Boss of Black Brooklynpresents a riveting and untold story about the struggles and achievements of the first black person to hold public office in Brooklyn. Bertram L. Baker immigrated to the United ...States from the Caribbean island of Nevis in 1915. Three decades later, he was elected to the New York state legislature, representing the Bedford Stuyvesant section. A pioneer and a giant, Baker has a story that is finally revealed in intimate and honest detail by his grandson Ron Howell.
Boss of Black Brooklynbegins with the tale of one man's rise to prominence in a fascinating era of black American history, a time when thousands of West Indian families began leaving their native islands in the Caribbean and settling in New York City. In 1948, Bert Baker was elected to the New York state assembly, representing the growing central Brooklyn neighborhood of Bedford Stuyvesant. Baker loved telling his fellow legislators that only one other Nevisian had ever served in the state assembly. That was Alexander Hamilton, the founding father. Making his own mark on modern history, Baker pushed through one of the nation's first bills outlawing discrimination in the sale or rental of housing. Also, for thirty years, from 1936 to 1966, he led the all-black American Tennis Association, as its executive secretary. In that capacity he successfully negotiated with white tennis administrators, getting them to accept Althea Gibson into their competitions. Gibson then made history as the first black champion of professional tennis. Yet, after all of Baker's wonderful achievements, little has been written to document his role in black history.
Baker represents a remarkable turning point in the evolution of modern New York City. In the 1940s, when he won his seat in the New York state assembly, blacks made up only 4 percent of the population of Brooklyn. Today they make up a third of the population, and there are scores of black elected officials. Yet Brooklyn, often called the capital of the Black Diaspora, is a capital under siege. Developers and realtors seeking to gentrify the borough are all but conspiring to push blacks out of the city. A very important and long-overdue book,Boss of Black Brooklynnot only explores black politics and black organizations but also penetrates Baker's inner life and reveals themes that resonate today: black fatherhood, relations between black men and black women, faithfulness to place and ancestry. Bertram L. Baker's story has receded into the shadows of time, butBoss of Black Brooklynrecaptures it and inspires us to learn from it.
Remarkable, important, and beautifully written book about a key figure at the forefront of black politics in Brooklyn in the 1940s.
Brooklyn today has three dozen black elected officials, including members of Congress. It has overtaken Harlem as the center of black political power in the city and is synonymous with the blackimmigrant presence in New York City.
In 1948 Bertram L. Baker became the first black person elected to political office in Brooklyn. He took his New York State Assembly seat in January of 1949 and served 22 consecutive years as the political boss of black Brooklyn, which in those days meant Bedford Stuyvesant.
The incredible story of the man and legend who has come
to symbolize the continuing pursuit of justice for
Blacks in the United States Through the 1980s, the
mainstream press portrayed the Reverend ...Al Sharpton as a buffoon, a
fake minister, a hustler, an opportunist, a demagogue, a race
traitor, and an anti-Semite. Today, Sharpton occupies a throne that
would have shocked the white newspaper reporters who covered him
forty years ago. A mesmerizing story of astounding transformation,
craftiness, and survival, King Al follows Reverend Sharpton's life
trajectory, from his early life as a boy preacher to his present
moment as the most popular Black American activist/minister/cable
news host. In the 1980s, Rev. Al created controversies that would
have doomed a lesser man to the dustbin of history. Among these
controversies were his work with the FBI as the agency attempted to
locate Black Liberation Army leader Assata Shakur; and his
involvement in the 1987 Tawana Brawley episode. Regarding the
Brawley matter, a white prosecutor sued Sharpton, successfully, for
falsely accusing him of having raped the then-fifteen-year-old
Brawley. It was the white press, in its glory days, that created
the podium from which Sharpton became both famous and infamous.
Those reporters would joke that the most dangerous place in New
York was between Al Sharpton and a television camera. But it was
those reporters who made Sharpton the media figure he is today.
Today, as host of MSNBC's PoliticsNation news program,
Sharpton has more news viewers than those reporters ever had
readers. The Reverend Al's rise to respectability is a testament to
an endurance and boldness steeped in Black American history. Born
in Brooklyn to parents from the old slave-holding South, he
transformed himself into one of the most respected and politically
influential Blacks in the United States. In his in-depth coverage,
author Ron Howell tells the stories of Sharpton's ascendance to the
throne. He tells us about the glory years of American newspapers,
when Sharpton began his rise. And he tells us about the politicians
who intersected with Sharpton as he climbed the ladder. King
Al is an engaging read about the late-twentieth-century
history of New York City politics and race relations, as well as
about the remarkable staying power of the colorful, politically
skillful, and enigmatic Sharpton.
The incredible story of the man and legend who has come to symbolize the continuing pursuit of justice for Blacks in the United States
Through the 1980s, the mainstream press portrayed the Reverend ...Al Sharpton as a buffoon, a fake minister, a hustler, an opportunist, a demagogue, a race traitor, and an anti-Semite. Today, Sharpton occupies a throne that would have shocked the white newspaper reporters who covered him forty years ago. A mesmerizing story of astounding transformation, craftiness, and survival, King Al follows Reverend Sharpton’s life trajectory, from his early life as a boy preacher to his present moment as the most popular Black American activist/minister/cable news host.
In the 1980s, Rev. Al created controversies that would have doomed a lesser man to the dustbin of history. Among these controversies were his work with the FBI as the agency attempted to locate Black Liberation Army leader Assata Shakur; and his involvement in the 1987 Tawana Brawley episode. Regarding the Brawley matter, a white prosecutor sued Sharpton, successfully, for falsely accusing him of having raped the then-fifteen-year-old Brawley.
It was the white press, in its glory days, that created the podium from which Sharpton became both famous and infamous. Those reporters would joke that the most dangerous place in New York was between Al Sharpton and a television camera. But it was those reporters who made Sharpton the media figure he is today.
Today, as host of MSNBC’s PoliticsNation news program, Sharpton has more news viewers than those reporters ever had readers.
The Reverend Al’s rise to respectability is a testament to an endurance and boldness steeped in Black American history. Born in Brooklyn to parents from the old slave-holding South, he transformed himself into one of the most respected and politically influential Blacks in the United States.
In his in-depth coverage, author Ron Howell tells the stories of Sharpton’s ascendance to the throne. He tells us about the glory years of American newspapers, when Sharpton began his rise. And he tells us about the politicians who intersected with Sharpton as he climbed the ladder.
King Al is an engaging read about the late-twentieth-century history of New York City politics and race relations, as well as about the remarkable staying power of the colorful, politically skillful, and enigmatic Sharpton.
THE ENTRANCE OF the “Godfather of Soul” James Brown into Sharpton’s life is also tied into Brooklyn politics. It’s a representation of the “six degrees of separation” concept that Black people often ...use to describe lifelong relationships that developed seemingly by chance.
In 1971, with the help of Brooklyn Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, the boy preacher Rev. Alfred would start the National Youth Movement. The NYM would be the source of his popularity with many, and it was also a reason why politicians wanted to connect with him. Among the politicians who worked with Sharpton, putting together the paperwork for the
UNTIL A FEW years ago, I was not so impressed with the “new” Al Sharpton. Even as the Rev. was winning the hearts and minds of so many Black Americans, I harbored distrust that lingered from my ...younger reporting days. The suspicions largely had to do with my assuming he had indeed been trying to help the FBI capture fugitive Black revolutionary Assata Shakur in the 1980s—and was denying it.
Assata is a legend and folk heroine to so many Blacks. It’s not because they delight in the 1973 shooting death of New Jersey State Trooper Werner Foerster, whom
IN JIM SLEEPER’S 1993 New Yorker profile of Sharpton, “A Man of Too Many Parts,” Sharpton told the writer that he was different from the controversial attorney Alton Maddox, who had advised the ...Tawana Brawley family. Maddox was raised in Georgia, and Sharpton in Brooklyn, he advised. Therefore, “I know Jews from Italians.”
Al Sharpton’s ability to deal with white reporters, Catholic or Jewish, was impressive. This was shown in the way he made peace with and continued friendly contact with Mike McAlary, the New York Newsday reporter on the team that broke the story about Sharpton’s work with the
The Early ’80s Howell, Ron
King Al,
10/2021
Book Chapter
THE STORY OF Rev. Al’s relationship with the white press begins in 1984. He was not yet the boisterous presence he would become, but he was stepping onto the stage. In the spring of 2020 Sharpton ...told attendees at the Saturday meeting of his National Action Network that they should watch a “Trial by Media” documentary. He said he was surprised that there was video of him protesting in those days. The documentary, one of a number in a “Trial by Media” series, was titled Subway Vigilante. It showed Sharpton leading angry and noisy protesters, denouncing the Manhattan prosecutor’s handling
SCHOLARS OFTEN REFER to American journalism’s Golden Age as the period from the late 1800s to the beginning of the 1900s. That was when Ida Tarbell exposed the evils of industrialism with her classic ...investigative work published in McClure’s magazine. Her model of long-form investigative reporting saw lasting impact as a book, The Standard Oil Company. During that era, her colleagues, the so-called muckrakers, wrote about and shot photographs of those living through poverty in America, notably New York City.
Some journalism historians have maintained that the Golden Age existed in stages, the last one stretching over the final decades
BEING A BLACK man who spent two decades working for white news papers in New York City—first with the New York Daily News, then with Newsday—there’s something I can say with certainty about white ...newspapers of the Golden Age.
Collectively, they cared little to nothing about rapes of Black women. What took Tawana Brawley to the front pages was the attention-grabbing genius of Rev. Al Sharpton. Nothing more. Nothing.
The contrast between the white press’s treatment of assaults on Black women versus attacks on white women was glaring and sickening. At no time was that difference made more
