Federal Writers' Project – Life Histories/2022/Fall/Section087/Nannie Hawkins

Overview

Nannie Hawkins was a poor Black woman born in the early 1900s. Her life at the time of her interview was riddled with loss and struggle. Hawkins spent all of her life at the time of her interview trying to make ends meet and help her husband and family provide. Hawkins lived with her husband Charlie and worked for most of her days. Her life

Personal Biography

Nannie Hawkins was born in the early 1900s in Macon Georgia, a small city an hour outside of the Atlanta Metro area. Hawkins came from a large home of ten siblings, but, due to her father's passing and multiple siblings dying, Hawkins was forced to drop out after the sixth grade in order to work and provide for her family. Hawkins expresses distaste for this, as she proclaims that she loved attending school, and wished she could have continued her studies further. Despite this early end to her education, Hawkins declares that this was more than her mother, as her mother does not have the ability to read and write because she was not able to stay in school for long. Hawkins lives with her husband Charlie, whom she married after being with since the age of twelve. Hawkins works as a maid, and her husband Charlie, worked for the Coca-Cola company. Hawkins lives in a small, crowded home that is falling apart. She also lives with her mother, who has gotten ill and is in need of care, and her niece Mary, the daughter of her late sister. Hawkins and her husband own a home on the outskirts of Macon, surrounded by other people of color who were segregated into predominately minority communities. Hawkins and her husband live along the poverty line, as after payments, and caring for Mary and Hawkins' mother, the two are just barely able to make ends meet. Hawkins and her Husband regularly attend church services at Vineville baptist, Hawkins describes herself as fairly religious and is a member of the women's circle at her church. Hawkins and other women meet weekly, talk about scripture, and knit items that are sold. The money used from selling the items is then given away to charity. Hawkins had long, artificially straightened hair, and light-brown skin, and per her interviewer, was rather intelligent for someone of her race.

Social Context

Religious Identity in the Black Community

Silver Bluff, a predominately black Baptist Church

Christianity spread to black communities largely through contact with Europeans during the early stages of Imperialism. As Christianity spread, original African practices and beliefs became deconstructed or intermingled with the faith brought by Europeans. As black identity evolved in the United States, Christianity became a place of community for slaves, and later on following the abolition of slavery, a place for Black people in a segregated society to have a safe haven. Religious sermons and movements united black communities and created a sense of belonging. People united under the messages of justice, and fair treatment that was found in scripture. During the Jim Crow era, the church was a place for Black people to freely express themselves and was a place of organization. The church was a place for emotional, spiritual, and economic support. The African American communities' history with slavery helped shape their religious beliefs to be based on justice and service towards others. Religious movements across the country prioritized helping people in need and standing up for social justice issues.

Lack of Education in the South

Education in the early 20th century was seen as less of a right and more of a privilege for most individuals. Due to economic stressors that were spearheaded by the great depression, retention rates in schools were abysmally low. only half to a third of all children reported attending school as their primary responsibility in the early 1900s. This doesn't mean that school was not seen as important during this time period, as during the 20th century, there was an increased call to further access to education for those less fortunate, as people began to understand that education is one of the best ways for people to escape poverty. However, poor individuals oftentimes had no choice, most families were large at the time, and when it came down to it, families had to prioritize feeding themselves over their kid's education. This stress and forceful entrance into the working world at an early age has a drastic impact on people and their allosteric loads. An allosteric load is a term used to define indicators of stress in somebody, such as heart conditions, poor mental health, and other physical illnesses. It has been determined that people, especially black people, whose access to education was even worse than their white counterparts, had a higher allosteric load than those that continued their education. This is because not having an education proved to be a barrier for most people. What didn't help was The Great Depression 1930s, which propelled numerous people into lives of poverty, especially in the case of African Americans, who faced even more economic barriers due to Jim Crow-era restrictions that segregated individuals of color from having similar opportunities to white individuals.

Racial Stereotypes

An example of an advertisement containing racial stereotypes

The racial stereotypes of the 1900s revolved largely around a hatred for features that couldn't be categorized as "white", such as bigger noses, lighter skin, and a sense of "properness" in speech and mannerisms. Oftentimes in media Black people were categorized as the opposite of this, as certain facial features in their lips, skin tone, and speech were exaggerated to create a dehumanizing caricature. A popular example of this is the Aunt Jemima ads from the early 20th century that featured Aunt Jemima with exaggerated facial features, and her vernacular was meant to make her seem uneducated and simple. These types of stereotypes not only dehumanized African Americans but also turned their image into a product. They were turned into characters that could be used to make money, forcing them to be seen as the face of a brand, but not as equal to whites. Because of these common-held beliefs, it was very common to see products meant to alter the appearance of African Americans, especially women. One popular product was a skin-lightening cream, lighter skin was seen as more attractive and desirable compared to brown skin, so the idea behind many products was to provide a "lucky-brown" glow, and advertisements often showed Black women applying the products to themselves and seeing results that made their skin lighter. These stereotypes were rooted in an idea of black and brown bodies as inferior and unintelligent, and there was a large market for commodifying these ideas in order to sell products, which oftentimes would lead to the reinforcement of such stereotypes.

References

Bolin, William J. 1890. The Universal Stock Register of Eastern Oregon Brands. Together with the Laws of the State of Oregon, Relating to the Branding and Marking of Stock. Union, Or: L. J. & M. F. Davis. doi:10.5962/bhl.title.42029.

Carter, Linda K. "Evening Schools and Child Labor in the United States, 1870–1910." Order No. 3376970, Vanderbilt University, 2009. http://libproxy.lib.unc.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/evening-schools-child-labor-united-states-1870/docview/305007424/se-2 (accessed October 13, 2022).

Colfax, J. David, and Susan Frankel Sternberg. “The Perpetuation of Racial Stereotypes: Blacks in Mass Circulation Magazine Advertisements.” The Public Opinion Quarterly 36, no. 1 (1972): 8–18. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2747512.

Miller, M. Sammy, and Carter G. Woodson. 1976. “The Sixtieth Anniversary of The Journal of Negro History 1916-1976: Letters from Dr. Carter G. Woodson to Mrs. Mary Church Terrell.” The Journal of Negro History 61 (1): 1–6. doi:10.1086/JNHv61n1p1

Nannie Hawkins, n.d, Folder 267, Federal Writing Project Papers, Southern Historical Collection, UNC Chapel Hill

Solis, Kyle. “The 1940’s – Aunt Jemima Pancakes.” Ads through the ages, March 9, 2018. https://theblogofsolis.wordpress.com/2018/03/09/the-1940s-aunt-jemima-pancakes/

Waslemann, Katrina, Jay Pearson, and Emily Abruzzi. “Education in the Jim Crow South and Black-White Inequities in Allostatic Load among Older Adults.” SSM-Population Health Volume 19 (September 2022). https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2022.101224.

Wiesenfeld, Judith. “Religion in African American History.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History, 2009. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199329175.013.24Williams, Alissa. Black American Beauty in the Late 1900s. Müd & co., May 25, 2020. https://www.whatamud.com/blog/black-beauty-1900s.