You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them.
Bishop Desmond Tutu
It was 2004 and there I was, a broadcaster on national television every week, and suddenly I found myself unable to speak a single word. Speechless, my family and friends would say, for the first time in their recent memory.
I can stand in front of crowds full of total strangers, audiences made up of well-known personalities and dignitaries, or even in front of television monitors knowing that people beyond the farthest reaches of my imagination are watching in living rooms, restaurants, community centers, and a variety of other venues, and yet, I was so emotional I couldn’t get out… a… single… word… for what seemed like a minute. I composed myself and spoke from my heart tenderly what my Mom meant to me.
She went by a variety of names: Mrs. Brown, Ma Brown, or Mother Brown. To her friends she was Mary Ann.
To me she has always been Mom.
And now we were gathered together to celebrate Mom on the event of her seventieth birthday and, more importantly, we wanted to give thanks for God mercifully giving Mom back to us after she had gone into code blue the previous year. We had decided to put all of our finery on display to honor her in a loving, intimate way, with HER making the final decisions. The family was in black tie and formal attire, and I had watched with admiration as my siblings, family members, and lifelong friends, spoke to her and about her. My sister had time-lined the whole celebration and wanted us to be mindful of the time, because of Mom’s health and the need to get her back home and to bed before the hour got to be too late. All of the comments were very touching. And so, when it was my turn to speak, it was very difficult.
There were too many memories.
At heart, I am truly a mama’s boy.
This book is as much about and a product of my parents, and specifically my mother, as it is a story of anything else. I was born in the southeast part of the District of Columbia, but most of my childhood memories are from times after we moved in the late 1950s, when I was around eight or nine years old, in third grade, into the home I grew up in near Catholic University, in the northeast section of DC. It was a modest home in a solidly middle-class neighborhood that was simple, and like most neighborhoods back then, it was safe. It was a neighborhood that had been predominantly white, but now integration was taking hold, and the face of the neighborhood was slowly changing. After we moved in, with some other black families following behind, the white families began to leave.
My father, John Brown, reminded me of Joseph, the husband of Mary, in the New Testament. He was the breadwinner, the backbone of the family, dutifully obedient to the role that he felt that he was committed to play as the head of the household. I remember my father working two and three jobs to provide for Mom and the five of us children, allowing my mother to stay home and raise us. He quietly went about his work, providing a good example of what a strong father looked like while my mother took the primary hands-on role in raising the children.
My father was actively involved in the lives of his wife and children. Despite being busy with his multiple jobs, he was always there for us. He was a taxicab driver, a corrections officer at a local jail (a now closed DC correctional institution housed in Lorton, Virginia), at Avis Rent A Car, a car wash attendant, and a longtime post office employee—all the while caring for five children. He worked long, hard hours, and modeled for us what it meant to support your family as a loving, guiding father. I know that he would have preferred to be with us even more than his hard work to support us permitted. He was always there for our important occassions, making as many sporting events as possible.
When my father spoke, we moved—actually, we jumped. John Brown didn’t have to say anything to us twice. What he said was the law, as it was with my mom. They demanded and received our respect, without fail. At times, what he said was catchy. He had axioms that he would trot out and leave with us: “Every good-bye is not gone,” and “Every shut-eye is not sleep.” Things that were pretty tough to puzzle over if you were just twelve. And he’d simply leave it out there—without explanation—for us to ponder. He always seemed very wise.
My father was from the Georgetown area of Washington, and had been in the army. He served during the beginning of the Korean War just before my birth in February 1951, and continued later as a member of the Army Reserves.
When I ran across my birth certificate in our house, I noticed, with surprise, that my dad’s occupation at that time was “car wash attendant.” And as I thought about how my family was living in a nice middle-class neighborhood, it was my first introduction to a lesson which would never leave me—how you start in life doesn’t have to be how you finish.
As for Mom, well, to me she was much larger than any single character. Mom was our Rock of Gibraltar, as strong a woman as you’d ever find.
My parents were a very sociable pair, at least early on in their marriage when I was a young boy. I remember a lot of activity, a number of gatherings of friends, many of them my father’s army buddies. For me, those experiences underscored the importance my parents placed on camaraderie and the beauty of friendship. They embodied the concept of togetherness for me and my sister and brothers, and gave us a lasting example of how two people should be together—for each other, their family, and others.
When I say that I’m a mama’s boy, I don’t mean it in the usual pejorative sense that gets bandied about. She was one of the strongest people I know, a woman of strength, integrity, and character, of resolve and courage. I saw firsthand, especially in her later life, how she lived according to God’s Word, reading from her Bible each day, and exhibiting for us the way our lives should be lived.
My mother and father were responsible for training us and shaping us morally. We like to say, they had PhD’s in Common Sense. Our home was a place of joy and togetherness, a sanctuary for the Browns where we knew that we were always loved. It was also a place of great wisdom—which I began to appreciate later in life—as my mother would share lessons with us straight from God’s Word, around the family dining room table.
There were five of us children and later her younger brother Clifton that she took seriously the responsibility to rear and nurture into productive members of society: John, Alicia, Terence, Clifton, Everett, and myself. John is eighteen months younger than I am, Alicia three years, Terence and Clifton five, and Everett is eight years younger than me. She must have had her hands full dealing with us, and she might have felt that way, but we never thought that was the case. It always appeared to us that everything was running smoothly and that Mom was completely in control of whatever was happening. When Mom, the Sergeant, spoke, we saluted. It was always “yes ma’am, no ma’am.”
All six of us had chores to do—my specialties were ironing the dress shirts, waxing the floors, and washing the windows. The house was always spotless. Mom’s mission was to be a homemaker. As a young wife and mother her greatest joy was taking care of her family. She was also able to put her gifted mind to the greatest use possible—raising her children.
All of us kids have had our challenges along the way, and as an adult her response has always been the same: first, look to the Bible to see what guidance it gives for what we were going through. Not what she thought was right or wrong, but what did God say about it. Then she’d move on to the next step. She would begin praying for you and the situation. There was many a time that we were not sure how things worked out the way they did, other than to look to my mom and know that her prayers were answered. You always knew that she loved you, whether you were in the right or the wrong. Her love knew no bounds or conditions, although she wasn’t shy about letting you know when she thought you were outside of God’s perfect and pleasing will—or outside of her will for that matter! She never wanted us to stay where we were—if she felt it was outside of God’s will—that’s how much she loved us.
* * *
Mom also demonstrated her love for us over meals. I think it was the Southerner in her to do all the cooking, but as a result, I’m a horrible cook. She always showered us with her love, often in the form of meals or snacks. Her desserts—cakes, pies, banana pudding—were legendary. You never left hungry. In fact, you never left unless you were bursting at the seams. I have fond memories of our Sunday family dinners, a tradition that we continue to this day. She would cook abundant amounts of food—chicken or turkey, sweet potatoes, green beans, or lima beans, and on and on. The table would be filled end to end with bowls and platters of the food she created with love. Everything would be ready shortly after we returned from church, and everything would be ready at once. I can’t even get one thing ready (on time or otherwise), so some of that feat is lost on me, but I’m told by my wife and sister that having the parts of a meal always hot and ready at once is no small accomplishment—and she did it every single week for a family of seven. (So, not being a competitive athlete anymore, I hope that you will have mercy when you hear about my ongoing challenge with my weight!)
My parents always expected me, as the eldest of five kids, to be the leader and set the right example for my brothers and sister. Although my father worked two and three jobs so that my mother could stay home with us, there was a time when I was older that my mom had a seasonal job around Christmas, and I was expected to be at home and in charge and have everybody pull together around the house.
I was also expected to be in charge when my parents went out for the evening, once they decided that I was old enough to stay with the others. Terence says that I was “quite a comedian,” but I simply recall doing whatever was necessary to keep smaller children occupied. I dressed up as Superman or invented stories of characters and faraway places—whatever I needed to do to spin those plates and keep everybody happy until the adults arrived back at the house. My brothers and sister remember far better than I—I must have blocked it out—about one particular Saturday evening when I was a teenager, and Mom and Dad left me in charge so they could go out.
That fateful night, my siblings recall my allowing them to watch the television horror show Chiller Theatre, which came on Saturday nights around 11:30. There were only two problems with my decision: one, they were supposed to go to bed by 8:30; and two, we weren’t allowed to watch Chiller Theatre. As the show was on, a violent thunderstorm blew through our area, with howling winds, thunder, and lightning. By the time my parents arrived home, every light in the house was back on as well as the television. And they found all of us upstairs, hiding under one of the beds. I had not exactly fulfilled the role they had envisioned for me as the leader of the kids.
I was reprimanded. I do recall that particular part of the evening pretty well, even if the rest is a bit hazy.
* * *
Between the two of them, my parents had very clear ideas of the roles for their children. My mother and father were a product of their era, and gender roles and responsibilities were certain in their minds. My brothers and I were always responsible for taking out the trash, mowing the lawn, and shoveling snow—Alicia never had to help with any of those chores. On the other hand, however, she alone had to do all of the dishes, every day.
As best as I can tell, everyone functioned according to Mom’s plan! As for exactly what she did… she did everything… it was yeoman’s work and without her things would not have run as smoothly or efficiently. I do know that. If we were getting up for school at seven, by my best estimate she was up by five, making breakfast, packing lunches, and ironing our clothes—we were always clean and neat. As I have said, we had a very nice, modest house which we all proudly called home. All that we owned was clean, in good working order, and tidy. Very tidy.
My parents ran the house like a military base, assigning us chores and then inspecting the tasks once completed. Every morning we were required to make our beds and sweep any dust out from under our beds before we went to school.
Saturday mornings were for housework. Alicia sometimes wonders how Mom came up with some of the jobs she came up with for all of us to accomplish, given how clean the house always remained, but selecting my job was easy—it never seemed to change. Every Saturday morning, along with one or more of my brothers, I had to wash and wax the hardwood floors in our house—and all the floors in the house were hardwood. We were on our hands and knees to do it, and would take turns—one of us would put the wax on while another would take the wax off with a hand buffer.
I used to help Mom with my younger siblings. When Everett was still an infant, I was taking him down the steps in our house, which were, of course, freshly waxed, and I was wearing socks. I slipped on the stairs while carrying Everett but clung to him, though the fall caused a gash on the bridge of his nose (the scar is still there today). To this day, he blames those waxed floors, but points out that because of that fall, he’s still my favorite brother. I’ll never admit to it in front of John or Terence, though.
Mom was a disciplinarian, whether with us or with other children. Guidelines for appropriate behavior were clear, as were the consequences for any diversion from them. She was one of those parents who was always willing to tell you when you were messing up, even if you weren’t her child. Mom never cared what others’ backgrounds were, or their race or religion. She cared about what kind of person you were, and whether you were doing what you were supposed to do.
She didn’t put up with any foolishness from her children, that much was for certain. She was an advisor and mentor for others at the church and from the neighborhood, but she was a parent to us. My parents expected a great deal from us academically—to do our best and put in whatever effort was required to hit that standard. Even if, however, we were not capable—as opposed to willing—to make the grades, they still had high expectations for us. My mother would say “If you can’t bring an A in any other subject I expect an A in citizenship and effort.” That is, we could control our disposition, our behavior, and our hunger to excel. And she expected as much from each of us.
My parents were very stringent about where they would let us go and with whom they would let us consort. There were embarrassing—to me—times when I was not allowed to go with someone because my parents either didn’t know their parents or weren’t comfortable with where we were going. If I was allowed to go, I had to call when I arrived, leave a telephone number at which I could be reached, and always—always—adhere to my curfew, which usually made me the first to have to go home. The flip side of that, however, was that everyone was welcome at our house, so we always seemed to have a crowd at home with us. In addition, if I was allowed to go somewhere, it seemed as though other parents would follow my mom’s lead—that is, if Mrs. Brown was letting James go, it must be alright.
Two of the kids who were often in those crowds at our house were Louis Washington and his little brother Alan. Shortly after we moved into our neighborhood, the Washington family moved in behind us. Mr. and Mrs. Washington had two sons, both of whom were younger than me. Louis, their oldest—we all called him Beanie, for reasons none of us ever understood—was three years behind me in school, and ended up going to DeMatha as well. Both of them, as well as many other children from around the neighborhood, congregrated at our house. I’m not sure exactly what caused that, but I know that my mom played a large role. It was interesting that she could be strict and lay down firm rules for us and other kids, yet we all seemed to welcome that. Probably because most of the other parents were the same way! We might have protested—and meant it—but deep down there was probably a part of us that appreciated the boundaries, knowing that they cared enough to set them. Even though we might have objected at times, there was a sense of security we all felt in knowing that they were always there watching and expecting us to do what was right as they laid out that standard.
Mom certainly didn’t want to hear what I had to say about how I wanted to wear my hair. As I got older, afros were becoming more popular. Each time I would go to the barber and try to return with something resembling the beginning stages of an afro, she sent me back. One time in particular, I was bound and determined to have it longer than I usually did. She sent me back three times that day, as I recall, each time to have it cut shorter from the point I’d had the barber previously leave it.
One experience helped me to understand the wisdom in keeping my “fro” only moderately long. I had intentionally put my hair in braids so that when I had the braids taken out, my hair would be a lot fuller, a lot higher. A bigger “fro.” I did that in preparation for a date one evening. My hair was nice and high and full. I had just gone past the front porch when I felt something fall from a tree into my hair. I went back into the house to get my “pie rake” and carefully comb my hair with an upward or outward stroke. I heard something drop into the sink and saw a huge spider! Needless to say, from that point forward, I had what my friends called a “teenie-weenie fro.”
My brother John loves to tell the story about the time that he came back to visit Mom, after he was an adult living in San Antonio. He had traveled to the DC area and spent the duration of his time running from place to place, visiting with friends. He never made it back to her house, and when he returned to San Antonio Mom let him know that behavior was unacceptable. A year later he returned, and in his way of telling it, he set an afternoon aside to make sure that he was with Mom. He came into her room—she was ill and in bed—and sat by the bed in a rocking chair, quietly. John said that they passed the time together in silence, mother and son, not needing to talk, just enjoying the simple pleasure of each other’s company. At the end of the afternoon, they said their good-byes and John left.
He was recounting this story to others in front of Mom some time later, telling them about what a pleasure the afternoon had been for them, when Mom interjected.
“John, I didn’t have the heart to tell you this before,” she said. “But about two minutes after you arrived, I fell asleep and didn’t wake up until you woke me by saying ‘Good-bye.’ ”
Mom was going to make sure that not only would her family visit, but they would not make it an afterthought. Or try to squeeze her into an afternoon. Family, for her, came first.
Mom’s family—specifically, her father—has always fascinated me. Mom was a product of Hattiesburg, Mississippi, and my grandfather was one of the prominent black businessmen of that era. She had ministers in her family as well as a grandmother who was a missionary, but the one whose stories I’ve always found myself irresistibly drawn toward is her father, Milton Barnes, Sr.
My grandfather had a ninth grade education, and yet owned a number of businesses in Mississippi, including a baseball team, the Hattiesburg Black Sox. Former Major League pitcher, Mudcat Grant, and others used to tell me that they remembered barnstorming down there and playing the Black Sox in Hattiesburg. I remember Granddaddy telling me, about ten years ago, stories about Hank Aaron and Cool Papa Bell coming to town to play in Hattiesburg, and what great players they were. But the most fascinating story was about Satchel Paige. I remembered folks telling me about one of Mr. Paige’s many weapons being the hesitation pitch, where he would start into his throwing motion, actually stop in forward stride a second, continue with the pitch, and then deliver the ball to the plate with some “heat” on it. Granddaddy said that was absolutely true. And I remember when an aging Satchel Paige was finally allowed to play with the Major Leagues, that formidable pitch of his was outlawed.
Granddaddy had a fondness for luxury vehicles that he used to drive from Mississippi to New York, and he would stay at the Hotel Theresa, a black hotel that housed many of the famous black Americans of the time, the “Waldorf Astoria of Harlem,” when he would go to watch the World Series, or take in other Negro League games. Granddaddy had story after story of Satchel Paige and others, and I regret that I didn’t take Julian Bond’s advice. Bond was a colleague when I hosted America’s Black Forum, a public affairs program. At one point, when he was the head of the NAACP, Julian told me that I really needed to have someone go see Granddaddy and record his wonderful stories. I regret now that I never did it before he passed away, and so behind-the-scenes details of stories, like his being instrumental in bringing a young Martin Luther King, Jr., to town to register blacks to vote and the resulting furor, are lost to fading memories. He was a real mover behind the scenes who had garnered the respect of both the white and black establishment. Mr. Bus Cook, whose prestigious client list includes former NFL quarterback Brett Favre, handled legal work for Granddaddy as well.
Although the baseball team may have been the most high-profile part of Granddaddy’s holdings, he also had a nightclub named the Hi Hat, which was one of the “chitlin circuit,” nightclubs that were safe for African-American performers in the South. The Hi Hat drew a number of black acts including Ike and Tina Turner, Bobby “Blue” Bland, Little Milton, Moms Mabley, and B.B. King, among others. Oh, and James Brown played there, too. The other James Brown. And then Granddaddy would get up on Sunday morning and head to church fulfilling his responsibilities as a church officer.
In fact, when B.B. King was recognized by the Governor of Mississippi, he sent a limousine the ninety miles down from Jackson, the capital, to Hattiesburg, to bring my grandfather to the event and share in the day with him. B.B. once told me that “back in the day” when very few clubs would allow him to play, my grandfather gave him a grand stage to play on, a time that was instrumental in helping him to build his persona and popularity.
Granddaddy also owned a couple of trucks for shipping, a construction company, a land development company, a dry cleaning business, and had business interests in New Orleans as well. The dry cleaners that he owned was the first black-owned dry cleaners in the state of Mississippi, which he won in a craps game in 1936. Not how I would suggest starting out, but I suppose it was a different world back then, in many ways. Granddaddy actually formed a joint venture with a white-owned dry cleaners that had a contract with a military base in the area. Granddaddy could do the work for half the cost of the other cleaners, who would then send the items to the base. Under the existing contract, everyone was coming out ahead. When the owner of the other cleaners eventually exited the business, he assigned the contract to my grandfather. It was too early in our nation’s history for joint ventures between the races in southern Mississippi, but Granddaddy was quite a business pioneer.
He had an amazing entrepreneurial spirit, and I have looked back on my life and some of the risks I have taken and some of the endeavors I have started, and feel that I have some of that spirit of Milton Barnes, Sr., as well. It seemed that every time we went down there to visit, we learned that “Mr. Milton” had a hand in whatever business establishment into which we happened to wander.
Mom did hold a variety of seasonal positions around the holidays, and later when we entered private high schools, she began working fulltime. It was always gratifying to see her able to use her intellect and administrative skills in the outside world. In those positions, she would often end up quickly being promoted, and on many occasions store managers and owners would take the opportunity to go to her for ideas on how to improve areas of the business: inventory control or tracking, organizational issues, and the like. In fact, at one of her positions, the department store sent all of the trainees from around the city to her store, where she was the department manager, for training. She was later promoted to the downtown DC office to become an assistant buyer, even though she wasn’t sure she wanted to be promoted to a location so far from home.
She clearly had a great deal of common sense and business sense, no doubt obtained, in large part, through her father. She grew up having to open the cleaners in the morning and close it on some evenings, and had the opportunity in so many disparate business areas to learn how to run a successful enterprise no matter the circumstances or obstacles before you.
Mom was unquestionably a successful employee, one whose work ethic was never questioned, but much of her life she was focused on a different type of success. I remember her talking about Joshua 1:8, the Bible verse that she would point to for her understanding of success. “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success” (KJV). For her, especially as we grew in stature and she grew in her faith, success was not to be measured by a worldly standard, but by following God’s will for your life.
Those early years laid the foundation for all of us in becoming engaged members of society. And looking back, I can see that I was beginning to be shaped in what was truly important, in what it really meant to be successful by using your role, whatever that was, to impact those around you—for good.
There are so many memories. Thank God.