Journals
Walk with us as we open our doors. Turn the keys. How did each of us come to be? Who are we and why?
- Read our stories.
- Share your own.
- It is never too late to learn from our past, to better understand the present, and to build the finest of futures.
Cornucopia
To Mulugeta Seraw What could we have done but give your son our crooked handwritten, misspelled condolences? We wrote letters and poems on construction paper, neatly folding them like your resting hands in the casket. We slipped our notes between fruit [...]
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Irene Robinson Cries, “Mayor You Stole My Children’s Safe, Sane Neighborhood School”
Surrounded by girls, Rasheed Curtis, 6, talks about why Overton should stay open before the last day of school at Overton Elementary School, June 19, 2013. | Jessica Koscielniak ~ Sun-Times Mayor You Stole My Children’s Safe, Sane Neighborhood SchoolA second open letter from Irene Robinson [...]
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Dear White America; Why It Is Always About Race
I’VE LEFT EARTH in search of darker planets, a solar system that revolves too near a black hole. I have left a patch of dirt in my place & many of you won’t know the difference; we are indeed the same color, one of us [...]
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Memoir; Star Student Tried to Get Into College and Could Not
This Teacher Made A Video About His Star Student Trying To Get Into College. She's Not Getting In. Clint Smith tells us that "Everything I write, even when it’s not directly about me, is informed by my students. "Memoir” wasn’t something I thought about until I [...]
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I Fell In Love with a Salon Commenter
“I do not know you, but I love you,” I typed. I stared at the words, momentarily letting them linger, then pressed “send.” The recipient of my confession lived thousands of miles away. We had no connection to one another aside from [...]
Secret Daughter
We all have a personal history, a story we pass on. Perhaps, we were rejected, neglected, abandoned or hidden. Could it be that we were loved, but too much, or were we lost either, each, or neither? Author June Cross has experienced as most of us have, [...]
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Alyn D. Johnson; Freedom, Justice, and Lessons Learned From ’63 Boycott
Written By Alyn [Before the Film Preview Screening '63 Boycott and Forum] The Past is similar to today! Black people were separated from white people in the past. What do you do when you have trouble? Maybe run or call for help? If you [...]
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Becoming White: Reinterpreting a Family Story by Putting Race Back into the Picture
I grew up hearing stories about a great-great-grandmother who immigrated from Switzerland to the U.S. by way of New Orleans. According to stories, she was a linguist who spoke four or five languages fluently, an accomplished seamstress, and a medium. (My siblings and I loved the idea [...]