, and that it probably would be of interest to those who might 
read it.?
38
 Cansler relied on a conventional trope in African American slave narratives 
and autobiographies. The representation of the black writer?s desire to develop a black 
autobiography emerging from the black writer?s intended audience is a customary literary 
convention. Cansler?s adoption of this trope was further evidence of his study of the 
African American literary tradition, because it revealed that Cansler was familiar with the 
traditional way of addressing the criticism that Three Generations is only a reflection of 
his vanity. Moreover, Cansler consciously described that his family?s accomplishments 
were primarily the outcome of communal-minded principles shared by both blacks and 
whites that his family encountered. This technique was used to avoid the appearance of 
glorifying the family?s achievements.   
Cansler gathered information to create Three Generations largely from family 
stories and from records in local newspapers. In 1939, he privately published and sold 
copies of Three Generations from his home to members of Knoxville?s black community, 
 96
influential whites in Knoxville, and historically black colleges and universities. He also 
had a small national and international audience. In 1940, Three Generations received 
favorable reviews from the Minnesota Historical Society, the Mississippi Valley 
Historical Society, and the Book Dealers World in London, England.  
Today, his book resides in the archives of prestigious colleges and universities 
and prominent historically black colleges and universities, most notably at Duke 
University, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Howard University. A 
study of Cansler and his family?s local race leadership legacy provides black and white 
readers with a family?s history of local racial activist beliefs within the black community 
and the strategies they used for earning recognition from progressive-minded whites.   
Part 2 
Charles Warner Cansler?s Construction and Performance of Three Generations  
Cansler?s Three Generations, covering a period of over one hundred years, takes 
us into the lives, minds, social reality and achievements of two generations of a free black 
family. He employs his grandparents? and parents? lives to promote readings of African 
American and American history designed to inspire the race and educate whites. Thus 
Cansler?s book is not only a hybrid text because it includes biographical and 
autobiographical statements of local racial activist traditions and local racial ambassador 
conventions, but also because it aligns history with literary techniques found in other 
black writers? representations of themselves, including Frederick Douglass? antebellum 
slave narratives and his later work Life and Times of Frederick Douglass.  
 97
Cansler relied on local and national newspapers to provide a historical context for 
Three Generations, and he depended on his mother?s middle-class and Victorian-minded 
outlook to provide an ideological framework for Three Generations. He recalls,  
?.father and mother were subscribers to the local weekly, published by 
grandfather Scott, to the daily newspapers published in the near by city, to the 
Toldeo Ohio Blade, and to the ?Sunny South,? published in Atlanta, Georgia. I 
was especially fond of the two latter publications because through them I received 
the viewpoints of both the North and the South. Scarcely twenty years had passed 
since the bitter Civil War, and writers in these publications often lived over in 
them their experiences of those days.
39
    
If these are the sources he referred to develop a historical context for Three Generations, 
then he looked to his mother?s collection of novels by Charles Dickens, George Eliot, and 
Sir Walter Scott to develop the dialogues occurring between various voices in Three 
Generations and himself and other people.
40
 He had read all of his mother?s collections 
of Dickens? novels and Shakespeare?s plays by the time he was sixteen as well as 
Frederick Douglass? narratives. His integration of literary techniques with racial 
ascendancy ideology from Douglass? narratives allowed him to create a local racial 
ascendancy ideology that black readers would embrace and progressive-minded white 
readers would recognize and acknowledge as effective writing.
41
 
Cansler also relied on his knowledge of his ancestors? oral history to construct his 
book. He used familial oral histories to recreate his immediate ancestors? lives and to 
demonstrate how he carried on their legacy. From recollections of these oral histories, he 
constructed the settings, family members? relationships, and their dialogues with 
 98
important historical figures. His recollections allowed him to develop both a third- person 
narration of his immediate ancestors? lives as well as the confident voice of a local public 
figure in Knoxville recounting his story for black and white readers. For instance when 
he discussed William B. Scott taking his family and the Gentle family from North 
Carolina to Knoxville, Cansler wrote in the third person.  
These six Negro people moving out of a state that was once one of the most 
liberal in the southern states in its attitude toward free Negroes, but since the Nat 
Turner insurrection, had become pronouncedly bitter and hostile, represented in 
their family histories is an interesting study for any student of that period.
42
 
Note how Cansler?s third person narration merged the past and the present by describing 
how their free Negro family histories in North Carolina form important insights for 
students of that period.  
When he dealt with his own experiences in Washington D.C. in 1896, Cansler 
employed his interactions with the last southern Negro Congressman, from North 
Carolina, to offer his historical insights. 
While in Washington in 1896 I saw a great deal of Hon. George White, our last 
Negro Congressman from the South. Mr. White visited frequently a North 
Carolina friend with whom I was stopping, and I heard much about the difficulties 
he was undergoing in getting his quota of appointments from the new Mckinley 
administration. The then Republican United States Senator had made a secret 
trade with the Democratic leaders of North Carolina to have Negro leaders 
discredited and not recognized, and eventually to disfranchise the Negroes of the 
state, which was later done.
43
    
 99
Cansler?s third and first person voices are quite striking because of what they relate, but 
even more so because Cansler?s biographies and memoir display the value of 
documenting his family and his own experiences as local racial activists and local racial 
ambassadors within America?s larger racial landscape. Cansler borrowed the strategy of 
representing personal experiences that serve the purpose of documenting the pervasive 
presence of American racism from slave narratives. Cansler?s social status allowed him 
to gain access to corridors of power, but he focused on introducing his readers to how 
social constructions of racism shaped the behavior of influential whites.
44
 
Although Cansler?s first and third person voices are the dominant ones in Three 
Generations, they are not the only ones. In its most elemental form, Cansler?s Three 
Generations is reminiscent of Douglass? use of other voices to authenticate his 
antebellum slave narratives. Like Douglass, Cansler used the voices of other characters.
45
 
In Douglass? narratives, these other characters? voices appeared in appended documents 
written by abolitionists to authenticate and vouch for Douglass? story.
46
 However, 
Cansler?s characters? voices appear within the body of Three Generations. For instance, 
he utilized local and national public figures and official documents to authenticate his 
immediate ancestors? life stories, and he used his interactions with Douglass,? Booker T. 
Washington?s and James Weldon Johnson?s voices to authenticate his story. Cansler 
gained artistic control over the authenticating voices in Three Generations by developing 
an introspective analysis of the various voices and documents.
47
 
Cansler published Three Generations in 1939 as Langston Hughes and Richard 
Wright were debating their roles as the literary race?s spokesmen. Hughes and Wright 
were performing as the race?s spokespeople as blacks suffered with the last hired first 
 100
fired social reality of the Great Depression. They knew that their performances had to 
resonate with blacks? social misery. While Hughes cultivated images of black 
romanticism in his autobiography The Big Sea (1940) from the richness of the black 
underclass? music and folklore as a response to the legacy of slavery, Jim Crow, 
segregation, and the effects of the Great Depression, Wright used his essay ?The 
Blueprint for Negro Writing? (1937), his personal essay ?The Ethics of Jim Crow: an 
Autobiographical Sketch? (1938) and his famous novel Native Son (1940) to argue that a 
more radical approach was needed. He shocked his white and black readers with 
naturalist and realist depictions of the effects of American racism within black and white 
communities. Hughes thought Wright?s revolutionary approach perpetuated racial 
stereotypes rather than challenged them. Although Hughes and Wright had disagreements 
about how to develop and present their national racial ascendancy philosophies and 
narratives, they agreed that the lives of the folk would play a prominent role in their 
performances as the race?s spokespeople.  
Whereas Hughes and Wright had largely abandoned the African American middle 
class and Victorian-minded racial uplift perspective as the model of black progress and 
American moral uplift in the late 1930?s, Cansler did not. His middle class and Victorian 
minded vision of black progress continued to shape his view of local racial activism and 
belief in local racial ambassador conventions. He believed that middle class minded 
racial ascendancy principles should remain as the primary philosophy in the struggle for 
racial equality, because he perceived them as the only means of enabling black 
communities to endure American racism.   
 101
Cansler?s stewardship narrative may not have been well known, or in vogue at the 
time, but it offered an important contrast to two of the most prominent African American 
literary figures? national racial ascendancy narratives, because it illustrated how blacks 
can find ways of being successful and contributing to the prosperity of their own 
communities. His stewardship text was not designed to profile abstract character traits of 
self reliance as black leadership. Cansler?s text focused on pragmatic matters of acquiring 
resources from other blacks in the black community but largely from whites to build 
schools, train teachers, and to develop newspapers and businesses. Hughes? and Wright?s 
artful construction of themselves within folk and Marxist-minded racial spokesmen 
sensibilities revealed the presence of having access to paths to social-class mobility that 
the majority of blacks did not have. Moreover, to continue to enjoy their financial 
rewards and social prestige, they had to translate their lives for foreign white audiences. 
This meant that they were often promoting individualistic-minded racial ascendancy and 
migration to the North as the emblem of black leadership, even though most blacks 
would have tremendous difficulty trying to emulate their individualistic success stories. 
Hughes wanted accolades as a black writer from white readers and wealthy white 
patrons while using his work to speak to the race as a literary race?s spokesman. Hughes 
understood that his primary readerships were wealthy progressive-minded whites and a 
segment of middle-class black readers. He knew his financial well being was not from 
black communities but from wealthy white patrons. He also felt that middle-class and 
culturally refined blacks only accepted him as their race?s spokesman after he received 
critical praise from the ruling elite. As early as 1926 he argued in his article ?Negro Artist 
and the Racial Mountain? that the black community did not accept black writers as the 
 102
race?s spokespeople until whites acknowledge them. He believed his vision of black 
romanticism would assist him in fulfilling the expectations of divergent white and black 
readers. Most of Hughes? white readers admired his view of the folk as heroic and artistic 
figures of the American experience, while many blacks greatly appreciated Hughes? 
vision of the folk as a form of racial romanticism, and some progressive blacks and 
whites viewed them as symbols of social protest against American racism.
48
 
Wright did not feel that Hughes? vision of black romanticism confronted the 
reality of American racism. Wright believed realist and naturalist vision of American 
racism would facilitate the process of racial reform in America. He clearly thought that 
this approach to the race problem would also help him address the spoken and unspoken 
expectations as the literary spokesman for the race, but his world at that time was largely 
within the arena of leftist-minded white intellectuals and white patrons. Wright learned to 
write not from black intellectual circles like Hughes did during the Harlem Renaissance; 
Wright?s literary apprenticeship was with white leftist and Marxist intellectuals during 
the 1920?s and 1930?s.   
Cansler was not interested, as Hughes and Wright were, in competing for the title 
of the race?s spokesman. Cansler saw himself as a local grassroots racial activist and a 
local racial ambassador. He wrote Three Generations mainly to and for Knoxville?s black 
community, and secondarily to black communities throughout the nation and to open-
minded whites. Nonetheless, he addressed issues that Hughes and Wright did not 
confront in their national racial ascendancy narratives. Cansler?s depictions of his life, 
and his construction of his ancestors? lives, were designed to respond to the specific 
needs of Knoxville?s black community, and to offer a blueprint of local racial activism 
 103
and local racial ambassador conventions for various black communities across the 
country. His biographical statements and memoir promoted the image of the black middle 
class working as an assembly of superintendents within their respective black 
communities, and as local racial ambassadors with progressive-minded whites. Cansler 
believed that local racial-activist traditions would help blacks realize social standing and 
racial respectability within their own communities. However, he understood and defined 
racial ?integration? not as blacks living with whites in Knoxville but as blacks staying 
within their own communities and middle-class blacks taking on the responsibility of 
advisory roles for the community.  
I am not implying that what Cansler did was in any way better for the race than 
Hughes? and Wright?s work, but I am arguing that Cansler?s  profile of stewardship in 
Three Generations complements Hughes? and Wright?s enactments of themselves as the 
literary race?s spokespeople. Placing Cansler?s work alongside their performances, and 
the founding fathers of the national racial ascendancy narratives, enhances our awareness 
of the need for stewardship texts. 
Cansler had to confront questions about his ancestral past if he was going to write 
a book about the need for local racial activism. Cansler?s free-black ancestry forced him 
to explain his ancestors? relationship with black and white communities in Knoxville. 
Although there were 500,000 free blacks throughout the country during the antebellum 
era, most free blacks felt isolated because they were not accepted by blacks or whites.
49
 
So they often formed their own communities. Nevertheless, there are many narratives and 
oral histories of successful free blacks demonstrating the potential of the race. These 
narratives and oral histories did not receive much critical attention or commercial success 
 104
because they did not fit within the slave narrative conventions? commitment to using the 
debilitating social reality of slavery to educate and mobilize white readers. If free blacks 
found readers or audiences, small communities of blacks read or heard of their stories. In 
many cases their life stories were told in novels like Frank J. Webb?s The Garies and 
Their Friends (1857). However, Cansler?s Three Generations is unique because Cansler 
presented generations of a family as models of middle-class-minded racial ascendancy 
designed to inspire the race and educate whites. To gain acceptance from blacks and 
whites, Cansler recalled how his ancestors used their talents for collective racial 
ascendancy and racial integration. He described how they created black newspapers, 
black schools and worked with white legislators at the local level to develop a black 
infrastructure.  
Cansler?s book begins with representations of free-black-middle-class life. He 
developed images of free blacks? social reality in Knoxville from his biography of his 
grandfather William B. Scott (1821-1885). Cansler recollected that Scott was the free 
black mulatto son of a white aristocratic mother and a mulatto man who was light enough 
to pass as white.
50
 While many Americans are just learning of these love affairs, Charles 
Chesnutt wrote about these sexual liaisons. In his 1902 essay The Free Black People of 
North Carolina, Chesnutt argued that the upper ranks of white women did not get 
involved with enslaved black men. This topic was particularly important to Chesnutt 
because he could also pass for white. Moreover, his appearance and exposure to the 
ruling white elite enabled him to become a lawyer and African American artist and 
intellectual. He recalled only of a few slaves and poor white women having interracial 
affairs, and the children who followed inherited the condition of the white mother.
51
 But 
 105
Cansler?s recollection of his grandfather?s life indicated that, because of the existence of 
white skinned black men, there were also a few of the upper ranks of white women who 
had affairs with middle-to-upper-middle- class free Negroes. Cansler described how his 
great- grandfather, Scott?s father, left the family and moved to Canada because someone 
uncovered his interracial heritage.  
Cansler?s treatment of his great-grandfather?s decision ends abruptly, however. I 
believe that shame prevented him from elaborating on the pain many mulatto family 
members felt as they grappled with how they were going to define themselves and 
receive social acceptance from the margins of America?s socially constructed color line. 
Cansler was clearly aware of the envy associated with skin color in black communities, 
the dominant culture and the agency that it provided and continues to provide. Cansler?s 
white skinned free black ancestors had access to racial and social class privileges that 
slaves, most free blacks, and even many whites did not have, but the privileges came at a 
price.  
Cansler?s ancestors had to decide between the social and financial privileges of 
whiteness and their families. They had to choose between living their own socially 
constructed lie and living as free black mulattoes where they had to deal with more 
uncertainty over their fate. Moreover, if they chose this path, they risked not being 
accepted by slaves, other free blacks and whites. Because of the fear of racial rejection, 
Cansler represented the decision Scott made as the natural decision anyone would make 
in the family. He presented Scott?s choice as if he never second guessed his decision to 
define himself as a black man by marrying and raising a black family. Cansler?s 
rhetorical choice prevented the reader from gaining a more complex understanding of life 
 106
at the margin of the color line. Cansler did not include any details about Scott?s 
relationship with his white mother and her thoughts about his decision to live as a black 
man. Instead, he only focused on how Scott used his free black middle-to-upper-middle-
class status to become a steward for slaves and free blacks in Knoxville.  
Scott?s relationship with his middle-class white mother would be most the most 
appropriate space to explore the issues that white-skinned mulattoes faced within society. 
Scott?s mother would more than likely want her son to pass for white. She mostly likely 
would have wanted to protect him from America?s debilitating practices of racial 
discrimination. Despite his decision to live as a black man within society, Scott?s white 
mother was not only able to provide her son with freedom but also access to white 
tradesmen. Scott became a master wheelwright and an expert in the printing press.
52
 Like 
Chesnutt, Scott could pass for white, but he decided to live as a black man, marry a black 
woman, support his family and use his racial and social class advantages to uplift the 
race.
53
 As I mentioned earlier, he helped to create the second school for blacks in eastern 
Tennessee, the Freedman?s Normal Institute, a School designed to train blacks to become 
teachers. He also founded the first black newspaper in Tennessee, The Colored 
Tennessean.
54
 Cansler described how his mother, Laura Ann Scott Cansler (1846-1926), 
and William B Scott?s daughter, established the first school for free blacks in Knoxville 
and coordinated and taught newly freed blacks how to read and write during 
Reconstruction at night in Knoxville?s black churches.  
Cansler utilized his father?s life history to further explain how middle-class 
minded black family men became local racial superintendents during the crisis of slavery, 
Jim Crow and segregation. He knew that his father?s heritage revealed the existence of 
 107
local race leadership culture to both black and white readers. Cansler?s father, Hugh 
Lawson Cansler (1835-1919), was also the product of a white woman from a wealthy 
landowning family, but his father was an enslaved black man.
55
 It was rumored that 
Catherine Kantzler had an affair with Appius who was one of her father?s slaves. Long 
after her father Conrad Kantzler?s death, she bought his freedom in 1850. Appius no 
longer lived with the family at that time, however. When Conrad Kantzler died as her 
oldest son Hugh was born, Appius had already left Eastern Tennessee. He remained close 
to Eastern Tennessee, but he had an estranged relationship with his sons Hugh, Andrew, 
and Martin. 
Catherine Kantzler understood the importance of naming her children. She named 
her other two sons Andrew Jackson Kantzler (1836) and Martin Van Buren Kantzler 
(1838). Hugh Lawson Cansler was named after Hugh Lawson White who was born in 
Idrell, North Carolina, but moved to Tennessee with his family when he was fourteen.
56
 
Hugh Lawson White?s father, James White, established a frontier fort on the Holson 
River in the summer of 1787.
57
 This encampment would become the town of Knoxville.
58
 
Hugh Lawson White carried on his father?s military legacy. Hugh served under General 
Sevier in the war against Cherokee Indians. In the battle of Etowah, Hugh is said to have 
helped decide the battle by mortally wounding the Cherokee?s leading Chief, King 
Fisher. At the tender age of 28, Hugh Lawson White was appointed Supreme Court 
Justice of Tennessee.
59
 Catherine Kantzler understood the value of being proud of your 
family, even in the case of her mulatto children. She raised her three boys largely on her 
own with some help from compassionate relatives and friends of the Kantzler family.  
 108
Hugh Lawson Kantzler changed his name to Hugh Lawson Cansler after learning 
about his heritage to form his own identity, but Hugh Lawson Cansler used the Kantzlers? 
social status and networks to cultivate racial alliances. For three years he trained under 
Tom Peace and learned to be an expert wheelwright.
60
 Tom Peace was an active 
magistrate who owned a blacksmith and wheelwright shop.
61
 Hugh Lawson Cansler 
married Laura Ann Scott in 1861. Cansler recollected that not only did his father support 
the family during the Civil War, but he also convinced David Key, a Lieutenant Colonel 
in the Confederate Army, to write a letter that provided him and his family with legal 
shelter from Confederate forces.
62
 He realized that the letter would provide protection 
because Key was a prominent member of a wealthy southern family in Knoxville. 
Hugh had to master the art of racial diplomacy for his and his young family?s well 
being. After working for Key and the Confederate Army for sixteen weeks, Cansler 
stated that his father Hugh was on his way to the Scott home to get his pregnant wife 
when he encountered the advanced guard of Union General Sherman?s troops on their 
way to Knoxville. General Sherman?s Union troops were heading to Knoxville to support 
General Ambrose Burnside?s troops, who were under siege from General James 
Longstreet?s Confederate forces. Cansler wrote that Hugh volunteered to guide Union 
General Sherman?s forces to the quickest route to Knoxville. He was swung up behind an 
officer on his horse and the cavalry rode off. After a few miles, Hugh led them to a 
farmer who was a Union sympathizer.
63
 Hugh borrowed a horse from him and led the 
Union troops to Knoxville. Years later Hugh Lawson Cansler?s affidavit would help the 
farmer gain compensation for his horse from the federal government.
64
 
 109
Cansler recognized that his grandfather?s and his father?s development as black 
family men, local racial activists, and local racial ambassadors demonstrated the 
usefulness of familial and beneficial interracial relationships. Cansler emphasized the 
value of such alliances by showing how his grandfather?s and his father?s apprenticeships 
with white artisans enabled them to master harness, wheelwright, and printing trades. 
Cansler recognized how the Scotts? and the Canslers? belief in proper domesticity 
provided them with the opportunity to further develop public identities as local race 
leaders in the black community and as racial ambassadors with influential whites.  
?Proper domesticity? was the idea that the home was where each generation 
taught their children how to work with blacks who were interested in collective racial 
ascendancy and with white people who were interested in being co-workers for the black 
community?s social uplift. Cansler stressed that proper domesticity allowed his 
grandparents and parents to create a social knowledge tradition for realizing financial 
comfort and black middle-class respectability. His biographical statements of his 
grandparents? and parents? lives demonstrated the role teaching principles of proper 
domesticity played in creating a blueprint for working within the existing socioeconomic 
system, while simultaneously searching for ways of changing the system and improving 
the social realities of blacks at the local level.  
 Cansler?s construction of the Scott and the Cansler family values presented a free 
black family?s contribution to the creation of the next generation of local race leaders and 
local racial ambassadors. Cansler?s biographical statements exemplified why his 
promotion of himself, and his ancestors, was essential to their becoming educators and 
builders of significant black infrastructures in Eastern Tennessee and Knoxville for 
 110
nearly a century. Cansler envisioned Three Generations as a historical text but also an 
educational tool for black and white readers. Black readers would discover a new 
interpretation of African American history from a free black family?s belief in race pride 
and commitment to collective black uplift, and white readers would encounter an 
important reading of American history from a story of a free black family that embodied 
principles of racial cooperation in the quest for social equality and justice. Nonetheless, 
similar to works in the national racial ascendancy tradition, Cansler?s book is also a 
literary performance of American moral uplift.  
Part 3 
The Association of Three Generations with the National Racial Ascendancy 
Narratives 
George Lipsitz?s article ?Academic Politics and Social Change?(2000) and Robert 
Burns Stepto?s book From Behind the Veil (1991) offer literary frameworks to compare 
Charles Warner Cansler?s Three Generations with national racial- ascendancy narratives. 
Lipstiz?s article critiqued activist- minded intellectuals who have difficulty reconciling 
their beliefs and desire to produce scholarship within the conservative demands of the 
academy.
65
 Stepto?s From Behind the Veil named the dialogue occurring between slave 
narratives and black autobiographies by addressing the meaning of national- racial 
ascendancy narratives in African American literature and the larger society. He made a 
substantial contribution in the debate about how black autobiographers should utilize the 
success of their national racial ascendancy narratives to act as the race?s spokespeople.
66
 
Lipsitz?s and Stepto?s texts provide the language to examine how Cansler?s expression of 
 111
local racial ascendancy compared to Frederick Douglass,? Booker T. Washington?s and 
James Weldon Johnson?s representation of their lives to address American racism.  
 Lipsitz?s explanation of scholars? internal conflicts within the academy resembles 
black intellectuals? inner turmoil as the race?s spokespeople. His concept of 
?contradictory context? refers to the experience of scholars who adopt apolitical or 
conservative approaches to scholarship that contrast with their beliefs.
67
 ?Contradictory 
consciousness? refers to situations where the scholars realize that they are producing 
apolitical or conservative scholarship that conflicts with their experiences and beliefs for 
particular purposes.
68
 Lipsitz?s analysis is helpful in assessing African American literary 
figures? production of national racial- ascendancy narratives as the race?s spokespeople.
69
 
?Contradictory context? was and continues to be the imposition of a constructed and 
oppressive social reality, the existence of white paternalism, and inhumane laws and 
racism which force national race leaders to adopt public personas that contrast with their 
beliefs. ?Contradictory consciousness? defined black artists? use of carefully constructed 
public personas to reach white readerships for personal and political reasons. For 
instance, Douglass and Washington adopted self- made-man ideologies and uplift myth 
sensibilities that contrasted with their experiences, and in some cases their beliefs, to 
draw predominately white readers, but their performance of contradictory consciousness 
enabled them to fulfill the expectations of divergent white and black readers. Many of 
their largely northern white sponsors provided them with financial resources because they 
hoped that they would convince blacks to become content with second-class citizenship 
and moderate racial change. However, comparable to the black masses, Douglass and 
Washington believed in social equality. Moreover, they wanted to use the money that 
 112
they received from their white patrons for career advancement and for collective racial 
development.  
Cansler?s decision to become a steward offered him an opportunity to learn from 
Douglass and Washington about the complexity of national race leadership. As Cansler 
began his career, he met Douglass. Cansler?s role as an advisor for the black community 
in Knoxville and a local racial ambassador also enabled him to interact with Washington 
and Johnson. His family?s legacy, and his participation in the Afro-America League, 
helped him to earn Washington?s respect. Washington and Johnson were typically in 
Knoxville on their way to speaking engagements at Fisk University and Knoxville 
College or to meetings with local black and white racial uplift benefactors. Washington 
stayed at least once at Cansler?s home and Johnson also came to Cansler?s home at least 
five times before his death in 1938. 
In chapter VIII of his memoir, ?Leaders of Another Decade,? Cansler described 
his interactions with Douglass. He recalled, ?[a]s a boy, I had read Mr. Douglass? 
autobiography and was thrilled with it, for his life had been an eventful one.?
70
 But 
Cansler also recognized that Douglass? status removed him from the race and mainstream 
white America. Cansler wrote, 
Hon. Frederick Douglass was the most prominent Negro in this country during 
my boyhood. Many Negroes still think that Mr. Douglass was the greatest Negro, 
in point of ability, that the Negro race has yet produced in this country. Among 
the whites Mr. Douglass was not universally popular, probably due to the fact his 
second wife was a white woman. He lost some popularity among his own race, 
also, because of this marriage.
71
 
 113
For Cansler Douglass? interracial marriage separated him from many whites and blacks, 
because his interracial marriage represented a privilege that threatened whites, and many 
blacks took it as an abandonment of race pride. This was obviously also a personal issue 
for Cansler because two generations of his family were products of interracial 
relationship. He looked to both his grandfather?s and father?s experiences as evidence 
that interracial relationship of this kind can only end in social misery and despair. He also 
realized that his patriarchal role models may have benefited from having white mothers, 
but he stressed that they did everything that they could do to assert their identities as 
black men. In particular, he emphasized that they chose to fall in love with and marry 
darker black women. This may have been true, but it was also Cansler?s way of coping 
with the racial anxiety that came with his mulatto ancestry and his desire for acceptance 
within Knoxville?s black community.  
Cansler used his experience with Douglass to present one of his dominant 
supervisory messages to Knoxville?s black community: the value of being responsible 
and on time.  
It became one of the greatest pleasures of my life when I found myself serving on  
a reception committee to greet and entertain Mr. Douglass when he came to 
deliver an address in our city. As the youngest member of the committee I felt that 
I was destined to be the most silent and inconspicuous one, but it happened that 
this turned out decidedly differently, fortunately for me, for only the chairman of 
the reception committee and I were on time at the station when Mr. Douglass? 
train arrived, and we were his only escorts to his stopping place.
72
 
 114
When the Chairman had to leave to make the necessary arrangements for Douglass? 
speech, Cansler stressed that his being on time allowed him to have a few moments alone 
with the most talented Negro in America.  
Cansler also observed that Douglass was obviously well aware that he was an 
institution. After Douglass entertained Cansler and the Chairman, he requested that they 
pick him up at 9:45 am. Douglass wanted to hear a noted evangelical speaker who 
happened to be in town. The Chairman discouraged him from going to the event because 
the speaker would only humiliate the great Frederick Douglass. Instead of Douglass 
merely stating the event will not humiliate me, Cansler recalled, 
It was then that Mr. Douglass rose to his full height of more than six feet, and 
with eyes flashing replied, ?No man can humiliate Frederick Douglass. I bear 
upon my body the scars of wounds received at the hands of a mob in the streets of 
the city of Boston when those of my race were denied freedom of speech and of 
action. Am I to be more afraid in this new day of freedom and opportunity for 
myself and my race??
73
 
If Cansler?s memory is at all accurate here, Douglass went into a kind of theatrical 
performance because he felt that he had to make it abundantly clear that he was not set 
apart from the race. The Chairman and Cansler came to his room and took him to see the 
evangelical speaker. As it turned out, the speaker acknowledged that Douglass was one of 
the most remarkable characters in American history. When Douglass gave his favorite 
?Self Made Men? speech in Knoxville (a speech he gave across the country in which he 
received his standard fee of $25),
74
 Cansler sensed the presence of what he considered to 
be an overly orchestrated script.
75
 Cansler recalled that Douglass only departed from his 
 115
speech to address the accusation found in southern newspapers that he came to the South 
to teach black men how to marry white women and make bombs. He used his thoughts on 
how scripted Douglass? speech was to direct black and white readers? attention to the 
construction of Douglass as the representative Negro of his era.  
Cansler obviously recognized Douglass? brilliance, but he was wary of Douglass, 
or anyone, being anointed as the race?s spokesman. 
He (Douglass) was such a commanding appearance that, as we appeared upon the  
Streets with him, nearly all we passed turned to look at him. I thought of him as 
Sidney Smith said of Daniel Webster. As he looked upon Mr. Webster when the 
god-like Daniel once visited England, Sidney Smith is said to have remarked, 
?Daniel Webster is a living lie, for no man can be as great as he looks.? And thus 
I thought of Mr. Douglass.
76
 
He recognized the construction of one?s public identity is not an exact reflection of the 
man, even in the case of the Frederick Douglass. Cansler knew this because of the 
difficult choices that he himself had to make in the construction of Three Generations. 
Moreover, Douglass? career ambition and celebrity status created an internal conflict 
between his desire for personal gain and the needs of the race. 
 Cansler?s meeting with Douglass helped him develop a more complex reading of 
Booker T. Washington?s life as the spokesperson of the race. When Washington stayed at 
Cansler?s home, Cansler recalled that Washington was not as much of a conversationalist 
as Douglass. He surmised that Washington was often entangled within his own thoughts 
even as conversations continued around him. Washington may have been entangled with 
thoughts about the constant threats on his life and how national sentiment about 
 116
supporting blacks? educational and social development had greatly declined. He may 
have also been entangled in thought about the price he had to pay to maintain his position 
as the race?s spokesman. He knew that he had to promote a strategy of addressing the 
race problem that at times sacrificed his and the race?s dignity and civil rights for the 
acquisition of personal power and to save lives. 
Cansler had a more positive impression of James Weldon Johnson. He considered 
him a humble yet brilliant and proud race man who had made significant contributions to 
the collective development of the race. He was particularly impressed with Johnson?s 
musical compositions (such as ?Lift Every Voice and sing?). He realized that Johnson?s 
musical scores exhibited a compelling nationalistic sensibility of race pride.   
Cansler?s interactions with these national race leaders enhanced his representation 
of his family?s lives and his own experiences as cultural superintendents. Their national 
racial ascendancy narratives construct middle-to-upper- class models of African 
American respectability as race leadership. Cansler?s biographical statements about his 
grandparents and parents introduced black and white readers to a free black family?s 
ability to gain access to cultural currency skills (such as literacy, vocational expertise, 
and how to form their own businesses) and conscious decision to use their access to 
whites for themselves and the black community. It also introduced black and white 
readers to Cansler?s own recollection of how his family?s efforts facilitated the 
development of the next generation of local racial activists within the family and 
Knoxville?s black community.
77
  
A comparison of national racial ascendancy narratives and Cansler?s Three 
Generations shows the importance of recovering representations of local racial activism 
 117
in African American literature throughout American history. For instance, whereas 
Cansler wrote Three Generations and sold it from his home to blacks and interested 
whites, Douglass? national race leadership performance relied on the support of 
influential white sponsors and readers. White abolitionists were largely responsible for 
Douglass? ability to become the most influential race?s spokesman of his era.
78
 He 
established a public persona and narrative image of himself as the self- made man 
because he knew that his largely white audience believed in the rags- to- riches ideology, 
but Douglass was not a self-made man.  
In the Young Frederick Douglass: The Maryland Years (1980), Dickson J. 
Preston argued that Harriet Bailey?s ancestry provided her son Frederick with traditions 
of social respectability and opportunities for economic independence that most slaves and 
many whites could not imagine on southern plantations. Preston?s biography of Douglass 
ventured behind Douglass? construction of himself as the representative Negro of his era 
and the representative American. Preston?s biography of Douglass is useful because it 
revealed Douglass? relationship with his prominent matriarchal black heritage not found 
in the Narrative and only briefly discussed in his revision of his life, My Bondage and My 
Freedom (1855)
79
 While Henry Louis Gates Jr. was disturbed by Preston?s tendency to 
diminish speculation on the suffocating atmosphere of even the most benign prison house 
of slavery, in his article ?Frederick Douglass and the Language of the Self (1987),? Gates 
recognized that Preston succeeded where other biographers of Douglass did not because 
Preston looked behind Douglass? own account to see how much could be verified ?or 
disproved by independent evidence.
80
 Preston did more than Gates suggested. Preston 
revealed how Douglass? association with sophisticated familial and beneficial interracial 
 118
relationships and principles of proper domesticity enabled him to become both the 
representative Negro of his era and the representative American.  
Preston?s biography pointed out that Douglass had not sprung full grown out of 
nowhere. Records from the seventeenth century show that Douglass? mother?s name?
originally ?Baly?-began in Barbados:
81
 
 First Generation: Baly ca. 1701, presumed father of Jenny (jenny, Jinny), born ca. 
 December, 1745. Sue, born ca. 1721, or Selah, Mother of Jeney. 
Second Generation: Jenny (Jeney), born 1745, mother of Bets (Bett, Betsey, 
changed the spelling of name to Bailey, Born May, 1774. 
Third Generation: Bets (Bett, Betsey) Bailey, Born 1774, mother of Harriet 
(Hariet, Harriot), born February 28, 1792. 
Fourth Generation: Harriet, born 1792, mother of Frederick Augustus, born 
February, 1818. 
Fifth Generation: Frederick, born 1818, took the name Frederick Douglass.
82
 
The Balies managed to pass down the name as they were sold from Barbados to 
Maryland for five generations. The mere existence of the Baly name being passed down 
from one generation to the next can be linked to their ancestry in Barbados, but in 
Maryland the Baly name signified the long and intimate contact with aristocratic white 
society that placed supreme emphasis on ?breeding? and pride of family. When 
Frederick?s grandmother, Betsey Baly, married Isaac Bailey, they established the 
family?s beneficial interracial relationships and cultural currency traditions in Maryland. 
Although Betsey was technically a slave, she did not behave or live like one in 1797.
83
 
She managed to display a remarkable degree of social respectability and economic 
 119
independence. She made and sold seine nets to catch fish that were in demand as far 
away as Denton and Hillsboro in Caroline County. Her master, Aaron Anthony, also paid 
her $2.40 cents per birth as a midwife. She was clearly recognized as one of the leaders in 
slave community in Tuckahoe, Maryland.
84
 She was also the wife of a free black man, 
Isaac, who was as self reliant as she was.
85
 And Frederick?s mother, Harriet, could read 
and write and most likely had an affair with Frederick?s father Captain Aaron Anthony, 
the Baly / Bailey family?s master. But readers will find only a modicum of information 
about Frederick Douglass? matriarchal heritage in the Narrative (1845), and readers only 
get a sketch of the family?s prominence on the plantation and use of familial and 
beneficial interracial relationships in My Bondage and My Freedom (1855) because 
information about their lives weakens Douglass? construction of himself as the Self Made 
Man. 
To reclaim his life story and public identity from William Lloyd Garrison and the 
abolitionists, Douglass primarily used his matriarchal ancestry and downplayed his 
grandfather Issac?s social and economic independence in his second slave narrative, My 
Bondage and My Freedom. Isaac and Betsey owned a cabin in the woods of Tuckahoe 
Maryland where Betsey was a caregiver for her grandchildren,
86
 but Douglass barely 
mentioned Isaac in the Narrative and My Bondage and My Freedom. He was an 
independent operator as a sawyer of wood. He had business dealings with Captain Aaron 
Anthony, Betsey?s and Harriet?s master, and Frederick?s master-father, for thirty years.
87
 
His business was so prosperous that at least on two occasions he had the means to hire 
help. Douglass must have known that his representation of himself as a self-made man 
 120
would be undermined if he emphasized his grandfather Isaac?s social and economic 
independence.  
Unlike Douglass, Cansler?s decision to write largely for his community, and 
secondarily for middle class black readers and open-minded whites across the country, 
allowed him to display what role strong and respectable free mulatto race men and 
women played in his life and in the development of Knoxville?s black community. 
Cansler?s biographies of his ancestors and his own memoir were able to document, in 
much more detail, the existence of the social networks free blacks, and fortunate enslaved 
blacks like Douglass, used to gain various degrees of social and economic independence.  
Douglass? construction and performance of himself in between the Narrative and 
My Bondage and My Freedom (1855) revealed his struggle with Garrison?s paternalistic 
attitudes. The prominence of the self-made man ideology within the social mindset of 
Americans allowed him to respond to Garrison?s vision of his life and his own desire for 
critical praise as a significant literary figure and public speaker. Garrison declared how 
representative Douglass? experience of slavery had been. But Garrison could not help but 
note the extraordinary individuality of the black author?s rendering of that experience.
88
 
His interpretation of Douglass? Narrative highlighted Douglass? ability to appeal to white 
readers searching for heart- wrenching details of life in bondage and black readers? need 
of a role model of racial uplift, but he ultimately wrote a narrative that emphasized the 
value of his evolving self destined for mental as well as physical freedom and financial 
prosperity in the North.
89
 Thus Douglass? performance of himself as the self- made man 
eventually liberated him from his paternalistic white sponsors, and his careful 
construction and enactment of his life formed an ideological blueprint for black writers 
 121
who wanted to establish their own national racial ascendancy narratives to reach 
divergent white and black readers and realize their own career ambitions. 
Washington?s ?Atlanta Exposition? speech in 1895 permitted Washington to seize 
Douglass? throne as the race?s spokesman. However, Cansler knew that Washington?s 
speech was the type of national race leadership performance that did more to further his 
career as the race?s spokesman than facilitate racial opportunities for the black masses. 
Cansler suggested that, ?[h]is speech would appeal more to his auditors than the 
addresses of either of the others.?
90
 He perceived that Washington?s speech would have 
more of an affect with Washington himself and his inner circle than further the cause of 
the race. Cansler did, however, praise Washington?s establishment of the Tuskegee 
Institute.  
Moreover, I discovered that Cansler had written a speech that responded to 
Washington?s speech. In some old papers of Cansler?s, I found one of his speeches 
entitled ?The Past, The Present, and The Future of Negro Public Schools in Tennessee? 
(1914). Although he does not provide specific information about where the speech was 
given, I suspect it was presented for Eastern Tennessee Association of Teachers which he 
founded in 1912. In this speech, he offered an important response to Washington?s 
philosophy on Negro education. 
 Cansler?s speech signified his realization of how Washington?s famous speech 
shaped the debate about Negro education. Cansler?s own talk was designed to revise 
Washington?s vision of Negro education and his performance of black leadership culture 
for whites and for blacks. Like Washington?s famous speech, Cansler began by 
addressing the sacrifices whites made to establish educational opportunities for Negroes 
 122
in the South but more specifically in Tennessee. He realized that his experiences with 
whites in Tennessee provided him with more revolutionary examples of whites? 
involvement in the growth of Negro education. In describing ?The Past? he focused on 
Northern whites? decision to come to the South and risk their lives to aid the race in 
acquiring access to quality educational opportunities. He gave specific examples of this 
in Knoxville such as white Christian missionaries and their churches: The Presbyterian 
and Congregational Churches, the Methodist and Baptist Churches who were sending out 
men and women as early as 1865. He listed the creation of Knoxville College as one 
result of their efforts.
91
 
Cansler?s description of their efforts to develop Knoxville College resembled 
Washington?s description of white philanthropists? role in the establishment of Tuskegee 
Institute, but there were obvious differences. Whereas Washington clearly saw Tuskegee 
as his creation with the aid of white patrons, Cansler presented the birth of Knoxville 
College as much more of an interracial communal effort. Moreover, their approach to 
what needed to be done in terms of Negro education was also different. Washington felt 
he had to lay the majority of the blame for the lack of racial progress on blacks 
themselves, while Cansler offered a more balanced interpretation. 
 Cansler began his critique by challenging the commonly held belief that books 
and higher educational opportunities were only for whites.  
It was the old story of the dominant class trying to believe that the wisdom and 
mysteries of books were intended for it alone. But despite every handicap, the 
Negro public school made advancement in the thoroughness and efficiency of 
 123
their pupils, the pedagogical and scholastic ability of their teachers and the better 
character of its school buildings and equipment.
92
 
Cansler presented a history that has often been overlooked or ignored by teachers and 
schools then and today: free blacks? ability to establish schools of their own for 
themselves and for slaves in northern as well as southern cities. His knowledge and 
sharing of this history for blacks and whites who were participating in the continued 
development of Negro education in Tennessee was designed to inspire his interracial 
audience while he simultaneously offered important criticism. He argued that ?In many, 
many instances white school authorities are not interested in the work of Colored 
Schools.?
93
  He felt that their visits to colored schools reflected an indifference to them 
and the issues that they faced. He also asserted that he was tired of the flattery bestowed 
on colored schools that he felt many blacks school officials know that they do not 
deserve. He pointed out that white authorities have consciously assigned unqualified 
white and black administrators to public schools to hinder racial development. His 
criticism of whites and blacks would clearly be considered radical for 1914, but he did 
not stop there.  
 While Cansler did not take on Washington directly as W.E.B. Du Bois did, he 
presented a stern critique of Washington?s almost absolute promotion of industrial 
education as the primary form of instruction for the race.  
Short cuts in Negro education are as detrimental as short cuts in white people?s 
education. The lowering of the curriculum in colored schools?the placing of a 
premium on industrial education and a corresponding discount upon literary 
 124
training is becoming a popular idea in Negro Education and must be forever 
combated by those who are true friends of our race.
94
 
Cansler asserted his view that black students? education should be viewed as equal to that 
of their white peers. He perceived Washington and other national and local educators and 
race leaders? emphasis on industrial education as subordinating black students? 
educational development. His declaration of this view showed that some local 
educational race leaders advocated a more revolutionary view of black education.    
Thus Douglass? and Washington?s performances of themselves as the race?s 
spokesmen exposed some of the limitations of national racial ascendancy narratives. 
Douglass? self-made man performances of racial uplift forced him to conceal the 
existence of his family?s traditions of local racial uplift in Maryland that were largely 
responsible for his recognition as the race?s spokesman, and Washington?s uplift myth 
provided further evidence of his form of contradictory consciousness that many scholars? 
argue impeded as much as it assisted the race?s development. Cansler?s decision to 
represent himself as a local race man and local racial ambassador offered him more 
artistic freedom. He did not have to deal with the paternalistic views of white patrons and 
publishers. He was able to display a heritage of black leadership and racial progress for 
black and white readers that Douglass and Washington could not represent, because the 
nature of their roles as the race?s spokesmen forced them to rely on the self-made man 
and uplift myth ideologies to tell their stories.  
Nevertheless, writing primarily for the Knoxville?s black community prevented 
Cansler from exploring in more depth essential issues of racial identity formation.  He 
wrote from the position of being in an advisory role for the black community. He 
 125
believed his role as an author should focus more on the promotion of middle-class blacks 
as custodians and local ambassadors than as an author who investigates his ancestors? and 
his own subjectivity. This circumstance also limited the artistic expression of Douglass 
and other prominent black autobiographers as well because race?s spokespeople formed 
idyllic images of themselves to promote the race?s promise. Nevertheless, Cansler 
omission of significant details of his interracial ancestors? relationships revealed his 
anxiety. He concealed difficult racial identity formation issues behind romantic local 
racial activist images to gain acceptance from black readers and to promote values of 
local racial equality to white readers. 
Still, Cansler?s depiction of his grandfather William B. Scott and father Hugh 
Lawson Cansler introduced readers to embodiments of middle- class -minded black 
masculinity that Douglass experienced but could not represent in his narratives. Like 
Douglass? grandfather Isaac Bailey, Cansler?s grandfather and father were removed from 
both the racial and class hierarchies on large and small southern plantations because they 
were free blacks and models of the merchant American middle class. His grandfather and 
father share some striking similarities with Douglass? grandfather. Both Isaac Bailey and 
Cansler?s grandfather and father were in a social and economic position to provide for the 
family?s physical needs and social development. William B. Scott and Hugh Lawson 
Cansler were merchants who were able to gain a substantial degree of social and 
economic independence and provide educational, social and economic opportunities for 
their children. The Baly / Bailey?s may have been slaves but they also had unique 
privileges, which enabled them to make their own money, in some cases, and provide 
economic and social development opportunities for the next generation.  
 126
Cansler?s grandparents and parents privileges as free blacks were clearly much 
greater than those of Douglass? immediate ancestors, but in reading Preston?s Young 
Frederick Douglass: The Maryland Years, we learn that Douglass had a unique 
experience on the plantation. He had contact with his free black grandfather Isaac Bailey 
and exposure to his matriarchal heritage. He also had unique relationships with his 
middle-class white master-father Aaron Anthony and the Auld family. Moreover, he 
learned a great deal from his time with the Lloyd family. These unique situations 
provided him with proper domesticity values and some of the familial and beneficial 
interracial relationship privileges that Cansler?s immediate ancestors? relied on for their 
social and economic development.  
However, the difference was that Douglass could not represent his grandfather 
Isaac Bailey as a model of middle-class-minded black masculinity and his matriarchal 
heritage as a symbol of familial racial uplift if he was going to represent himself as the 
self-made man. Thus the absence of a more sophisticated understanding of Douglass? 
relationship with his family prevented the reader from learning more about how Douglass 
managed to achieve his status. For instance, Douglass? special relationships with his 
family and the white middle class and the Lloyd family allowed him to avoid his master- 
father?s fate. Douglass argued that his master father?s demise was a direct result of 
slavery, but it was not that simple.    
Readers of the Narrative and My Bondage and My Freedom would not learn that 
Douglass? father was a self-made man. Captain Aaron Anthony grew up fatherless. He 
rose from an environment of ignorance and poverty with little schooling to largely teach 
himself how to read, write, and do simple arithmetic. Anthony also learned how to handle 
 127
ships. In 1795 young Edward Lloyd V hired him as a captain of Elizabeth & Ann. Shortly 
after this achievement he received more good fortune when he married Ann Catherine 
Skinner.
95
 She was from a prominent Maryland family in Talbot County. Edward Lloyd 
V later offered him a position as chief overseer of the Lloyd estate in Wye, Maryland. He 
earned 213 dollars a year plus a rent-free home on the Lloyd estate for his wife and 
family.
96
 Publicly Captain Aaron Anthony became a Victorian-minded model of the 
middle class.  He lived by a code of pride, self discipline, ambition and life-long 
adherence to thrift.
97
 But misfortune dominated Captain Anthony?s life. His wife Ann 
became an invalid in 1818 and died shortly after, the year Frederick was born.
98
 And his 
sons Andrew and Richard did not turn out well.
99
 Andrew had an apprenticeship with a 
cabinet maker, James Neal Easton, and went to Indiana to make his fortune but he 
returned home a failure with a habit of drinking and gambling.
100
 There is no evidence 
that Richard ever did anything with his apprenticeship with a blacksmith except that he 
did buy a set of secondhand blacksmith tools.
101
 Douglass argued in the Narrative and 
My Bondage and My Freedom that Anthony?s hard luck was the direct result of slavery, 
but it could have been that his father did not have the social role models that Douglass 
had on the Lloyd plantation.  
Douglass? interactions with the Lloyds provided cultural references for realizing 
and preserving financial prosperity that his father would not be aware of. Young 
Frederick came to the Lloyd?s home in 1824 as Edward V took charge of the estate and 
became the State?s Governor and Senator with Edward VI waiting in the wings. The 
Lloyds maintained the aristocratic dynasty through what Preston described as 
advantageous marriages. Preston also pointed out that as slave holders of at least one 
 128
hundred slaves the Lloyds had developed a shrewd business philosophy. They seldom 
sold slaves, they never freed them, they consistently hired overseers noted for their strict 
discipline and they were considered by at least some of their contemporaries as harsh 
masters.
102
 Nonetheless, on the Lloyd plantation young Frederick?s experiences were 
different. Douglass received exposure to the type of cultural refinement that would one 
day provide him with the persona that commanded the abolitionists? and the world?s 
attention.  
Out of some eighty black children on the central farm, and ahead of the scores of 
eligible boys that belong to Colonel Lloyd, he was chosen to be the companion of 
twelve year old Daniel Lloyd, the Colonel Edward Lloyd V?s youngest son. 
Considering all the circumstances, it is remarkable evidence that even at the age 
of six or seven Frederick was recognized by his white superiors as an altogether 
exceptional child.
103
   
Preston?s analysis of the Lloyd?s early recognition of young Frederick?s promise revealed 
that at any early age he had access to the ruling elite. His black matriarchal heritage, 
complexion and innate intelligence made him an attractive figure within the Lloyd?s 
ruling elite cultural traditions. Frederick had to in some way remind them of themselves. 
He formed from Daniel a clear understanding of the contrast between the daily opulence 
of the aristocracy and the poverty-stricken daily existence of slave hands whose labor 
made it possible.
104
  He also adopted Daniel?s culturally refined diction. When the 
abolitionists later commented on Douglass? diction, he told them that it came from his 
time with Daniel Lloyd.
105
 Through his exposure to both worlds, he became a keen 
 129
outside observer. He absorbed facts, names, and events that he would employ to convince 
the abolitionists to select him as their spokesman for the abolition of slavery.  
Douglass? status clearly isolated him from the black underclass of slaves on the 
Lloyd plantation. He made no lasting friendships with the children of the Lloyd family?s 
field slaves. His playmates were his Anthony-owned cousins, Phil, Tom, Steve, Jerry, 
Nancy, and Betty. They would largely be considered as middle-class house slaves. His 
other playmate was of course Daniel Lloyd.
106
  Moreover, Douglass? performance of 
himself as the self-made man also did not include his relationship with his own children 
and whether or not he played a role in passing on strategies about how to live in-between 
various racial and social class worlds and the importance of modeling racial respectability 
and leadership.
107
 
Preston exposed how Douglass? construction of himself as the self-made man, as 
brilliant as it was, could not tell the whole story of how Frederick Augustus Washington 
Bailey became Frederick Douglass. Douglass? national racial ascendancy slave narratives 
could not address how his quest for his rightful patrimony began with the Baly/Bailey 
family and Captain Aaron Anthony, developed with his experiences with the Auld family 
and determination to steal literacy and self awareness from them, and ultimately ended 
with a life that resembled his time with the Lloyd family. I contend that Cansler?s 
representation of how he acquired self awareness from his family demonstrated his search 
for a new paradigm of racial activism.  
Cansler?s representation of his life offered a different, and to some extent, a more 
complex and broader perspective on beneficial interracial relationships. He described 
how Knoxville?s principles of race pride and achieving middle class respectability 
 130
influenced white educators? perceptions of the race?s capabilities. In Chapter III of his 
memoir ?A Boy with a Remarkable Faculty,? Cansler?s description of his experiences 
with the white Quaker community and with Principal William Hastings at the Freedman?s 
Normal Institute provided illustrations. He recalled how Knoxville?s black community 
shaped Principal Hastings? belief in local and national racial equality.  
Principal William P. Hastings was always on the alert to discover ability in his 
pupils. When he once discovered it he made every effort to develop it or would 
encourage them to develop it. He knew each of his more than two hundred pupils 
thoroughly and seemed to enjoy studying them to find out their inclinations and 
abilities. He performed this task so well that I think it highly probable that he was 
able to apprise any of them within twenty five per cent of what they really 
were.
108
 
He could have had but little contact with member of the Negro race before 
coming to head the Freedman?s Normal Institute, but he had an open mind on 
questions affecting them. He spurned the idea of the natural inferiority of the 
Negro race, and was often heard to remark that the abilities of his Negro students 
were equal to those of students in any other school with which he had been 
associated.
109
 
The black community?s belief in race pride and the Quakers? adherence to values of 
social equality helped Hastings realize that his students were equal to whites. Moreover, 
Cansler?s depiction of his time with Principal Hastings modeled for his black and white 
readers not only views of grassroots beneficial interracial relationships found within 
 131
Knoxville?s black community that should be emulated throughout the South and the 
North, but also ideals of whites? roles as superintendents for black communities.  
Cansler?s memoir also offered a response to Washington?s representation of 
beneficial interracial relationships. In ?the Struggle for an Education,? Washington 
described how his experiences with Mrs. Ruffner provided him with cultural currency 
skills that facilitated opportunities for higher educational development.  
I heard of a vacant position in the household of General Lewis Ruffner, the owner  
of the salt-furnance and coal mine. Mrs. Viola Ruffner, the wife of General 
Ruffner, was a ?Yankee? woman from Vermont. Mrs. Ruffner had a reputation all 
through the vicinity for being very strict with her servants, and especially with the 
boys who tried to serve her. Few of them had remained with her more than two or 
three weeks. They all left with the same excuse: she was too strict.
110
 
Washington?s depiction of Mrs. Ruffner?s reputation provided him with a model of the 
ideal beneficial interracial relationship to reach white and black readers. Like Douglass? 
interactions with the Lloyds, Washington?s experiences with the Ruffners helped equip 
him to realize higher educational opportunities. Slavery was over, but the rigid class lines 
between the ruling elite, the middle class and the working class remained. Still, like 
Douglass, Washington managed to reach middle-class status by earning a job as a 
domestic with a ruling elite family; and Washington employed that experience to perform 
as a national race leader and a national racial ambassador.  
Washington?s description of Mrs. Ruffner?s expectations for service produced a 
conservative image of whites as custodians for blacks. Washington wrote ?that the 
lessons that I learned in the home of Mrs. Ruffner were as valuable to me as any 
 132
education I have gotten anywhere since.?
111
 As a result, his model of beneficial 
interracial relationship allowed him to successfully promote a conventional ideal of race 
relations. Washington?s relationship with Mrs. Ruffner signified the promise of non-
threatening racial cooperation and prosperity. He also reached out to whites who had 
white supremacist views by appealing to them to take on the responsibility of aiding the 
race in realizing at least a modicum of cultural refinement and social respectability. His 
vision provided him with the opportunity to attract white sponsors and offer a modest 
critique of Jim Crow and white supremacist views.
112
 White supremacist?s dominant 
themes were that because blacks had degenerated into beasts they were not suited for 
freedom and full citizenship.
113
 Washington used his experience with Mrs. Ruffner as 
evidence of blacks? capabilities for white readers, and as a practical means of realizing 
social and economic upward mobility for black readers.  
Cansler?s association with his white mentors offered an alternative to 
Washington?s performance of whites? functions as stewards for the black community. 
Whereas Washington?s ideal image of a white steward was a white woman of social 
standing but limited power and a white mentor General Armstrong whom Washington 
revered, Cansler did not look up to white wardens within the local establishment in 
Knoxville. Moreover, he demonstrated that he perceived himself as their equal, and that 
they in turn were able to respect Cansler. He presented his relationship with the 
Honorable Samuel G. Heiskell, the mayor of the city, as an example.  
Hon. Samuel G. Heiskell, a man who came as near believing in equal opportunity  
and justice for the Negro as any white man I ever knew. A native southerner, an  
Aristocrat by birth and appearance, he was absolutely unafraid in dealing with 
 133
matters affecting the Negro race. From the public platform he proclaimed the 
doctrine ?give the Negro an equal opportunity to every other man in the race of 
life, give him every privilege that all other citizens enjoy, give him good  school 
facilities for the education of his children enjoy?and then if he fails in the 
struggle for existence, it will be his own fault.?
114
 
He used Hon. Samuel G. Heiskell to authenticate the local racial-activist traditions and 
local racial-ambassador conventions in Knoxville. Cansler demonstrated that he was not 
willing to sacrifice his dignity for personal gain or for a victory for the black community, 
but he still managed to get what he wanted from Heiskell.  
Cansler indicated that while Heiskell subscribed to the separate but equal 
doctrine, he still believed in fairness. Cansler used Heiskell?s values of fairness to win a 
victory for the black community. He convinced Heiskell to move Austin High School 
from a vice district to a new district in a better environment with more money for facility 
improvements.  
He (Mayor Heiskell) began the movement by advocating unpopular means that 
would have deprived the whites of their old and revered high school site (not to 
place the Negro high school, there however), that would have increased the tax 
rate and the city?s large indebtedness. He was assailed in the daily newspapers, by 
men in the street, but he kept his course?and we won in getting our high school 
moved out of a vice district.
115
 
He later convinced Heiskell to contact the Andrew Carnegie foundation to fund a public 
library for blacks in Knoxville. The erection of a tablet authenticated his mastery of local 
racial ambassador conventions. ?This tablet is Erected By The City Commissioners of 
 134
Knoxville in Recognition Of The Faithful Efforts Charles W. Cansler, Who First 
Conceived The Idea Of This Library for His Race?And Who Aided Materially in 
Securing It.?
116
 
 I argue that Cansler?s representation of his experiences with his family?s local 
racial-activist traditions, and his contributions to their legacy, challenged Washington?s 
conservative view of how to present healthy race relations. Washington felt that he had to 
mask his agenda for racial development behind images of black subservience. Cansler 
formed a response to Washington by documenting his family?s and other local racial 
activists and ambassadors? ability to gain recognition and resources from whites without 
having to sacrifice their dignity. The problem, however, is that Cansler?s vision only 
works at the local level. Washington?s assessment was arguably the only choice aspiring 
race?s spokespeople had at that time in American history, but Cansler understood that the 
idea that a national racial spokesman?s campaign would not address the complexity of 
issues that black communities faced across the country. Cansler also realized that local 
racial activists had to address the race?s struggle with internalized racism. Blacks had 
imposed America?s racial hierarchy on each other. He witnessed lighter skin blacks 
receiving white or lighter skin privileges in both white America and in black 
communities across the country. His representation of the culture of passing responded to 
passing narratives within the African American literary tradition.    
For example, Cansler?s biography of his grandfather formed a reply to James 
Weldon Johnson?s enactment of his protagonist decision to pass for white. Johnson?s first 
person novel, The Autobiography of an Ex Colored Man, (1912) exposed America?s 
culture of racism. Cansler in a sense responded to Johnson?s passing trope by presenting 
 135
his white skinned grandfather as a model of middle class minded black masculinity 
despite his origins. He formed images of a family?s white skinned black patriarch who 
was dedicated to his family and collective racial uplift. He described how Scott?s 
realization of his tragic biracial heritage governed his view of himself in-between 
contrasting black and white social realities.  
William B. Scott, the leader of the group, was the son of a white woman and by a  
Negro so light in color that unless one knew of the slight strain of Negro blood 
which he possessed would easily have taken him for a white man. It was said that 
he had been given his ?free papers? by his white plantation owner father and had 
made his way to the mountains of North Carolina. There posing as a white of full 
blood, he met the woman he made his wife. Certain circumstances forced him to 
reveal his strain of Negro blood a few years after William?s birth, (Cansler?s 
grandfather), and soon after, he disappeared, to be seen by wife and son no more. 
One rumor of the mountain neighborhood had it that his wife?s brothers could 
have revealed the story of the man?s disappearance had they chosen. Another 
rumor had it that he had gone to Canada and there lost his racial identity. But the 
mischief had been done when the rumor spread that William?s father was partly a 
Negro and therefore William was treated as such by all whom he came in 
contact.
117
 
His account of his grandfather?s childhood was designed to reveal Scott?s reasons for 
adopting a race-man ideology. Because Scott?s white-skinned father abandoned his 
family in Statesville, North Carolina to pass as a white man in either a northern state or 
Canada, as stated above, Scott realized that race pride and middle-class racial solidarity 
 136
were the only means of saving himself from his father?s fate. Scott came of age certain 
that he did not want to sacrifice who he was for the privileges that came with being 
recognized as a white man in society. He consciously chose to live his life as a black 
man, marry a black woman, and raise a black family.  
Cansler?s life history of the younger Scott offered a unique presentation of a race-
conscious- white-skinned family man as the embodiment of middle-class-minded black 
masculinity.   
While Scott alone would have little trouble due to the fact that he was more than 
three fourths white, with all of the features and language and mannerism of those 
of the white race, his wife was dark brown in color with Negroid features, yet 
with a culture that showed that she must have had a careful training unusual to 
members of her race of that period.
118
 
Scott married Maria Jones in 1838. She was the daughter of a widowed free colored 
woman, Nancy Jones. As the quotation suggests, Cansler understood the importance of 
stressing his grandfather?s beliefs in race pride. He knew that his role as the biographer of 
his grandfather?s life was not only to present his white-skinned grandfather?s beliefs of 
race pride, but also to introduce the role his middle-class-minded racial solidarity played 
in collective racial advancement.  
Cansler also used his own experiences with the culture of passing found in black 
communities to offer a critique of America?s racial hierarchy. In the third paragraph of 
chapter I of his memoir, Cansler recalled, 
That I was born a brown baby perhaps had more significance than anything else 
surrounding my birth. It certainly had more to do with determining my destiny 
 137
than any other circumstance. I was born a brown child but I had no early color 
consciousness until it broke upon me when I was six years old. I recall events 
years back of that, but it was only when I was nearly six that it came to me that I 
was brown, and not white like many other children with whom I played, and that 
because I was brown I could not got to school with Sophie, the little Scotch girl, 
who daily came to our house to play, and who seemed so happy with the children 
of our home.
119
 
Cansler stressed that race was the key factor in his life. He in a sense also builds on 
James Weldon Johnson?s performance of America?s culture of racism being taught to 
blacks and whites in school at an early age. When Johnson?s protagonist in The 
Autobiography of an Ex Colored Man learned at school that he was black, Johnson 
confronted his white and black readers with evidence that race is taught, but this scene 
was clearly designed to educate white readers because black readers lived it.    
Cansler wondered when learning that he could not go to school with his Scottish friend 
Sophie from his mother: ?Is there a school for brown children? And another school for 
black children? Will Josie (a very fair girl with blue eyes whose father is a mulatto man, 
and whose mother is white in color) go to school with white children??
120
 Like Johnson, 
Cansler raised important questions that undermine America?s efforts to establish rigid 
racial hierarchies but these questions were directed more toward black readers than white 
ones. Cansler made references to much more complex biracial people that blacks would 
encounter on a daily basis as more direct evidence of American racial hypocrisy.  
Cansler?s Three Generations is part of a forgotten history of local public figures 
who dedicated their lives to the social and economic development of the race. A study of 
 138
his life helps us better understand the value of the history of communal activism within 
the black community and in alliance with influential whites. His life reveals how these 
local public figures use of familial and beneficial interracial relationships, proper 
domesticity, and black mentorship enabled them to establish schools and newspapers 
designed to educate and uplift the race. Moreover, unlike the national race leaders? and 
racial ambassadors? individualistic performances of themselves in national racial 
ascendancy narratives for social class mobility that only a few could achieve, Cansler?s 
performance of his immediate ancestors, and his enactment of his own life, reveals the 
role the family and the black community played in forming collective opportunities 
within black communities. Cansler?s Three Generations offers a window into a black 
community that survived and in some cases thrived despite the fact that they had to 
struggle under the constraints of Jim Crow and segregation. 
Part 4 
Recovering a Lost History: Black Communities and Brown V. Board of Education  
 Cansler died a year before the 1954 Brown V. Board of Education decision. The 
black community that he knew in Knoxville, and others like it, began to disappear after 
the landmark case mainly because many middle-class blacks abandoned their roles as 
stewards of local black communities for greatly enhanced access to mainstream 
American society. Many of the prosperous black families decided to leave the traditional 
black communities for integrated neighborhoods, or newly forming middle- to- upper- 
middle-class black enclaves. Most history books define the Brown decision as a 
triumphant narrative; however, black intellectuals, judges and politicians have recently 
offered important criticisms of how Brown was turned against successful black 
 139
communities that Cansler and other local race leaders and local racial ambassadors 
helped to build. These influential black public figures who are forming arguments about 
how Brown was turned against black communities come from both conservative and 
liberal points of view. Conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas said, ?The 
case reflected an assumption of racial inferiority.?
121
 And on the other side of the political 
spectrum, legal scholar and critical race theorist, Derrick A. Bell, lamented Brown?s 
irrelevance. Moreover, Elizabeth Eckford, who braved white mobs to desegregate Little 
Rock?s Central High, declares that she now appreciates ?blackness.?
122
 And some white 
liberals have joined in the criticism including Michael Klarman who argued that Brown 
halted the mellowing of race relations in the South and hardened white resistance. Gerald 
N. Rosenberg leads the chorus of disillusioned liberals who grieve that Brown spawned 
the ?hollow hope? the Supreme Court could remedy injustice.
123
 
However, in Brown V. Board of Education: A Civil Rights Milestone and Its 
Troubled Legacy, James T. Patterson argued that the twentieth anniversary of Brown 
decision in 1974 represented tangible progress in the South: the end of Jim Crow, and the 
desegregation of most Southern public schools. Patterson believed that this progress was 
important in challenging the recent nostalgia for the black communities that Cansler and 
other local race leaders and racial ambassadors had created during the era of Jim Crow. 
Patterson argues that these black purveyors forget the ?crowded, often leaky tarpaper 
buildings? and the ?awful facilities.?
124
 On the other hand, Patterson may have missed 
these black purveyors realization of the need for race pride and local racial activist 
traditions and racial ambassador conventions found in black communities during the Jim 
 140
Crow era that could assist black communities who continue to be ignored by federal and 
state governments.  
Moreover, Patterson does not address the de-facto racial segregation within the 
schools: the existence of divergent white and black, separate and unequal worlds within 
many of these southern school Districts. Nonetheless, Patterson does at least recognize 
that Brown changed little outside of the South. Patterson knew that Brown did not 
challenge Northern de-facto segregation; he pointed out that the Supreme Court?s mood 
was altered by four Nixon appointees to the court and the country?s rightward shift. 
Taking what Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall ?called a giant step backwards,? 
the court refused to penalize white flight by equalizing per-pupil expenditures between 
school districts or merging urban and suburban school districts outside the South.
125
 Thus 
the racial mixing in schools was declining at the end of the twentieth century. Many 
white and black students lived divergent educational realities divided not only by race, 
but also by class and access to cultural currency skills, such as the preparation that would 
provide one with higher education opportunities. Cansler and other local racial activists 
and local racial ambassadors cultivated the creation of schools that mentored and trained 
teachers. They taught teachers how to reach poverty-stricken black students and equip 
them with cultural currency skills that facilitate access to higher educational opportunities 
within black communities, but shortly after the end of Cansler?s life these black schools 
were closed and the teachers were fired. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 141
 
                                                 
 
Notes 
1
 Noralee Frankel. ?Breaking the Chains (1860-1880).? To Make Our World Anew: A History of African 
Americans. Ed. Robin D.G. Kelley and Earl Lewis. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) 239. 
Noralee Frankel?s article provides an overview of the historical context in which Charles Warner Cansler 
presented his immediate ancestors? legacy and described how they shaped his interpretation of himself as a 
steward, local racial activist and local racial ambassador for Knoxville?s black community. 
 
2
 Frankel, ?Breaking the Chains,? 239-242. 
 
3
 Frankel, ?Breaking the Chains,? 239-242. 
 
4
 Frankel, ?Breaking the Chains,? 239-245. 
 
5
 Frankel, ?Breaking the Chains,? 239-245. 
 
6
 Frankel, ?Breaking the Chains,? 239-245. 
 
7
 Frankel, ?Breaking the Chains,? 239-245. 
 
8
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 34-36. 
 
9
 William, Clifford, Roberts Jr. The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip 
W. Gentzler. Baltimore: (Gateway Press, 2000) 440. 
  
10
 Roberts, The Cansler Family in American: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip W. Gentzle, 440. 
 
11
 Roberts, The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip W. Gentzler, 441. 
 
12
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 94, 95. 
 
13
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 118. 
 
14
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 123. 
 
15
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 150. 
  
16
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 150. 
 
17
 Leon F. Litwack. Trouble in Mind: Black Southerners in the Age of Jim Crow. (New York: Vintage 
Books, 1999) 53, 54. 
 
18
 Litwack, Trouble in Mind: Black Southerners in the Age of Jim Crow, 53, 54. 
 
19
 Litwack, Trouble in Mind: Black Southerners in the Age of Jim Crow, 53, 54. 
 
 142
                                                                                                                                                 
20
 Bartow G. Wilson. The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro 
Knoxville Today. (Knoxville: Trent Publishing Company, 1929) 7. 
Barlow G. Wilson?s book was an important primary source. His work provided important information 
about how Knoxville?s black community formed leadership practices that I defined as local racial activist 
and local racial ambassadorship traditions. Moreover, he documented important leaders within the black 
community that I used as examples of local racial activism and local racial ambassadorship. He also 
presented Charles Warner Cansler?s achievements as one of the leaders of Knoxville?s black community.  
 
21
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 13. 
 
22
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 5. 
 
23
 Maria Farland. ?W.E.B. Du Bois, Anthropometric Science, and the Limits of Racial Uplift,? American 
Quarterly 58 (2006): 1017-1019. 
 
24
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 15. 
 
25
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
26
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
27
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
28
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
29
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
30
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
31
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
32
 Wilson, The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 19. 
 
33
 J. Martin Favor. Authentic Blackness: The Folk in the New Negro Renaissance. (Durham: Duke 
University Press, 1999) 30.  
 
34
 Wilson. The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today. (Knoxville: Trent Publishing Company, 1929) 67. 
 
35
 Wilson. The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 67. 
 
36
 Wilson. The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 67. 
 143
                                                                                                                                                 
 
37
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) v. 
 
38
 Wilson. The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress Prevalent in Negro Knoxville 
Today, 67. 
 
39
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 98, 99. 
 
40
 Cansler, The Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 98-99. 
 
41
 Robert B. Stepto. From Behind the Veil: A Study of Afro-American Narrative (second edition). (Urbana: 
University of Illinois Press, 1991) 20, 21. 
 
42
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 14. 
 
43
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 160. 
 
44
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 160. 
 
45
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 160. 
46
 Robert B. Stepto. From Behind the Veil: A Study of Afro-American Narrative (second edition). (Urbana: 
University of Illinois Press, 1991) 20, 21. 
 
47
 Stepto, From Behind the Veil: A study of Afro-American Narrative, 20, 21.  
48
 Scott L. Malcomson. One Drop of Blood: The American Misadventure of Race. (New York: Farrar 
Straus Giroux, 2000) 230-235. 
Malcomson interpreted Hughes? view of the black artist as a race?s spokesman who would represent the 
race but also ignore it. The black artist would operate independent of the day to day lives of blacks because 
the race existed primarily within the black artist?s imagination. (231) 
 
49
 ?To Our Patrons,? editorial, Freedom?s Journal. 12, March. 1827. First ed.: 2-9. 
50
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 14. 
 
51
 Charles Chesnutt. ?The Free Black of North Carolina.? The Workman, volume 31, number 3. (Hampton: 
Hampton Institute 1902).138. 
 
52
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 22. 
 
53
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 34. 
 144
                                                                                                                                                 
54
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 34. 
55
 William, Clifford, Jr Roberts. The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of 
Phillip W. Gentzler. (Baltimore: Gateway Press, 2000) 436. 
 
56
 Roberts, The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip W. Gentzler,  436, 
437. 
 
57
 Roberts, The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip W. Gentzler, 436, 
437. 
 
58
 Roberts, The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip W. Gentzler, 436, 
437. 
 
59
 Roberts, The Cansler Family in America: The Ancestors and Descendants of Phillip W. Gentzler, 436, 
437. 
 
60
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 52. 
 
61
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 52, 53. 
 
62
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 60. 
63
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 69. 
64
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 69, 70. 
 
65
 George, Lipsitz. ?Academics and Social Change.? Cultural Studies and Political Theory. Ed. Jodi Dean. 
(Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000) 80-84. 
 
66
 Robert B. Stepto From Behind the Veil: A Study of Afro-American Narrative (second edition). (Urbana: 
University of Illinois Press, 1991) xi, xii. 
 
67
 George Lipsitz. ?Academics and Social Change.? Cultural Studies and Political Theory. Ed. Jodi  
Dean.(Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000) 80-84.  
The difference between academics producing scholarship within contradictory context and contradictory 
conscious circumstances are that in the later situations scholars are aware of having to develop traditional 
forms of scholarship to maintain their status within academia. Thus they recognize that they are creating 
conservative scholarship for their own particular purposes. I argue that contradictory context and 
contradictory consciousness circumstances for activist minded intellectuals resemble black intellectuals? 
existences as spokespeople for the race. They often realized the need to develop representations of 
themselves that conflicted with their beliefs to gain recognition as the race?s spokespeople. Black public 
figures used literature to articulate that they understood that they had to develop self awareness from 
whites? perceptions of them. Moreover, they realized that they had to learn how to perform to reach white 
readers and manipulate their emotions for recognition and support from foreign and influential white 
patrons and readers. See also W.E.B. Du Bois? The Souls of Black Folk and his interpretation of double 
consciousness. Dickson D. Bruce Jr.?s ?W.E.B. Du Bois and the Idea of Double Consciousness? and Paul 
Laurence Dunbar?s poem ?We Wear the Mask.? 
  
68
 Robert B. Stepto. From Behind the Veil: A Study of Afro-American Narrative 2nd edition. (Urbana: 
University of Illinois Press, 1991) xi,xii. 
 145
                                                                                                                                                 
I borrowed from Robert Stepto?s interpretation of call and response, a concept that originated in the 
rhythmic lead-and-chorus relationship between a spiritual leader like Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm 
X and his or her congregation. Stepto uses the idea of call and response to explore prominent literary 
figures responses to each others performances of their lives. While Stepto focuses more on the texts 
themselves, I pay closer attention to the racial and social challenges that each generation asserted in their 
narratives to the previous generation and to each other. Stepto?s book provided me with the historical and 
literary context to represent the differences between what I describe as a national race leader tradition and 
local racial activists? reactions to the national race leader convention.  
 
69
 George Lipsitz. ?Academics and Social Change.? Cultural Studies and Political Theory. Ed. Jodi  Dean. 
(Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000) 80-84. 
 
70
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 155, 156. 
 
71
 Cansler, Three Generations, 155-156. 
 
72
 Cansler, Three Generations, 155-156. 
 
73
 Cansler, Three Generations, 155-156. 
 
74
 Henry Louis Gates Jr. Ed. The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: Written By Himself. By 
Frederick Douglass. Library of American Edition. (New York: Library Classics of America, 1994) 1061. 
 
75
 Cansler, Three Generations, 155-156. 
 
76
 Cansler, Three Generations, 156-158. 
 
77
 Farah Jasmine Griffin. ?Who Set You Flowin??? The African American Migration Narrative. (New 
York: Oxford University Press, 1995) 3.  
Black writers? representations of migration narratives enabled them to build on the American 
autobiographical convention. Griffin?s work helped me develop a comparison between Cansler?s emphasis 
on cultivating opportunities for blacks within their communities in his book Three Generations and 
canonical slave narratives and autobiographies representations of how to achieve racial uplift by learning 
trades and to read and write and migrating to the North. 
 
78
 Paul Bagget. ?Transcending the Boundaries of Nation: Images and Imaginings of Frederick Douglass.? 
Process: A Journal of African American and African Diaspora Literature and Culture. 2, Spring 2000. 
103-105. 
Frederick Douglass was clearly the most recognizable African American leader from the antebellum era to 
the 1890?s. Bagget?s article revealed how Douglass? influential white patrons within the abolitionists? 
movement enabled Douglass to emerge as the representative American both in America and in Europe. His 
article provided important context for my interpretation of Cansler?s evaluation of Douglass? status as the 
spokesperson for the race.    
 
79
 Dickson J Preston. Young Frederick Douglass: The Maryland Years. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins 
University Press, 1980) 172, 173.  
Dickson J. Preston?s biography of Frederick Douglass searches beneath Douglass? construction of his life 
to fulfill an important literary agenda for himself and the majority of the race in bondage. Preston?s study of 
Douglass? ancestry was of particular importance to me because his research provided essential information 
about Douglass? grandparents and parents which enabled me to compare Douglass? ancestry with my great-
grandfather Charles Warner Cansler?s ancestry.  
 
 146
                                                                                                                                                 
80
 Henry Louis Gates Jr. Figures in Black: Words, Signs and the ?Racial? Self. (New York: Oxford 
University Press, 1987) 115. 
I borrowed language from Gates? text to develop my interpretation of the race?s spokespeople tradition in 
African American Literature. His text is useful in documenting how Douglass used language to fulfill the 
role as a black writer who employed his experiences to speak on behalf of the race and to the race. 
Moreover, his analysis of Preston?s biography of Frederick Douglass supported my use of Preston?s work 
in my dissertation because Gates is one of most influential scholars in African American Literature.  
 
81
 Dickson J. Preston. Young Frederick Douglass: The Maryland Years. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins 
University Press, 1980) 8, 9. 
 
82
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 5-6. 
 
83
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 17. 
 
84
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 17, 18. 
 
85
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 17-18. 
 
86
 William L Andrews. ?Narrating Slavery.? Teaching African American Literature: Theory and Practice. 
Ed. Maryemma Graham, Sharon Pinealut- Burke Marianna White Davis. (New York: Routledge, 1998) 18. 
William L. Andrews is one of the most respected scholars of nineteenth century African American 
Literature. I used his interpretations of Frederick Douglass? slave narratives to develop my interpretation of 
the national race leader tradition. I was able to refer to Andrews work to document how the success of 
Douglass? slave narratives enabled him to emerge as the first spokesperson of the race.  
 
87
 Dickson J. Preston. Young Frederick Douglass: The Maryland Years. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins 
University Press, 1980) 17, 18. 
 
88
 William L. Andrews. ?Narrating Slavery.? Teaching African American Literature: Theory and Practice. 
Ed. Maryemma Graham, Sharon Pinealut- Burke Marianna White Davis. (New York: Routledge, 1998) 17, 
18. 
 
89
 Andrews, ?Narrating Slavery,? 17, 18. 
 
90
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 162. 
 
91
 Charles Warner Cansler. ?The Past, The Present and The Future of Negro Public Schools in Tennessee 
(1914). Unpublished Speech 2-3. 
 
92
 Cansler, ?The Past, The Present and The Future of Negro Public Schools in Tennessee (1914). 
Unpublished Speech 2, 3. 
 
93
 Cansler, ?The Past, The Present and The Future of Negro Public Schools in Tennessee (1914). 
Unpublished Speech 2, 3. 
 
94
 Cansler, ?The Past, The Present and The Future of Negro Public Schools in Tennessee (1914). 
Unpublished Speech 3, 4. 
 
 147
                                                                                                                                                 
95
 Dickson J. Preston. Young Frederick Douglass: The Maryland Years. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins 
University Press, 1980) 25-30. 
 
96
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 25-30. 
 
97
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 25-30. 
 
98
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 25-30. 
 
99
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 25-30. 
 
100
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 25-30. 
 
101
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 25-30. 
 
102
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 42-47 
 
103
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 54. 
 
104
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 54. 
 
105
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 55. 
 
106
 Preston, Young Frederick Douglass, 60-61. 
 
107
 William L Andrews. ?Narrating Slavery.? Teaching African American Literature: Theory and Practice. 
Ed. Maryemma Graham, Sharon Pinealut- Burke Marianna White Davis. (New York: Routledge, 1998) 20, 
21. 
 
108
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 106. 
 
109
 Cansler, Three Generations, 106, 107. 
 
110
 Booker T. Washington. Up from Slavery. African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up 
From Slavery 100 Years Later. Ed. Rebecca Carol. (New York: Harlem Moon, 2006) 41-42. 
 
111
 Washington, Up From Slavery, 42. 
 
112
 Michael Rudolph West. The Education of Booker T. Washington: American Democracy and the Idea of 
Race Relations. (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006) 122, 123. 
 
113
 West, The Education of Booker T Washington, 122,123. 
 
114
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 148, 149. 
 
115
 Cansler, Three Generations, 148-150. 
 
116
 Cansler, Three Generations, 148-151. 
 148
                                                                                                                                                 
 
117
 Cansler, Three Generations, 14. 
 
118
 Cansler, Three Generations, 14, 15. 
 
119
 Cansler, Three Generations, 89. 
 
120
 Cansler, Three Generations, 90. 
 
121
 Laura Kalman. ?American Apartheid: A historian examines the effects of a famous Supreme Court 
Decision.? The New York Times, Monday, January 21, 2002. 
 
122
 Kalman, ?American Apartheid: A Historian examines the effects of a famous Supreme Court Decision? 
123
 Kalman, ?American Apartheid: A Historian examines the effects of a famous Supreme Court 
Decision.? 
 
124
 Kalman, ?American Apartheid: A Historian examines the effects of a famous Supreme Court 
Decision.? 
 
125
 Kalman, ?American Apartheid: A Historian Examines the effects of a famous Supreme Court 
Decision.? 
 
 149
Chapter 4 
William B. Scott?s Dream  
Part 1 
The Makings of the Mythical Free Black Community 
Free-black activists wanted to establish free black communities dedicated to 
abolition and racial development, but they had substantial obstacles to overcome. In 
Slaves without Masters: the Free Negro in the Antebellum South (1974), Ira Berlin 
argued that while whites and slaves resided at the extremes of southern society, according 
to law and custom, free blacks dangled awkwardly in the middle.
1
 Berlin stated that in the 
early 1800?s, they shared few of the privileges of whites and were burdened by many of 
the liabilities of slaves.
2
 He discovered that their precarious existence meant that they 
were socially set apart from both worlds.
3
 Moreover, he contended that they were further 
isolated from each other because of the class divisions within free black society. In her 
article ?Let My People Go (2000),? Debora Gray White would later support Berlin?s 
view of social class divisions within free black communities. She stated that differences 
in wealth, literacy, complexion and occupations resulted in different social- class 
connections and classes within free black society.
4
 
In addition, the majority of free blacks resided in the countryside in shanty towns. 
In North Carolina where William Scott was born so many free blacks resided with their 
white employers that the state decided to make white employers responsible for 
collecting freed-men?s taxes.
5
 Thus Berlin wrote that in rural areas free-black living 
conditions were not much different from that of slaves. He explained that white 
employers often quartered their free Negroes with slaves, and in the cities free blacks had 
 150
to develop semblances of respectable home life in back alleys, dank cellars, factory lofts, 
and the corners of abandoned industrial cities. The divergent geographical locations of 
free blacks made it difficult for them to establish communities they envisioned. 
Berlin argued that most small cities did not have large single black communities. 
Many free blacks had to reside near their former masters or their white employers 
because they did not have access to public transportation which arrived for white citizens 
with the omnibuses in the 1830?s. Moreover, Berlin contended that whites were reluctant 
to allow single free-black communities because of the fear that these communities would 
serve as breeding grounds for slave insurrections.
6
 
In the 1800?s the fear of slave revolts led to further restrictions on free blacks.
7
 
White southerners viewed them as the most likely catalyst. The worry was that slaves 
would see the accomplishments of free blacks and demand liberation from slavery and 
yearn for opportunities of social-class mobility.
8
  Consequently, by the 1830?s free blacks 
were disenfranchised in Delaware, Maryland and Kentucky. Moreover, by 1832 every 
southern state had enacted legislation barring free blacks from entering their borders.
9
 
The pervasive racial oppression, however, did not prevent educated-free- black-national 
race leaders from organizing communal-minded literary spokespeople conventions.  
Newspapers became one of the means of uniting free black communities and 
reaching out to sympathetic white readers. National race leaders and local racial activists 
felt that this was one of the best methods to promote free-black racial solidarity and to 
address the pervasiveness of white supremacist thought in North America. In Rewriting 
Race: Race, Class and Cultural Capital in Nineteenth- Century American (2004), Todd 
Vogel contended that black antebellum writers understood that an ideology of whiteness 
 151
was emerging and that they tried to stop it.
10
 He stated that black writers faced the 
difficult question of how to sound when they spoke on behalf of the race and addressed 
literate free blacks.
11
 Vogel claimed that they created their own version of the new 
?middling style? endorsed by the rising middle class in America.
12
 Comparable to that of 
the rising free black middle class, black writers wanted to turn this approach to language 
into a form of cultural capital.
13
 The hope was that this strategy of literary racial 
leadership would provide black writers with opportunities to challenge an emerging 
scientific racism, which ?scientifically? placed blacks at a lower level of humankind and 
made whites the standard by which all should be measured.
14
 
In New York City free black papers such as Freedom?s Journal and The Colored 
American, Douglass? The North Star, the African Methodist Church?s Christian 
Recorder, and Washington D. C?s National Era were sites for free black abolitionists? 
and fugitive slaves? national leadership efforts.
15
 Obviously the editors of these free black 
newspapers published articles about abolition, but they also found and published articles 
about citizens? obligations and rights in a republic. However, the demise of the 
Freedom?s Journal in May of 1829 was clearly a setback. John B. Russwurm and Samuel 
Cornish had started the paper in New York in 1827, but just a few years later the paper 
had folded largely because of the lack of financial support. Russwurm and Cornish 
intended for the paper to be a literary display of race?s promise to counter the slanderous 
portrayal of slaves and free blacks in white newspapers across the country. The demise of 
the paper signified the limited avenues to represent the race?s struggle.
16
 Other African 
American journalists had difficulty finding financial support and readerships, but free 
blacks in particular remained determined to find ways of expressing an independent 
 152
voice.
17
 The need for black voices became more apparent with the increase of anti-black 
activity throughout the North, South and the Midwest.
18
 In 1829, Ohio revitalized ?Black 
Laws? designed to discourage free blacks from entering the state.
19
  
Other national race leaders had already realized that literary racial activism can 
only do so much. From the 1830?s to the 1840?s some national free black race leaders and 
communal activists came to feel that black newspapers were not enough to promote the 
need for social change. They felt that the literary approach was important, but that it 
would not gain sufficient white support to abolish slavery, end racism and challenge 
white supremacy. This belief further intensified debates about abolition, racial-uplift 
strategies and emigration. Some influential free black race leaders recognizing the bleak 
prospects of the struggle, promoted self defense as the best means for realizing 
citizenship. For instance, in David Walker?s Appeal in Four Articles; Together with a 
Preamble, to the Colored Citizens of the World (1829), He argued that blacks should 
have the right to defend themselves against white violence and oppression.  ?It is no more 
harm for you to kill a man who is trying to kill you, than it is for you to take a drink of 
water when thirsty: in fact the man who will stand still and let another man murder him is 
worse than an infidel.?
20
 Many blacks agreed with Walker but they stressed other 
approaches to achieving citizenship.  
Frederick Douglass and Maria Stewart remained committed to supporting 
socioeconomic and cultural racial ascendancy strategies. Their emphasis on economic, 
social and moral development created a more positive image of the race?s future 
prospects in America. Throughout the late 1830?s and1840?s Douglass proclaimed that 
the pathway to racial progress and American citizenship would emerge from the display 
 153
of intelligence, accumulation of wealth and respectability. Stewart, one of the few black 
women on the speaking circuit, agreed with Douglass. While she understood Walker?s 
view of self defense, she focused on exhibiting messages of moral improvement in her 
speeches to blacks.  She encouraged free blacks to give up drinking and invest in schools 
and in seminaries. Nonetheless, other national race leaders disagreed with Douglass? and 
Stewart?s social and economic strategies.
21
  
Martin Delany, a Harvard-educated physician and nationally known black 
abolitionist, championed Black Nationalism and emigration. In his book entitled The 
Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of Colored People of the United States 
(1852), Delany wrote ?No people can be free who themselves do not constitute an 
essential part of the ruling element of the country in which they live.?
22
 While national 
race leaders had different views about approaches for the abolition of slavery and 
whether blacks could achieve citizenship in the Americas, they were united in feelings of 
racial solidarity and self- confidence. National race leaders? self- assurance protected 
them from proponents of slavery?s belief in white supremacy.
23
 William Lloyd Garrison 
became the editor of an abolitionist newspaper the Liberator. He made sure that he 
presented free black writers? voices in a manner that displayed their moral authority. In 
the 1850?s some national race leaders responded to Garrison by changing their strategy. 
They moved from a focus on the moral hypocrisy of slavery to acquire converts for the 
abolitionist cause to exhibiting moral defiance as the means of demanding social 
change.
24
   
   The 1850?s became the decade of some racial prosperity. The success of free 
blacks across the country bolstered national race leaders? self confidence. There was a 
 154
steady increase of free black land ownership all over the country. In Nashville, twenty-six 
blacks had assets of more than a thousand dollars, and in Charleston, South Carolina, 
which always had a wealthy free black elite, as many as seventy-five whites rented their 
homes from blacks.
25
 Throughout the upper South free black agricultural workers 
successfully lobbied for higher wages because slaves were being sold and moved down 
South.
26
 Free black success not only led to the establishment of larger black churches and 
wealthier congregations, but it also generated optimism that collective activism was the 
best means for overcoming white racial oppression.
27
 While these racial collective 
activist efforts were successful at the local level in ending the oppressive Black Codes in 
New York City and winning court cases in Richmond, national racial activists were 
unable to win countrywide victories over America?s racial discrimination practices and 
cultural convictions of white supremacy.  
However, historian Deborah Gray White pointed out that there were clear political 
differences between white and black abolitionists. While many white abolitionists were 
determined to end slavery because of its sinful practices, they did not possess the same 
fervor about colonialism, racism and white supremacy as black abolitionists. Black 
abolitionists wanted to employ language from the Constitution to challenge American 
colonialism, the institution of slavery and white supremacy, but she argued that many 
white abolitionists were unable, or unwilling, to make the connections among these 
powerful forms of racial oppression. They did not understand how much these racist 
social policies and practices enabled the institution of slavery to thrive in the Americas.
28
 
Additionally, national race leaders had to develop contradictory consciousness to 
remain as nationwide race leaders. Douglass had to promote views on the Constitution 
 155
that he did not agree with to appease his white patrons and influential white audience. In 
January of 1851, he investigated the possibilities for change. He lobbied for support from 
a prominent and wealthy abolitionist, Gerrit Smith.
29
 Acquiring support from Smith 
became one of the determining factors in whether he would be able to change his view on 
the Constitution and slavery. He wrote Smith that he was ?sick and tired of arguing on 
the slaveholders? side? on the question of whether the Constitution is pro slavery.?
30
 
Garrison and other prominent abolitionists were clearly against slavery, but they refused 
to challenge it on Constitutional grounds. They were not concerned with colonialism and 
racism. They were only interested in the debate about slavery. Thus they made their case 
against the institution of slavery exclusively from a religious perspective. Douglass felt 
he had to gain Smith?s financial backing before making a political shift. Douglass was an 
astute student of the abolitionist political landscape. When Garrison realized that 
Douglass had changed his stance on whether the Constitution possessed a pro-slavery 
stance, he rescinded his financial support of Douglass. Douglass must have believed he 
would be in financial straits if he did not gain Smith?s monetary patronage to cover the 
loss of Garrison.
31
 
Douglass simultaneously had to address the race?s concerns. In New York City in 
1853, Douglass and other black abolitionists held one of their largest black abolitionist 
conventions in history.
32
 They were reluctant to advocate black separatism, but they 
believed the fugitive slave law left them with no choice.  Free blacks in the South and the 
North could at anytime be kidnapped and enslaved. The absence of protection and 
citizenship in both the South and the North led to the emergence of a black separatist 
ideology. Phillip A Bell, in the Weekly Advocate, wrote, ?Whites may make ?Our Cause? 
 156
their cause all they want, but their efforts will be unavailing without our thinking and 
acting, as a body for ourselves.?
33
 It is within this context that free black and mulattoes 
constructed a free black race-conscious ideology.  
The performances of thriving urban free blacks and reports of newly freed black 
communities in newspapers, biographical sketches of prominent black citizens, slave 
narratives, autobiographies and novels countered widely held beliefs that blacks did not 
possess the social and intellectual capacity for American citizenship. Moreover, the 
ideology of the prosperous free-black community encouraged blacks to discover ways of 
helping themselves.
34
 Charles Warner Cansler?s Three Generations contributed to this 
tradition. He is one of the first local black activists to write a text that explored a free 
black family?s heritage of middle-class racial respectability and local racial activism.  
Part 2 
 
Charles Warner Cansler?s Construction of William B. Scott?s Migration Narrative  
Cansler?s representation of his grandfather?s life is an illustration of Farah 
Jasmine Griffin?s perception of the migration narrative. In ?Who set you Flowin?:? The 
African-American Migration Narrative, Griffin asserted that black migration narratives 
were marked by four pivotal moments: (1) an event that propels the action northward, (2) 
a detailed representation of the initial urban landscape, (3) an illustration of the migrant?s 
attempt to negotiate that urban landscape, (4) and a vision of the possibilities or 
limitations of the North, the West, the Midwest and the South.
35
 Cansler?s account of 
William B. Scott?s life as a black-migration narrative demonstrated how Scott?s white -
skinned appearance and cultural refinement enabled him to leave Statesville, North 
Carolina in search of a better life for himself and his family in the North. He reflected on 
 157
how Scott?s European features and relationships with free blacks and with whites allowed 
him to find tutors for his children and improved employment opportunities when he 
moved to Eastern Tennessee.  He focused on how Scott?s persona and vocational 
expertise led him to investigate the possibility of realizing his dream to become a local 
racial activist for Eastern Tennessee?s prominent yet small free black community. His 
representations of Scott?s thoughts on race and social-class mobility provide an analysis 
of both the possibilities and the limitations of local racial activism principles in Eastern 
Tennessee during the antebellum era.  
Cansler?s description of William B. Scott?s race consciousness and migration to 
Eastern Tennessee resembled France E. W. Harper?s account of local racial activism. In 
1869, Harper serialized ?Minnie?s Sacrifice? from March to September in the African 
American newspaper The Christian Recorder.
36
 Harper advocated group-oriented racial 
uplift traditions through the representation of white-skinned Minnie?s and her future 
husband Louis? racial self discovery and decision to become local racial activists.
37
 When 
well-intentioned whites rescue Minnie and Louis from the horrors of racism, they were 
raised as white children.
38
 Harper promotes ideals of local racial activism like courage, 
self sacrifice and race pride as the positive outcome of racial identity formation. She 
described how Minnie?s and Louis? racial self discovery represented race pride rather 
than shame.
39
 She shows how Minnie?s and Louis? discovery of their racial identities 
revealed a desire to participate in collective action for social change.
40
 Cansler?s 
biography of Scott echoed Harper?s performance of white or light-skinned blacks? 
adoption of a local racial activist ideology as one of the dominant characteristics of racial 
identity formation. Cansler formed a portrait of his grandfather as a white skinned man 
 158
who was privately and publicly committed to racial solidarity and group oriented uplift 
efforts.  
Scott?s plan to move from Statesville, North Carolina to Ohio provided 
compelling images of free blacks? ability to embody the aims of bourgeois humanism as 
an expression of race pride and racial ascendancy. He thought that if he could get to 
Knoxville, he would then be able to reach Oberlin, Ohio. ?My present mind is to go from 
Knoxville to Ohio. I understand that a quite a few colored people are living around 
Oberlin where there is a college that their children are permitted to attend. I am anxious 
to give my boy and girl some education.?
41
 Here Scott is portrayed talking to his middle-
class white friend Thomas Jenkins in 1840. Mr. Jenkins is selling Scott a wagon for the 
move. Cansler documented that Scott had already reached free black middle class status 
because he had relationships with middle-class whites and access to information about 
other successful free black families. In addition, his plans for his children reflected his 
belief in egalitarianism because he recognized that both his son and daughter deserved 
college educations.  
Cansler also used Thomas Jenkins? comments to emphasize the requirements for 
passing for white. Jenkins declared, ?I think it a shame, Scott, that a man like you would 
have to leave our state to go any whar. You are as white as I am, an? I wish I had half 
your eddication.?
42
 Here Jenkins is shown recognizing that Scott can pass for white not 
only because of his physical appearance, but also because of his intelligence and 
education. And Cansler utilized Scott?s response to highlight his grandfather?s rejection 
of the culture of passing for principles of racial solidarity. When Thomas Jenkins asks 
Scott about the injustice of being treated as a black man and second-class citizen, Scott 
 159
responded. ?And my fate in the world is not nearly as bad as that of millions of others of 
my race who are held in the shackles of slavery.?
43
 Cansler wanted his readers to 
understand that Scott considered himself as a fortunate member of an oppressed race not 
a man with a biracial heritage unfairly linked to an uncivilized race. 
Jenkins? comments about Scott also helped show that influential whites? admired 
Cansler?s grandfather. Jenkins? responded by saying,  
I heard Jedge Simpson say the other day that you are as well informed as any man 
in this country. An then, what are the farmers goin to do when you leave the 
county when we need our saddles and harness mended? I don?t believe thar?s any 
man any whar better than you at this kind of work.
44
 
Cansler?s construction of Jenkins? comments authenticated his grandfather?s potential for 
local racial ambassadorship. He also referred to Scott?s relationship with his best friend 
Rad to make black and white readers aware of other prominent free black men?s thoughts 
about America?s race problem.  
The representation of Scott?s and Rad?s relationship displayed free blacks? 
heightened level of sophistication during the late 1830?s. Scott and Rad became best 
friends because they had a great deal in common. Rad was also born in-between 
contrasting black and white racial realities. ?Rad was the child of an Irish woman by a 
Negro man.?
45
 Rad?s mother provided him with an ideal beneficial interracial 
relationship. Shortly after Rad was born, she placed him with a white shoemaker named 
Gentle. Growing up with Gentle enabled Rad to learn a trade, and he became a master 
shoemaker. He was also an intelligent man and well regarded in Statesville. Like Scott, 
he chose to marry a black woman and help raise a black family. Moreover, his reputation 
 160
helped to secure his wife?s freedom. ?Hester Schade, who was to become Rad?s wife, had 
been purchased when a small child by a German immigrant lately come to the United 
States who had seen the child exposed for auction in the slave market.?
46
 The German 
immigrant hated slavery and was determined to buy the child to secure her freedom.
47
 
After raising the child as if she was his own, he learned that his surrogate daughter-slave 
met and fell in love with Rad. When Rad asked for her hand in marriage, the German 
immigrant immediately registered her free papers. Rad?s racial background not only 
resembled Scott?s racial heritage, but Rad?s values and reputation also offered Cansler 
another important model of African Americans? ability to embody images of bourgeois 
humanism. 
Cansler?s representation of his grandfather?s life and friends resembled what 
Michele Mitchell referred to as Afro-American domestic texts in her work Righteous 
Propagation: African Americans and the Politics of Racial Destiny after Reconstruction 
(2004). She wrote that Afro-American domestic texts appeared in black communities as 
early as the 1890?s and that these texts were created on the pages of tracts, manuals and 
pamphlets.
48
 She contended that they were produced by the aspiring and relatively elite, 
they were created to provide the black masses with conduct advice. Aspiring poverty-
stricken and working-class blacks consumed them because they were searching for 
knowledge about how to gain mastery of proper behavior. While Cansler?s Three 
Generations offered similar anecdotes about proper conduct, he was primarily concerned 
with inspiring educated middle-class blacks and vocationally trained working-class 
blacks to become stewards for black communities. Moreover, he used his free black 
ancestors? and their free black friends? stories to provide his readers with specific 
 161
examples of how individuals and families can become important advisors for their 
communities. 
In Part 1 in Chapter III of Three Generations ?Scott and Rad Discuss Racial 
Oppression,? Cansler described how Scott?s and Rad?s conversations revealed the 
existence of two culturally refined free black men. Cansler wanted his black readers to 
develop racial consciousness by witnessing their awareness of America?s racial 
hypocrisy. 
Judge Simpson accidentally left a Baltimore paper in my shop the other day when 
he came in to talk to me about a new set of harnesses he is having me make for 
that pair of iron gray horses he recently bought. When he left, I stopped my work 
to read the paper. The caption of the chief editorial was, ?The Free Negro?A 
Threat to Our Internal Peace.? The editor advocated the forcible deporting of all 
the free Negroes in the country to Liberia. He says that Thomas Jefferson, 
Benjamin Franklin, Bushrod Washington and others saw this when they organized 
the ?African Colonization Society.
49
 
Not only is Scott able to support himself and his family by mastering trades and owning a 
successful business, he is also able to read and intelligently discuss the existence of racial 
politics with his best friend. Scott argued, ?I don?t see how it squares with the white 
man?s idea of justice to bring Negroes forcibly into this country when they did not want 
to come, and then forcibly to take them out when they want to stay.?
50
 He wanted to 
make sure his readers were aware of how American racism played a major role in 
producing oppressive social, racial and class boundaries.  
 162
Cansler?s description of Rad?s comments about wanting to become a Mason is 
just another example of the South?s manufactured and flawed color line. Rad?s discussion 
with his surrogate white father revealed the hypocrisy of the socially constructed color 
line.  
I ran up against something I did not know, just yesterday,? said Rad. 
?Mr. Gentle has been going out to meet with the Masonic lodge at least one night 
each month as far back as I can remember. I said to him yesterday that I had been 
thinking that I would like to join this order if there was any possible opportunity. 
He said their law said that one to be a Mason must be free, white, and twenty one 
years of age. By ?white? is meant one of full blood, though there has been such a 
racial mixture due to slavery that I do not know how anyone will ever determine 
who is a pure blooded white.
51
 
Rad?s words reflect Cansler?s view that pure whiteness is almost impossibly rare. Rad 
knew that whites, both men and women, have intermingled with the supposedly inferior 
race to such a degree that white society was unable to determine if one is ?pure white.? 
Rad?s opinions revealed that only an arbitrary line between blacks and whites existed as 
early as the 1830?s because of whites? sexual appropriation of black bodies. Many 
mulattoes responded to this social circumstance by mastering the culture of passing as 
white as early as the 1830?s.  
Cansler instituted a dialogue between Scott and Rad to present his readers with a 
paradigm that undermined America?s socially constructed color line. He also used Rad?s 
statement about his best friend Scott to promote his grandfather?s commitment to race 
pride.  
 163
You, Scott, could have gone where you are not known and could have married 
into one of the best white families. Your children and grandchildren would be 
Negroes in the eyes of the law if the little drop of Negro blood in you were 
known, but they would be highly respected citizens if the public was unaware that 
you had Negro blood. You did not try to ?pass over? to the white race, but there 
are hundreds who have. Don?t you know that many a white family (in name) will 
run into a skeleton in its family closet one hundred years from now when it begins 
to trace its family history?
52
 
Cansler?s portrayal of Rad?s assessment of Cansler?s grandfather offers a racially 
conscious alternative to the culture of passing. Rad argued that Scott could have easily 
reinvented himself as a prominent white man in American society. But his most 
important commentary was that Scott was an exception. He witnessed how passing as 
white became a prevalent custom throughout the antebellum era; he knew that many 
white people would realize they were legally black if they ever examined their family 
history. Cansler?s construction of Rad?s thoughts about his experiences not only formed 
an argument about the prevalence of miscegenation, but he also turned America?s 
construction of a racial hierarchy on its head. Cansler constructed Rad?s views from 
family stories. He used his interpretation of family stories to demonstrate how the culture 
of passing materialized as one of the dominant means of surmounting the color line. His 
historical construction of Rad?s opinions about Scott?s life and the existence of a culture 
of passing among mulattoes raised important questions about American society?s 
disturbing racial history, but he ultimately formed a biography about a free black family 
man?s dream of becoming a local racial activist.    
 164
The enactment of Scott?s discussion with Rad about moving North revealed the 
roots of the family?s version of local racial activism. Cansler?s account of this 
conversation displays a white-skinned black man?s dream of being completely free and 
organizing racial uplift efforts for the race. 
Each year I have had an ever increasing desire to live where I can be entirely 
free,? said Scott. We are not likely to have complete freedom for Negroes in this 
state in many years, even though emancipation should come to the slaves. Twenty 
years ago we free Negroes voted in this state. Today this and many other 
privileges which we once had are denied us as free men. I should like to go to 
northern Ohio to live or even into Canada. I believe that someday all of my race 
will be free and that the main body will live in the South. It is my great ambition 
to live to see that day and to live among and help my struggling and oppressed 
race.
53
 
Scott dreamed of participating in extending principles of American democracy to include 
the race. He wanted to witness the moment when the race obtained full citizenship. 
Cansler described how his grandfather realized he would not be an eyewitness to this, 
however. He documented how his grandfather observed that America had taken dramatic 
steps backwards rather than forward in the process of recognizing black humanity. Still, 
Cansler?s description of how Scott realized his dream of organizing racial uplift efforts 
generated images of the founding father of the Scotts? and the Canslers? contributions to 
the local race-activist tradition.  
 
 
 165
Part 3 
Family Values: Charles Warner Cansler?s Enactments of Middle- Class- Minded 
Black Family Men as Local Race Leaders  
 The Scotts? and the Canslers? local- race- leader tradition was born as the pro-
slavery argument gripped the public mind of white society. The crux of the pro-slavery 
argument was that blacks would never be prepared for citizenship because they were 
child-like and in need the moral guidance and supervision of white masters.  
An intricate system developed on the plantation throughout the South to 
perpetuate this perception in the minds of both whites and blacks. The institution of 
slavery maintained the mythology of white supremacy and black inferiority on the 
plantation by trying to prevent the slave from acquiring any semblance of self- 
consciousness. Two dominant practices emerged to deny the slave self awareness: 
constant disruption or destruction of the slave family and organized efforts to prevent the 
slave from acquiring access to literacy and cultural refinement. Slaves were not allowed 
to legally marry. Slave men had no rights to protect themselves, their slave lovers or 
children from their masters.
54
 It was a common practice to separate the slave men and 
women from each other and their offspring.  Moreover, slave men were encouraged to 
have sex with a variety of slave women on the plantation. While masters trained their 
slaves to remain active physically, the slave masters were committed to keeping their 
slaves? minds in atrophy. Slave masters implemented cultural norms and laws against 
teaching slaves to read and write. They recognized that once slaves gained knowledge 
they would not be satisfied with their existence within the institution of slavery. The 
masters understood that by preventing the slave from developing the ability to think for 
 166
themselves that the slave master was in the position to think for the slave.
55
 Thus the 
institution of slavery provided slave masters and their families with the means to promote 
their own racial superiority to their slaves. The institution of slavery formed an 
ideological model of dominant and subordinate race relations between master and slave.
56
  
Some of the most well- respected white historians continued to believe in and 
promote this view of slavery as late as the 1960?s. For instance in his well known work 
American Negro Slavery: A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Labor As 
Determined by the Plantation Regime (1966), Ulrich B. Phillips employed a widely held 
paternalistic perspective of slavery to describe the relationship between master and slave. 
?Masters of the standard type promoted Christianity and the custom of marriage and 
parental care, and they instructed as much by example as by precept; they gave 
occasional holidays, rewards and indulgences, and permitted as large degree of liberty as 
they thought that the slaves could be trusted not to abuse.?
57
  Historians like Phillips 
resonated with southern and northern whites because this depiction of slavery established 
a mythology of benevolent white supremacy as truth, and it enabled whites in the South 
and the North to justify healthy race relations defined as the dominant white and 
subordinate black races. Still, during the antebellum era the free-black communities in 
both the southern and the northern cities created problems for proponents of blacks? 
innate racial inferiority. 
The most successful free blacks and communal race leaders lived in cities. They 
could send their children to school, go to churches, shops and bars and bury their dead 
away from the constant supervising eyes of white slaveholders.
58
 By 1860, they were the 
most urban of all of America?s people.
59
 Nonetheless, where ever they went both in 
 167
southern and northern cities they encountered suspicion, hostility and in many instances 
violence.
60
 Most southern cities began to coordinate legislation designed to curb the 
population of free blacks because their success was considered a threat to the pro-slavery 
argument.
61
 Scott embarked on his quest to become a local racial activist in Eastern 
Tennessee because Eastern Tennessee had small-yet-thriving black communities within 
its cities and progressive-minded whites willing to help.  
Cansler?s depiction of Scott?s racial alliances with influential whites advocated 
progressive principles of citizenship. A form of middle- class- minded black masculinity 
was the ideal he thought that black men must develop. This included three ideal character 
traits:  (1) to operate within black and white social realities, (2) to provide for themselves 
and their families, (3) and to act as influential role models of local racial uplift for the 
black community despite pervasive racial discrimination practices. He believed that black 
families, and perhaps more importantly black men, needed role models of racial uplift; 
then and now the story of middle-class black family men committed to their children and 
their community have largely been excluded from national black artists? performances of 
themselves as racial leaders and racial ambassadors. Whites? adoption and application of 
progressive-minded principles of citizenship also played a substantial role in free black 
family men and local race activists? social and economic achievements.  
The ideal of white citizenship was that influential whites should promote values 
of racial integration: (1) to be willing to act as co-workers for the development of blacks? 
social and educational advancement, and (2) to keep their word to assist the race even as 
whites challenged their involvement in racial uplift strategies. Cansler?s enactment of 
 168
Scott?s life displayed the value of the black family man and activist within the black 
community and the importance of progressive-minded whites as allies.  
In Part 2 in Chapter VI ?Their Arrival in Tennessee? Cansler introduced black 
and white readers to other middle-class-minded black men who were committed to their 
families and the race. For instance, the Dogan family decided to take in Rad and Scott 
and their families.  John Dogan was the embodiment of an ideal of black masculinity. 
Cansler writes that even as a slave Dogan was able to realize the standards of middle- 
class black manhood by earning the respect of whites. 
John Dogan had spent the first thirty years of his life as a slave. A man of 
powerful frame and great physical strength, he had been hired out by his first 
master as a blacksmith apprentice and then as a blacksmith after he mastered the 
trade. There was an agreement that he was to work ten hours each day for which 
his master was to receive pay, and that for any extra hours above that John was to 
receive pay at the same rate as his master, and that this money was to be John?s.
62
 
 Note how Dogan?s time in slavery, physical features and strength develop a powerful 
image of  black manhood, and the arrangement that Dogan had with his master 
demonstrated the role Dogan?s physical prowess, expertise and work ethic played in his 
life. Cansler wrote that Dogan not only earned the respect of his master, but that he also 
negotiated a financial arrangement which provided him with an opportunity to buy 
himself out of slavery.  
When Dogan decided to use his hard-earned money to first buy his wife out of 
slavery, he promoted the belief that black men must sacrifice their own needs for the 
betterment of their families. 
 169
So busy did he keep at his work, and so careful was he at hoarding his earnings, 
that after two years he was able to purchase Myra, a young slave woman, that he 
had known several years and decided to make his wife. After another two years of 
hard work and of careful saving, he was able to pay over to his master six hundred 
dollars, which his master had fixed as a price for Dogan?s liberty.
63
 
Dogan realized that saving and spending his hard earned money for his wife?s freedom 
was his first duty as the protector and provider for the family. Cansler also demonstrated 
how Dogan?s principled work ethic and self-discipline enabled him to become successful. 
In 1847 Dogan owned a thriving blacksmith business in the heart of the town in Eastern 
Tennessee, a four room cottage, and he had nine hundred dollars in the bank. His 
administering of the protestant work ethic provided Cansler with an ideal illustration of 
black middle-class values.   
Dogan was the perfect recruiter for the free black community of Eastern 
Tennessee because he was the model of what could be accomplished in this small free 
black community. He convinced Rad to remain in Eastern Tennessee. 
?There are some twenty five or thirty of us free Negro families here in 
Knoxville,? said he, ?and I consider that we are all doing well. You see our white 
people here in East Tennessee have never been strong on slavery, and not a great 
many of them own slaves, and those not more than two or three. We grow no 
cotton, and there are no great plantations. Because of the friendly attitude of the 
whites toward us this is one of the best places free Negroes can find in which to 
live. You may go much farther and fare worse. I think Gentle will do well here as 
a shoe cobbler, as none of our race is working here at that.?
64
 
 170
Cansler constructed Dogan?s plea to explain why the white and black cultural landscape 
in Eastern Tennessee allowed Rad to become a local race leader in his own right. He 
became a respected member of the free-black community in Knoxville, a participant in 
the civil matters in his adopted city, and he realized his ambition to become a Master 
Mason and leader in that organization. Adding to this account, Robert J. Booker, a local 
historian, writer for the Knoxville Journal and former executive director of the Beck 
Cultural Exchange Center, Knoxville?s Museum of Black History and Culture, wrote that 
Gentle was nominated as a delegate to the Convention of Colored Citizens of Tennessee 
on August 7, 1865, at Nashville.
65
 But Scott initially had much more difficulty 
determining if he wanted to remain in Eastern Tennessee. Scott had to develop 
relationships with various whites in Eastern Tennessee to discern whether he could make 
a living for his family, provide his children with educational opportunities, and realize his 
dream of becoming a local racial activist. 
 Scott?s relationship with Dogan provided access to prominent whites in Eastern 
Tennessee. Dogan arranged an interview for Scott with Major O?Connor, one of the most 
influential whites in the area. Cansler?s illustration of Scott?s interview with Major 
O?Connor offered a historical account of the prospects for white-skinned free black 
tradesmen in Eastern Tennessee in the 1840?s. Major O?Connor initially was pleased with 
Scott?s plan of establishing a saddle harness-making business in town until Scott declared 
he was a black man. Major O?Connor then raised serious concerns about whether whites 
would ever accept Scott?s business even if he did remarkable work. Nonetheless, David 
Jones, a member of the Quaker community in Friendsville, overheard the conversation 
and approached Scott about the possibility of creating his business there. Jones was a 
 171
member of the Underground Railroad as were most of the Quakers in Friendsville, 
Tennessee. They had rejected principles of white supremacy and had instituted plans for 
helping fugitive slaves reach the North. But Scott did not make this decision without 
bringing Jones to see his wife Maria at Dogan?s home to discuss the matter.  
The Scotts? decision to move to Friendsville, Tennessee symbolized a progressive 
vision of free-black-middle-class respectability. Cansler wanted his black and white 
readers to understand that his family?s vision of proper domesticity involved a philosophy 
of egalitarianism. He emphasized that in the Scott and the Cansler family black men and 
women shared power in making decisions. The Scotts decided to leave the Dogan?s home 
and stay with the Jones family in Friendsville until they built their own home. They then 
tutored their children and found tutors for them within the Friendsville community. Life 
went quite well until the Civil War.  
In chapter V ?The Civil War Brings Persecution,? Cansler wrote that in the 
1860?s free blacks suffered as much if not more than enslaved black men and women, ?In 
New York in July of 1863 the mob of rioters who resisted the draft of President Lincoln 
in his call for more troops to put an end to the war, went through the streets shooting, and 
killing all of the Negroes with whom they came in contact.?
66
 And in the South, 
Confederate Soldiers and sympathizers invaded the homes of free blacks, took their 
household belongings, sometimes flogging them, and left warnings for them to leave 
town.
67
 Cansler understood from his grandparents? and parents? recollections that slavery 
was not a prevalent institution in Eastern Tennessee, and many of the slave owners could 
only afford a few slaves, so they relied more on them. He felt that for these reasons their 
masters had to protect them at least to some degree from Confederate soldiers and 
 172
sympathizers. He also believed enslaved men and women on these small farming 
properties knew how much food their masters? land could produce. There was at least 
some certainty for them within the chaos of slavery and the Civil War, but free blacks 
had no form of protection. Thus successful free blacks became special marks for 
Confederate attacks.  
Scott?s children were young adults when General John H. Morgan?s Confederate 
soldiers came into the Scotts? home and kidnapped nineteen year-old William Jr. They 
also took numerous quilts, blankets and other household belongings.
68
 Cansler described 
how Scott tried to save his son?s life by relying on the family?s beneficial interracial 
relationships. After General Morgan?s troops kidnapped his son, Scott immediately began 
a mile journey to Colonel William Haskill?s home to gain assistance in saving his son?s 
life, but Colonel Haskill informed him that he did not have enough political influence to 
convince General Morgan not to enslave or kill William Jr. and release him. Although 
William Jr. later managed to escape from his captors, the family had to leave their home 
in Friendsville and move in with Scott?s best friend, Rad Gentle, and his family in 
Knoxville.
69
 
Cansler described why Scott?s decision to seek the support of Colonel Haskill to 
save his son?s life was the primary survival tactic of educated free blacks. Their 
associations with influential whites were often their only defense against other whites and 
Confederate forces during the Civil War. Even as the family grappled with the loss of 
their home and the psychological trauma of William Jr.?s kidnapping, Scott again used 
his interracial alliances to create as much normality for his children as possible.  
 173
Cansler described how Scott almost immediately went to the Protestant Episcopal 
church Rector, the Rev. Dr. Hume, to ask him to teach his children. Hume, despite being 
a southerner, was an educated and liberal man in his views. He willingly agreed to tutor 
Scott?s free-black children and any other free-black children in Knoxville. Scott?s actions 
displayed his strict adherence to principles of educated- middle- class- black masculinity. 
He wanted his readers to observe that Scott saw it as his duty to provide educational 
opportunities for them no matter the situation because he felt that education would 
provide his children with the necessary transferable skills to find career opportunities to 
support themselves. Cansler also highlighted the dignity and courage of Scott?s white 
friends. 
Hume?s commitment to Scott?s children formed a compelling image of white 
citizenship. Hume kept his promise to teach William Jr. and Laura Ann even as a member 
of his congregation challenged his decision. Hume responded to the criticism:  
If these children were the children of slaves, I would not disobey the laws of the 
state by teaching them. Since under the law, they are as free as I am, I not only 
see no harm in teaching them, but feel my duty to do so. As to any sentiment 
against my actions that you speak of I can only say that I assume all of the 
responsibility for this action, and am willing to take the resulting consequences 
from it.
70
 
Cansler hoped black readers would recognize that there were progressive-minded whites 
willing to sacrifice their reputations for their free black friends, and he hoped white 
readers would admire Hume?s decision and determination to keep his word. The ability to 
develop alliances with white men of conviction allowed Scott to emerge as a prominent 
 174
local racial ambassador. He knew that he had to become a race leader within Friendsville 
and Maryville both near Knoxville, as the Civil War ended in 1865. He recognized that 
four million formerly enslaved black men and women were to be set adrift to fend for 
themselves, many uneducated and ill- prepared for freedom.  Scott?s creation of the 
newspaper The Colored Tennessean was one of the ways in which he provided his 
services as a local racial activist. He produced it almost immediately after General Robert 
E. Lee?s surrender.
71
  
Scott?s The Colored Tennessean may have been only a county paper, but it shared 
the vision of the black newspaper establishment. For instance, in the August 12, 1865 
edition, Scott covered the August 7 meeting of the Colored State Convention, with 
convention speeches covering the entire second page.
72
 The Freedom?s Journal (1827) by 
John Russwurm and Samuel Cornish and The Christian Recorder (1854) by Rev J.P. 
Campbell, The North Star (1855) by Frederick Douglass, and The National Era (1847) by 
Dr. Gamiel Bailey Jr. were designed to educate the race. As I mentioned earlier, these 
national newspapers offered important information about the Civil War and its legacy, 
about the debates in Washington, D.C. on Reconstruction, and about national race 
leaders? assessments of what black communities needed to do to survive and possibly 
thrive despite the fact that the North had largely abandoned the race by 1875, and that the 
South remained largely in favor of principles of white supremacy and violence towards 
blacks.
73
   
The creation and evolution of The Colored Tennessean, however, revealed that 
local racial activists had to develop a sophisticated understanding of the southern and the 
northern political landscape to survive. 
 175
After a little more than one year spent in the publication of The Colored 
Tennessean in Nashville, William and son removed their plan to Maryville, 
Tennessee, where Mr. Scott had lived after moving from Friendsville and where 
he was known to a large number of people. His paper became the county paper 
and was successively edited by Republican and Democratic editors. At one time it 
was ?the Blount County Republican,? and at another ?The Blount County 
Democrat? although many people in the County knew it as ?Scott?s paper.?
74
  
Scott recognized that his local interracial alliances had to take precedent over political- 
party affiliations. The Republican Party of Abraham Lincoln may have freed the slaves 
and developed a philosophy of instituting civil rights protections for the race during 
Reconstruction, but the party ultimately abandoned the race during Reconstruction and  
most southerners saw the Republican Party and its political views as a northern 
occupying social force.  
Scott knew that the Democratic Party denied the cruelty of slavery, ignored the 
Klu Klux Klan?s murder of blacks and its use of fear tactics to intimidate blacks across 
the South, but he also knew that he had to find a way of working with both Republicans 
and Democrats in Maryville if he wanted to provide for his family, protect them and 
accomplish anything for the community.   
Colored men in the South had begun to reflect if it were not better to make friends 
of the southern people by voting with them than to make enemies of them by 
voting against them. Scott was one of this number of Negro leaders who favored 
trying to keep the friendship of the southern white people by a closer political 
alliance with them.
75
 
 176
Cansler presented Colored men?s realization that they had to vote contrary to their beliefs 
as a survival strategy. Cansler argued that Scott and other Colored leaders believed that 
they would obtain necessary protection and cultural and political capital from whites for 
voting with conservative southerners. They surmised that voting Democratic would send 
a message to conservative-minded whites that loyalty to the South superseded America?s 
race problem. They clearly did not believe this, but they realized that this was the stance 
that they had to take for their own well-being and their families? safety. Laws that could 
have protected their human rights did not exist or they were not enforced. Their tactics 
resembled slaves? practices of deceit as one of the means of surviving in bondage. Slaves 
understood that they had to conceal their feelings about slavery from their masters, even 
if it meant that they had to lie. They knew that honesty about the horrors of slavery could 
result in severe whippings or death. Even prominent free blacks had to deal with this 
overwhelming racial liability.  
Cansler recalled witnessing a half dozen of the white lawyers and politicians of 
the town in his grandfather?s room on Sunday mornings. He felt that this showed that this 
approach provided Scott with access to influential whites. His grandfather?s political 
alliance with conservative-minded southern whites enabled him to live and provide some 
safety for his family. Moreover, he was also able to have a successful saddle and harness 
shop. His grandfather?s and other Colored Men?s philosophy was a precursor to Booker 
T. Washington?s viewpoint of racial accommodation that Washington adopted to acquire 
power as the race?s spokesman at the turn of the century. Scott knew, however, that if he 
wanted to achieve important social and educational victories for the black community, he  
had to continue to cultivate his interracial alliance with liberal-minded Quakers.     
 177
Scott?s relationships with influential Quakers led to the creation of The 
Freedman?s Normal Institute, a black school in Maryville designed to train blacks to 
become teachers in the community, in other southern black communities and in the 
North. Cansler noted, however, that his grandfather recognized that educating the black 
community was only the beginning of the struggle to achieve social and economic 
opportunities and civil rights entitlements in American society, providing newly freed 
blacks with educational opportunities merely facilitated the process of gaining 
employment prospects and American citizenship.  
Nevertheless, Cansler characterized the success of his grandfather?s school by 
presenting Booker T. Washington?s thoughts about the Normal Institute.  
Booker T. Washington, the greatest Negro educator, paid tribute to the work of 
this school in the following language: ?When I first went to Tuskegee I was 
constantly coming in contact with those who had finished the course of Normal 
Training at the Freedman?s Normal Institute. Most of these people were teachers, 
and they were thoroughly prepared and skillful teachers. I received great 
inspiration from them, and felt that perhaps no school in the South at that period 
was doing better work.?
76
 
Washington?s words show that Scott was part of a group of elite mulattoes? committed to 
improving the standing of black Americans regardless of color and class differences.
77
 
Washington?s words illustrate that Cansler?s grandfather?s school produced aspiring 
teachers that were prepared to take on the challenge of educating the race. Cansler used 
Washington?s words to offer his black and white readers the idea that Scott?s 
 178
performance as a local racial ambassador was part of a larger segment of the mulatto elite 
who sought political and social advancement for the race.  
  Cansler?s life and career as a local racial activist and local racial ambassador in 
Knoxville resembled the author Charles Chesnutt?s (1858-1932) life and career. Both 
men were descendants of free blacks. They were both teachers and principals of black 
schools and both men earned credentials in law and used their expertise to serve the race, 
but Chesnutt left his hometown of Fayetteville, North Carolina for New York City in 
search of better employment opportunities. Cansler also had the opportunity to leave his 
hometown but he decided to remain in Knoxville. Scott and Chesnutt had a great deal in 
common too. Both men were angered by assumptions that any white-skinned black man 
wanted to pass for white. They decided not to pass because they refused to abandon their 
families and were proud to serve as local racial activists and national race leaders. 
Cansler?s representation of his grandfather?s life also resembled the vision of a local 
racial activist in Chesnutt?s novels.   
 Chesnutt?s protagonist, Dr. Miller, in The Marrow of Tradition (1901), like 
Cansler?s Scott, was presented as a middle-class-minded race hero. This was where the 
similarities end, however. Chesnutt?s story of Dr. Miller revealed the reality behind the 
New South?s mask of progressivism. Miller?s heroic response to white violence in the 
fictional town of Wellington was based on the actual Wilmington, North Carolina race 
riots in 1898.
78
 Whites? savage murder of blacks signaled the crisis of color prejudice and 
the problem of social segregation at the dawn of the twentieth century. Dr. Miller?s dream 
of creating a black hospital for his race was destroyed; he realized that his apolitical 
stance and belief in the moral integrity of his white friends would not protect his family 
 179
and the black community from white supremacy and racial violence. Dr. Miller believed 
that by not getting involved in racial politics he would earn recognition as a role model 
from blacks and gain the support of whites. Whereas Dr. Miller did not engage in 
political activism, Scott did. He established interracial alliances that enabled him to 
emerge as a social force for racial progress despite the existence of pervasive white 
supremacy and violent attacks against blacks.  
Cansler represented his grandfather as much more race conscious because he 
abandoned the primary goal that Chesnutt avowed of reaching and educating white 
readers. Cansler, in his work, concentrated on blacks within his community and whites 
who were interested in his family?s life stories. He believed that blacks would get the 
most from the Scotts? and the Canslers? life stories. He hoped that they would learn about 
group-oriented strategies for acquiring skills to facilitate social and economic 
opportunities for themselves. He did, however, hope that whites would learn about the 
values of interracial cooperation from reading about the whites that the Scotts and the 
Canslers worked with during their lifetimes.    
Part 4 
The Second Generation: Hugh Lawson and Laura Ann Scott Canslers? decision to 
Uphold William B. Scott?s Local Race Leader Legacy 
As expressed earlier, throughout the South many free black families found 
themselves isolated from slaves and whites. Yet Hugh Lawson Cansler and Laura Ann 
Scott Cansler continued Scott?s local- race- leader traditions. Scott inspired them to use 
beneficial interracial relationships with white Quakers, state politicians, teachers and 
principals in Knoxville for the betterment of the family and the race.  
 180
Scott?s values shaped Hugh Lawson Cansler?s and Laura Ann Scott?s 
relationship. Hugh presented himself to Laura Ann as if he were making a case for 
marriage to her father. Hugh knew that Laura had reservations because her father felt that 
she was too young for marriage and that getting married during the Civil War was 
unwise. Nonetheless, Hugh convinced Laura Ann to elope because she loved him, and 
she realized he had met her father?s and her own standards of middle-class respectability. 
The elopement meant that Hugh had an additional incentive to show that he was a 
suitable son- in- law. He had to prove to himself and to Scott that he could protect and 
provide for Laura Ann.  
In ?Love Leads to Elopement? Cansler provided descriptions of how William B. 
Scott?s life shaped his daughter?s perception of whether Hugh was a suitable husband. 
The Scotts? home was a one-story structure with five bedrooms badly in need of paint but 
otherwise in fairly good condition; the yard was well kept. Cansler described how his 
father requested that his mother marry him. Cansler recalled stories of how the house 
stood back from the gate where a light-brown man, Hugh, well built, clean shaven, and 
with a face and eyes that gained one?s confidence stood one spring day in 1861 talking to 
Laura Ann Scott.
79
 Laura, seventeen, of a lighter hue, a dark mulatto type and taller than 
most women, watched and listened to Hugh from the house. She had clean-cut features 
and straight long black hair. As Cansler portrays it, Hugh was saying: 
?I, too, have considered all of this and have talked to David and Summerfield Key 
about it. The Key boys have finished college and are now lawyers. We work 
together in the fields many a day. They say that war is coming and they will go 
with the South, whatever comes. David said to me a few days ago at the wagon 
 181
shop where I work, ?Lawson, you are as free as I am, and if war should come, I 
will protect you with my life.? When I answered him that if war should come he 
would be away at the front, he said, ?Well, even then, I can take you with me as 
my own private servant, for I am looking forward to a commission as an army 
officer. It is already talked that a Sixth Tennessee Regiment is to be formed with 
James Gillespie as Colonel and with me as Lieutenant Colonel. I will not leave 
you here to be kicked around if you go with me.?
80
 
When Hugh described how the Key boys would protect him, Laura responded ?That 
would be very nice of him for you, ?.but what would become of me? I could not go with 
you.?
81
 Cansler wanted to demonstrate that his mother Laura Ann believed if a man 
wanted to be with her he had to make arrangements for himself and her. She helped Hugh 
form a new understanding of marriage and black masculinity. Hugh responded by 
arguing that his mother?s family, the Kanztlers, had influential white friends that will go 
with the South but would protect them from the Confederacy. Laura Ann could have 
easily asked her father to use his own connections for Hugh and the Cansler family, but 
Laura Ann believed that Hugh must provide the same degree of protection that her father 
would provide for his family. Throughout the South many free black families found 
themselves isolated from slaves and whites. Yet others like Hugh Lawson Cansler and 
Laura Ann Scott Cansler had relationships with whites that could and did offer them 
protection from the Confederacy.  
Because free blacks relied on their relationship with whites for their own survival, 
working for the Confederacy was an issue but it was not the issue. The most important 
concern for Hugh was what working arrangement would enable him to protect his family 
 182
from the Confederacy. Working for an influential southern family that he relied on for his 
own livelihood and his family?s well being was the best means of protection. Cansler 
wrote that Hugh considered himself as an employee of the Key family. Cansler realized 
that he and his father were having difficulty with the decision that Hugh had to make. 
Cansler knew that his father?s decision left him and his ancestry in a vulnerable position. 
He had to find ways to explain the complexity of Hugh?s situation. He begins by telling 
his father?s story, presenting his father?s relationship with slaves and describing how his 
father carried on his grandfather?s legacy.  
Hugh?s racial- and social-class background evoked images of Laura Ann?s father 
William B. Scott?s heritage. Cansler?s description of his father?s racial and social class 
background is worth quoting at length.  
About the later part of the eighteenth century there came into Western 
Pennsylvania a family of German immigrants who spelled there name Kantzler or 
Kanseler. There were five brothers, who with their large families constituted quite 
a large clan. Three of the brothers migrated to Burke and Iredell Counties, North 
Carolina, in 1801, purchased land, and became successful farmers. Conrad 
Kantzler, one of these brothers, with six girls later crossed the mountains and 
purchased farm land in Monroe County, Tennessee. Conrad Kantzler was a man 
of immense bulk, weighing about three hundred pounds, with such a pronounced 
German brogue that his neighbors scarcely ever understood him. In his home they 
spoke the English language in their conversation with one another. In addition to 
being a very large landowner, Conrad Kantzler was the owner of several slaves. 
 183
He was very indulgent to these slaves, and gave them much larger liberty than 
slave owners generally granted to slaves.
82
 
Cansler?s account of the Kantzler family?s migration formed another image of the 
American Dream. The large family found a home, professions as farmers, and became 
owners of large amounts of land. Note how Cansler established an underlying link 
between the large family and their ability to amass substantial amounts of land in the new 
country. Cansler was able to direct his readers? attention to the family?s capacity to 
redefine themselves as models of the rags- to- riches success story and the protestant 
work ethic. The Kantzler family?s success provided an important backdrop for Cansler?s 
treatment of Conrad Kantzler?s life. His enormous size matched his vast property and 
prosperity.   
 Nonetheless, Cansler?s account of Katherine Kantzler?s love affair with one of her 
father?s young slaves clearly stood out. He explained how the ability of some slaves to 
acquire social skills, cleanliness and the proper demeanor that attracted wealthy white 
women?s attention and affection. He also represented how some of these wealthy white 
women withdrew from society after having affairs with enslaved black men to preserve 
some of their moral integrity.  
 Perhaps it was this freedom from any restraint placed upon one of these slaves,  
Perhaps it was his intelligence or his comeliness?or all of these things combined 
that caused young Katherine Kantzler to become infatuated with one particular 
young Negro male slave. But whatever it may have been, young Katherine either 
lost her head, or premeditatedly threw all discretion to the winds, for it soon 
became known in the neighborhood that Katherine Kantzler was the mother of a 
 184
colored baby boy. Ordinarily in such cases society ostracizes the woman, but 
Katherine Kantzler did not wait for society to ostracize her. From the moment the 
child was born she became a recluse.
83
 
Cansler formed a contrast between his grandmother?s and father?s lives. Whereas he 
described his grandmother as an outcast, Cansler simultaneously explained how Hugh 
Lawson Kanztler eventually change his name to Cansler to begin the process of 
rehabilitating the family name. Moreover, he described how his father used the Kantzlers? 
social status and connections to gain vocational training, which allowed him to emulate 
traits of bourgeois humanism. 
 Hugh established an apprenticeship relationship with Tom Peace and cultivated an 
association with the Key family that helped him to provide for and protect his family. 
Tom Peace was a magistrate who owned a blacksmith and wheelwright shop in 
Maryville, Tennessee. Hugh?s expertise and reputation as a good worker for Tom Peace 
eventually enabled him to provide for himself, his mother and later for his own family. 
He was able to rely on Tom when the Confederate Army invaded Eastern Tennessee and 
Maryville. ?He immediately made arrangements with Tom Peace for the use of his team 
(horses) and wagon to carry himself and wife to the home of his father- in- law (William 
B. Scott).?
84
 Moreover, his work and association with the Key family provided him and 
his family protection from Confederate soldiers and sympathizers.  
??I am glad you came over,? said David Key.  
?We are now in the thick of war. As a free colored man, your position is  
some what serious. There is no danger to you from the older citizens about here, 
 185
but we have many hot heads and the sentiment around here is seventy-five per 
cent for the South. The average white man blames slavery for the whole war crisis 
and is not friendly disposed to your race as a whole. Some may be bitter because 
your mother is a white woman, though why you should suffer for that I just can- 
not understand. You and I have worked together in our fields many a day and 
every member of my family likes and respects you. I am going to the front as 
Lieutenant Colonel of a new regiment and can use you to look after my personal 
belongings. In this way you will be protected from any insult or harm that may 
come to you if you remain here. What do you say??
85
 
Hugh managed to revise the race relations mythology of the kind and trustworthy masters 
and contented and hardworking slaves for his own purposes. Key?s assessment of Hugh?s 
situation embodied the image of the honorable master; his perception of Hugh builds on 
southern mythology because Key recognized that Hugh was in danger and wanted to do 
something about it. Key?s expression of goodwill was largely because of the regard Hugh 
possessed as a hard working and likeable free black that the Key family had grown to 
respect. Hugh understood that he also had to use his reputation to protect his mother and 
wife from the Confederacy and their sympathizers. ?I am afraid I cannot do that, David,? 
said Hugh. ?My wife and mother are in need of my help and protection. It would be 
cowardly of me to leave them at a time that they need me just in order to save myself. I 
am not willing to do that.?
86
 Cansler?s representation of his father Hugh?s relationship 
with the Key family evoked images of southern mythology.  
 Cansler described David Key as an honorable southerner who was loyal to his 
friends in need, even if they were free mulattoes. He presented that Key defined himself 
 186
as a southern gentleman who aided in a free black man?s determination to protect and 
provide for his family.    
?Well, Lawson (Hugh), since you cannot accept my offer, and I agree with your 
reasons for not accepting, this idea suggests itself to me. Come and go with me 
only long enough for it to enter the thick skulls that the Keys are in back of you, 
and that you are rendering service to their cause as my servant, and this will help 
you, your mother, and your wife as well. If you stay with me only a month, and 
then come home, it will have a good effect, and I can find some good excuse for 
sending you back, and give you a letter besides stating that you are a friend to our 
cause and are not to be harmed in any way.?
87
 
 Cansler?s depiction of Hugh?s negotiations with Key illustrated the free-black- middle 
class? use of interracial alliances. Hugh knew how to bargain with influential whites for 
his and his family?s well being. Hugh?s skills and cunning, and David Key?s display of 
integrity, provided Hugh with means to protect and financially support his family. In six 
weeks Hugh left David Key at the front and returned home with a letter that stated, 
?Hugh Lawson Cansler and his family are not to be disturbed in any way since Hugh 
rendered service to the Confederate cause in general and to Lieutenant Colonel Key in 
particular.?
88
 Hugh stayed with his mother for a few days and then was headed to his 
father in law?s house when Ap, a free black farmer and owner of a small lot of land, came 
to see him. 
 Cansler had difficulty representing his father?s alliance with slaves because 
Hugh?s free-black social status separated him from the slave community. When Ap went 
 187
to Hugh?s house for assistance, Cansler described how Hugh was faced with a difficult 
situation.  
 In a section of Chapter III ?The Runaway Slave and His Cave? Cansler describes 
how Caesar, a runaway slave, trusted Ap. Ap, a free black from Eastern Tennessee, 
established close ties to both free black and slave communities. Ap did not see himself as 
being set apart from fugitive slaves. He had been a slave and Catherine Cansler bought 
him and set him free, and he was rumored to be Hugh?s father. When Caesar arrived in 
Knoxville, he must have learned of Ap. Caesar?s belief in Ap represented the relationship 
between fugitive slaves and some free middle- class blacks. Caesar fleeing slavery heard 
about Ap and found a way of meeting with him.  
Caesar was a giant, coal black Negro of at least six feet and three inches, and 
weighing at least one hundred ninety pounds. No one in the neighborhood knew 
anything about him, for he was rarely seen. He had been first seen in this 
neighborhood a year or so before this time, though probably fewer than half a 
dozen persons had ever seen him. Ap had seen him more frequently than any 
other person except the miller, and neither of these knew anything of his history, 
or where he lived, or how he sustained himself. The few times that Ap and the 
miller had seen him, Caesar seemed to suddenly appear, almost as if from thin air, 
and almost as suddenly vanish, to where no one knew. Rumor had it that he had 
his home in a cave somewhere in the vicinity, and that he was probably a runaway 
slave.
89
 
Caesar was a powerful slave who did not fear death. He had learned the art of deception 
and secrecy, and how he made himself visible only to people he trusted. His decision to 
 188
reveal himself to Ap indicated that a number of the fugitive slaves considered some free 
blacks as trustworthy allies in the struggle against slavery. Caesar had also learned that 
free blacks and slaves respected Hugh Lawson Cansler. When Caesar requested a 
meeting with Hugh, Ap obliged and arranged the meeting. 
 Ap?s and Hugh?s association revealed some of the difficulty of black fathers? 
relationships with their interracial sons. Katherine Kantzler used her inheritance to buy 
Ap and set him free shortly after her father Conrad Kantzler died. She also helped him 
obtain the land he owned and farmed on the outskirts of Maryville.  Nevertheless her son 
Hugh did not have much of an affiliation with Ap, but ?rumor had it that Ap was Hugh 
Lawson Cansler?s father, though if this were true, Hugh Lawson Cansler showed little 
recognition of it, for he always addressed Ap as he would address any acquaintance, and 
Ap never manifested any unusual interest in Lawson, as he always called him.?
90
 When 
Ap came to see Hugh, he wondered why Caesar wanted a meeting with him. Hugh had 
not been part of the world of fugitive slaves that Ap must have known well. Hugh had the 
reputation of being a political local race leader. He led by example. He had not gotten 
involved in political activism. Hugh had not yet embraced Scott?s principles of middle-
class black manhood.  
Cansler gives the reader the impression that Caesar knew of Hugh, however.  
Early the one morning at six o clock Ap took Hugh to the woods to meet Caesar, and he 
then took the two men to his cave. 
I can tell you two what I want with you. I?m gwine to tell you the story of my life 
fust. I ?ve told it to not another living soul, and am telling you  cause I don?t 
believe you?ll tell it, and if you do , woe be to you and your?n. I was bawn down 
 189
in Ole Mississippi near de Louisiana line. My massa sold my mother from me 
when I wuz three years old. Den olde Aunt Jinny kep? me wid about forty other 
little pickaninnies too little to do any wuk in de fields. When wuz little, dey call 
me Frank?.When I was twenty I took a wife, and den in time my woman had a 
little boy. All went well until I come home one night and dey tell me dat the 
ovahseeah sell, or had my massa sell, my wife and little boy, and den hell broke 
loose in me.
91
 
Caesar?s story provided an illustration of black slave vulnerability. Caesar decided to rob 
his master and become a fugitive slave, however. When the master?s and the overseer?s 
attention focused on another slave?s escape from the plantation, Caesar snuck into the 
master?s house, found two hundred dollars he had heard was in a bag in the home and ran 
into the woods heading northward. In this story, Cansler introduced readers to another 
white man who not only hated slavery but also was willing to help a fugitive slave. The 
miller sold Caesar food and did not tell anyone about Caesar?s cave. However, Caesar 
only told his life story to Ap and Hugh because he perceived them as natural race leaders. 
He wanted to use his story to convince them to join the revolution he was planning. 
 Caesar used his story to introduce himself to them and to request their support in a 
rebellion against slavery. He thought that his story would educate and inspire Hugh, in 
particular, to lead his race in war to overthrow white supremacy in the South.  
But I?ve asked you two to come heah for suumpu?n else. I heah dat massa 
Linkum?s army is near in Knoxville. ?De army ob de lawd campeth roun? about.? I 
have a plan where I needs you boys and all true men to follow me and help me. 
We can start right here in these Tennessee mountains a move dat will cause de 
 190
slaves everywhar to rise up and strike for dere freedom. With only fifteen or 
twenty men we can strike agin de McBee place over on de river, burn his big 
mansion, and kill all de white folk dat may get in the way, and git some of his 
slaves to go wid us. McBee?s got several hundred slaves, and his sister?s got more 
dan a thousand on a big plantation on de Mississippi near whar I come from. If we 
git hard pressed we can make our way to massa Linkum?s army, which is not 
more dan a days hard travel. Will you boys go wid me in dis fight for our race?s 
freedom?
92
 
Caesar?s plan was a grassroots idea for violent liberation from the institution of slavery. 
His request for Ap?s and Hugh?s support evoked images of Denmark Vesey?s 1822 plan 
to take over Charleston, South Carolina. Vesey, a free black from Charleston used his 
status as a well-respected free black Methodist church organizer to unify free blacks and 
slaves in a violent insurrection against slavery. Whereas Vesey?s plan was more elaborate 
because it involved Gullah Jack Pritchard, an African priest from Mozambique, and 
Monday Gell, another one of his lieutenants, who wrote two letters to the president of 
Santo Domingo seeking support for the insurrection, Caesar?s plan resembled Vesey?s 
because he wanted Ap and Hugh to be his lieutenants.
93
  
 Hugh wanted no part of Caesar?s plan. He had read about Turner?s rebellion and 
he thought that such rebellions only ended in the senseless deaths of fugitive slaves. 
Cansler described how Hugh?s command of history demonstrated that he had a different 
view of slave rebellion than Caesar and Ap.  
?Caesar, any such plan as you have mentioned will end in failure. Do you know 
that a slave named Nat Turner in 1831 attempted the very thing you have in 
 191
mind? Turner and his men were captured and hung. John Brown, a white man, 
attempted the same thing a few years ago, some of his followers were killed, and 
he was captured and hung. If your plan should succeed, and you and your men 
were to reach General Burnside?s army at Knoxville, the General would simply 
turn you over to state authorities who would make short work of you. I can not 
follow such a wild plan.?
94
    
Hugh?s explanations revealed how his life contrasted with Caesar?s. Hugh?s primary 
concern was his family and the ability to protect and provide for them. He did not view 
the North as his savior. He knew slavery was wrong, but he did not believe it was his 
primary duty to lead a violent rebellion against it. 
Hugh was, however, trying to reach Caesar and make him conscious of the fact 
that the plan would not work. Hugh?s most important comment was that the Union 
soldiers were not necessarily co-conspirators in the war against slavery. Cansler wanted 
his readers to gain a heightened understanding of the limitations of the Union army in 
facilitating the abolition of slavery. Hugh knew that the Union was much more concerned 
with unifying the nation than freeing the slaves. The North and the Union army offered 
ambiguous responses to the institution of slavery. Caesar tried to convince the men 
otherwise, but after the meeting Caesar took the men to where they had met earlier and 
Hugh Lawson never saw Caesar again. Hugh?s dialogue with Caesar about insurrection 
resembled Chesnutt?s representation of middle-class black masculinity in The Marrow 
Tradition.  
Chesnutt?s depiction of Josh, an imposing working-class black man, and Dr. 
Miller, a resolute model of the educated black middle class, and their debate about how to 
 192
respond to white violence provides a powerful image of the emasculation of middle-class 
black manhood. Josh was willing to die for the cause of freedom. He decided to defend 
himself against white supremacy and violence, even if it meant death. His determination 
to fight back exhibited a belief in dying as a man rather than living as a coward. When 
Josh advocated taking arms and defending themselves against white violence, Dr. Miller 
responds,  
My advice is not heroic, but I think it is wise. In this riot we are placed as we 
should be in a war: we have no territory, base of supplies, no organization, no 
outside sympathy, ---we stand in the position of a race, in a case like this, without 
money and without friends. Our time will come, ---the time when we can 
command respect for our rights; but it is not yet in sight. Give it up, boys, and 
wait. Good may come of this after all.
95
    
Dr. Miller?s advice revealed just as much about his feelings of isolation and 
disillusionment as it did about the race?s dire situation in the fictional town of 
Wellington. He wondered if he had the courage to sacrifice his life for a worthy cause 
even if it was hopeless. ?Miller, while entirely convinced that he had acted wisely in 
declining to accompany them, was yet conscious of a distinct feeling of shame and envy 
that he, too, did not feel impelled to throw his life in a hopeless struggle.?
96
 Dr. Miller?s 
statement revealed Chesnutt?s perception of the emasculation of middle class black 
manhood.  
While Cansler arguably fails to align his father with the slave community in this 
instance, he was able to draw from another story to present his father as part of the 
family?s legacy. Cansler relied on Hugh?s volunteering to guide General Sherman?s 
 193
Union forces to Knoxville to aid General Burnside?s troops in their battle with General 
Longstreet?s Confederate army. Hugh?s choice allowed Cansler to represent his father as 
part of the Scott family?s participation in country-wide local racial activist efforts.  
 Many successful free blacks? rejection of slaves and folk culture impeded the 
establishment of cohesiveness between middle-class and working-class blacks. Numerous 
free middle-class blacks suffered from internalized racism. They wanted to exhibit only 
postures of European cultural refinement. Thus, they did not acknowledge their use of 
trickster rituals as survival techniques, but Cansler?s representation of Hugh?s ability to 
maneuver between black and white worlds and the Confederacy and Union armies 
demonstrated that black trickster rituals were not separate from but an integral part of the 
free middle-class blacks? ways of life. They too used trickster rituals to survive and 
perform as race-conscious leaders in between various white and black communities.
97
  
Hugh?s reliance on a prominent southern white family for his protection, and his 
new wife?s safety, symbolized free blacks? realization of their complex power 
relationships with whites. Many blacks and whites may consider Hugh?s decision to work 
for the Confederacy as a moral contradiction. Some might argue that his choice is a 
betrayal of his racial identity. Hugh did not believe that he had a choice. He felt that there 
was no opportunity to really express his free will. Free blacks managed to survive 
because they recognized the complexity of their relationship with whites. They knew that 
whites denied them recognition as human beings within society and raped and killed 
family members and friends, but they also had to understand that their associations with 
whites enabled them to productively work for white families to establish kinship 
associations. These surrogate familial kinships enabled free blacks to gain recognition of 
 194
their humanity from whites. They were keenly aware of how successfully performing 
these kinship relationships with whites could save their lives and members of their 
families? lives.
98
    
Moreover, Hugh?s ability to work within and against southerners? perception of 
race relations while believing in and supporting the Union army?s Reconstruction policies 
aided Laura Ann. Hugh?s local race heroism allowed Laura Ann Scott Cansler access to 
General Ambrose Burnside. She capitalized on her husband?s heroic efforts to convince 
General Burnside to support the establishment of a free black school in Knoxville in 
1863.    
Laura Ann Scott Cansler carried on her father?s local racial activist legacy as the 
Union forces gained control of Knoxville and as later General Lee surrendered to General 
Grant. Cansler described how many historians of the Civil War pay tribute to northern 
whites who came to the South after the Civil War specifically to help the race, but he 
realized that his mother was part of a larger community of successful free black race 
leaders that have been either ignored or overlooked. Free blacks understood the power of 
organized activism against slavery and colonization. Many of them rejected principles of 
race relations that allowed them to live comfortably as second-class citizens in favor of 
collective racial activism. Substantial numbers of free blacks decided to take a stand 
against slaveholders and politicians who were advocates of colonization and slavery.
99
 
Nonetheless, many black and white scholars and common citizens are unaware that a 
large number of free blacks recognized that the fight against slavery and colonization was 
a fight for themselves and for their brothers and sisters in bondage.  
 195
In his chapter ?Freedmen Tell Stories of Slavery,? Cansler related that ??.there 
was a class of leaders too often forgotten or disregarded, of colored men and women who 
had been more fortunate than other members of their race in having the opportunity to 
acquire some education which fitted them for the leadership of the race.?
100
 He realized 
that a focus on their efforts enabled a new generation to understand the role free black 
families played in black uplift. His definition of leadership is not national race leadership. 
It is a different form of leadership that I have defined as stewardship. He wrote that ?The 
intellectual and spiritual needs of the freed race were attempted to be met in the 
organization and building of black churches, in the establishment of day schools, night 
schools and Sunday Schools.?
101
 He used Three Generations to document how this 
forgotten group of leaders devoted themselves to the creation of a social and educational 
black infrastructure.  
Cansler?s mother Laura Ann Scott Cansler committed her life to addressing the 
intellectual and spiritual needs of the race during and after the Civil War. She established 
the first school for free blacks in 1863. Her teaching during the day ended because she 
had to take care of her two children. 
But she could teach in the Night School when her husband could be home at night 
to look after the children, for he was better fitted for that job than for teaching 
school. And she could teach Sunday school, for her husband was willing to take 
over the children for that purpose on Sunday mornings. And as the children grew 
older, Willie, the older, became old enough to see after Sammie, the youngest 
child. She took over such additional duties as organizing and sponsoring the 
 196
Young People?s Temperance Society, and the formation of a debating club to 
train the young men and women in the art of public speaking.
102
 
Cansler?s biographical depiction of his parent?s marriage resembled that of black 
women?s post-Reconstruction novels. Frances Harper?s Iola Leroy (1892), Amelia E. 
Johnson?s The Hazel Family (1894) and Pauline Hopkins? Contending Forces (1900) 
constructed models of black womanhood as the domestic nurturer, spiritual counselor, 
moral advocate, social activist and academic teacher, and as the confident, charming and 
resourceful superintendent of attractive black homes.
103
 Three Generations extended this 
model to include middle-class-minded black manhood. Cansler considered his father?s 
support of his mother?s career aspirations as the family?s way of promoting values of 
achieving self definition, race pride, family-formation and communal uplift. Hugh?s 
participation in rearing the children enabled Laura Ann Scott Cansler to emerge as a 
social force in Knoxville and fulfill her father?s wishes. 
   Of all of Laura Ann?s accomplishments for the black community, she was most 
proud of the night school. 
?These older people are so willing and eager to learn,? she used to say. ?Though 
some of them are seventy years of age and more, they crowd in early each night 
and want to remain even after the hour for closing school. The great ambition of 
most of them is to learn the Bible. With some of them it is to learn to write so that 
they can communicate with distant friends. How clumsily they held their pencils 
to begin with! They took hold of them very much after the way they take hold of a 
hoe or a shovel. It often takes nearly a month of hard work to get them to hold 
their pencils properly. But when they finally succeed they are certainly proud. 
 197
?Aunt Chloe Robinson,? after four months of hard work finally succeeded in 
scribbling her name, and she could not have been happier by an invitation to a 
Presidential Address.?
104
 
Her pride in the creation of the Night School showed that she wanted to do the day- to- 
day work of helping the black community gain social skills and spiritual fulfillment 
through education. Her observations of her students? progress represented the discipline 
needed to assist the race in acquiring fundamental skills for racial uplift during the Civil 
War and Reconstruction. Cansler?s mother?s career as a local racial activist was a 
precursor of a much larger movement for universal black public school education in the 
South.  
 The Scotts? and the Canslers? roles as local racial activists for the development of 
black schools resembled black politicians? efforts to lobby the Republican party to 
legalize public education for blacks in former Confederate states.
105
 Laura Ann Scott 
Cansler was one of the pioneers in the effort to coordinate grassroots movements to build, 
fund, and staff schools. Her work coincided with the hard work of other local racial 
activists. Their commitment provided educational opportunities for blacks before 
southern states had committed to providing public educational opportunities for blacks, 
which began in the 1870?s. Still, many major cities did not have adequate educational 
facilities until the late 1900?s.
106
 
 One of Laura Ann?s pupil?s life stories offered an alternative interpretation of the 
white-skinned black man?s life in bondage. When she asked her students to talk and tell 
her about themselves, Jube Bogle resplied, 
 198
?I was bawn down un Gawgia, though I was somethin? down thar. My mammy 
had five chilllun and I was next to be younges.? I nevah did know who my daddy 
was, but my mammy was dark color and of all de chillum I was de white one? so 
you can figure it out for yourselfs how I happen to come into the world. I figgered 
it out for myself when I heard my mammy cryin the night before I was sold from 
home when she told de white overseeah dat of all her chillum I wuz de last one he 
ought to want to see sold away. But de ovahseeach jes? grinned as though he was 
tiahed of lookin? at me and tickled to death to git rid of me. You see it was dis 
way?my ole massa married a young woman from up heah in Tennessee. Massa 
wuz rich but his wife?s people wuz po?h. When my missis? sistah comes down in 
Gawgia to visit she has slaves to wait on her which she don?t have at home. 
Missus tell her sistah when she git ready to come home dat she give her one of de 
young slaves to work around her heah. Missus? sistah say she ruther have a boy to 
work de gyar?den and keep up de yahd and be handy about de house. After talkin? 
wid de overseeah ?day decide on me to come. I wuz fifteen years old den and 
mammy liked to cry her eyes out, but dey brought me heah and heah I is 
today.?
107
  
Bogle?s life story presented a contrast to the mulatto race leader tradition found in 
canonical slave narratives and autobiographies. Unlike Frederick Douglass,? Booker T. 
Washington?s and James Weldon Johnson?s first- person novel, Bogel?s white-skinned 
privileges did not provide him with access to cultural refinement. Although his forced 
move from Georgia provided him with more opportunities in Knoxville, he did not have 
access to literacy and the resources needed to provide for and protect a family. His 
 199
mistress hired him out to learn the trade of blacksmith and allowed him to keep the 
money to buy his girlfriend Gordie?s freedom. Her master said that he would sell her to 
Gordie for five hundred dollars but their story ended in heartbreak because Gordie?s 
master sold her down South before Bogle had the money. Bogle?s story complicated the 
notion that whiteness immediately provided one with a better life. It may have given him 
a more comfortable life in bondage, but it did not provide him with nearly the same 
opportunities that Douglass enjoyed. I contend that Bogle?s life was more representative 
of the white-skinned slaves? experiences with their masters. His story demonstrated that 
access to white mentors and free black status were necessary ingredients for achieving 
social and economic self-reliance and nuclear family formation. Cansler realized that his 
mother was in a position to assist Bogle because of the family?s access to cultural 
currency and their social status.  
 Nevertheless, Laura Ann was most proud of her children?s decision to carry on 
the family?s local racial activist practices. She and her husband Hugh raised nine 
children, but she still found time to develop schools, and debate teams for the youth and 
to play an active role in the Women?s Christian Temperance Union.  In 1952, the city of 
Knoxville honored their first black teacher by naming the Cansler Elementary School in 
her honor.  
The success of the Canslers? children illustrated the promise of the family?s 
representation of the local race leader tradition. Five of her children William (1863-
1937), Nannie (1868-1915), Charles (1871-1953), Rex (1874-1963), and Fritz (1885- 
1942) became teachers and local race activists in Tennessee and Pennsylvania. Along 
with William Cansler and Charles Warner Cansler, Fritz began his higher education 
 200
career at Knoxville College, but he later attended the University of Pennsylvania and 
Denver University. He started his career as a clerk in the Census Office in Washington 
D.C, but he returned home and taught at Austin High School in Knoxville for 10 years 
before he became an official for the YMCA where he served in branches in Philadelphia 
and Harrisburg in Pennsylvania. Their lives offer important biographical statements about 
the need for stewards in black communities because many of the institutions that they 
worked for created opportunities for blacks to survive and prosper within their 
neighborhoods and within the larger society.
108
 
 
                                                 
Notes 
 
1
 Ira Berlin. Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South. (New York: The New Press, 
1974) 250. Ira Berlin?s text provided me with valuable information about the diverse social reality of free 
blacks prior to the Civil War. I used his book to present the social and historical reality that the Scotts and 
the Canslers encountered in their quest for better educational and social development prospects for 
themselves and their families and their efforts to coordinate the creation of an educational infrastructure for 
blacks in Knoxville. 
 
2
 Berlin, Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South, 250, 251. 
 
3
 Berlin, Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South,  250, 251. 
 
4
 Debra Gray White. ?Let My People Go.? To Make My World Anew: A History of African Americans. Ed. 
Robin D.G. Kelley and Earl Lewis. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) 202, 203. 
 
5
 Ira Berlin. Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South. (New York: The New Press, 
1974) 250. 
 
6
 Berlin, Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South, 250. 
 
7
 Berlin, Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South, 250, 251. 
 
8
 Berlin, Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South, 250, 251. 
 
9
 Berlin, Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South,  250, 251. 
 
10
 Todd Vogel. Rewriting White: Race, Class, and Cultural Capital in Nineteenth-Century America. (New 
Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2004) 20, 21. Todd Vogel?s text was useful in presenting the 
meaning behind racial uplift strategies. Vogel?s use of the term cultural currency to describe educated 
blacks? activism against white supremacy provided me with the language to articulate the various skills that 
local and national race leaders had to master to gain recognition as influential figures within black 
communities and the larger society. 
 201
                                                                                                                                                 
 
11
 Vogel, Rewriting the White: Race, Class and Cultural Capital in Nineteenth-Century America, 20, 21. 
 
12
 Vogel, Rewriting White: Race, Class, and Cultural Capital in Nineteenth Century America, 20, 21. 
 
13
 Vogel, Rewriting White: Race, Class, and Cultural Capital in Nineteenth Century America, 20, 21. 
 
14
 Vogel, Rewriting White: Race, Class, and Cultural Capital in Nineteenth Century America, 20, 21. 
 
15
 Bruce, D Dickson, Jr. The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865. (Charlottesville: 
University Press of Virginia, 2001) 175-177. 
 
16
 Bruce, The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865, 175-177. 
 
17
 Bruce, The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865, 175-177. 
 
18
 Bruce, The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865, 180-186. 
 
19
 Philip A. Klinker and Rogers M. Smith The Unsteady March: The Rise and Decline of Racial Equality in 
America. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999) 27-30. 
 
20
 Dickson D. Bruce, Jr. The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865. (Charlottesville: 
University of Virginia Press, 2001) 179-182. Bruce?s work enabled me to situate Cansler?s The 
Generations within the larger African American Literary tradition of using black newspapers, slave 
narratives and autobiographies to educate blacks and represent the race?s case to the larger society. 
 
21
 Bruce, The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865, 179-182. 
 
22
 Bruce, The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865, 182. 
 
23
 Bruce, The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865, 268. 
 
24
 Bruce, The Origins of African American Literature: 1680-1865, 268. 
 
25
 Deborah Gray White. ?Let My People Go (1804-1860)? To Make My World Anew: A History of African 
Americans. Ed. Robin D.G. Kelley and Earl Lewis. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) 218, 219. 
 
26
 White, ?Let My People Go,? 218, 219. 
 
27
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860),? 218, 219. 
 
28
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860),? 218, 219. 
 
29
 Henry Louis Gates Jr. Ed. The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: Written By Himself. By 
Frederick Douglass. Library of American Edition. (New York: Library Classics of America, 1994) 1060. 
 
30
 Gates, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: Written By Himself, 1060, 1061. 
 
31
 Gates, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: Written By Himself, 1060, 1061. 
 
32
 Deborah Gray White. ?Let My People Go (1804-1860)? To Make My World Anew: A History of African 
Americans. Ed. Robin D.G. Kelley and Earl Lewis. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) 215-217. 
 
33
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860),? 215-217. 
 
 202
                                                                                                                                                 
34
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860),? 218. 
 
35
 Farah Jasmine Griffin. ?Who Set You Flowin??? The African American Migration Narrative.? (New 
York: Oxford University Press, 1995) 3. 
 
36
 Frances Smith Foster. ?Frances Ellen Watkins Harper.? African American Writers: Profiles of Their 
Lives and Works From the 1700?s to the Present. Ed. Valerie Smith, Lea Baechler, and A. Waltonlitz. 
(New York: Collier Books, 1991) 133.  France Smith Foster?s biographical sketches enabled me to situate 
the Scotts and the Canslers local racial activist beliefs of collective racial development as the anecdote to 
white supremacy within black women writers? emphasis on the role black families can play in producing 
models of how to overcome white supremacist views and America?s debilitating practices of racial 
exclusion. 
 
37
 Foster, ?Frances Ellen Watkins Harper,? 133. 
 
38
 Foster, ?Frances Ellen Watkins Harper,? 133. 
 
39
 Foster, ?Frances Ellen Watkins Harper,? 133. 
 
40
 Foster, ?Frances Ellen Watkins Harper,? 133. 
 
41
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 11. 
 
42
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 11. 
 
43
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 11, 12. 
 
44
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 12. 
 
45
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 16. 
 
46
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 16, 17. 
 
47
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 16, 17 
 
48
 Michelle Mitchell. Righteous Propagation: African Americans and the Politics of Racial Destiny after 
Reconstruction. (Durham: University of North Carolina Press, 2004) 108. 
 
49
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 19. 
 
50
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 19. 
 
51
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 19, 20. 
 
52
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 19, 20. 
 
53
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 20, 21. 
 
54
 Deborah Gray White. ?Let My People Go (1804-1860).? To Make My World Anew: A History of African 
Americans. Ed. Robin D.G. Kelley and Earl Lewis. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) 219. 
 
55
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860), 217. 
 
 203
                                                                                                                                                 
56
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860), 215. 
 
57
 Ulrich B. Phillips. American Negro Slavery: A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro 
Labor As Determined by the Plantation Regime. (Baton Rogue: Louisiana State University Press, 1966) 
267-270. 
 
58
 Deborah Gray White. ?Let My People Go (1804-1860).? To Make My World Anew: A History of African 
Americans. Ed. Robin D.G. Kelley and Earl Lewis. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) 219. 
 
59
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860),? 219. 
 
60
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860),? 219. 
 
61
 White, ?Let My People Go (1804-1860) 219. 
 
62
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 23. 
 
63
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 23, 24. 
 
64
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 24. 
 
65
 Robert J. Booker. Two Hundred Years of Black Culture in Knoxville, Tennessee (1791-1991). 
(Knoxville: Beck Cultural Center, 1992) 17. 
 
66
 Cansler, Charles Warner. Three Gen 
erations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. (Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 23. 
 
67
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 30. 
 
68
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 31. 
 
69
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 32. 
 
70
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 33. 
 
71
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 34. 
 
72
 Armistead S. Pride and Clint C. Wilson II. A History of the Black Press. (Washington D.C: Howard 
University Press) 76. 
 
73
 Michelle Mitchell. Righteous Propagation: African Americans and the Politics of Racial Destiny after 
Reconstruction. (Durham: University of North Carolina Press, 2004) 10. 
 
74
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 34. 
 
75
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 35. 
 
76
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 40. 
 
77
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 40. 
 
78
 Nancy Bentley and Sandra Gunning. Eds. The Marrow of Tradition. A Bedford Reader Cultural Edition. 
By Charles W. Chesnutt. (Boston: St. Martin?s Press, 2002) 217. 
 204
                                                                                                                                                 
 
79
 Cansler, Charles Warner. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 45. 
 
80
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 46. 
 
81
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 46, 47. 
 
82
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 50. 
 
83
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 51. 
 
84
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 57. 
 
85
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 59. 
 
86
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 59. 
 
87
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 59. 
 
88
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 60. 
 
89
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 63. 
 
90
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 62. 
 
91
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 64. 
 
92
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 66. 
 
93
 Timothy Patrick McCarthy. ?To Plead Our Own Cause?: Black Print and the Origins of American 
Abolitionism.? Prophets of Protest: Reconsidering the History of American Abolitionism. Timothy Patrick 
McCarthy and John Stauffer. (New York: The New Press, 2006) 133. 
 
94
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 66. 
 
95
 Nancy Bentley and Sandra Gunning. Eds. The Marrow of Tradition. A Bedford Reader Cultural Edition. 
By Charles W. Chesnutt. (Boston: St. Martin?s Press, 2002) 218. 
 
96
 Charles Chesnutt, The Marrow of Tradition: A Bedford Critical Edition, 219. 
 
97
 Eric J. Sundquist. To Wake the Nations: Race in the Making of American Literature. (Cambridge: 
Harvard University Press, 1993) 298. 
 
98
 Michele Mitchell. Righteous Propagation: African Americans and the Politics of Racial Destiny after 
Reconstruction. (Durham: University of North Carolina Press, 2004) 7. 
 
99
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 70. 
 
100
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 70. 
 
101
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern  Tennessee, 71. 
 
 205
                                                                                                                                                 
102
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 71. 
 
103
 Claudia Tate. Domestic Allegories of Political Desire: The Black Heroine?s Text at the Turn of the 
Century. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992) 11, 12. 
 
104
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 70. 
 
105
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 70. 
 
106
 James D. Anderson. The Education of Blacks in the South: 1860-1935. (Chapel Hill: the University of 
North Carolina Press, 1988) 19, 20. 
 
107
 Charles Warner Cansler. Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee. 
(Knoxville: Kingsport Press, 1939) 70. 
 
108
 Cansler, Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee, 79-84. 
 206
Chapter 5 
 
The Emergence of J. Herman Daves: A Local Race Leader?s analysis of the Scotts?  
and the Canslers? Local Race leader Legacy 
Part 1 
 
Remaking the Race in Knoxville: Herman Daves? Quest for Recognition within the 
Scotts and the Cansler Family?s Racial Uplift Traditions  
When I was growing up in the late seventies and early eighties, I knew about my 
great-grandfather Charles Warner Cansler, but I did not know that my grandfather J. 
Herman Daves was also a prominent local racial-activist in Knoxville. I first learned 
about J. Herman Daves while looking at old pictures when my parents told me about the 
influential blacks in photographs with my grandfather. They pointed out that my 
grandfather stood next to figures like the famous black doctor Charles Drew. I examined 
the pictures and wondered how he became part of a network of national and local public 
figures that took on leadership roles for racial uplift and integration prior to the civil 
rights movement. My father explained that granddad earned recognition as a local black 
leader because he played an instrumental role in the integration of the Tennessee Valley 
Authority, an institution that provided water and electricity to homes and businesses in 
Knoxville and later to a wide geographical area in the late 1930?s and the early 1940?s. I 
learned that granddad?s journey to become a local racial activist in Knoxville was 
drastically different than that of the Scotts and the Canslers. Unlike them, he was not part 
of W.E.B. Du Bois? ?Talented Tenth.? His economic and social ascent was not the 
product of familial and communal local racial-activist traditions passed down from one 
generation to the next.  
 207
 Granddad grew up in the small town of Rocky Mount, North Carolina, the son of 
Julia Daves, a black seamstress, and Charles Hammond, a white heir to the Hammond 
family?s grocery story. I learned that Hammond fell in love with Julia after she became 
the Hammond family?s seamstress. On trips to my aunt?s and uncle?s home, I saw old- 
looking pictures of an attractive and voluptuous black woman with sad dark eyes and a 
hefty white man with a congenial disposition. I learned from my father that these were 
granddad?s parents, but that granddad refused to talk about their relationship because he 
was ashamed of his illegitimate bi-racial heritage.  
I asked my father about what he knew of granddad?s childhood. He replied,  
?Dad never spoke about his heritage or his childhood. My sister told me a story 
about asking him about his father, and he looked intently at her and abruptly 
walked away.  I did learn from relatives that Dad, his sisters, and his brothers 
lived in a home provided by the Hammond family, and Dad reluctantly worked 
for Hammond in the Hammond family?s grocery store. Obviously Dad had no 
control over his bi racial heritage so there was nothing to be ashamed of, but in 
those days you did not talk about interracial relationships. Charles Hammond and 
Julia Daves could not marry because North Carolina forbade the marriage of 
blacks and whites. Dad?s interaction with the Hammond family only occurred at 
the store. Dad did not have any interaction with the Hammonds. Dad turned to his 
relationship with his mother for solace. He often took us to visit Julia Daves, and 
our aunts, uncles and cousins in Rocky Mount North Carolina.?  
I asked him how granddad got to Knoxville. My father recalled,  
 208
??Dad had a black mentor Dr. John Cotton. He was a minister for the Presbyterian 
Church in Henderson, North Carolina only a few miles from Rocky Mount. 
Because Rocky Mount did not provide black youth with a school system, he 
enrolled Dad in Henderson Academy, a black preparatory school sponsored and 
run by the church. Dr. Cotton also steered Dad toward Knoxville College and 
helped him get jobs at steel mills in Pennsylvania during the summers to pay for 
Knoxville College.? 
 I inquired why granddad had to work in steel mills to pay for the College. Dad 
responded,  
?Charles Hammond did set aside money for his children?s education because Julia 
was his common-law wife, and he believed that her children were his family.  He 
never married a white woman. When he died, his sisters took the money intended 
for Julia and their children. The Hammond sisters were able to break the will and 
take the money allocated for college tuitions largely because Hammond could not 
legally marry Julia.?  
After hearing about Charles Hammond?s love and loyalty, I thought his benevolent 
intentions were unusual and rare, but as early as the antebellum era novelist wrote of 
these interracial relationships.   
For instance, Frank J. Webb?s novel The Garies and Their Friends (1857) 
portrays a relationship similar to that of Julia Daves and Charles Hammond. Webb?s 
novel raises the question: what if a plantation owner and a quadroon woman were an 
interracial couple in love? Mr. Clarence Garie and his common-law wife Emily are 
struggling to preserve their love and lives together within a society committed to white 
 209
supremacy and rigid racial segregation.
1
 They contemplate moving to Europe, but 
ultimately decide to go to Philadelphia. They met their demise at the hands of a white 
mob during a race riot in Philadelphia. Julia Daves and Charles Hammond also 
considered moving to Philadelphia where there was a small but thriving middle class 
black community, but they ultimately choose to remain in Rocky Mount where they 
learned to endure white supremacy and the inability to legally and to publicly live as 
husband and wife. They also had more to deal with than the fictional Clarence Garie and 
his common-law wife Emily and other interracial families during that time because Julia 
Daves was dark skinned and possessed prominent African features.   
Still, Julia Daves and Charles Hammond suffered more from the Hammond 
family than from public outrage about their interracial relationship. White families 
opposed interracial marriages largely because of the belief that interracial relationships 
threatened their racial and social class status.
2
 While the Hammond family allowed the 
children to see their father just before he died, the Hammond family refused to let Julia 
see her common-law husband. Despite the Hammond?s effort to destroy the Daves 
family, my father recalled granddad?s determination to succeed.  
?Dad was the only one of the six children to earn a bachelors degree, which he did 
from Knoxville College, a Master?s degree in Sociology from the University of 
Buffalo and do doctoral work at the University of Wisconsin.?  
I observed that granddad?s successful adoption of Booker T. Washington?s pull-yourself- 
by-your-own-bootstraps ideology enabled him to realize most of his educational, career, 
and economic aspirations, which made me wonder if he adopted the racial activist 
philosophy of the Scotts and the Canslers for acceptance and recognition within the 
 210
family, or did he always have the ambition of becoming a local racial activist? I asked my 
father what he knew about granddad?s dreams before becoming a member of the Cansler 
family. He said,  
?I think Dad always dreamed of being a role model for his family and for blacks 
in the neighborhood, but he clearly had an additional incentive; he wanted 
acceptance from the Canslers, particularly from the patriarch of the family 
Charles Warner Cansler. When he fell in love with your grandmother (Willard 
Wilson Cansler, the only daughter and child of Charles Warner and Lilllian Web 
Cansler), he must have known that becoming a well-respected local racial activist 
was the best means of earning acceptance within the Cansler family.?  
I asked my father what he knew about granddad?s career as a sociologist and as a local 
racial activist. He said,  
?I knew that Dad was the head of the Sociology Department at Knoxville College 
from 1931 to 1939, and I knew that Dad began his career with the Tennessee 
Valley Authority in 1939, but I learned more from the obituaries about his 
accomplishments than I did from him.? 
 My father gave me granddad?s obituaries. In The Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tuesday, 
March 21, 1978, I discovered that, ?in 1958 he received an honorary degree of Doctor of 
Humane Letters from Knoxville College for his remarkable contributions to the 
betterment of society through his work with the TVA and in the community. He served 
on two boards: the board of Child and Family Services and the Cansler YMCA. He was 
also the President of the Knoxville College Alumni Association and a member of the 
Board of Trustees of the College.?
3
 
 211
 My granddad?s life and career builds on what W.E.B. Du Bois famously wrote in 
1903 that he came to the realization African Americans conducted their lives in America 
behind a veil.  
Then it dawned upon me with a certain suddenness that I was different from the 
others; or like, mayhap, in the heart and life and longing, but shut out from their 
world by a vast veil. I had thereafter no desire to tear down that veil, to creep 
through; I held all beyond it in common contempt, and lived above it in a region 
of blue sky and great wandering shadows.
4
 
Whereas Du Bois was referring to the realization of racial difference imposed on him by 
white society, my granddad was not only isolated from white society, but he was also 
separated from the Scotts and the Cansler?s free-black pedigree and local race-leader 
legacy. Granddad was a mulatto, but one who did not enjoy the privileges that the Scotts 
and the Cansler acquired as early as the 1840?s. Unlike the Scotts? and the Cansler?s 
ability to build on their predecessor?s successes to emerge as prominent local figures in 
black and white communities, Granddad had to rely on his determination for access into 
elite white social circles and educational institutions, and he had to use his networking 
skills and educational accomplishments to earn respect as a role model within 
Knoxville?s middle- and working-class black communities. His performance of racial and 
social-class dualism allowed him to coordinate efforts for racial, economic and 
educational development both at Knoxville College and at the TVA with liberal-minded 
blacks and whites.    
I wondered how Granddad presented himself after he became a force for social 
change. I specifically wanted to know if J. Herman Daves fashioned himself after W.E.B. 
 212
Du Bois because he was clearly the most recognizable activist minded black sociologist 
in the country. My father responded.  
?No. I don?t think so. Du Bois was considered by many in the black community 
as an intellectual giant and model of the black elite. Dad was not an intellectual in 
that sense. I knew that Dad knew Charles S. Johnson, President of Fisk 
University, Benjamin E. Mays, President of Morehouse College, Albert L. Turner, 
Dean of North Carolina College?s Law School, because he spoke admirably of 
these men and contacted them when I was pursuing teaching opportunities at 
these prominent historically black colleges and universities early in my career, but 
he did not offer many political and racial-uplift opinions privately with the 
family.? 
 Thus my father was surprised when I discovered that granddad had written a sociological 
study of Knoxville based on Du Bois? research on black communities.  
I learned from my father?s stories and my own research that J. Herman Daves was 
a man struggling with his interracial legacy. I discovered that he became a humble local 
race leader and racial ambassador as a means of coping with and overcoming his bi- 
racial heritage. His accomplishments allowed him to create distance from his past. Still, 
his achievements as a local race leader and an ambassador were more for his family and 
the community than they were for his own purposes, because he believed his work must 
not be about him as much as it should be about his family and the community. He wanted 
to liberate himself from his past and gain acceptance from the Cansler family. He defined 
his work as a local race leader as way of healing himself and aiding the black community, 
but most importantly as a means of helping his family. Daves used his association with 
 213
the network of black academics and local racial activists as the means of supporting his 
children and providing a better life for them. He drew on his associations with the black 
academic community to introduce his younger son to the woman he eventually married. 
He arranged for my father to meet my mother Allayne Turner (1926-1992) by casually 
dropping by the Turner house in Durham, North Carolina on a trip to Rocky Mount. 
 My mother was the daughter of Albert L. Turner, Dean of the Law School at 
North Carolina College, and Dessa Turner, a formally trained pharmacist who owned her 
own pharmacy in Durham. In those days, blacks could not stay at hotels so when J. 
Herman Daves earned recognition within this exclusive community of black intellectuals 
and local race leaders, he stayed with the Turners and others when he traveled to Rocky 
Mount to visit his mother. He conscientiously saved enough money from his career as a 
sociologist and executive for TVA to assist his children in buying homes and sending 
their children to colleges and to universities.  
Part 2 
 
Performances of Racial Uplift: J. Herman Daves? Contributions to Representations 
of Local and National Race Leadership Traditions 
J. Herman Daves? sociological objectives for his (1926) book A Social Study of 
the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee resembled Du Bois? famous (1897) work 
The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study. Daves? and Du Bois? primary methodological 
tools were house- to- house interviews. Daves conducted his sociological study of the 
Negro population in the months of June, July, and August of 1925. He focused on East 
Knoxville and West Knoxville known as Western Heights because the majority of 
Negroes lived in these areas. Daves wanted to obtain a snapshot of the Knoxville Negro?s 
 214
life. He coordinated the work of fourteen interviewers and his own interviews to develop 
a sociological study of 13, 232 Knoxville Negroes. He studied Housing Conditions, 
General Living Conditions, Room Crowding, The Lodger Problem, Lodgers, and Rent, 
Negro Industry, Classifications of Workers, Employers? Experiences with Negro 
Workers, Negro Women in Industry, Domestic Workers, The Family Budget, and, above 
all, educational opportunities.
5
 Similarly, from August 1, 1896 to December 31, 1897, Du 
Bois conducted a house- to-house sociological study of the Seventh Ward of 
Philadelphia, which extended from South Seventh Street to the Schuykill River, and from 
Spruce Street to South Street, which was the center of the Negro population. 
There were obvious differences between Daves? and Du Bois? studies, however. 
Whereas Daves only had resources available to him from the Free Colored Library in 
Knoxville, Du Bois had access to an abundance of resources from his association with the 
University of Pennsylvania. Thus Du Bois? study of the condition of forty thousand or 
more blacks residing in Philadelphia was much more extensive than Daves. There were 
also slight differences in emphasis. While Du Bois made large claims about the Negroes? 
struggles with white supremacy in American society, Daves? research on Knoxville only 
made subtle interpretations of how the Knoxville Negro was representative of the larger 
challenges that the race faced in American society.
6
 
Nevertheless, there were more similarities than differences. Daves and Du Bois 
wanted to acquire information about the distribution of members of the race, their 
occupations and daily life, their homes and their organizations. Daves focused on the 
Knoxville Negro?s educational opportunities and inter-racial associations, and Du Bois 
emphasized the need for black educational infrastructures and interracial associations for 
 215
racial uplift and for integration.
7
 Not only does Daves? work resemble Du Bois? work, but 
Daves? research also responded to Du Bois? vision of the role sociology can play in 
promoting racial uplift and integration.  
Daves? study addressed what Du Bois argued at the turn of the century was 
needed to critically examine the Negro problem. On May 29, 1900 Du Bois developed an 
outline for what was required to seriously examine the Negro problem from a 
sociological point of view. His article for The Southern Workman emphasized the 
demand for objective-minded scientific studies of occupations and wages, land, property, 
and taxation and education.
8
 Du Bois believed that these were the primary subjects that 
provided accurate measures of how much the Negro has achieved in the war against 
American racism and systemic oppression. Daves must have had knowledge of Du Bois? 
work because he produced an objective minded scientific study that focused on similar 
topics.  
Daves? study emphasized housing conditions, employment opportunities for black 
men and women, educational institutions, hospital facilities and community organizations 
for racial uplift. He wanted to ascertain the intimate problems facing Negroes in 
Knoxville?their daily social difficulties, the reflection in their home life of their struggle 
for existence, how they lived and participated in the Negro community and with 
influential whites in the surrounding area.
9
 3,151 Negro families were visited.
10
 He 
discerned from his interviewers? research and his own work that the majority of Negroes 
in Knoxville were poor.  
Daves began his study evaluating the Knoxville Negro?s home life. He measured 
their poverty from his assessment of what the average white citizen considered 
 216
fundamental necessities such as bathrooms and electric lighting. These material things 
were considered luxuries in Negro homes that most could not afford. Most Negro homes 
in Knoxville were still heated with fire wood, coal stoves and kerosene lamps, and two or 
three families often shared a poorly constructed three-room home.
11
 Daves discerned that 
this was a common occurrence for poverty-stricken black families. On Campbell Street 
he found a family of eleven living in three rooms.
12
 Ages of the family?s children ran 
from one to seventeen, and on Elmas Street a family of twelve lived in four rooms 
without water, sewage disposal, or electricity. Daves recognized that the black elite in 
Knoxville enjoyed entirely different home conditions, however. These prominent black 
families had electric lighting, furnaces, hot water and gas for cooking.
13
 They redecorated 
their homes once a year, took proper care of garbage, and kept their lawns cut and planted 
flowers. Their lives resembled those of white-middle class whites? home life in 
Knoxville.
14
 
Daves emphasized the lives of the poverty stricken and working classes in the 
arrangement and interpretation of data, however. Daves stated that there were 15 skilled 
laborers, 96 semi-skilled laborers and 1, 253 unskilled laborers.
15
 He followed these 
statistics with an interpretation of how the laws and culture of Jim Crow prevented blacks 
from becoming skilled laborers.
16
 Blacks could not join unions and many whites refused 
to hire skilled black laborers.
17
 He argued that this practice enabled industries to keep 
blacks in the least-profitable paid positions in white-owned-and-run industries. Thus he 
surmised that this is the reason why most black men in industries in Knoxville remained 
as common laborers. One could easily argue from Daves? study that common black 
laborers inability to ascend to higher positions and status resulted in drinking, domestic 
 217
difficulties, and their failure to get medical aid when they were sick. Moreover, as Daves 
pointed out, the Knoxville Negro in general suffered from the lack of adequate hospital 
facilities. Men drinking on Saturday night and failing to come to work on Monday 
mornings was a common practice according to one of the firms interviewed for Daves? 
study.
18
 Daves argued that while black men were often common laborers for a variety of 
industries, black women largely worked in domestic service. He used employment 
research from the Phyllis Wheatley Branch, Young Women?s Christian Association.
19
 He 
observed that the wages were very low for the hours and amount of work expected.
20
 In 
most instances Daves discovered that most domestic workers earned 7 or 8 dollars a week 
for twelve hours of work a day, which he concluded was not enough to support 
themselves respectably.
21
 
The working conditions for a majority of black men and women raised the 
questions of how Daves presented the differences between poverty-stricken, working 
class and middle-class black families according to income: which families would be 
considered living in poverty, which families had achieved working-class status and which 
families managed to reach middle-class status. He interpreted families living in poverty 
were earning $850.00 to $950.00 a year, working class families grossed $1,100.00 to 
$1,400.00 a year and middle class families made $1,500.00 to $1,700.00 a year at that 
time.
22
 The middle class were largely Negro professionals, teachers, school 
administrators, professors, and administrators at Knoxville College, business owners, 
lawyers and doctors.
23
 
These middle-class black local race leaders and ambassadors facilitated the 
establishment of an educational and social infrastructure in Knoxville. Daves argued that 
 218
the existence of nine schools for Negro education and Knoxville College was above that 
of many of the Southern communities; however, all of the nine schools were 
overcrowded. For instance the Colored High School?s capacity was 560, but there was an 
enrollment of 1060 and only 24 teachers; the Maynard School?s capacity was 360, but 
had an enrollment of 803 and only 14 teachers. The Heiskell School?s capacity was 320, 
but an enrollment of 584 and only 10 teachers. The Sam E. Hill School?s capacity was 
200, but an enrollment of 210 and only 5 teachers. The Eastport School?s capacity was 
158, but an enrollment of 187 and only 3 teachers. The New Hope School?s capacity was 
35 but an enrollment of 63 and only 1 teacher. The enrollment in grades 1- 11 in 1924-
1925 was: first, 518; second, 400; third, 359; fourth, 366; fifth, 303; sixth, 208; seventh, 
164; eighth, 169; ninth, 119; tenth, 74; eleventh, 45.
24
 
Still, although all of the schools dealt with overcrowding and a shortage of 
teachers, they had relatively low dropout rates: first, 46; second, 30; third, 29; fourth, 41; 
fifth, 31; sixth, 27; seventh, 19; ninth, 6; tenth, 4; eleventh, 1. Daves interviewed 
principals to discover the causes for the dropouts. The principals felt that the reason in 
Grades 1 to 3, was poverty of the family, lack of suitable clothing, etc. The principals 
perceived students that dropped out in Grades 4, 5, 6, and 7, (a) had desires to become 
wage earners, (b) indifference of the parents as well as children. The principals believed 
that the students that dropped out in high school (a) could not keep up with their studies, 
(b) needed to provide a living for themselves and for their families, (c) lacked 
encouragement from their parents. Despite the external and internal issues that led 
students to drop out, the middle class black community employed interracial coalitions to 
establish a respectable educational standard of achievement.
25
  
 219
 Daves realized that the educational system needed improvements, however. He 
believed (1) more rooms were needed to alleviate congestion; (2) a high school building 
devoted exclusively to high school work; (3) establishment of Kindergartens; (4) same- 
scale salaries as for whites; (5) same standard curricula in colored as in white schools; (6) 
professionally trained teachers; (7) special teachers for music, writing, and drawing; (8) 
an athletic director for colored public schools; (9) a commercial course and (10) modern 
languages.
26
 Daves? lists of improvements for the Negro school system reveal his desire 
for the Negro youth to gain skill sets necessary for black middle-class respectability and 
integration. He understood that as a rule black teachers did not have access to the 
educational preparation that white teachers received. He perceived that segregation was 
the primary cause of the racial disparity in teacher training. White teachers come from 
schools that have a much- higher educational rating in the world than black teachers. 
Moreover, Daves observed that white teachers had opportunities to do research and take 
courses at nationally recognized universities during the summer. Nevertheless, 
Knoxville?s black community was able to form a more- than-adequate educational and 
social infrastructure for racial uplift. They also developed a Free Colored Library, Phyllis 
Wheatley Branch of the Young Women?s Christian Association, Knoxville College, Well 
Baby Stations, a Free Clinic, YMCA, an Orphan Home and two movie theatres.
27
    
 The existence of community organizations designed for racial uplift coincided 
with Daves? belief that educational infrastructure must provide Negro youth with the 
skills necessary to realize middle-class respectability and integration. The Student Inter-
racial Commission was composed of representatives from Maryville College, historically 
black Knoxville College, and the University of Tennessee, five members from each.
28
 
 220
Daves discovered that the primary purpose of the commission was to produce an 
intelligent study of the race problem with the ultimate goal of contributing something to 
its correct solutions.
29
 Daves learned that the commission served as a model for realizing 
mutual understanding between the races. The Young Men?s Civic Club offered another 
forum for black men to discuss the problems that Knoxville?s black community faced. It 
was started in 1925 as a means of studying the local problems which affect the colored 
people of Knoxville. It was composed of twenty local racial activists.
30
 They were 
committed to generating greater interest in the civic, economic and social problems of 
Negroes in the city. They hoped that their efforts would facilitate sane, intelligent and 
constructive solutions.   
Whereas Knoxville?s black community embraced local-minded racial uplift and 
integration ideologies, they appeared reluctant or indifferent to national organizations 
even though local race leaders like Cansler and Daves had access to national race leaders 
such as Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. Du Bois and James Weldon 
Johnson with whom they worked with and alongside. Daves noted, nonetheless, that the 
local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was 
inactive in 1926.
31
 In general, responsibilities that were largely seen as the functions of 
national organizations? race leaders were handled by local associations. For instance, the 
Inter-racial Commission became the communal group that was largely responsible for 
addressing the needs of Knoxville?s black community. They developed interracial 
alliances that responded to health, to housing, to sanitation and to economic issues; the 
Ministerial Alliance formed a union among the churches to facilitate race conscious 
Christian spirituality within Knoxville?s black community; and the Medical Association 
 221
was designed to advance medical knowledge and professional skills for Knoxville?s black 
community.    
Daves provided black and white readers his research about how blacks in 
Knoxville offered more educational opportunities that facilitated possibilities for social 
class mobility and integration than blacks in much larger cities. Often blacks from other 
southern states learned about the educational opportunities and migrated to Knoxville 
where their children earned high school and college degrees, and in many cases the 
children left for more higher education opportunities in the North.  
For instance, I learned from Glimpses of Knoxville?s Black History (a calendar 
published by the Beck Cultural Exchange Center in Knoxville in 1982) that Ambrose 
Caliver (1894-1962) was born in Saltville, Virginia on February 25, 1894, but his parents 
migrated further south to Knoxville where Caliver completed his elementary and high 
school education in 1911. He went onto receive a B.A. Degree from Knoxville College in 
1915, and in 1920 he earned a Masters degree from the University of Wisconsin and later 
became the Dean of Fisk University. He left his position there to earn his doctorate from 
Columbia University in 1929. Following his graduation, Dr. Caliver was appointed as a 
Specialist in Negro Education with the United States Bureau of Education. He 
coordinated a survey of the Higher Education of Blacks from 1930-1941, and in 1950 he 
was appointed to the position of Assistant to the Commissioner of Education.
32
 There 
were other influential figures whose parents migrated to Knoxville when they decided to 
raise a family.  
I learned from my father that Victor Giovanni was one of J. Herman Daves? 
students at Knoxville College. Victor Giovanni from Cincinnati was the father of Nikki 
 222
Giovanni, the internationally acclaimed poet who was born in Knoxville on June 7, 1943. 
She attended Austin High School, earned a BA from Fisk University and an MA in Social 
Work from the University of Pennsylvania.  Caliver and Giovanni were only a few 
people who benefited from the educational infrastructure for blacks in Knoxville. Daves? 
work provided sociological information about how the educational infrastructure and 
community?s associations improved the lives of blacks and produced influential black 
citizens.   
 The development of an infrastructure designed for racial uplift and integration in 
Knoxville contrasted with what many blacks encountered in their southern hometowns 
and when they migrated to urban areas in northern cities. Black migrant workers 
encountered middle-class black paternalism on the one hand and indifference on the 
other. They also had to deal with white anxiety and violence about the rise in the black 
migrant populations.  
  In the South in 1910 at one of the educational centers for Negroes there was no 
real black educational infrastructure except for the University. In his study of The College 
Bred Community, Du Bois observed, 
It was the last year of my first sojourn in Atlanta University where I taught for 
thirteen years. Academically our success in these days was marked. Our graduates 
were among the best teachers of Negroes in the South: principals of schools and 
professors in colleges. Tuskegee without their assistance could not have kept its 
doors open. They were beginning to enter the professions. Their careers and those 
of their fellows as shown by our initial study of college-bred Negro was 
remarkable and encouraging. We had at Atlanta University the first systematic 
 223
study of the American Negro made anywhere in the world; and yet Atlanta 
University was starving to death. Its support, its funds were dwindling. It had to 
continually retrench. It was threatened with debt. Dr. Bumstead, the calm, 
hardworking apostle of the Negro college of the day, was giving his whole life to 
collecting funds and once in a while I left teaching to go to the North to help him. 
On a certain occasion I spoke to white, rich, and well-born in Brookline 
Massachusetts residents, and tried to impress upon them not simply the use, but 
the indispensable need of the college-bred man in the South.
33
 
Du Bois witnessed Atlanta University?s valuable role in rearing young black men for 
leadership positions in major professions, but he also lamented Atlanta University?s 
financial crisis. He became both a scholar and a racial ambassador for the school because 
he had to take on some of the responsibilities of the president. He realized that the school 
desperately needed him in that capacity. Du Bois turned to the Harvard University 
community for financial assistance for Atlanta University. He also learned that there were 
no public schools for black folk in Georgia. The College thus took on the function of 
educating college-age students, while providing a normal school and the only public high 
school facility for blacks in Georgia.  
Ultimately, Du Bois had to leave Atlanta University because he realized his 
presence was impeding the University?s ability to acquire financial support from northern 
white philanthropists. Atlanta University was one of the few black educational 
institutions that offered a liberal arts education. Their mission contrasted with Booker T. 
Washington?s emphasis on industrial education. Washington had cornered the market of 
northern white philanthropy. Thus Du Bois knew that his feud with Washington about the 
 224
need for liberal arts education for Negroes would undermine the University?s financial 
support from the North. Most of the white northern money went through Washington?s 
Tuskegee Institute before it was distributed to the other historically black colleges and 
universities. Washington knew Du Bois was working at Atlanta University and Du Bois 
knew Washington may prevent funds from going there. 
In Black Bourgeois (1957), the critically acclaimed black sociologist E. Franklin 
Frazier argued that Du Bois? situation and Atlanta University?s financial crisis 
symbolized the dilemma facing most of the historically black colleges and universities.
 34
  
If they wanted money, these institutions would have to adopt Washington?s mission of 
industrial education. Washington?s industrial education philosophy saved lives, made him 
the race?s spokesman and provided educational and employment opportunities for 
Negroes, but at what cost? The educational and employment opportunities for Negroes 
were limited. Moreover, the emphasis on industrial education for black colleges and 
universities was coupled with teaching Negroes to accept second-class citizenship. When 
Du Bois left the University of Pennsylvania for Atlanta University, he learned a valuable 
lesson about racial politics occurring within the black colleges and universities? 
community.   
Frazier?s and Du Bois? analysis of the racial politics and limited educational 
opportunities for blacks in higher education contrasted with Daves? assessment of the 
educational opportunities in Knoxville, however. William B. Scott?s students from the 
Freedman Normal Institute were considered excellent teachers at Washington?s Tuskegee 
Institute, and Charles Warner Cansler established a working relationship with 
Washington. I believe that this provided Knoxville College protection from Washington?s 
 225
attack on black liberal arts colleges. The comparison of Daves? and Du Bois? works 
illuminated for me what generations of a small black community accomplished in 
Knoxville and what kind of educational, racial and social obstacles blacks encountered 
throughout the country, particularly in the South. 
Whereas Du Bois? study documented why so many blacks migrated from the 
South to Philadelphia in search of employment opportunities and better lives, Daves? 
sociological research explored why southern blacks migrated to Knoxville and why the 
black community there prepared many of the youth to realize educational and social 
ascendancy both in the South and the North. His research provided evidence of why the 
Knoxville Negro?s educational infrastructure and community associations were 
illustrations of Carter G. Woodson?s educational ideology.
35
  
Woodson believed real education involved inspiring people to live more 
abundantly, to learn about society as they found it and make it better.
36
 For instance in his 
text The Mis-Education of the Negro (1933), Woodson argued that black individuals who 
learn to think independently and express themselves were labeled opponents to interracial 
cooperation. Cansler?s representation of his family?s lives responded to Woodson?s 
critique of many whites and blacks? perceptions of race relations prior to the civil rights 
movement. Knoxville?s black community embodied Woodson?s educational ideology. 
Their establishment of an infrastructure designed to encourage their students to think 
independently, to interact with both blacks and whites, and to develop strategies for 
transforming race relations echoed Woodson?s vision. Cansler and other local race 
leaders subscribed to the belief that interracial cooperation relationships should strive to 
develop equality of participants.
37
 
 226
 Daves? study also represented how Knoxville?s black community embodied Du 
Bois? vision for racial uplift. He argued that, ?Negroes develop in the United States an 
economic nation within a nation, able to work through inner cooperation, to found its 
own institutions, to educate its genius, and at the same time, without mob violence or 
extremes of race hatred.?  Thus Daves? work provided educators with the ability to 
consider how Knoxville?s small black community fulfilled Du Bois? vision and how their 
efforts compared to the accomplishments of other black communities in major cities.  
For instance, the perspective in Daves? work formed a stark contrast to Richard 
Wright?s experiences in the rural South and in urban areas in the North. When Wright?s 
adopted home of Chicago gained more than fifty thousand black migrants from 1910 to 
1920, most of the black migrant population did not have skill sets to support themselves 
and their families. Daves? life was also figuratively in conversation with Wright?s 
representation of himself in Black Boy (1945) and Hazel Rowley?s most recent biography 
of his life, Richard Wright: the Life and Times (2001).  
Daves? aspirations for local race leadership correspond with Wright?s desire to 
become the literary racial representative during the 1930?s and 1940?s. Their difficult 
upbringing inspired them to emerge as influential local and national racial spokespeople. 
Both Daves and Wright were estranged from their fathers? families. Daves felt the shame 
of his father?s white ancestry and the Hammonds? rejection of him and his siblings, and 
Wright suffered from the abandonment of his father and his disillusionment with his 
father?s family.  Daves and Wright embraced their mothers, however. Daves? and 
Wright?s relationship with their mothers shaped their socially conscious activities as local 
and national racial spokespeople. Daves and Wright loved and financially supported their 
 227
mothers. Daves modeled himself as the dutiful son in his treatment of his own family and 
work for the black community, and Wright wrote as if he was seeking retribution for his 
mother?s, the race?s and his own suffering at the hands of white patriarchal society. 
Daves? and Wright?s pull- yourself- up- by- your- own- bootstraps story, educational 
achievements and innate leadership capabilities provided them with the cultural currency 
to come into view as a local racial activist in Knoxville and as America?s literary race?s 
spokesman. 
Daves and Wright came of age during the 1920?s. They were both products of the 
New Negro ideology. They used their lives to contribute to the belief that a New Negro 
was born at the turn of the century and that the time had come to share with America a 
new understanding of Negro culture and artistic expression. They benefited from Alain 
Locke?s articulation of New Negro ideology in New Negro Voices of the Harlem 
Renaissance (1925). Daves? study of the Knoxville Negro represented that the Negro in 
Knoxville had already adopted this vision, however. It was Wright who benefited more 
from the interest in black artistic expression which allowed him to reach white audiences 
who were prepared to engage with his social protest convention by the 1930?s. Whereas 
Locke?s and Wright?s literary performances had an indirect affect on the lives of blacks 
across the country, Knoxville?s local racial activists had already begun the day to day 
work of preparing the next generation to assert themselves within the American 
mainstream, which was not the case in some of the major cities.   
In Hazel Rowley?s biography, referred to above, she described the limited 
educational opportunities Wright experienced when he migrated to Chicago.  
 228
In 1960, the last year of his life, Richard Wright would tell an interviewer on 
French radio that nothing in his life, before or since, was as difficult or traumatic 
as that journey from the South to the North. And yet he was merely one of twelve 
million Southern blacks who went North during the ?Great Migration? between 
1916 and 1928. The trains transported them, overnight from semifeudal 
conditions in the rural South to the steel and stone grind of modern industrial 
capitalism. ?Perhaps never in history has a more utterly unprepared folk wanted to 
go to the city.?
38
 
Rowley?s interpretation of Wright?s experiences, and his own words, represent the reality 
of many blacks in both the South and the North in their search for a better life. Rowley 
and Wright emphasize that the race was caught between two socioeconomic systems that 
shackled them to poverty-stricken realities. Because Daves was born and raised in rural 
Rocky Mount, North Carolina, and he worked in steel mills in Pennsylvania to pay his 
way through college, he would have understood what Wright and other black migrants 
across the country encountered. Moreover, their work emerged from their experiences 
within impoverished southern rural black communities and the destitute environs of 
urban black families in the South and the North, but these men had no interaction with 
each other largely because they lived geographically far apart and in different racial 
social circles.  
While Wright made a living by working for the Post Office on the South Side of 
Chicago, and learned his trade as a black writer and racial representative in Communist -
minded John Reed clubs, J. Herman Daves took a more conventional approach made 
available to him within Knoxville?s black community. The community?s educational 
 229
infrastructure offered him the resources and inspiration to become a sociology professor, 
an executive and local racial activist. Whereas Wright would eventually become one of 
the most influential racial representatives in African American and American literature, 
Daves provided for his family and gave back to the community that enabled him to earn 
recognition as prominent black family man, professor, and executive. 
 Daves? and Wright?s lives as prominent communal and public figures highlight 
the differences between local and national racial representation. Daves became part of the 
Scotts and the Cansler?s local race-leader legacies because he had a formal constituency 
that he encountered on a daily basis as one of the local racial representatives for 
Knoxville College and the TVA, while Wright became a national racial representative 
because his goal was to use his novels and autobiographies to emerge as the literary 
spokesman for the race. Unlike Daves, he did not have immediate constituencies that he 
responded to on a day- to-day basis. Wright wanted everyone to know his work, and he 
dreamed that his work would make him immortal. He hoped that his work would educate 
generations about American racism, but he was not held accountable for the opinions and 
views he portrayed in his novels and autobiographies in the same manner as Daves. 
Daves had more responsibility than Wright because he had a constituency.  His 
constituency looked to him to lead them in the classroom at Knoxville College and to 
positions within prominent local institutions like the TVA or offer mentorship on how to 
cultivate career opportunities in both the South and the North. Moreover, Daves and other 
local racial activists made a greater sacrifice because their purposes did not lead to riches, 
fame, and immortality. 
 230
 The last few pages of Daves? work revealed his personal aspirations and the goals 
he had for his black students at Knoxville College and employees at the TVA. He 
provided pictures of homes ?owned and occupied by Negroes that are an asset to any 
community.? A picture of Charles Warner Cansler?s home resided above this quotation. 
Daves would eventually inherit the home, when his wife Willard Wilson Cansler Daves 
convinced him to move the Daves family into Cansler?s home in the early 1940?s to assist 
the aging patriarch, Charles Warner Cansler. Daves and his father- in- law were 
estranged, however. Cansler never felt that Daves was good enough for his only child, 
and Daves could never forgive Cansler for not accepting him. My father remembers 
sensing the tension between the two men in the home even as a little boy. The irony here 
was that Cansler?s life was largely responsible for acquiring the funds for the library that 
Daves relied on for his study of the Knoxville Negro, and Cansler?s son- in-law was 
clearly responsible for subsequent generations? ability to carry on the Canslers? local 
race-leader legacy within the United States and around the world.  
Part 3 
 
Inheritance: Knoxville?s Black Community and J. Herman Daves? Local Race 
Leader Legacy  
I draw here on interviews with my father about how Knoxville?s local race leader 
traditions and his father shaped the lives of his older brother?s J. Herman Daves Jr., his 
sister Carolyn Daves Reinhardt?s and brother-in-law John E. Reinhardt?s lives. J. Herman 
Daves Jr. (1923-2005) carried on the family?s legacy by earning a B.S. in Physical 
Education from Talladega College, and he earned a Masters in Physical Education from 
the University of Illinois. He married Jean Lewis while they were students in 1947. They 
 231
moved to Washington D.C. where J. Herman Daves Jr. taught health and physical 
education for 34 years, first at Howard University then in Public Schools. He found the 
most enjoyment when he became a legendary basketball coach in high schools in 
Washington D.C. Herman and Jean Daves had three children: Cheryl, Michael and Brian.  
I learned about how J. Herman Daves Jr. carried on the Scotts, the Canslers, and 
the Daves? local race leader legacy from his December 19, 2005 memorial service. He 
died on November 17, 2005, but the service was held in December. The church across the 
street from my Uncle Herman?s home on Seventh Street, N.W. in Washington D.C. was 
filled. There were more than two-hundred people at the service. Some of the mourners 
were unable to find seats in the pews so they sat on the floor at the door for the entire 
service. Floyd Lewis, one of his best players and brightest students, gave the first tribute. 
Floyd is a tall man, about six feet eight inches. He had to unfold himself from one of the 
pews and walk to the front of the church. He informed the mourners in the audience that 
coach used the game of basketball as metaphor to teach his players lessons about life.  
?I learned from him how to read situations and make good decisions which led me 
to the right choices in life.?  
Although he was highly recruited by major Division 1 basketball programs, Lewis 
decided to attend Harvard University in the early 1970?s. He played with James Brown, 
Fox Sports T.V. analyst and investigative reporter for Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel 
on HBO. After graduating from Georgetown University Law School, Lewis became a 
lawyer in Washington, D.C. William Saunders, a retired superintendent and principal in 
the Washington D.C. school district, informed the mourners that J. Herman Daves Jr. had 
administrative opportunities but remained in the classroom and as a coach because that 
 232
was where he felt he could make the most difference in young peoples? lives. My father, 
Charles Warner Daves, also spoke at the service. He spoke of how Herman was one of 
his role models as he was growing up because his older brother exhibited a sense of pride 
and dignity that he wanted to emulate.   
Herman and Jean Daves? children and grandchildren also fulfilled the unspoken 
expectations of the Scotts, the Canslers, and the Daves family?s local race leader legacy. 
Their oldest child Cheryl was born in 1950. She graduated from Wilson College and is 
the assistant to the Bishop at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. Michael was 
born in 1952. He graduated from Bucknell University and has had a successful career as a 
human resources executive. Michael and his wife Gayle have two children, Andrew and 
Angela. Andrew is currently in a B.S. and M.B.A. program at Florida A & M, and 
Angela graduated as a Math and Spanish from Spelman College.  Herman and Jean 
Daves? younger son Brian was born in 1958. He graduated from Brown University and 
earned a M.B.A and C.P.A from Boston University. At Brown in the mid 1970?s, he 
helped to coordinate a sit-in within the administration building to demand that Brown 
offer African American Studies courses. He recently was nominated as the President for 
the nationally recognized Black C.P.A association. He is currently a Vice President of 
Bank of America in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he lives with his wife Carla. 
Carolyn Daves (1925- ) earned a BA in Sociology from Howard University in 
1946, and she did graduate work at the University of Wisconsin where she was 
reintroduced to Dr. John E. Reinhardt. Dr. Reinhardt (1920- ) was a doctoral student in 
English literature. She knew of him because he was one of the brightest students to come 
out of Knoxville?s black school system. He was a first year student at Knoxville College 
 233
at the age of sixteen in 1935. He was the editor of the Knoxville College newspaper and a 
leading member of the college?s debate team. Carolyn Daves? father had Dr. John E. 
Reinhardt as a student and remarked that he was clearly his brightest student. They were 
married in 1947. Although there was a clear age difference, her grandfather and father 
were pleased to accept John into the family. 
Dr. John E. and Carolyn Reinhardt?s children represent the emergence of 
cosmopolitanism within the Scotts, the Canslers, and the Daves? local race leader legacy. 
John and Carolyn Reinhardt have three daughters. Sharman Willard Reinhardt was born 
in 1948 in Madison, Wisconsin where John was earning his doctorate. Alice Nicole 
Reinhardt was born in 1951in Richmond, Virginia where Dr. John E. Reinhardt accepted 
an assistant professor of English Literature position at Virginia State University in St. 
Petersburg Virginia, but there youngest daughter Carolyn Cecile Reinhardt was born in 
1957 in Manila Philippines. Their youngest daughter was born in Manila after Dr. John 
E. Reinhardt entered Foreign Service for the United States. 
Dr. John E. and Carolyn Reinhardt?s healthy marriage offered a model for their 
daughters. Their daughters? exposure to their parent?s sound marriage assisted them in 
making important life decisions. Two of their three daughters have had healthy interracial 
marriages, which can obviously present additional challenges because of race.  The 
Reinhardt?s oldest daughter, Sharman, married Neil Lansfield. Neil is a successful builder 
and accountant in Jersey City, New Jersey and his sister Margaret is a doctor in 
Princeton, New Jersey where her husband Rush Holt is a Congressman for the 12
th
 
District, New Jersey. Sharman is a district supervisor for the U.S. Housing and Urban 
Development Department. Sharman and Neil have two boys. Their older son John Stuart 
 234
Lansfield went to Choate Rosemary Hall and earned a B.A. in English Literature and 
Economics from Harvard University. He currently works for a Hedge Fund in New York 
City, and their second son, Daniel, graduated from Reed College with a degree in Spanish 
and Biology. He is currently in Medical School at the University of California, San 
Francisco. Dr. John E. and Carolyn Reinhardt?s youngest daughter, Cecil, married John 
Feinstmaker, an accomplished organist and choir director. John and Cecil also have two 
sons. Their older son, Paul, is a sophomore at Harvard University, and their second son is 
a first- year student at the St. Paul School. Thus Dr. John E. and Carolyn Reinhardt 
children?s and grandchildren?s lives reflect the values that they acquired from their 
parents and Knoxville?s black community.  
 Reinhardt began his Foreign Service career with the United States Information 
Service in Manila as a speech writer for the United States ambassador to the Philippines, 
was the Director of the American Cultural Center in the ancient Japanese capital of 
Kyoto, the Cultural Attache in Tehran, Iran, and served for three years as the American 
Ambassador to Nigeria. They returned to the Washington area in 1975, and ex- 
Ambassador Reinhardt worked in the State Department, until his appointment in the 
Carter Administration as the Director of the Information Agency of the U.S. Before his 
retirement, he was a staff member for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. 
and a Woodrow Wilson fellow.  
Reinhardt came from a proud working-class family that struggled financially. His 
father had several jobs. He was a janitor, and he performed a variety of services for 
luxurious hotels, and shined shoes. Young John often worked with his father at the posh 
 235
hotels to help the family. He knew the social reality of hard working-class families 
because he worked alongside his father. His father was his son?s biggest supporter.  
 Reinhardt?s life and career reminded me of Richard Hoggart?s interpretation of 
the Scholarship Boy in The Use of Literacy (1957). Hoggart defined scholarship boys 
from the educational selection of working-class English boys for admittance into the 
middle class.
39
 In the 1950?s teachers developed the system because they were interested 
in promoting the possibility of social-class mobility in an English country that historically 
was defined by its rigid caste system. Hoggart argued that the selection process led to 
alienation, however, because these selected working class students were trained to mimic 
their teachers and middle-class culture rather than learn to think for themselves. They 
were socialized to shun their working-class roots and look to the system that offered them 
social and financial mobility for guidance. This process led to their realization that the 
system offered them much more financial comfort in many cases, but where they were 
often not fully accepted by it. Thus the scholarship boy no longer belonged to the 
manual- labor-oriented community of his working-class neighborhood, and he was never 
fully accepted within the social milieu of middle- to- upper-middleclass English society.  
Reinhardt?s situation was different, however. While Reinhardt dealt with many 
adjustments as he became one of the first African Americans to achieve prominence in 
Foreign Service, his parents and Knoxville?s black community encouraged him to master 
the art of racial dualism. They taught him that the aim was to serve the race by exhibiting 
race pride with blacks and whites and transcending American society?s belief in dominant 
and subordinate race relations between whites and blacks. His parents and other local- 
racial activists in Knoxville?s black community modeled how one must demonstrate 
 236
African Americans? ability to make valuable contributions within American society. 
Reinhardt?s experiences contrasted with Hoggart?s impression of social class ascendancy 
in England and Carter G. Woodson?s view of racial and social-class ascendancy in 
America. 
Hoggart?s interpretation of the disillusioned scholarship boy in England paralleled 
Woodson?s analysis of the crisis of the educated Negro. In The Mis-education of the 
Negro (1933), Woodson argued that the educational system trained blacks to worship the 
psychological and economics of American capitalism and reject their own black culture 
as derivative and insignificant. When they were taught to revere whiteness yet not 
allowed to live and work in white America, they were forced to return to a black 
existence where they no longer found any comfort. Reinhardt?s capabilities and training 
enabled him to live in between various worlds. His success symbolized a new form of 
leadership in the Scotts,? the Canslers,? the Daves? and Knoxville?s black local racial 
activist legacies.    
Whereas the Scotts, the Canslers and Herman J. Daves Sr. and Jr. were black 
leaders in Knoxville and Washington D.C, Dr. John E. Reinhardt was a leader of blacks 
as well as whites. The difference was that the Scotts, the Canslers and Herman Daves Sr. 
and Jr. became successful black leaders when they successfully responded to the needs of 
blacks within their communities, but Reinhardt became a leading African American. A 
leading African American is defined by being a pioneer in the corridors of power where 
he or she symbolizes blacks? capacity for leadership in major corporations and 
international affairs but they only indirectly deal with racial issues. Although Reinhardt 
became a symbol of racial uplift and integration, his profession had more to do with his 
 237
mastery of foreign policy and his ability to act as a national ambassador for America. He 
was responsible for carrying out the business of the nation in foreign countries and 
gathering information to protect the country during the Cold War. He was a pioneer in the 
evolution of local and national race- leader tradition because he demonstrated the 
effectiveness of African American leadership within national and international politics.  
Still, Reinhardt?s accomplishments were not known by many of his black 
successors. For instance, Vernon E. Jordan Jr. (1935- ) partner in the investment firm of 
Lazard, Frere & Company in New York City and powerbroker in Washington D.C. in the 
1990?s in the Clinton administration did not know of Reinhardt?s career. He stated in an 
interview for Henry Louis Gates Jr.?s America Behind the Color Line: Dialogues with 
African Americans (2004) that when ?he finished Howard Law School in 1960 that there 
was not a job in Atlanta, his home city, for a black lawyer?no matter what school you 
went to or what you were and regardless of your class standing?not in the city 
government, the county government, the state government, or the Federal Government, 
and certainly not in a private law firm.?
40
 While I clearly understand why Jordan was 
arguing that there was not a known small community of blacks within the corridors of 
power and mainstream institutions, there was at least one black pioneer who was already 
pursuing an accomplished career in Foreign Service. Although these two men did not 
know of each other, the two men shared an admiration for Whitney Young Jr., another 
influential black leader and leading African American. Whereas Jordan spoke of Young?s 
death as marker of when he gained access to the white establishment when he started to 
cultivate a relationship with the Rockefeller family, Reinhardt was paying tribute to 
Whitney Young Jr.?s life in Nigeria where Young died.  
 238
I learned that Reinhardt dedicated the Whitney Young Jr. Library at USIS on 
March 20, 1974. The naming of the Young library allowed Reinhardt to express his view 
of race leadership. The designation of the library honored Whitney Young Jr.?s (1921-
1971) devotion to the causes of civil rights. Young had a remarkable career as a scholar 
and national race leader. He earned a B.S. degree from Kentucky State College in 1941 
and he later did graduate work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also 
acquired an MA in Social Work from the University of Minnesota in 1947. Young 
fulfilled his service as a national race leader by becoming the executive director of the 
Urban League from 1961 to 1971. The Urban League continues to be one of the most 
effective organizations committed to civil rights and improving the economic 
opportunities of African Americans. Young was also a successful racial ambassador. He 
served on seven Presidential Commissions of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. 
In 1969 Young was one of 20 Americans to receive the Medal of Freedom, the Nation?s 
highest Civilian award from President Johnson. Young died during a visit to Lagos, 
Nigeria in 1971. President Nixon sent a plane to Nigeria to take Young?s body back to 
the United States.
41
 
Young?s local race leader heritage resembled that of the Scotts,? the Canslers? and 
the Daves? local race-leader legacies. His family became influential members of the black 
community in Young?s hometown of Lincoln Ridge, Kentucky. His father Whitney 
Young Sr, was President of Lincoln Institute, the boarding school for African Americans 
that Young would attend. His mother, Laura Ray Young, was a teacher at the school. 
Reinhardt?s dedication of the library followed a memorial service of 800 mourners. The 
Rev. Jesse Jackson joined two Nigerian Episcopal Priests in the coordination of the 
 239
service. Reinhardt?s dedication of the Whitney Young Library in Nigeria was another 
example of how he had taken the Scotts, the Canslers,? and the Daves? and Knoxville?s 
black community?s local race-leader legacies to the world?s stage.
42
 
 I am not challenging Jordan?s assessment of America?s history of racism, and I 
am not arguing that because Reinhardt was a successful diplomat from the late 1950?s to 
the early 1980?s that this somehow undermined Jordan?s view of race relations, but I am 
arguing that Jordan?s lack of knowledge of at least one of the leading black pioneers in 
the Foreign Service and the Federal Government says something about the continued 
work that needs to be done on the Diaspora. Reinhardt was one of the first African 
American ambassadors to the continent of Africa. It was understandable that Jordan did 
not know about Reinhardt then, but it is important to place Reinhardt within his rightful 
place now. Reinhardt?s career was a precursor to Vernon Jordan?s political career and 
Colin Powell?s and Condoleezza Rice?s Foreign Service careers. More recently, 
Reinhardt was called upon to give his opinions on America?s foreign policy in the Middle 
East. 
 Reinhardt was asked to take part in a discussion for a News Hour with Jim Leher 
televised on the Public Broadcasting System on November 1, 2001. The topic was how 
the U.S. and its allies are waging a war of words against the Taliban and Osama Bin 
Laden?s al-Qaida network. Terrence Smith, newly appointed Director for Voice of 
America, led the discussion. Voice of America is an editorial daily radio station 
sponsored by the U.S. government which has an audience of 91 million people world 
wide; George Cowan, the former Director of Voice of America during the Clinton 
Administration, now Dean of the Annenberg School of Communication at the University 
 240
of Southern California; Edmund Ghareeb is an adjunct professor of the School of 
International Service at American University; Allen Weinstein is the president of the 
Center for Democracy in Washington D.C; and John Reinhardt, retired member of 
Foreign Service, was director of the U.S. Information Agency in the Carter 
Administration.   
 Smith focused the discussion on the ideological war of winning the hearts and 
minds of Arabs in the Middle East, which has been the policy of the Bush administration 
in Iraq and on the war on terror. Smith pointed out that the ominous history of this 
ideology began during the Vietnam War and that the ideology clearly was not successful. 
Weinstein, Cowan and Reinhardt agreed that the administration was slow in mobilizing 
to win this ideological war. They believed that the US has people in all of the Arab 
countries, and that the US must make more of a concerted effort to assess Arabs? 
perceptions of America and discern whether America has lost the hearts and minds of 
Arab populations in the Middle East. Moreover they all felt more resources were needed. 
In concluding the discussion, Smith had a specific question for Reinhardt who clearly had 
the most Foreign Service experience.  
Smith raised the question: ?How do you combat the images of civilian casualties 
and bomb damage that come out of Afghanistan? How do you put that in a context if you 
are the United States or if you are running the information end of things? 
Reinhardt: These images are very difficult to combat, particularly in time of war. 
But you?ve got to realize that there is a great backlog of information among 
peoples all over the world about the United States. This is not by accident. Many 
of these people have studied here. Many of them have come on exchange grants, 
 241
vast contracts. There are, there are many peoples around the world who 
understand what we are like. Some like us, some don?t. But the backlog of 
goodwill is excellent.
43
 
Reinhardt?s response acknowledges that the utter devastation that comes with war are 
difficult images to counter, but he argued that the belief in America as the land of 
opportunity and America?s effort to make that ideology a reality for peoples around the 
world offers the best form of cultural capital available to respond to what many critics 
argued was the necessary war in Afghanistan after terrorist attack on September 11, 2001.  
 Smith: You would tap into that somehow: 
Reinhardt: I would certainly tap into that. We must also realize that there are other 
media in the United States that are read in the Middle East, that are listened to. 
CNN broadcast for example. All of these are not images that we would like to 
have, but they are an image, are images that give a balanced picture of the United 
States.
44
 
Reinhardt?s reply here offers a complex interpretation of what the American government 
should do and should not do to win the hearts and minds of Arabs in the Middle East and 
what role the media plays in Arabs? perceptions of America?s Foreign Policy. He relies 
on Arabs? experiences with Democracy as the best means of battling against anti-
American sentiments. I would argue that his confidence comes from how his 
extraordinary life embodies the creed of American Democracy, but if one looks closely at 
his reply, he does not adopt blind patriotism. He does not think that America should 
manipulate the media to reach Arabs in the Middle East. Even in a crisis where the 
country needs to reach Arabs, he feels that the Arabs must make their own decision based 
 242
on what they observed in the balanced information available to them. Moreover, his 
decision to join a group of ex-officials that criticized the Bush administration?s foreign 
policies in the Middle East is further evidence of his stature and his strong convictions. In 
June of 2004, Reinhardt signed a letter along with 25 other Diplomats and Military 
Commanders demanding a major revision of American Foreign Policy, specifically in the 
Middle East. He believes that America?s misuse and abuse of power can only lead to 
Arabs forming a view that American Democracy is hypocritical. Furthermore, it will lead 
to the loss of confidence in American leadership world wide.
45
 
Although Reinhardt?s story marked the most extraordinary evolution in the 
Scotts,? the Canslers,? and the Daves? local race-leader legacies, my father had a similar 
experience. His local race leader legacy also involved a migration into the world of the 
elite prior to the civil rights movement and a decision to emerge as a local black leader 
and a leading African American.       
Part 4 
Waking from the Dream: Charles Warner Daves? Performance of Local Race 
Leadership during the rise and fall of Civil Rights Ideology  
 Charles Warner Daves (1930- ) embodied the use of education as the means of 
participating in the family?s local race leader legacy. My father was born in Buffalo New 
York where his father, and my grandfather, J. Herman Daves Sr., was working on his 
Master?s degree in Sociology at the University of Buffalo while employed by the local 
YMCA. My father was three months old when the family moved black to Knoxville 
because J. Herman Daves Sr. accepted a position as a professor in the Sociology 
 243
Department at Knoxville College. My father came of age in Knoxville, but left home in 
1945 to attend Mount Hermon School.  
When I asked my father about how he got to Mount Hermon, he told me, 
?Gramps, (Charles Warner Cansler), used to say to me ??Go east, young man? (a 
variation on Horace Greeley?s ?Go West:?) what he wanted was for me to go to 
an eastern college. He knew of Mount Hermon and encouraged me to apply. I was 
the last child and several years younger than my brother and my sister. My father 
had moved onto to TVA, so we were better off financially and Gramp also helped 
pay for Mount Hermon, where there was a lower-level tuition for moderate 
income families.?  
Mount Hermon marked my father?s move from a small black community to a broader 
world. He said:  
?My first puzzle to solve was learning how to distinguish the white students from 
one another, especially the blonds who looked alike to me. I was used to only 
black students who had different shadings and different hair textures. Sports 
enabled me to gain acceptance in this new world. I played varsity basketball and 
learned enough soccer to start my senior year. Athletic ability as well as academic 
ability was important at this all-boy school.? 
 My father noticed a difference between his educational training in Knoxville and 
the preparation he received at Mount Hermon, which would later merge with the 
Northfield School for girls and become Northfield Mount Hermon. He recalled:  
?From my first year I gained an appreciation for literature. My English classes at 
home explained grammar in workbook exercises, so classes at Mount Hermon 
 244
were my first serious exposure to literature?American and British. I wrote my 
first long paper on Robert Frost.? 
My father told me that this was how he acquired access to the cultural currency skills that 
enabled the aristocracy to develop critical thinking skills, mastery of expository writing, 
and study habits. His training at Mount Hermon enabled him to realize his educational 
desires and Charles Warner Cansler?s dream. He earned a B.A. from Cornell University 
in American Studies in 1952. He received his M.A. in American Civilization in 1953 
from the University of Pennsylvania. After he earned his masters degree, he became an 
instructor of English Literature at Morehouse College from 1955 to 1956, and he taught 
at Fisk University from 1956 to 1959. He returned to school in 1959 and earned a 
doctorate in English Literature from the University of Minnesota in 1965. He taught at 
the University of Rochester for four years before taking a position as an executive at the 
Educational Testing Service from 1968 to 1998. He was also nominated to be a member 
of the Board of Trustees for Trenton State College from 1974 to 1984, renamed the 
College of New Jersey in 1996. He was elected as chair for five years. His leadership 
played a pivotal role in the small state college?s evolution. Today the College of New 
Jersey is considered as one of the premiere state liberal arts colleges in the country. A 
plaque of my father?s tenure as chair graces the doorway of the student center. My 
father?s career as a local race leader, local racial ambassador, and leading African 
American occurred during a dramatic shift in the public?s perceptions of the civil rights 
movement. His educational development and career paralleled the rise and fall of civil 
rights movement ideology.  
 245
My father exchanged his credentials at Mount Hermon (renamed Northfield 
Mount Hermon) for acceptance at Cornell University before the civil rights movement 
and the introduction of Affirmative Action Programs. He could have made this difficult 
journey much easier because he could pass for white, but he never did. He consciously 
chose to live as a black man at Mount Hermon and throughout his academic and 
executive career.  
Cornell offered my father heightened preparation for life in broad settings. He 
informed me:  
?I learned a lot from the classes and from the well-prepared fellow students. 
Unfortunately, I did not seek out the professors outside of class. They were, 
however, in many cases good if not excellent teachers and researchers. I learned 
approaches to disciplines such as historiography, not just the findings. Also 
because some of the classes were large, I had to learn to represent myself by my 
written work?papers and exams? I could not rely on the teachers knowing me 
from my active participation in class.? 
 My father?s recollections represented the role social class played in academic 
achievement and career opportunities. He became part of an educational system that 
prepared the elite for lucrative careers in education, business, politics, law, and medicine. 
Moreover, he joined a unique fraternity created at Cornell entitled Watermargin: ?All 
Men Are Brothers.?  
Watermargin embodied the emergence of a new form of liberalism. Watermargin 
was born at Cornell in 1950. Leftist-minded historians, sociologists and political 
scientists counseled the Watermargin fraternity. Dr. Mario Einaudi, professor of 
 246
Government, Dr. Paul W. Gates, Chairman, Department of History, Milton R. Konvitz, 
professor of Industrial and Labor Relations, Maurice Neufled, professor of Industrial and 
Labor Relations were on the Board of Advisors of Watermargin.  Watermargin offered 
my father the opportunity to experience the progressive sensibility that took hold in 
northern elite social settings.  
I learned the following from my father?s brochure of the educational and fraternal 
organization: 
Watermargin is an educational and fraternal organization composed of a group of  
Students at Cornell University who firmly believe that it is possible for all men to  
live together in harmony, regardless of racial or religious background. 
Watermargin is the implementation of this ideal. The foundations upon which 
Watermargin is built are the phrases ?All Men Are Brothers? and Learning by 
Doing.
46
 
My father recalled that in the fraternity he learned about ?social pluralism? and ?marginal 
man? long before he heard the terms from the educated public. He said he lived in a 
house with other black, white, Latino and Asian students. The students had ranging 
interests from engineering and mathematics to philosophy and literature. Watermargin 
provided him with a rich culturally progressive environment, which made my father 
realize that the future would provide more educational opportunities for blacks. He knew 
that he would be able to benefit from this. His experiences in Knoxville, on Mount 
Hermon?s and Cornell University?s campuses enabled him to become comfortable as the 
only, or one of few blacks, in a predominately white environment. Moreover, he knew 
 247
how to find white mentors to further his career and aid blacks who also found themselves 
as one of few blacks in predominately white and elite settings. 
Ralph Ellison?s literary representation of blacks? experiences between black and 
white worlds resembled my father?s thoughts about America?s culture of racism. My 
father read Ellison?s Invisible Man when it came out in 1952 and was included in an 
American Literature course at the University of Pennsylvania. He told me that he was 
blown away by Ellison?s writing style and his ability to articulate the inhumanity of 
America?s racial caste system through black history and culture prior to the civil rights 
movement. He described how Ellison?s first-person novel enabled him to develop a 
critical eye on the rise and fall of the civil rights movement. I learned from my father?s 
eyewitness account of the rise and fall of the civil rights movement that by the late 1960?s 
black people were left again to fend for themselves.  
 Nevertheless, the materialization of the civil rights movement shaped my father?s 
racial and educational development. He was teaching at Morehouse College when Rosa 
Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat for a white man in Montgomery 
Alabama and Martin Luther King Jr. coordinated the Montgomery Bus Boycott. He was 
an English Instructor at Morehouse College shortly after Martin Luther King Jr. received 
his B.A there. He observed Dr. Benjamin Mays? performance of race leadership. Mays 
was the President and a force in the struggle for integration. Martin Luther King Jr. also 
considered Mays as his spiritual mentor when he was a student at Morehouse College and 
during the civil rights movement.  
My father was an eyewitness to Mays? grassroots construction of local race- 
leader traditions at Morehouse. He told me that at the beginning of each school year, 
 248
Mays addressed the student body in the auditorium. He then brought every member of the 
faculty onto the stage and recited the faculty?s credentials without a note card, and then 
someone in the faculty would shout out,? Dr. Mays what about you?? and Mays replied, 
?B.A. Bates, Ph.D. University of Chicago.? My father told me that in those days the 
college?s student body included sons of sharecroppers and boys from small country 
towns. They did not have the substantial middle-class black student body that they do 
today. He believed Mays? performance was designed to demonstrate for these black men 
that despite America?s rigid racial caste system not only can you achieve what you have 
heard your professors accomplish, but it was your duty to do so as a Morehouse man. 
Mays also made requests to successful black teachers, college administrators, doctors, 
and lawyers, all graduates of the school, to return to Morehouse and perform as role 
models for the next generation of Morehouse men.  
 While my father observed Mays? grassroots ideology of local-race leadership, my 
father?s experiences at Fisk University exposed him to the elite black middle-class? 
involvement in rearing the next generation of largely middle-class blacks for racial uplift 
and integration. He took the teaching opportunity at Fisk after receiving a telegram from 
Charles S. Johnson the President of Fisk University. My father told me that  
?Johnson was an internationally known sociologist who authored many scholarly 
books. In the 1920?s Johnson was editor of the Urban League?s new publication, 
Opportunity: A Journal of Negro Life in New York. Under Johnson?s editorial 
leadership, Opportunity became a principal publication of the New Negro Arts 
movement.?  
 249
My father was proud of the academic and cultural community that Johnson cultivated at 
Fisk. He told me,  
??Johnson continued the development of the Fisk Jubilee singers who were doing 
tours in Europe. I was a member of the English Department with Robert Hayden, 
the internationally recognized African American poet. I served with Arna 
Bontemps, critically acclaimed contributor to the Harlem Renaissance and close 
friend of Langston Hughes, who was the librarian.?  
My father taught the survey course for the first half of American Literature. He told me 
that one of his brightest students was Hazel Reid, who became Hazel O?Leary. She was 
the Energy Secretary in President Clinton?s cabinet and recently became President of Fisk 
University. He told me that my mother, Allayne Turner Daves, earned the opportunity to 
be an assistant for Professor Mark Heald?s large lecture class in the History of Western 
Civilization. She had a Master?s degree in History from the University of Minnesota. 
Johnson hired Professor Heald, a white teacher who had recently retired from Rutgers, to 
expand academic specialties. Johnson also brought in another white scholar, Professor 
Scott Buchanan, an expert on Plato, from St. John?s College in Annapolis, Maryland, 
both as Visiting Professors. My father wanted to get to know Johnson, but he died the 
first fall that my parents came to Fisk, having married in August of that year.   
 After completing his doctoral work at Minnesota, he was hired at the University 
of Rochester. At Rochester he met the Peck family, a liberal white family. Russell Peck is 
a professor of Medieval Literature. He won a national award for teaching. Ruth Peck, his 
wife, is a loving woman who genuinely embraced my father and my mother. Their 
children are also bright and gifted teachers and scholars. Their oldest child Nathan 
 250
teaches history at a private school in Saint Louis, their daughter Demary earned her 
B.A.in English literature from Princeton University and her Ph.D. from the University of 
Virginia. She taught at Washington and Lee before leaving academia to teach high school 
and take care of her children after a difficult divorce. Gunther, their youngest child, 
graduated from Princeton University with a BA in History, and he earned his Ph.D. in 
History from Yale University. He is currently a history professor at Duke University. My 
parents were part of Rochester?s predominately white and progressive academic 
community, but they were also involved in the development of the community such as 
the Urban League in Rochester.  
My mother worked at Rochester?s Urban League in 1967-1968. She coordinated a 
program that provided secretarial training for poverty-stricken and working-class black 
women, who were often single mothers who wanted to support themselves and their 
children. My father told me that one day my mother came into the office and the black 
secretary said to her, ?You have been black and middle class all your life!? My parents? 
perceived her observation as one of astonishment.? This was one of the many stories I 
heard about the isolation that came with being black and middle class.      
 When my parents left Rochester because my father accepted an executive position 
at the Educational Testing Service (ETS) in Princeton, New Jersey in 1968, the liberal 
retreat from the principles of the civil rights movement and the conservative backlash had 
already begun. In his article ?The Liberal Retreat from Race during The Post?Civil 
Rights?Era, ?Stephen Steinberg argued, that by 1963 there were already signs of liberals 
increasing disaffection with the movement in the South as well as the North. He used 
Murray Friedman?s essay ?The White Liberal Retreat? for Atlantic Monthly January 1963 
 251
as an illustration. Friedman believed that there were a number of factors that led to this 
retreat.?
47
 When desegregation came to northern cities, whites realized that the civil 
rights movement was more than an abstract concept.
48
 The re-emergence of Black 
Nationalism scared many whites, particularly when whites were asked to concede their 
leadership positions in civil rights organizations to blacks.
49
 The race riots further tested 
white liberals? support of the movement. Friedman believed that they now wanted change 
without problems and without having to make personal sacrifices. My parents sensed the 
erosion of white liberal support when they moved into a predominately white middle-to-
upper-middle-class suburban neighborhood in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, but they had 
cultural currency in the form of skin color because my father could pass and my mother 
was light brown, and they had the pedigree of upper-middle-class America.   
 Nevertheless, because of my father?s experiences growing up in Knoxville, 
Tennessee, and educational career at Morehouse and Fisk University, he believed that he 
has a certain responsibility to be a leader for racial uplift and integration. He focused a 
great deal of his attention on a response to the liberal retreat and the conservative 
backlash. At ETS, he encouraged and actively participated in the recruitment of black 
professionals, and he and my mother helped to mentor new hires, especially as they 
began their careers in a new environment. 
For instance, my father used information for a panel presentation on higher 
education at the National Urban League Conference on the Black Family in November, 
1977 as the material for an article in the IVY Leaf ?Education: At What Cost?? The IVY 
Leaf was the Official Organ of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority, one of the premiere 
black sororities and social networks for college students and alumni. He began his article 
 252
with a response to Roger Wilkins? New York Times article ?Black America?s Holiday 
Mood: Gloom, Suspicion and Pessimism.? Wilkins is an accomplished local and national 
race leader. He is a law professor and historian at George Mason University and an 
accomplished author. Wilkins revealed that President Carter?s promises to blacks were 
too optimistic to be believed. He citied that Carter?s first year in office was worse than 
anticipated. My father?s thesis for his article came from Wilkins? bleak statistics that the 
income of blacks was 60% that of whites and unemployment about twice the rate of 
whites.
50
 My father argued that cultivating educational opportunities for the race were the 
best means of addressing Wilkins? disturbing assessment of black life.
51
 He focused on 
familial and communal activism as the most effective means of producing educational 
opportunities which he felt would address the crisis affecting black America.
52
 
 My father relied on his experiences growing up with local racial activists in 
Knoxville, and witnessing Mays? and Johnsons? local race-leader ideologies. He stated 
?the surest way I know to attack the matter of lower relative income of blacks is by 
increasing college and graduate school attendance and graduation rates.?
53
 He believed 
that we have always known that. He felt as many members of the black community do 
today that blacks must be highly educated and in many cases over qualified to earn career 
opportunities. He knew that the social reality for blacks had not changed, but what he 
realized had changed considerably, despite the liberal retreat and the conservative 
backlash, was access to lucrative career opportunities in business, law, higher levels of 
management, as well as college and university teaching. He had also witnessed that the 
generation which came of age after the civil rights movement attended Dartmouth, 
Brown, Stanford, and Chicago, while their parents had only attended historically black 
 253
colleges and universities in most cases. Only a few black families with substantial 
cultural capital and exclusive networks with prominent whites had been able to send their 
children to private schools and elite colleges and universities at an earlier time, but during 
the late 1960?s and early 1970?s gifted black students from working ?middle-class and 
poverty-stricken families were finally offered opportunities to attend these elite colleges 
and universities and their own state universities. He believed, nevertheless, that 
historically black colleges and universities did an excellent job of preparing black 
students, but this shift enabled the black community?s best and brightest to receive the 
valuable cultural capital that graduating from elite schools provided for America?s 
aristocracy. 
 Still, my father thought that two issues threaten the means blacks rely on to 
narrow the socioeconomic gap with the majority population: (1) the backlash to 
affirmative action, and (2) the cost of higher education. He realized that the Alan Bakke 
case led to the mobilization of the reverse discrimination ideology that impeded black 
progress, and he understood that economic stagnation prevented the mainstream from 
being sympathetic to the plight of blacks within American society.
54
 He observed elite 
universities? assertion that they raised tuition, room, and board as well as monies 
available for financial aid, but he pointed out that in the late seventies even the president 
of Yale University, A. Bartlett Giamatti, informed the public that despite their large 
endowment Yale was operating in the red in the last few years.
55
 Elite universities, like 
largely upper class families, suffered from inflation and the substantial decline in value of 
stocks. Thus my father perceived that these institutions had to look to more students who 
could pay full tuition to stretch funds for students who desperately needed financial aid, 
 254
which would decrease some of the opportunities for blacks to attend elite colleges and 
universities.
56
 
   My father believed, nonetheless, that this was not the major problem in blacks? 
inability to gain admission to elite colleges and universities because financial aid did 
exist. He argued that overwhelmed college counselors at high schools were not providing 
students with information about financial aid. He raised the issue of how many students 
know about financial aid, and how many students select themselves out because they do 
not know?  He informed people of the new Office for Minority Education at Educational 
Testing Service developed a manual that served as a guide to acquiring financial aid and 
grants, but he wanted people to look to themselves for the major solutions. His beliefs 
came from what he found within Knoxville?s black community to develop five possible 
solutions to narrow the economic and unemployment issues affecting the black 
community:  
(1) Insure proper distribution of information about financial aid through 
community organizations like AKA; (2) work with students at early ages to 
develop cultural currency skills such as problem solving, critical thinking and 
expository writing; (3) Concentrate on making local schools more effective 
for all students (you may meet resistance at the administration or in individual 
schools, but persist). (4) Demonstrate the relationship of schooling to career 
occupations. (5) Push for and organize efforts for support of black colleges. 
Over the years these colleges have identified and developed leaders and have 
done so at a modest cost. Do not be convinced that because of greater 
 255
opportunities to attend elite institutions that these historically black colleges 
and universities need not exist.
57
 
My father?s blueprint for local racial-activism embodied his experiences with the Scotts, 
the Canslers,? and the Daves? local racial-activist legacies. His view coincided with 
scholars? realization that the Government recognized the public?s liberal retreat and the 
emergence of the conservative backlash. This awareness indicated that affirmative action 
would be challenged, but it also meant racism would no longer be a major focus of the 
Democratic agenda because now both liberals and conservatives wanted to avoid 
responsibility for the legacy of America?s rigid racial caste system and continued customs 
of institutionalize racism. He believed that the black family and black community had to 
carry most of the leadership burden. He realized that they were the only ones who were in 
positions to facilitate educational opportunities that lead to a stronger network for black 
development, which could facilitate educational opportunities and prospects for lucrative 
careers.               
 My father became concerned as he came to realize that the black middle class was 
abandoning the local racial activist and racial ambassador traditions, when they were 
desperately needed. He was appalled to learn from a recent investigation in the late 
1970?s that black students are not only underrepresented generally in higher education, 
but that underrepresentation at higher income levels was even greater than before.
58
 He 
recognized that the figures may be deceptive, but that if there is truth to these statistics, 
then the black middle class and upper-middle classes must make a concerted effort to 
send their children to college and participate in helping other blacks get into college and 
 256
universities. Thus he continued to believe in the figurative family motto: From those who 
have achieved, more is expected.
59
      
 I learned from my father?s stories, and reading one of his articles, that he 
anticipated what would happen in the 1980?s, 1990?s and during the early twenty-first 
century. My father believed we must provide for ourselves and our families to 
supplement federal and state programs. He recognized that Democrats firmly believed 
that continuing the progressive-minded movement ideology?s confrontation of America?s 
racial caste system would lead to their becoming a minority party in the house and the 
senate. He believed that they began to argue that the civil rights movement?s ideological 
end point was the end of legal segregation and limited forms of affirmative action. My 
parents had frequent conversations over the dinner table about Democratic leaders. They 
discussed how President Lyndon B. Johnson and Daniel Patrick Moynihan?s focus on the 
black family crisis cast light on the results of America?s rigid racial caste system without 
offering policy remedies for systemic institutional racism. They observed that the 
movement ideology officially ended when Ronald Reagan?s America took control of the 
White House and mainstream American culture.  
My own journey to discover myself within my family?s traditions began when I 
decided to become a teacher. My decision helped me to understand the sacrifices my 
parents had to make to provide me with opportunities to gain self awareness and have a 
fulfilling and productive life. 
 257
 
                                                 
Notes
 
 
 
1
 Werner Sollors. Neither black nor white yet both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature. (New 
York: Oxford University Press, 1997) 214, 215. 
 
2
 Werner Sollors. Neither black nor white yet both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature, 214,  
215. 
 
3
 J. Herman Daves. Obituary, in the Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tuesday, March 21, 1978, 15. 
 
4
 Henry Louis Gates Jr and Terri Hume Oliver. Eds. The Souls of Black Folk. A Norton Critical Edition. By 
W.E.B. Du Bois. (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1999) 10. 
 
5
 J. Herman Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee. (Knoxville: Free 
Colored Library, 1926) 1-7. 
 
6
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee. 1-7. 
 
7
 Dan S. Green and Edwin D. Driver. Eds. On Sociology and the Black Community. By W.E.B. Du Bois. 
(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978) 115-140. 
 
8
 Du Bois, On Sociology and the Black Community, 49-51. 
 
9
 Dan S. Green and Edwin D. Driver. Eds. On Sociology and the Black Community. By W.E.B. Du Bois. 
(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978) 115-140. 
 
10
 J. Herman Daves. A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee. (Knoxville: Free 
Colored Library, 1926) 1-7. J. Herman Daves? sociological study provided me with important data on the 
shortcomings and successes of stewardship, local racial activist and local racial ambassadorship traditions 
in Knoxville?s black community. 
 
11
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 1, 2. 
 
12
 Daves, A Sociall Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 2, 3. 
 
13
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 2, 3. 
 
14
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 2, 3. 
 
15
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 4, 5. 
 
16
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 4, 5. 
 
17
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 4, 5. 
 
18
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 5, 6. 
 
19
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 6, 7. 
 
20
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 6, 7. 
 
21
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 6, 7. 
 258
                                                                                                                                                 
 
22
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 7, 8. 
 
23
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 7, 8. 
 
24
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 9, 10. 
 
25
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 9, 10. 
 
26
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 10. 
 
27
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 11-13. 
 
28
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 11-13. 
 
29
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 11-13. 
 
30
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 11-13. 
 
31
 Daves, A Social Study of the Colored Population of Knoxville, Tennessee, 11-13. 
 
32
 Robert J. Booker. Glimpses of Knoxville?s Black History (a Calendar). Knoxville: Beck Cultural 
Exchange Center. 1981, 5. 
 
33
 Dan S. Green and Edwin D. Driver. Eds. On Sociology and the Black Community. By W.E.B. Du Bois. 
(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978) 61-65. 
 
34
 E. Franklin. Frazier. The Black Bourgeoisie: The Rise of a New Middle Class. (New York: Simon & 
Schuster, 1997) 4, 5. 
 
35
 Carter G. Woodson. The Mis-Education of the Negro. (Chicago: African American Images, 2000) 20, 21. 
 
36
 Woodson, The Mis-Education of the Negro, 29. 
 
37
 Hazel Rowley. Richard Wright: The Life and Times. (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2001) 52. 
 
38
 Hoggart, Richard. The Uses of Literacy. (New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2000) 227, 228. 
 
39
 Henry Louis Gates Jr. America behind the Color Line: Dialogues with African Americans. (New York: 
Warner Books, 2004) 27. 
 
40
 ?Retelling the Story of Civil Rights Leader Whitney Young Jr.? Crossroads Vol. 8, No 8 August- 
October, 2001? http://usembassy.state.gov/nigeria/wwwhxrdaug.html. 
 
41
 ?Retelling the Story of Civil Rights Leader Whitney Young Jr.? Crossroads Vol. 8, No 8 August- 
October, 2001?http://usembassy.state.gov/nigeria/wwwhxrdaug.html. 
 
42
 A News Hour with Jim Leher On Line Focus. ?Winning the Hearts and Minds.? November 1, 2001. 
www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july-dec01/heartsminds_11_1.html/. 
 
43
 A News Hour with Jim Leher On Line Focus. ?Winning the Hearts and Minds.? November 1, 2001. 
www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july-dec01/heartsminds_11_1.html/. 
 
44
 A News Hour with Jim Leher On Line Focus. ?Winning the Hearts and Minds.? November 1, 2001. 
www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july-dec01/heartsminds_11_1.html/. 
 259
                                                                                                                                                 
 
45
 A News Hour with Jim Leher On Line Focus. ?Winning the Hearts and Minds.? November 1, 2001.  
www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july-dec01/heartsminds_11_1.html/. 
 
46
 Stephen Steinberg. ?The Liberal Retreat from Race during the Post-Civil Rights Era.? The House that 
Race Built. Ed. Wahneema Lubiano. (New York: Vintage Books, 1998) 13-15. 
 
47
 Watermargin Brochure. (Ithaca: Cornell University 1948). 
 
48
 Stephen Steinberg. ?The Liberal Retreat from Race During the Post-Civil Rights Era.? In The House that 
Race Built. Ed. Wahneema Lubiano. (New York: Vintage Books, 1998) 13-15. 
 
49
 Steinberg, ?The Liberal Retreat from Race During the Post-Civil Rights Era,? 13-15. 
 
50
 Steinberg, ?The Liberal Retreat from Race During the Post-Civil Rights Era,? 13-15. 
 
51
 Charles Daves. ?Education at What Cost.? Ivy Leaf, Spring 1978. 9, 10. Charles Daves? article enabled 
me to document how members of the family carried on the family?s local racial activism and adapted the 
principles to address the needs of current generations. Moreover, Daves? article reveals how the family?s 
belief enabled him to offer his own vision of the strategies educated middle class blacks may want to 
develop to carry on local racial activist traditions for themselves, their children and other black families. 
 
52
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10. 
 
53
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10. 
 
54
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10. 
 
55
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10. 
 
56
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10. 
 
57
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10. 
 
58
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10 
 
59
 Daves, ?Education at What Cost,? 9, 10. 
 260
Chapter 6 
Conclusion 
This study was motivated by my desire to understand my family?s leadership 
tradition, my sense that this tradition provided a rich opportunity to explore local racial -
activist traditions, and my own desire to come to terms with the family?s legacy and my 
experiences of being adopted into the family. When I first considered analyzing my 
experiences with my family?s local racial-activist legacy, I had to overcome my own 
skepticism. I had to learn to assess the value of my ancestors? and immediate family 
members? lives as local racial activists. As a young person, I had observed how 
influential white and black people admired my parents and immediate relatives, but at 
first I was unwilling to examine why they, and I, were given unique privileges. I felt that 
any real evaluation could only end in the feeling that my family and I were Uncle Toms. I 
felt as though a critical inspection of our lives would result in the conclusion that merely 
pleasing white people was the basis of our social and economic achievements. My 
thinking changed as I accepted my family?s legacy and became a teacher. I realized that 
my self-awareness and success was largely the result not of appeasement of whites, but 
my family?s determination to confront institutionalized racism with a variety of methods. 
Moreover, I discovered that their tactics for overcoming such racism were designed for 
familial and collective racial self improvement. I recognized that my ancestors? life 
decisions?from one generation to the next, from the antebellum years to the present?
enabled both blacks and whites to articulate what they really wanted from life.  
Appreciating this was only the beginning, however. Placing their local racial activist life 
histories in conversation with other local racial activist and national race leaders? 
 261
representations of themselves enabled me to form a deeper understanding of literary 
performances of black leadership culture. Cansler?s Three Generations was where I 
began my undertaking. 
 ?The Story of a Race Man: Charles Warner Cansler?s Representation of a family?s 
Local Racial Activist Legacy? provided me with an opportunity to explore Charles 
Warner Cansler?s (1871-1953) representation of himself, and how he used his family?s 
life stories to construct his understanding of himself as a steward for Knoxville?s black 
community. Charles Chesnutt?s article ?The Free Black of North Carolina? was a 
valuable resource for documenting the origins of the family?s free black status and 
examining Cansler?s version of it. I was also able to draw from primary sources such as 
Bartow G. Wilson?s The Knoxville Negro: Emphasizing the Great Era of Progress 
Prevalent in Negro Knoxville Today (1929) to display my interpretation of Cansler?s 
participation within Knoxville?s local racial-activist and local- racial- ambassador 
conventions. With the use of these and other primary and secondary sources, I 
demonstrated how Cansler?s and Knoxville?s local -racial activists? practices compared to 
and shared similarities with other communal and national black leadership cultural 
traditions. Moreover, ?The Story of a Race Man? offered me an opportunity to explain 
how Cansler?s interaction with other communal public figures? and national race leaders? 
enactment of themselves enables us to trace the roots of the civil rights movement not 
only back to larger- than-life historical black figures, but also to families and black and 
white neighborhoods.  
 ?William B. Scott?s Dream: A Patriarch?s Legacy? offered me an opportunity to 
examine Cansler?s biographical interpretation of the patriarch of the family?s roles as 
 262
educational and social superintendents for Knoxville?s black community. Cansler?s vision 
of William B. Scott?s (1821-1885) dream enabled me to discover a white-skinned free 
black man?s identity formation principles between various black and white worlds, how 
his decision to define himself as a black man, raise a free black family and perform as a 
coordinator of racial uplift principles offered Cansler the opportunity to display a 
revolutionary narrative of middle-class black masculinity. I investigated how his vision of 
Scott?s legacy compared with and resembled canonical narrative scripts written by and 
about activist-minded mulatto writers. Moreover, this chapter offered me an opportunity 
to explore his daughter Laura Ann Scott Cansler?s (1846-1926) and son in law Hugh 
Lawson Cansler?s (1835-1922) adoption of Scott?s racial identity formation values and 
local racial-activist principles, the way Scott?s life encouraged his daughter and son- in-
law to adapt and implement his strategies for collective racial advancement to gain 
acceptance and recognition between contrasting racial and social class environments. 
 ?The Emergence of Joseph Herman Daves: A Local Racial Activist?s Analysis of 
the Scotts and Cansler Family?s Local Racial Activist Legacy? provided me with the 
opportunity to analyze Daves? use of the family?s cultural values of racial development. 
He utilized the family?s traditions to gain acceptance from the Cansler family and the 
larger Knoxville community. I explored how his efforts marked a shift in the family?s 
heritage. Because he not only had to gain recognition from the family, but he also had to 
receive acknowledgement from blacks and whites within the community. Daves? 
sociological study of Knoxville?s black community allowed me to display what Daves 
learned from Du Bois? research, and how he used his knowledge of Du Bois? work to 
evaluate the advancement of Knoxville?s black community. Moreover, Daves? role as the 
 263
Chairman of the Sociology Department and executive at the TVA offered him 
opportunities to demonstrate his mastery of the family?s values. He became a role model 
for his children. His success inspired his older son Herman Jr., daughter Carolyn Daves 
Reinhardt, former student and son- in-law John E. Reinhardt, and my father Charles 
Warner Daves to carry on the family?s legacy in a variety of ways. I examined how they 
interpreted the family?s heritage from career paths in teaching and coaching to executive 
positions in higher education and Foreign Service for the United States government.    
Cansler?s book is my family?s local racial activist legacy in narrative form. His 
book is a literary performance of their quest for self awareness within familial and group 
oriented local racial-activist ideals. When he decided not to do a traditional historical 
analysis of their lives, his book offered opportunities to develop multiple interpretations 
of their experiences as free black communal advocates.
1
 His ability to imagine and to 
construct dialogues (based on information that he did not know) allowed the family?s 
story to emerge as a living black history for family members, Knoxville?s black 
community and the larger society.
2
 Mastering literary devices such as irony, parody, and 
rhetorical flourishes
3
 enabled him to represent the importance of growing up with 
family?s beliefs in local racial-activist principles. His use of novelistic techniques enabled 
him to do more than develop testimonies to his family?s lives as free blacks and 
achievements as coordinators of what I have defined as local racial-activist tradition. His 
hybrid text sought to turn my ancestors? life histories from the Civil War, Reconstruction, 
and World War 1 through to the Great Depression and beyond into inspiring biographical 
and autobiographical statements. 
 264
Consequently, Three Generations marked my family?s ways of defining 
themselves between various black and white social worlds. His book revealed how those 
ways of seeing themselves as local- racial activists were passed onto the next generation. 
His work made it possible for family members and others to discuss how his life, and his 
immediate ancestors? lives, worked with and alongside national performances of black 
leadership culture. For instance, during the rise in lynching in Tennessee, Cansler?s letter 
to Governor Rye in 1917 and Three Generations (1939) presented a contradictory reading 
of Booker T. Washington and his legacy.  
Similar to Washington?s performance of himself in his Atlantic Exposition 
Address (1895) and in Up from Slavery (1901), Cansler performed as a kind of corporate 
manager for the race by describing how the lynching of black men dramatically affected 
the economic well being of Tennessee?s economy. He argued that the lynching of black 
men convinced them and their families to leave Tennessee, which left severe labor 
shortages throughout the entire state. His use of Washington?s strategy conflicted with his 
unfavorable impression of Washington in Three Generations. While Cansler did not 
support Washington?s philosophy of negotiating for the lives of black men almost 
exclusively through economic justifications, he believed that writing within 
Washington?s paradigm was the best means of gaining Governor Rye?s attention and 
support. Though Cansler was unsuccessful, his decision to use Washington?s strategy 
demonstrated that Washington?s racial accommodation philosophy became the ideology 
that many local racial activists used to communicate with white politicians.  Cansler?s 
negative opinion of Washington but use of Washington?s tactics allowed me to discover 
the very real resistance to allowing local and national race leaders their intricacies.
4
 
 265
Cansler?s contradictory relationship with Washington and his legacy is part of a much 
larger discussion about Washington and his debate with W.E.B. Du Bois.    
Contemporary African American and American Studies Departments and 
programs nationwide teach W.E.B. Du Bois? debate with Booker T. Washington. They 
introduce students to African American and American history through these two national 
race leaders? perceptions of each other and their approaches to racial uplift and 
integration. Recently, books such as African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington 
and Up from Slavery 100 Years Later (2005), edited by Rebecca Carroll, have developed 
new perspectives on Booker T. Washington and his legacy. From the emergence of Black 
Nationalism in the 1960?s through the reemergence of Black Nationalists sentiment in the 
late 1980?s, Washington was usually labeled as an Uncle Tom: the race leader who 
abandoned his race for white approval and prestige.
5
 While some black intellectuals and 
local black politicians continue to agree with Du Bois? critique of him and similar 
critiques of Washington?s legacy, others have argued that scholars did not place him 
within a historical context. These supporters of Washington contend that scholars and 
students labeling Washington an Uncle Tom because of his philosophy of racial 
accommodation do not have an accurate understanding of American history. Still, others 
argue that they have not blindly labeled Washington an Uncle Tom. They maintain the 
view that placing Washington within a historical context will not save his legacy.
6
 
However, conservative-minded black scholars, and even some progressive- 
minded black intellectuals, believe that the view that he was an Uncle Tom was merely 
the Northern black elite looking down on Washington and on the southern, rural and 
poverty- stricken black masses. Moreover, they consider contemporary generations? 
 266
views of Washington as an Uncle Tom as na?ve and shortsighted. This debate about 
Washington, however, is not about southerner?s pessimistic perceptions of black youth 
and the northern black elite, or whether Washington can be definitively labeled a 
remarkable race leader or an Uncle Tom. The debate should focus on the limitations of 
the evaluation process. The demand for Washington to be considered as one or the other 
reveals the lack of imagination in the interpretation of performances of black leadership 
culture.
7
 The debates about Washington?s legacy expose that the lack of sophistication in 
the study of black leadership culture, both locally and nationally. Washington?s accusers 
and his defenders often either want to condemn him as an Uncle Tom or completely 
defend his strategy and conduct.
8
 Cansler?s Three Generations and Daves? sociological 
study of Knoxville reflect on Rebecca Carroll?s collection of more complex readings of 
Washington and his legacy.   
Cansler and his son- in-law J. Herman Daves were southerners from two entirely 
different social class backgrounds. While Cansler would be considered a member of Du 
Bois? talented tenth, Daves was a self-made man whose childhood more closely 
resembled Washington?s.  Cansler?s Three Generations and Daves? sociological study of 
Knoxville allow readers to explore national performances of black leadership culture 
alongside local race leaders? decision to work with national black leaders and 
independent of their ideologies. 
For example, J. Herman Daves? sociological research on Knoxville?s black 
community was part of a much larger debate about how to measure black progress 
throughout American history. The post-World War 1 era marked the emergence of black 
sociologists as influential race leaders on the national scene. Many educated whites and 
 267
blacks knew of Du Bois from his collection of sociological minded essays The Souls of 
Black Folk, but by the early 1900?s other black sociologists came into view as influential 
national and local race leaders. Black sociologists were changing as they received more 
recognition, however. Prominent black sociologist circles adopted the intellectually 
minded research of the Chicago School. Black sociologists? decision signified a lucrative 
move away from community organizing and activist-minded view and practice of 
sociology to a more scientific approach. This shift resembled Du Bois? interpretation of 
the field prior to his most famous work. Du Bois? The Souls of Black Folk would 
eventually mark awareness of the need for more than an objective scientific method to 
examine America?s race problem. Souls of Black Folk became a canonical work because 
of Du Bois ability to develop an interdisciplinary technique to document and represent 
the black experience within American society, but from the publication of his work, and 
several years after it, influential black sociologists emulated Du Bois? scientific-minded 
sociological study of systemic American racism. Nevertheless, some contemporary black 
scholars doing interdisciplinary work on black masculinity and race leadership believe 
that Du Bois? peer black sociologists had more in common with Washington than with 
Du Bois.  
  In his book Manning the Race: Reforming Black Men in the Jim Crow Era 
(2004), Marlon L. Ross argued that Booker T. Washington?s philosophy of racial 
accommodation shaped the Chicago School?s representations of the black ghetto. He 
employed Charles U. Smith?s and Lewis Killian?s ?Black Sociologists and Social 
Protest? to argue that Robert E. Park, one of the cofounders of the School, was heavily 
influenced by Washington?s philosophy of racial accommodation.
9
 Ross surmised that 
 268
Park?s patrons, most notably Julius Rosenwald, were also Washington?s prominent 
patrons. Rosenwald was also part of a cadre of white patrons who sponsored Fisk 
University?s emergence as the premiere historically black university in sociology from 
the 1930?s through the mid-1950?s when Charles S. Johnson was chair of the Sociology 
Department and then the first black President.
10
 Ross began his argument establishing a 
clear connection between Bookerite accommodationism, the Chicago School, and white 
paternalism?highlighting  what he viewed as his most important criticism: how the 
Chicago School?s belief in objective sociological methods were shaped by white 
paternalism.
11
  
Ross disagreed with the Chicago School?s argument that sociological truth 
materialized from objective interpretation of (housing conditions, boundaries of 
neighborhoods, cleanliness of laborers).
12
 He argued that what the Chicago School was 
really doing was contending that the central measure of progress was blacks? access to 
whites who modeled proper housing conditions, cleanliness, and neighborhood 
configuration. He believed that this construction of the truthful progress reinforced the 
existence of black inferiority and white superiority as the norm.  
While Ross critiqued the Chicago School by arguing that white influence 
governed their scholarship, not Du Bois? sociological vision, Daves formed an entirely 
different reading. He employed Du Bois? sociological methods to display the role local 
racial activists and the black masses played in developing their own interpretations of 
themselves and their communities; that is, he utilized the establishment of educational 
institutions and black home ownership to evaluate the effectiveness of race pride 
ideologies and black social organizations for racial improvement and interracial 
 269
cooperation.
13
 Daves? work should be placed in conversation with Ross?s and other texts 
that are forming contemporary studies of black masculinity and black leadership culture 
throughout American history.  
Recent research on Ralph J. Bunche?s work during the 1930?s and 1940?s offers 
us another important historical and cultural context to evaluate Cansler?s contribution to 
black leadership conventions. He provided an important historical and cultural context for 
Cansler?s views on local race leadership. Bunche?s Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro 
Leadership (1940) has only recently been published, but his notes on Negro Leadership 
provide a framework to explore Cansler?s philosophical representations of his family?s 
local-racial-activist- legacy.  
Bunche was the first African American to earn a doctorate in political science 
from Harvard University. He taught at Howard University through the 1930?s. There, he 
coordinated the establishment of the political science department. He was a pioneer in 
merging his scholarship with political activism and research on Africa, race and class 
politics, education and public policy.
14
 He also worked at the United Nations from its 
founding in 1946 to his death in 1971. In 1950 he won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work 
on mediating the armistice that ended the first Arab-Israeli war.
15
 
In his notes on black leadership for the Carnegie Foundation?s massive study An 
American Dilemma (1944), Bunche argued that there was a black leadership crisis. He 
asserted that black leaders? reliance on whites for financial support and social recognition 
were the root causes of the calamity. He believed that once black leaders gained social 
prestige and political power from influential whites that national and local black leaders 
 270
became more concerned with serving their careers than responding to the needs of the 
race and American society.
16
 
Bunche presented how white paternalism governed black leadership culture. He 
described how six of what he considered the most recognizable models of black 
leadership culture were influenced by white paternalism: (1) Aggressive local and 
national race leaders argued that organizations and ideologies of racial uplift needed to be 
in closer proximity to black communities. This type of leader for Bunche was outspoken 
in protest against America?s culture of racism and demanded change. He believed that 
this approach produced limited results, however, because both whites and blacks were 
fearful of aggressive national and local race leaders, particularly many members of 
middle-class black communities. (2) Cautious leaders publicly defended white society?s 
racist conduct by criticizing the behavior of blacks to earn social recognition from whites 
and conservative-minded blacks. (3) Liaison Leaders act as facilitators for slave masters 
and later as appointed stooges for local politicians and law enforcement. They were sent 
by local and national members of the establishment to ease racial tensions and protect the 
status quo. For their services influential and wealthy whites gave them financial rewards 
and promoted them as model citizens to whites and to conservative blacks. (4) Symbolic 
Leaders were appointed heads of historically black colleges and university who received 
recognition as emblems of the race?s progress but often appeared more beholden to the 
titles they acquired from whites than to using their status to educate and coordinate racial 
uplift strategies. (5) Prestige Leaders were national and local figures who began their 
careers fighting racial injustice but opted for white recognition of their success by taking 
positions as more moderate heads of schools and government agencies instead of 
 271
continuing their radical battles against American racism. (6) Negro Leaders Designated 
by Whites Bunche believed competed often for whites? recognition as the race?s 
spokespeople.  
Bunche perceived that this competition revealed that even blacks often did not 
accept aspiring local and national race leaders until they earned praise from influential 
whites. He identified some national and local race leader as embodiments of these types, 
but they were lesser known local and national race leaders. Nonetheless, Bunche?s view 
of black leadership culture was part of a larger conversation which included Douglass, 
Martin Delany, Harriet Jacobs, Maria Stewart, Frances E.W, Harper, Washington, Du 
Bois, Johnson, William Pickens, Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes and Richard 
Wright, Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin, and Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. 
These national race leaders debated whose performances of racial uplift and integration 
were more genuine and independent of white paternalism.  
Bunche felt that white paternalism and conservative black pathology always had 
the potential of crippling the growth of progressive-minded black leaders. His efforts 
indicate that serious scholarship can locate and document the racial anxiety inherent 
within black leadership culture. He tried to establish rigidly defined models of black 
leadership culture that were informed by white paternalism. His black leadership 
categories were intended to document why aspiring local and national black leaders 
consented to the belief that whiteness was equated with more moral legitimacy.  
From Bunche?s assessment of white paternalism?s control over black leadership 
culture, it is not surprising that blacks have responded to these issues by simplistically 
labeling black leaders as one type of black leader or ?the other? type to provide 
 272
themselves with some sense of security. His critique specified the want to achieve healthy 
racial identity formation by placing black leaders in manufactured and narrow-minded 
standard of authentic blackness. Consequently, the anxiety over white paternalism made 
it difficult for race leaders to examine their own conduct within black leadership culture, 
because the lack of suitable means of evaluating talented blacks? participation in black 
leadership culture turned any critique of one?s role as a black leader into a personal racial 
attack. The inadequate criteria available to analyze black leadership performances 
impeded the maturity of black leadership cultural traditions. For instance, while Bunche 
established important descriptions of white paternalism influence over black leadership 
culture, he does not describe his own experiences with white paternalism. Thus he must 
have known that given the limited means to assess productive and negative enactments of 
black leadership traditions, it was ill-advised to evaluate his personal experiences.  
Moreover, his difficulty in expressing personal introspection about black leadership 
culture revealed why previous and current national race leaders turned to black self help 
as the dominant stance of race leadership culture throughout American history.  
Three Generations offered an opportunity to place Cansler?s representation black 
leadership culture alongside Bunche?s perceptive critique. Cansler was able to address 
white paternalism issues facing black leadership culture from philosophical and personal 
perspectives. His introspective reading of the family?s local racial-activist legacy formed 
images of how they managed to overcome white paternalism and cope with Knoxville?s 
black community?s racial anxiety. Cansler demonstrated how he, his immediate ancestors 
and other local racial activists cultivated the self-reliance mindset necessary to model 
excellence for themselves, their families, and the black community. They were able to 
 273
demonstrate practices of local black leadership culture that produced results for the black 
community. Cansler exemplified how the group oriented approach offered a disciplined 
yet democratic adherence to selfless racial activism. He described how groups of local 
race leaders in Knoxville produced solutions to problems themselves by learning how to 
work with each other and form associations across racial and class lines. There were 
other local racial activists across the country that had similar success.  
For instance, William Still?s (-1902) family freed themselves from slavery in 
Maryland and moved to New Jersey. Still taught himself to read and write and moved to 
Philadelphia. There, he became chairman of the Abolitionist?s society. He developed his 
local race-leader institution by turning his house into an underground railroad and 
interviewing and keeping records of fugitive slaves that came to his house so that they 
could eventually find their families. He helped 649 slaves escape. In 1872, Still 
documented his local racial-activist tradition in a book called The Underground Railroad. 
Still?s ability to learn from whites and develop his own local race-leader institution 
offered another example of how local race leaders established their own black self help 
traditions and overcame white paternalism.
17
 National race leaders also used the black 
self help ideology for themselves and the race.   
Booker T. Washington?s Atlanta Exposition speech of September 1895 and Louis 
Farrakhan?s Million Man March of October 1995 surprisingly represent similar images of 
black leadership principles of self help.
18
 While Washington was widely praised for 
advocating conciliatory and accommodating philosophical responses to racial segregation 
in his speech, Farrakhan, the Head of the Nation of Islam, was considered a racial 
demagogue prior to the Million Man March and after it.
19
 Nevertheless, only on a 
 274
superficial level do Washington and Farrakhan appear to be at opposite ends of the 
political spectrum.
20
 Both men became national race leaders as white liberalism retreated 
from principles and practices of racial activism designed to protect civil rights for blacks 
and advocate educational and economic opportunities for them.
21
 This decision offered 
Washington and Farrakhan an opportunity to campaign as the spokesman for the race on 
an accessible agenda of black self-reliance.
22
 Both men preached black self-help as a 
response to the liberal retreat from the struggle against racial oppression, and they both 
rejected the strategy that the black community should plead for handouts from federal 
and local governments. Both men also believed property ownership and entrepreneurship 
held the keys to black upward mobility. Clearly the similarities between Washington and 
Farrakhan do not make Washington a black separatist or Farrakhan an accommodationist. 
They do, however, pinpoint what race leaders perceived as the most successful approach 
to address white paternalism, white abandonment, and racial anxiety.
23
 Washington and 
Farrakhan felt that the representation of black self help as national race leadership 
enabled them to develop organizations and political alliances to anoint themselves as the 
race?s spokespeople and challenge racial oppression. Their success, however, led to an 
autocratic and paternalistic national- race-leadership approach which often excluded 
women and other national race leaders with different approaches.
24
 Moreover, their 
presentation of the black self- help ideology could not directly address the various needs 
of southern black communities.  
Cansler?s text and Daves? sociological study of Knoxville can be placed in 
conversation with Washington?s and Farrakhan?s performances. Cansler and Daves 
understood that though national race leaders can develop agendas against racial 
 275
oppression, a committed group of local race leaders had to turn the national race leaders? 
program into a tangible reality, to respond to the individual needs of black communities 
both in the South and the North. The Scotts? and the Canslers? familial-minded and 
group-oriented racial uplift ideology enabled them to establish black self-improvement 
institutions. The Scotts and the Canslers beneficial interracial associations facilitated the 
creation of a series of schools, newspapers, a library, and in conjunction with other black 
and white leaders of their time in Knoxville, and Daves assisted in nurturing other vital 
institutions within Knoxville?s black community, such as Knoxville College and the 
Tennessee Valley Authority.  
Three Generations presented a family?s experiences with the evolution of black 
leadership culture. Cansler described the accomplishments of local- race-leadership 
culture as familial-minded black men and women promoting communal activism, race 
pride, and the formation of interracial alliances for the collective racial self improvement, 
but he also depicted middle-class black men and women?s obsession with materialism 
and social status as the eventual demise of the local race leadership principles during and 
after World War 1.  
Another major reason for the demise was our, and other prominent black 
families,? decision to the leave the black community. My father has said that one could 
make the argument that we, the large number of middle- and- upper-middle-class blacks, 
should have never left the South after achieving a northern education. Despite some 
working and middle-class blacks? realization of social class mobility opportunities after 
the civil rights movement, today we are still the most segregated racial or ethnic group in 
the country. One wonders were we would be as a race if talented and prosperous black 
 276
families surmounted internalized racism and superficial black elitism.  What kind of 
social infrastructure organizations could we have formed? If we had remained in black 
communities, we could have established types of educational development that provided 
blacks of all classes with positive self images and interracial principles, and we could 
have also formed more social-mobility avenues for working class and impoverished 
blacks.   
 While some members of my family carried on racial uplift traditions in 
predominately black neighborhoods and social circles across the country, most of them 
chose to reside in integrated or predominately upper-middle-class white neighborhoods. 
While my older cousins had some ties to the black community in Washington D.C. in the 
early 1970?s, they received their educational opportunities at prestigious highly selective 
liberal arts colleges or Ivy League colleges and universities. Previous generations 
received these types of educational opportunities at Northern Liberal Arts Colleges, but 
they returned to the southern black communities after graduation where opportunities 
were available in black communities and historically black colleges. This ritual ended in 
the 1950?s with the civil rights movement. Increased access to mainstream American 
society naturally led my family and others like them to affluent integrated or 
predominately white neighborhoods. 
In Time magazine?s May 10, 2004 edition, David E. Thigpen?s article ?Topeka 
Kansas: An Elusive Dream in the Promised Land? further illustrated the effects of my 
family?s and other prominent black families? decision to leave socially and economically 
diverse black neighborhood. Thigpen?s article evaluated the successes and failures in 
Topeka Kansas fifty years after the landmark Brown V. Board of Education of Topeka. 
 277
He begins by introducing Robert McFrazier, someone whose life and career in education 
resembled Charles Warner Cansler?s. While McFrazier was only ten during the rendering 
of the decision in 1954 and Cansler died a year before it, they both employed the value of 
education as means to define themselves and to exhibit local racial-activist ideologies. 
McFrazier was from Muskogee, Oklahoma about 250 miles away from Topeka. He can 
vividly recall the day that the Supreme Court ruled that Separate but Equal was 
unconstitutional. He remembered how teachers and students alike roared with excitement. 
He recalled how the promise of integration lured him to Topeka, Kansas where he 
believed that finally blacks would get a piece of the dream. Similar to Cansler?s 
successful career in education, McFrazier began his career as a junior high teacher, 
became principal and had a long tenure as superintendent of schools. He retired from the 
Schools? top post in 2003. Reflecting back on his career and that of the Supreme Court 
decision, he is disillusioned. He believes that while Brown was a social triumph, it was an 
educational failure.
25
 
Ironically, McFrazier feels that desegregation is the root cause of Brown?s 
educational failure. He argues, ?That the closing of black neighborhood schools?with 
their traditions, yearbooks, mottoes, fight songs and halls of fame?ripped the 
centerpiece out of those communities.?
26
  His view echoed the sentiment of many other 
black intellectuals and activists who now consider the idea of integration being the 
answer to racial and educational inequality as woefully na?ve. Moreover, his perception 
of middle-class black flight from economically diverse black communities supports my 
family?s view of what has happened. McFrazier also recognized that ?Black role 
models?doctors and educators?left the neighborhood and moved to suburban 
 278
communities, taking the achievement ethic with them.?
27
 He contends that this left 
lowered expectations. He believed it leaves working-class and impoverished black 
students in vulnerable situations. While the races may sit side by side in schools, black 
students are victimized by powerful racial prejudices in the classroom which lead 
teachers to expect more from white students than they do from black students. In many 
cases they do not even sit side by side. Too often black students are tracked into remedial 
courses whereas their white and Asian peers gain access to college prep tracks and AP 
courses.
28
  
Some of my older cousins did work, however, to instill racial consciousness in 
their children, my second cousins, by sending them to historically black colleges and 
universities after preparatory school, but even there they had much more in common with 
other affluent black children than they would with working-class blacks. My second 
cousins were part of a group of black students who decided to attend Historically Black 
Colleges and Universities (HBCU?s) because their parents had become disillusioned with 
predominately white and affluent public or private schools. This decision still meant, 
nevertheless, that they did not have substantial interactions with working-class and 
poverty-stricken blacks.  
Also, several of my older female cousins married upper- middle-class white men. 
While even a dream marriage can be difficult, the issue of race clearly adds another 
hurdle. However, my cousins have had loving and successful marriages with healthy, 
happy, and prosperous children, but this does not mean that they do not face racial 
identity issues. Some of their children, my second cousins, look white and have had more 
exposure to the white elite than they have had to blacks of any kind, certainly not the so 
 279
called ?authentically black? people. While I have tried to carry on the family tradition 
and they have not and so far they have not, this is understandable. I had to decide to take 
it up, and they did not have as much exposure to the tradition. The only times that they 
would hear of this tradition is on occasion from their mothers or their grandparents.  
Thus we either emerged as ?a minority within a minority of successful blacks? or 
influential whites who are merely technically black because they happen to have black 
mothers. Our lives are reflections of why social class within the race can have much 
significance in one?s experiences with such racial identity issues as skin color. Previous 
generations of my family had a stronger connection to blacks from a variety of social 
class backgrounds than we did because they grew up in black neighborhoods. 
Our parents? decision to leave the black community, for a variety of reasons, has 
altered blacks and whites perceptions of us. Blacks often question our blackness because 
of our social status and skin color, and whites often treat us as exceptions to the rule: 
honorary blacks in their social circle, or whites who just happened to have black mothers. 
Also, there are few black middle-class/working-class neighborhoods left. This migration 
from the black community to predominately white neighborhood, or exclusive black 
enclaves, has also affected blacks who have remained within thick working class and 
impoverished black communities. Because the absence of diverse notions of blackness in 
these neighborhoods enables socially constructed, and often self destructive notions of 
what it means to be black, to dominate valuable social spaces. Blackness in schools and 
peer circles is often now only characterized as criminal behavior such as hustling, 
prostitution, drug dealing, and gang culture. The entertainment and sports industries are 
then seen in these influential social spaces as the only legitimate means of achieving 
 280
racially authentic black advancement, because traditional forms of cultivating human 
capital through education are perceived as ?acting white.?    
That is why, in my view, it is time to turn Cansler?s representation of my family?s 
history into a living history. Cansler?s work can play a role in facilitating the possibility 
of an alternative future for generations of black men and women, particularly for many 
black men who have such a limited understanding of perceptions of black masculinity 
and black leadership culture. For instance, in my family the Daves men were largely 
responsible for carrying on the Scotts and the Canslers local race legacies in a variety of 
black and white communities across the country. 
Recently my father, Charles Warner Daves, became one of the caretakers of a 
local race-leader tradition which began at Princeton University in 1964. My father edited 
Carl A. Fields? memoir Black in Two Worlds: A Personal Perspective on Higher 
Education (2006). Fields? memoir chronicles his life as Princeton?s first black 
administrator and the first black administrator from outside African at the University of 
Zambia. My father relied on his experiences editing a book from a conference The Uses 
and Misuses of Standardized Tests and his published dissertation on the works of the 17
th
  
century English writer Samuel Butler and several articles.  
Thus I know my father felt that beyond the editing process his most significant 
contribution to Fields? story was convincing former Princeton (1957-1972) President 
Robert F. Goheen to write the Foreward for Fields? memoir. He did not know Goheen, 
but he knew that having Goheen write the Foreward could verify the importance of 
Fields? experiences and contributions to Princeton University since he was president 
when Fields was hired. Nevertheless, this request was a risk. What if Goheen?s Foreward 
 281
did not accurately reflect Fields? remarkable achievements at Princeton? In our 
conversations, I learned that my father was pleased. I learned why when I read Goheen?s 
Foreword. The former President represented what Fields encountered at Princeton.  He 
described how Fields aided the first critical mass of black students at Princeton while 
simultaneously making Goheen and his administration conscious of Princeton 
University?s racist history. Fields? local racial-activist capabilities made it possible for 
Princeton administrators to begin the difficult process of deciding what needed to be done 
to make Princeton University a more inclusive higher educational institution. In March of 
2006, my father helped organize a launching of the book in the Carl A. Fields Center at 
Princeton University. My father was pleased that current Princeton University President 
Shirley Tilghman and former President Goheen spoke at the event. Moreover, I learned 
that Fields? life as a local leader resembled my father?s experiences.   
In the 1960?s, I discovered that Fields and my father were black pioneers in 
Princeton. My father was one of the first black executives at the Educational Testing 
Service in 1968, and in the 1980?s he was the first black Chairman of the Board of 
Trustees at the College of New Jersey. Moreover, the two men took on roles as both 
educators and racial ambassadors for whites and blacks at their respective institutions. 
During their careers they witnessed both the progress and decline of the civil rights 
sensibility.  
 Thus Raising Black Dreams builds on Manning Marable?s recent book Living 
Black History: How Reimagining the African-American Past Can Remake America?s 
Future (2006). This dissertation responds to Manning Marable?s call for producing 
scholarship that documents the existence of a living black history of black leadership 
 282
culture. Raising Black Dreams should be part of a much large conversation about how to 
address the continued emphasis on organizing mainstream American history around the 
preservation of ?the historical logic of whiteness.? Marable believes that mainstream 
American History is still largely taught from the perspective of manifest destiny and a 
series of conquests and military victories for freedom and democracy that are designed to 
establish uniformity at the expense of people of color?s counter narratives of American 
history. Raising Black Dreams speaks to the need to develop local living black histories 
that reveal the narrative gaps of mainstream American History and construction of a 
master narrative that continues to exclude blacks from America?s history and culture. 
For instance, Raising Black Dreams takes readers back in time so that they can 
acquire a deeper understanding of the present and the need to facilitate alternative futures. 
As I mentioned earlier, blacks continue to be the most segregated minority group in 
American society, regardless of whether the primary reason for their isolation is society 
refusing to dismantle practices of racial exclusion or black communities? decision to self 
segregate and adopt thick forms of black self-consciousness. In either case, I hope this 
study provides readers with an opportunity to consider how a black family responded to 
central questions still facing contemporary black communities: how can families, local 
racial activists, and national race leaders aid the next generation in the development of 
positive self images, what can families, local  racial activists, and national race leaders do 
to help the next generation gain vital cultural-currency skills so that they can emerge as 
healthy and productive citizens in-between divergent racial and social class 
environments.  
 
 283
 
                                                 
 
Notes 
 
1
 William L. Andrews. ?Narrating Slavery.? Teaching African American Literature: Theory and Practice. 
Ed. Maryemma Graham, Sharon Pineault-Burke and Marianna White Davis. (New York: Routledge, 1998) 
27. 
 
2
 Andrews, ?Narrating Slavery,? 27.  
3
 Andrews, ?Narrating Slavery,? 27. 
4
 Debra Dickerson. ?Chapter X.? African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up from Slavery 
100 Years Later: Uncle Tom or New Negro? Ed. Rebecca Carroll. (New York: Harlem Moon, 2006) 86-88. 
 
5
 Kitwana, Bakari. ?Chapter IX.?  African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up from 
Slavery 100 Years Later: Uncle Tom or New Negro? Ed. Rebecca Carroll. (New York: Harlem Moon, 
2006) 77-79. 
 
6
 Ronald Walters. ?Chapter III.?  African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up from Slavery 
100 Years Later: Uncle Tom or New Negro? Ed. Rebecca Carroll. (New York: Harlem Moon, 2006) 26, 
27. 
 
7
 Debra Dickerson. ?Chapter X.? African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up from Slavery 
100 Years Later: Uncle Tom or New Negro? Ed. Rebecca Carroll. (New York: Harlem Moon, 2006) 86-88. 
 
8
 Bill E. Lawson. ?Chapter I.? African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and Up from Slavery 
100 Years Later: Uncle Tom or New Negro? Ed. Rebecca Carroll. (New York: Harlem Moon, 2006) 9, 10. 
 
9
 Marlon B. Ross. Manning the Race: Reforming Black Men in the Jim Crow Era. (New York: New York 
University Press, 2004) 166, 167. 
 
10
 Ross, Manning the Race: Reforming Black Men in the Jim Crow Era, 166, 167. 
11
 Ross, Manning the Race: Reforming Black Men in the Jim Crow Era, 166, 167. 
12
 Ross, Manning the Race: Reforming Black Men in the Jim Crow Era, 166, 167. 
13
 Ross, Manning the Race: Reforming Black Men in the Jim Crow Era, 166, 167. 
14
 Ralph J. Bunche. A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership. Ed. Jonathan Scott Holloway. 
New York: New York University Press, 2005. (1-5) 
 
15
 Bunche, A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership, 2-7. 
16
 Bunche, A Brief and Tentative Analysis of Negro Leadership, 33, 34. 
17
 William Still. The Underground Rail Road. (Philadelphia: Porter & Coates, 1872) 1-5. 
 284
                                                                                                                                                 
18
 Manning Marable. Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights. (xi-xii) 
 
19
 Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, xi-xii. 
20
 Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, xi-xiii. 
 
21
 Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, xi-xiii 
22
 Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, xi-xiii 
 
23
 Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, xii-xiii. 
 
24
 Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, xii-xiii. 
 
25
 Marable, Black Leadership: Four Great Leaders and the Struggle for Civil Rights, xii-xiii. 
 
26
 David E. Thigpen. ?Topeka Kansas: An Elusive Dream in the Promised Land.? Time Magazine May 10
th
 
2004. (32) 
 
27
 Thigpen, ?Topeka Kansas: An Elusive Dream in the Promised Land,? 32. 
28
 Thigpen, ?Topeka Kansas: An Elusive Dream in the Promised Land,? 32. 
 
 285
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