I am grateful to my research assistants: T. J. Learman, who was there at the beginning and found some of the original information from Crisis magazine and other publications, Christelle Onwu, Dwayne Pattison, Chryl Laird, Charlotte Otabor, Morgan Diamond, Nigel Greaves, Laura Blackwood, and Mike McGuire (who read through all the FSC annual reports).
In-kind support and generous information also came from the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund: John Zippert, Ajamu Nangwaya, Ralph Paige, George Howell, Heather Gray, Jerry Pennick, Melbah Smith, and Myra Bryant.
Financial and academic support was generously provided by the University of Saskatchewan Centre for the Study of Co-operatives and its director, Lou Hammond Ketilson (with support from CURA and SHHRC grants from the Canadian government); the Howard University Economics Department and the Center on Race and Wealth (and their directors, Rodney Green, Charles Betsey, and William Spriggs), which provided several research grants and a research assistant (with Ford Foundation grants to the Center on Race and Wealth); a PSC-CUNY 2012–13 research grant and the PSC union contract, which includes course buyouts, at City University of New York (through John Jay College); the John Jay College Provost’s Office (through the Research Foundation of CUNY) for research support; the Africana Studies Department at John Jay College, CUNY, and its chair, C. Jama Adams; the African American Studies Department at the University of Maryland, College Park, and its director at the time, Sharon Harley; the Democracy Collaborative at the University of Maryland, College Park; and the University of Wisconsin Center for Cooperatives in Madison (USDA research grant).
Many thanks to Sandy Thatcher, my first editor at Pennsylvania State University Press, for always believing me when I promised to meet a deadline, and for maintaining his enthusiasm. Thanks to Kendra Boileau for seeing it through to the end and to Robert Turchick and the rest of the editorial staff at Penn State Press. Thanks to my anonymous reviewers. In addition, thanks to the many, many others who have shared information, provided study tours, showed interest, asked about the book, or invited me to speak about the subject, including Carlos Perez de Alejo, Nicole Marín Baena, Melissa Hoover, Ed Whitfield, and the National Cooperative Business Association, the Canadian Association for the Study of Co-operatives, the Association of Cooperative Educators, the U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives, the Eastern Conference for Workplace Democracy, the Association for the Study of African-American Life and History, the African American Credit Union Association, and the National Economic Association. Also many thanks to Thomas Wilson, Emmanuel Briggs, William Darity, Margaret Sims, Ann Reynolds, Ann Hoyt, Roger Herman, Jackie Smith, Lawrence Gyot, Jonie Eisenberg, Linda Leaks, Stu Schneider, Heather McCulloch, and Erin Rice. Special thanks to James Stewart and Patrick Mason for the example of their pioneering work and their strong support.
Many thanks to the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, for permission to refer to selections from the manuscript collection BANC MSS 72/132 in the C. L. Dellums Papers. Many thanks also to the Chicago History Museum for permission to refer to selections from the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters manuscript collection. Many thanks to the Library of Congress for access to the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters archives and Nannie Helen Burroughs Papers; to the Chicago Historical Society for access to the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters archives; and to the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library, for access to the Ella Baker Papers. For access to the Fannie Lou Hamer Collections, thanks to the Tougaloo College Civil Rights Collection T/012, Mississippi Department of Archives and History, Jackson; and the Amistad Research Center, Tulane University. Thanks to the University of Wisconsin Center for Cooperatives for permission to reprint Table I.1.
Because this book has been so long in the making, I have carved many articles, book chapters, working papers, and oral presentations out of early drafts of the manuscript, including Gordon Nembhard 2000a, 2002a, 2002b, 2004a, 2004b, 2005, 2006a, 2006b, 2008a, 2008b, 2008c, 2008d, 2010, 2011; Gordon Nembhard and Haynes 2002; and Haynes and Gordon Nembhard 1999. In particular, I acknowledge the permission of the Review of International Co-operation (Gordon Nembhard 2004b) to reprint table 9.1 and portions of the early version of the case study of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund in chapter 9; and of Palgrave Macmillan to reprint table 1 (included in revised form as table 10.1 in this volume) and content in Gordon Nembhard 2006a.
A Continuous and Hidden History of Economic Defense and Collective Well-Being
Courage: Every great movement started as we have started. Do not feel discouraged because in our few months of life we have not rivaled some long established Co-Operative venture. Each successful Co-Operative enterprise has taken much time and energy and sacrifice to establish. Nothing worth accomplishing is ever achieved without WORK.
—BAKER (1931D, 2)
No race can be said to be another’s equal that can not or will not protect its own interest. This new order can be brought about once the Negro acknowledges the wisdom in uniting his forces and pooling his funds for the common good of all. Other races have gained great wealth and great power by following this simple rule and it is hoped some day that the Negro will do the same.
—WILSON (1942C, 1–2)
We can by consumers and producers co-operation, . . . establish a progressively self-supporting economy that will weld the majority of our people into an impregnable, economic phalanx.
—DU BOIS (1933B, 1237)
We have a chance here to teach industrial and cultural democracy to a world that bitterly needs it.
—DU BOIS (1940, 715)
African Americans have a long, rich history of cooperative ownership, especially in reaction to market failures and economic racial discrimination. However, it has often been a hidden history and one obstructed by White supremacist violence. When there is a narrative, the history is told as one of failure. The challenges have been tremendous, and have often been seen as insurmountable. The successes are often anecdotal and isolated, little understood, and even less documented—particularly as part of an economic development strategy and a larger economic independence movement. My research suggests that African Americans, as well as other people of color and low-income people, have benefitted greatly from cooperative ownership and democratic economic participation throughout the history of the United States, much like their counterparts around the world. This book documents these practices and experiences, as well as the various philosophies behind the strategy of cooperative ownership among African Americans.
Considering the broad aspects of cooperative economic development in African American communities over the past two centuries, my research shows that cooperative economic thought was integral to many major African American leaders and thinkers throughout history. These include known figures such as W. E. B. Du Bois, A. Philip Randolph, Marcus Garvey, E. Franklin Frazier, Nannie Helen Burroughs, George Schuyler, Ella Jo Baker, Dorothy Height, Fannie Lou Hamer, and John Lewis, as well as lesser-known figures such as Halena Wilson, Jacob Reddix, W. C. Matney, Charles Prejean, Estelle Witherspoon, Ralph Paige, and Linda Leaks; and organizations such as the Young Negroes’ Co-operative League, the North Carolina Council for Credit Unions and Associates, and the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund. This study attempts to show how these individuals and organizations contributed to the development and philosophy of the African American co-op