Ken Burns on "Reckoning with A History Fraught with Violence and Injustice" and the Table of Contents of "An Okie's Racial Reckonings"

 In the Washington Post 22 November 2021 Ken Burns says: "Being an American means reckoning with a history fraught with violence and injustice. Ignoring that reality in favor of mythology is not only wrong but also dangerous. The dark chapters of American history have just as much to teach us, if not more, than the glorious ones, and often the two are intertwined.

What I have been doing in 2021 is reckoning with that history. Here is the table of contents of a book I have nearly finished (one and a half chapters to go). I hope it can be published. All the chapters are about kinfolks in the colonies or the United States. Not one of my ancestors came to the United States. Neither of my parents was born in one of the states of the United States.

24 November 2021--TITLES IN ITALICS AND BOLD ARE NOT WRITTEN

 

                           ONE OKIE’S RACIAL RECKONINGS

 

#01 “GODDAMN OKIES”

#02 WHO THE OKIES WERE

#03 FAMILY STORIES--BEFORE I SAW I HAD TO DO RACE--good happy oblivious stories

#04 COUSINS AT WAR ON THE CHEROKEES What the Carolinians were doing at first instead of going off to fight the British

#05 JEFFERSON, COCKE, SIMS (The burning of the Sims Settlement 2 times. TJ as one of the cousins, an inconsistent one)

#06 RACIAL OBLIVIOUSNESS AT TRAP HILL (the Siamese Twins in NC--and 2 NC men who held Union meetings in 1863)

#07 Dropped this chapter

#08 MOUNTAIN MEADOWS MASSACRE (kin in the Arkansas wagon train were slaughtered in 1857) This is what I am working on right now.

#09 SIMS & SPARKS & THE “ATROCITY” AT MILLIKEN’S BEND (great cast of characters including Grant and the Empress Carlota & the handsomest hero--2 cousins of mine not kin to each other)

#10 FLETCHER HILL & FRATERNITY (1864 escape from Rebel Prison and journey to Union lines)

#11 CAPT. MATTHEWS--LIAR & MURDERER 1866 (Freedmen's Bureau lies are history now, still repeated)

#12 TOURGEE vs MCGEHEE--KKK 1860s & 1870s (awful details about KKK and end of Reconstruction)

#13 WILLY SIMS & THE DANVILLE “MASSACRE" or "STREET-FIGHT” (a reckless cousin who all by himself ended Reconstruction in Virginia)

#14 GLENN-TUCKER JARNDYCE vs JARNDYCE OF I. T. (My family story ending with 3 corrupt judges who ruled against us--one died in alcoholic binge, another slit his throat (but lived), and third had a leg cut off and died.)

#15 DICK COSTNER’S GALLANTRY AT WOUNDED KNEE (provocative--Sen. Warren is right to want to rescind medals--but Dick really was gallant and deserves to keep his medal.)

#16 LEE SPARKS--ONE BAD COP (Houston thug who doomed the Buffalo Soldiers in 1917)

#18 DOVEY--BLACK COSTNERS (horror story of black family driven from place to place)

         Appendix--RACIAL DOCUMENTS (grim items about kinfolks--disposition of slaves in wills, ads for runaways, auction ads for slaves &c)