Call
me sentimental, but I’ve always been moved by the holiday spirit at this time
of year. What I find most moving are the songs that celebrate life and
reuniting with one’s family and loved ones.
I
clearly understand the argument that the Christmas holiday has been
commercialized to nearly unimaginable proportions. Frederick Douglass, who
escaped slavery to become a leading abolitionist, argued that slavery would
have been overturned much sooner were it not for Christmas. Yes, people endure
a lot so we can have a joyous time with our families.
One
of the songs that has become a staple at this time of year is Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. I found
that the history of this song explains much about what this time of year is
about.
The
Montgomery Ward retailer of Chicago assigned Robert L. May the job of coming up
with a Christmas story that would promote their business. This was in 1939
towards the end of the depression. Aside from the depression of those years,
May had other problems he needed to deal with.
May’s
wife Evelyn had been battling with cancer for several years and her medical
bills were overwhelming. Robert and Evelyn had a four-year old daughter Barbara
who liked to go to the local Zoo. It was at this Zoo that Robert May first
thought of writing a story about Reindeers.
Robert
May was small in stature and wasn’t very popular in school. He eventually wrote
and identified with the idea of his Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer overcoming
his sadness and isolation to become loved by the other reindeers.
Eventually
Robert May received the ownership rights to this story and convinced his
brother-in-law Johnny Marks to write a song. Gene Autry sang Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and it
became one of the most popular songs of all time.
Simeon Booker
The
day before I started writing this column, I read and obituary of Simeon Booker.
Booker was the Washington bureau chief of Jet
and Ebony magazines for five
decades.
In
1955 Booker lived in Chicago and learned that the son of Mamie Till-Mobley,
fourteen-year old Emmett was missing. Emmett Till had been visiting his
relatives in Money, Mississippi. Booker immediately understood what this story
might be about, he visited Mamie Till-Mobley, and won her confidence.
Emmett
Till’s mutilated corpse was found in the Tallahatchie River in Mississippi.
Emmett had been raised in Chicago and didn’t think it was a problem to whistle
at a white woman. However, there is a long history of lynching in this country.
The federal government rarely prosecuted murderers who carried out these
lynchings.
In
the so-called trial of the murderers of Emmett Till, the courtroom was filled
with onlookers who had a bottle of whiskey in one pocket and a pistol in the
other. Simeon Booker, as well as others in the courtroom who were outraged by
this murder needed to get out of town immediately after the not-guilty verdict.
In an interview after the verdict one murderer of Till admitted his guilt.
At
Emmett Till’s funeral in Chicago, there were many who didn’t want the press to
be present. Mamie Till-Mobley was adamant that Simeon Booker and his
photographer, David Jackson, witness the funeral. She also insisted that the
funeral casket be opened. These were the words Simeon Booker recorded of Mamie
Till-Mobley at the funeral:
“Her
face wet with tears, she leaned over the body, just removed from a rubber bag
in a Chicago funeral home and cried out ‘Darling you have not died in vein.
Your life has been sacrificed for something.’ “
Just
a few months after the murder of Emmett Till, Rosa Parks refused to sit in the
back of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. This action, as well as the decades long
resistance to Jim Crow segregation, sparked the 385-day Montgomery Bus Boycott.
During
those years Simeon Booker would take off his suit and dress as a sharecropper
in overalls in order to avoid the violence against Black people in those years.
He also needed to hide in the back of a hearse in order to escape a racist mob.
My ride to work that day
After
reading this story, I went to work and listened to the Christmas Carrols on the
radio. One of those songs featured Levi Stubbs who sang with the Four Tops. Stubbs lived his life in
Detroit, Michigan and refused to have his name featured apart from the Four
Tops. The song was about a celebration of life at the holidays and getting
together with family.
Clearly
Levi Stubbs was well aware of the murder of Emmett Till and the
institutionalized discrimination Black people endured in every part of this
country. My opinion is that Stubbs as well as many other artists were able to
transcend the horrors of their day, and give us their idea of how precious life
can be.
Karl
Marx once argued that:
“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people"
My opinion is that Marx felt that if working people look squarely at our condition, we would be motivated to change it. Why should we work for our entire lives, so a tiny minority of the population can have more wealth than they could ever use?
“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people"
My opinion is that Marx felt that if working people look squarely at our condition, we would be motivated to change it. Why should we work for our entire lives, so a tiny minority of the population can have more wealth than they could ever use?
Clearly
Marx as well as Frederick Douglass were correct in their observations about
religion and the holidays. My opinion is that while we can appreciate their
ideas, we can also celebrate life and have good times.
This
year we can celebrate the freedom of Oscar Lopez Rivera who served thirty-seven
years in the dungeons of the United States. At this same time we see the utter
indifference of the United States government in the aftermath of a devastating
hurricane that hit Puerto Rico. Given this state of affairs, more and more
people understand why Oscar Lopez Rivera dedicated his life to the independence
of Puerto Rico.
Since
Christmas is a religious holiday, I will conclude this column with a quotation
from the Bible that I believe is relevant to all those who are religious as
well as non-religious. This was about the battle between David and Goliath.
Before
David engaged in his battle with Goliath someone argued that this battle would
not be fair. Goliath was large and strong and had sophisticated weapons. David
was smaller and all he had was a sling-shot. So, they warned David against
fighting Goliath. But David said: “Is there not a cause?”
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Yes,
there continues to be a cause, and this cause is the future of the human race.
While there may be times when we feel ridiculed and isolated, history teaches
us that we have a real possibility to make this a truly wonderful world.
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