Papa’s Merchant Marine’s Recollections. pt. 1

This is about my Papa’s recollections of being in the Merchant Marines. My Papa is my mother’s father.

WWII 1945, Columbia River in Oregon, out of 50 officers, there was one black lieutenant, who couldn’t go ashore with his crew. He wasn’t allowed to sit at certain tables. My papa, a cook, and his food crew said “he sits where he wants or we serve no one.” The lieutenant took a seat of his choosing. The white crew didn’t want the blacks near their quarter as they may see them in a “state of undress”. The chef on this ship was from Pennsylvania, a white man, former coal miner, an all around good guy. He once told my Papa “I’m going to make a chef out of you.” His name was Raymond Norwood. He was in charge of the food crew and again aserted the food crew’s power saying “if they’re too good for my boys to look at, they’re too good to get served.” The white crew posted Military Police at the entrance to the passageways in defiance. They missed a few meals.

There was a ship named the Booker T. Washington that had a black crew of dishwashers, engineers, radio engineers, officers and even the captain of merchant marine ship. I did some research online and found out that the United States Merchant Marine Liberty Ship named “S.S. Booker T. Washington”  was launched in 1942 and christened by famous soprano singer Marian Anderson. The unveiling of a bronze bust of Dr. Washington took place in 1946.

My Papa went with white shipmates to a restaurant after arriving at port in the US. They all ordered some food. The whites were served. My papa was not. It would seem from my Papa’s stories that there was usually at least “one good white guy.” This time it was a white guy from Kentucky who points to my Papa and asks the restaurant owner “what about him?” Well, they didn’t serve his kind. My Papa had to leave the establishment, he was directed to the home of black family who would gladly serve him a meal.

Open Invitation for Questions – story of my southern grandma

I have been wanting to write about my family, and families that have made an impact in my life, for quite some time, and hence I’ve embarked on starting a few blogs. The daily process of writing small posts makes it less of a chore as I think of different topics. I would greatly benefit from your questions. If you could ask anything you want, anything at all, what would it be? What would you ask an AA grandmother of 80? What would you ask an AA grandfather that had served proudly in the Korean war? What would you ask of a black man of 78 who against all odds established multiple businesses, owns many properties, and now has the means to care for new generations? What would you ask of the young college educated black woman who lived in the suburbs and learned how to adapt to every type of surrounding, be it a public or private school, a Black Baptist church or a Catholic mass? What would you ask if there was no worry about being offensive?

 

Let me tell you, briefly now and hopefully in more detail later, about my grandmother from Lousianna. She’s a great woman. The matriarch of that side of the family. Has raised children in our family that were not her own. She and my grandfather took in a cousin of mine and he later went on to receive a 4 year scholarship to college. They turned a troubled kid into a straight A student. She wears over the top outfits on Sunday with the obligatory “church hat”. She cooks large meals, fit for an army. Fried catfish, collard greens, home made corn bread, black berry cobbler, on and on. She can quote Bible verses but she also can have a sharp tongue. She has stories of surviving a flood that wiped out an entire black community in Oregon. She’s owned her own businesses. She’s been a seamstress and managed an office cleaning outfit. She sewed my flower girl dress when I was a child. She taught me how to scale a fish. Since starting a family of my own, she’s sent me recipes on banana walnut muffins and honey mustard chicken.

 

What would you like to know? Perhaps it’s a bit forward of me, and I hope it’s of no insult, but if you could imagine your child having a sort of extended/virtual black family, what sort of information would you want passed on?