March 21, 2025 • 12 mins
Dr. Vanessa Tyler talks to author and educator Kimberly Jones about her book, 'Wealthy Blacks Before the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863'. The book helps dispel the myth that Black wealth did not exist in the days of slavery. Kimberly Jones shares information on wealthy business people of color in the 1800's and how they struggled and thrived during that period. The book also examines why many of these stories are relatively unknown and how it relates to the supression of Black History.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
And now as a brown person, you just feel so invisible.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
It's not where we're from. Brothers and sisters. I welcome
you to this joyful day and we celebrate freedom.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Where we are, I know someone's heard something and where
we're going.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
We the people means all the people.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
The Black Information Network presents Blackland with your host Vanessa Tyler.
Welcome to Blackland. We are living in strange times. Some
Black people worry about efforts to turn back the clock.
There was a time black people were really in a
(00:40):
struggle to survive. But there were some black people who
did more than survive. They thrived. They were wealthy before emancipation,
a fact well documented in the book Wealthy Blacks before
the Emancipation Proclamation of eighteen sixty three. Kimberly Jones is
the author, Kimberly.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Welcome, Thank you, Thank you. Tell me about.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
These wealthy blacks.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
So they went in a variety of ways to gain
their wealth, and they were actually wealthy, and it's documented,
and I made sure. One of the things I made
sure if I could, I found newspaper articles on some
of them. This was like eighteen sixty three or eighteen
sixty one, and that I was able to find their advertisements,
(01:28):
and I was really excited about that.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Exciting and eye opening. Author Kimberly Jones profiles eighteen blacks
in her book She Stopped with eighteen. She could have
profiled more people like Robert Gordon, who became wealthy by
picking up the scraps of coal the white man who
enslaved him didn't.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Want, so he would pick it up, put it in
the bag, and go sell it. So he finally sold
enough to purchase his own freedom, and he ended up
moving to Cincinnati, Ohio, where he opened up his own
coal business.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Gordon and other free blacks in Cincinnati, Ohio were brilliant
enough to hedge against vengeful, hateful, jealous whites. They created
what they called the Iron Chest Company, sort of like
a bank and insurance company combined, where they saved money
to help black business owners quickly rebuild from the frequent
(02:25):
white vandalism, something that happened to Henry Boyd a lot.
He created, designed and built the four poster bed frame,
a design used to this day and one of the
wealthy blacks profiled in her book.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
He was able to create the bedpost, and so they
wouldn't allow him to have his patent, So he kept
trying to get his patent. He kept trying to get
his patent, and once they found out he was a
black man, he was rejected. So what he started doing
for his bed post he started carving in his initials
(03:03):
so people will know that's his product. They would come
and burn down his business. So again this is when
the iron chests came into play. He was one of
those who had to have assistance from the Iron Chests
to help him rebuild his business.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Wealthy blots before the Emancipation Proclamation were not just men.
There were women too.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Elizabeth Keckley, she was enslaved in North Carolina. She was
an awesome seamstress, so she began to make dresses. Her
mother taught her how to make gowns and dresses, and
she began to sow enough dresses to purchase her freedom.
When she purchased her freedom, she moved to Washington, D C.
(03:48):
And she was the fashion designer for Mary Todd Lincoln,
Abraham Lincoln's wife. She made all the dresses for the
women in Washington, D C. At that time, and that's
how she was able to gain her wealth.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Imagine the obstacles again. This was before emancipation, and those
who were free were never ever guaranteed peace. Like Cynthia
Hesdra who had to always look over her shoulder.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
She owned several laundry businesses, and so they said her
father did it first, and her father taught her the skill,
the entrepreneurship. He had the entrepreneurship spirit, and so her
father taught her everything. So unfortunately she was captured taken
to the South, and she was able to manage however
(04:36):
she did it. She was managed. She was able to
get her way back to the north in New York
and she started back up her businesses. So she had
all these several different businesses around New York and New
Jersey area. And when she passed away, it's in her estate,
which was I think eighteen ninety was the newspaper article
(04:57):
for the court order she had that she had over
one hundred thousand dollars in her estate. So you can
imagine that what that would be.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Now, many of the wealthy blacks had between one hundred
and two hundred thousand dollars a king's ransom at that time,
people like Stephen Smith.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
He was out of Philadelphia and Stephen Smith had a
lumber company in Philadelphia, Stephen Smith. Also, if you go
to Cape May, New Jersey, he had a summer home
and it says on the historical marker of the summer
home that the summer home was built I want to say,
(05:38):
in eighteen forty six. So not only did he have
a home in Philadelphia, but during the summer months he
would go to Cape May, New Jersey.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Another wealthy black Thomas Downing. He had an oyster shop
in New York. People would stop in from all around
the world.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Let me tell you who was able to go to
Thomas Downing's bus Smith Charles Dickens. Charles Dickens came from
another country and he made sure that he visited Thomas
Downing's restaurant.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Was there a unique characteristic in like a line connecting
all these people you researched, that made them want to
do this in light of every other black person still enslaved.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
I think it was determination and it was their permission
not to not to be defined by society. They defined
their own destiny.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
The worst incident of racial violence in American history, they
hate filled nineteen twenty one Telsa massacre. Days before the
Biden administration left office. Assistant Attorney General African American Kristen Clark,
who headed the DOJ's Civil Rights Division, delivered this report.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
The Justice Department has issued a new report on the
Tulsa Race Massacre. The one hundred and twenty three page
report documents the findings made during a review and evaluation
of the massacre conducted under the Emmett Hill Unsolved Civil
Rights Crimes Act. The Tulsa Race Massacre stands out as
(07:21):
a civil rights crime, unique in its magnitude, barbarity, races, hostility,
and its utter annihlation of a thriving black community. In
nineteen twenty one, white Tulsan's murdered hundreds of residents of Greenwood,
burned their homes and churches, looted their belongings, and locked
(07:42):
the survivors in internment camps. Until this day, the Justice
Department has not spoken publicly about the race massacre or
officially accounted for the horrific events that transpired in Tulsa.
This report breaks that silence through a rigorous examination and
a full accounting of one of the darkest episodes of
(08:06):
our nation's past. The report lays bare new information and
shows that the massacre was the result not of uncontrolled
mob violence, but of a coordinated military style attack on Greenwood. Now,
more than one hundred years later, there is no living
perpetrator for the Justice Department to prosecute, but the historical
(08:29):
reckoning for the massacre continues. This report reflects our commitment
to the pursuit of justice and truth, even in the
face of insurmountable obstacles. We issue this report in recognition
of the courageous survivors who continue to share their testimonies,
(08:49):
in acknowledgment of those who tragically lost their lives, and
with appreciation for other affected individuals and advocates who collectively
push us to never forget this tragic chapter of American history.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Ironically, author Kimberly Jones is from Tulsa, and the reason
she wrote her book Wealthy Blacks Before Emancipation Proclamation of
eighteen sixty three is because she never knew what happened
in her own backyard.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
I was so upset. I was really really upset because
I said, who, Why didn't I know about all these people?
And I don't know if I was upset with the
school system. I don't know if I was upset with
the neighborhoods or the community I grew up in because
I knew nothing, just barely minimum about black history. And yes,
(09:43):
I was one of those people. I'm in Oklahoma, you know,
grew up here Amasa all my life. I was one
of those people who did not know about the Tulsa
Race massacre. It goes back to who's responsibility is it
to share our stories? You know?
Speaker 4 (10:00):
You go and do we have an answer for that
because schools are not going and teaching Black history to
the extent of this.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
I mean, we know, of course and respect doctor Martin
Luther King Junior and Rosa Parks. But there were others, yes,
and I think more importantly, there were others during slavery,
which at a time many of us must think to ourselves.
(10:31):
I know there was a fight. I know they all
just didn't go with slavery. There were people who were
fighting back, and we need to know who those people are.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Right in.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
These individuals not only did they fight back, but they
gained their freedom as well as financial freedom.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
Do you think kids in school ever learned about these
amazing men and women in our history.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
It will be up to us. It will be up
to us, because it's going to be to us to
take stories like this out of the hidden textbooks, out
of the research, and out of the old court cases,
and out of the old newspapers and kind of you know,
you know, sew them together like a quilt, and like
(11:16):
this book is sewn together like a quilt, and present
these stories to these students because they won't know, they
won't know, and tell people, I say, listen, I will
teach Black history from under a tree if I have to,
I said, because we need to know this information some way, somehow.
We're going to have to rethink and make sure the
(11:39):
kids have access to the information at home because there
is a strategy that others are using to wipe out
our rich history. But we have to somehow creatively keep
that rich history alive. But I really think, just like
these individuals how God just made a way for them,
(12:00):
I think he will make a way for us, because
God is bigger than all of this.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
The book Wealthy Blacks Before the Emancipation Proclamation of eighteen
sixty three can be found on Amazon.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
When you think of slavery, you don't think of people
actually escaping slavery and becoming wealthy.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Kimberly Jones, thank you so much for the education I'm
Vanessa Tyler. Don't miss an episode of black Lands. A
new one drops every week. Be sure to like and
subscribe
And now as a brown person, you just feel so invisible.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
It's not where we're from. Brothers and sisters. I welcome
you to this joyful day and we celebrate freedom.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Where we are, I know someone's heard something and where
we're going.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
We the people means all the people.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
The Black Information Network presents Blackland with your host Vanessa Tyler.
Welcome to Blackland. We are living in strange times. Some
Black people worry about efforts to turn back the clock.
There was a time black people were really in a
(00:40):
struggle to survive. But there were some black people who
did more than survive. They thrived. They were wealthy before emancipation,
a fact well documented in the book Wealthy Blacks before
the Emancipation Proclamation of eighteen sixty three. Kimberly Jones is
the author, Kimberly.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Welcome, Thank you, Thank you. Tell me about.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
These wealthy blacks.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
So they went in a variety of ways to gain
their wealth, and they were actually wealthy, and it's documented,
and I made sure. One of the things I made
sure if I could, I found newspaper articles on some
of them. This was like eighteen sixty three or eighteen
sixty one, and that I was able to find their advertisements,
(01:28):
and I was really excited about that.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Exciting and eye opening. Author Kimberly Jones profiles eighteen blacks
in her book She Stopped with eighteen. She could have
profiled more people like Robert Gordon, who became wealthy by
picking up the scraps of coal the white man who
enslaved him didn't.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Want, so he would pick it up, put it in
the bag, and go sell it. So he finally sold
enough to purchase his own freedom, and he ended up
moving to Cincinnati, Ohio, where he opened up his own
coal business.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Gordon and other free blacks in Cincinnati, Ohio were brilliant
enough to hedge against vengeful, hateful, jealous whites. They created
what they called the Iron Chest Company, sort of like
a bank and insurance company combined, where they saved money
to help black business owners quickly rebuild from the frequent
(02:25):
white vandalism, something that happened to Henry Boyd a lot.
He created, designed and built the four poster bed frame,
a design used to this day and one of the
wealthy blacks profiled in her book.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
He was able to create the bedpost, and so they
wouldn't allow him to have his patent, So he kept
trying to get his patent. He kept trying to get
his patent, and once they found out he was a
black man, he was rejected. So what he started doing
for his bed post he started carving in his initials
(03:03):
so people will know that's his product. They would come
and burn down his business. So again this is when
the iron chests came into play. He was one of
those who had to have assistance from the Iron Chests
to help him rebuild his business.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Wealthy blots before the Emancipation Proclamation were not just men.
There were women too.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Elizabeth Keckley, she was enslaved in North Carolina. She was
an awesome seamstress, so she began to make dresses. Her
mother taught her how to make gowns and dresses, and
she began to sow enough dresses to purchase her freedom.
When she purchased her freedom, she moved to Washington, D C.
(03:48):
And she was the fashion designer for Mary Todd Lincoln,
Abraham Lincoln's wife. She made all the dresses for the
women in Washington, D C. At that time, and that's
how she was able to gain her wealth.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Imagine the obstacles again. This was before emancipation, and those
who were free were never ever guaranteed peace. Like Cynthia
Hesdra who had to always look over her shoulder.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
She owned several laundry businesses, and so they said her
father did it first, and her father taught her the skill,
the entrepreneurship. He had the entrepreneurship spirit, and so her
father taught her everything. So unfortunately she was captured taken
to the South, and she was able to manage however
(04:36):
she did it. She was managed. She was able to
get her way back to the north in New York
and she started back up her businesses. So she had
all these several different businesses around New York and New
Jersey area. And when she passed away, it's in her estate,
which was I think eighteen ninety was the newspaper article
(04:57):
for the court order she had that she had over
one hundred thousand dollars in her estate. So you can
imagine that what that would be.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Now, many of the wealthy blacks had between one hundred
and two hundred thousand dollars a king's ransom at that time,
people like Stephen Smith.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
He was out of Philadelphia and Stephen Smith had a
lumber company in Philadelphia, Stephen Smith. Also, if you go
to Cape May, New Jersey, he had a summer home
and it says on the historical marker of the summer
home that the summer home was built I want to say,
(05:38):
in eighteen forty six. So not only did he have
a home in Philadelphia, but during the summer months he
would go to Cape May, New Jersey.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Another wealthy black Thomas Downing. He had an oyster shop
in New York. People would stop in from all around
the world.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Let me tell you who was able to go to
Thomas Downing's bus Smith Charles Dickens. Charles Dickens came from
another country and he made sure that he visited Thomas
Downing's restaurant.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Was there a unique characteristic in like a line connecting
all these people you researched, that made them want to
do this in light of every other black person still enslaved.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
I think it was determination and it was their permission
not to not to be defined by society. They defined
their own destiny.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
The worst incident of racial violence in American history, they
hate filled nineteen twenty one Telsa massacre. Days before the
Biden administration left office. Assistant Attorney General African American Kristen Clark,
who headed the DOJ's Civil Rights Division, delivered this report.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
The Justice Department has issued a new report on the
Tulsa Race Massacre. The one hundred and twenty three page
report documents the findings made during a review and evaluation
of the massacre conducted under the Emmett Hill Unsolved Civil
Rights Crimes Act. The Tulsa Race Massacre stands out as
(07:21):
a civil rights crime, unique in its magnitude, barbarity, races, hostility,
and its utter annihlation of a thriving black community. In
nineteen twenty one, white Tulsan's murdered hundreds of residents of Greenwood,
burned their homes and churches, looted their belongings, and locked
(07:42):
the survivors in internment camps. Until this day, the Justice
Department has not spoken publicly about the race massacre or
officially accounted for the horrific events that transpired in Tulsa.
This report breaks that silence through a rigorous examination and
a full accounting of one of the darkest episodes of
(08:06):
our nation's past. The report lays bare new information and
shows that the massacre was the result not of uncontrolled
mob violence, but of a coordinated military style attack on Greenwood. Now,
more than one hundred years later, there is no living
perpetrator for the Justice Department to prosecute, but the historical
(08:29):
reckoning for the massacre continues. This report reflects our commitment
to the pursuit of justice and truth, even in the
face of insurmountable obstacles. We issue this report in recognition
of the courageous survivors who continue to share their testimonies,
(08:49):
in acknowledgment of those who tragically lost their lives, and
with appreciation for other affected individuals and advocates who collectively
push us to never forget this tragic chapter of American history.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Ironically, author Kimberly Jones is from Tulsa, and the reason
she wrote her book Wealthy Blacks Before Emancipation Proclamation of
eighteen sixty three is because she never knew what happened
in her own backyard.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
I was so upset. I was really really upset because
I said, who, Why didn't I know about all these people?
And I don't know if I was upset with the
school system. I don't know if I was upset with
the neighborhoods or the community I grew up in because
I knew nothing, just barely minimum about black history. And yes,
(09:43):
I was one of those people. I'm in Oklahoma, you know,
grew up here Amasa all my life. I was one
of those people who did not know about the Tulsa
Race massacre. It goes back to who's responsibility is it
to share our stories? You know?
Speaker 4 (10:00):
You go and do we have an answer for that
because schools are not going and teaching Black history to
the extent of this.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
I mean, we know, of course and respect doctor Martin
Luther King Junior and Rosa Parks. But there were others, yes,
and I think more importantly, there were others during slavery,
which at a time many of us must think to ourselves.
(10:31):
I know there was a fight. I know they all
just didn't go with slavery. There were people who were
fighting back, and we need to know who those people are.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Right in.
Speaker 3 (10:43):
These individuals not only did they fight back, but they
gained their freedom as well as financial freedom.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
Do you think kids in school ever learned about these
amazing men and women in our history.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
It will be up to us. It will be up
to us, because it's going to be to us to
take stories like this out of the hidden textbooks, out
of the research, and out of the old court cases,
and out of the old newspapers and kind of you know,
you know, sew them together like a quilt, and like
(11:16):
this book is sewn together like a quilt, and present
these stories to these students because they won't know, they
won't know, and tell people, I say, listen, I will
teach Black history from under a tree if I have to,
I said, because we need to know this information some way, somehow.
We're going to have to rethink and make sure the
(11:39):
kids have access to the information at home because there
is a strategy that others are using to wipe out
our rich history. But we have to somehow creatively keep
that rich history alive. But I really think, just like
these individuals how God just made a way for them,
(12:00):
I think he will make a way for us, because
God is bigger than all of this.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
The book Wealthy Blacks Before the Emancipation Proclamation of eighteen
sixty three can be found on Amazon.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
When you think of slavery, you don't think of people
actually escaping slavery and becoming wealthy.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Kimberly Jones, thank you so much for the education I'm
Vanessa Tyler. Don't miss an episode of black Lands. A
new one drops every week. Be sure to like and
subscribe
Host
Vanessa Tyler
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
Ridiculous History
History is beautiful, brutal and, often, ridiculous. Join Ben Bowlin and Noel Brown as they dive into some of the weirdest stories from across the span of human civilization in Ridiculous History, a podcast by iHeartRadio.