Preserving an engaging, little-known slice of American life, "The
Dark Side of Hopkinsville" is a collection of ten picaresque tales
bearing witness to a black child's life in a southern town at the
turn of the century.
Born and reared in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, Ted Poston
(1906-1974) became the first black career-long reporter for a major
metropolitan daily (the "New York Post") and served as a member of
Franklin D. Roosevelt's "Negro Cabinet" in Washington in 1940.
After thirty-five years at the "Post," Poston was without question
the "Dean of Black Journalists."
Acquainted with the major figures of the Harlem Renaissance,
Poston regaled his associates with tales of his childhood. These
memories resulted in the stories collected in "The Dark Side of
Hopkinsville." Told from the vantage point of "Ted," a bright,
high-spirited student at Booker T. Washington Colored Grammar
School, the stories focus on a coterie of imaginative children,
their entertainments and games, ties to the church, and relations
with immediate and extended families.
The memorable, recurring characters in the stories are based on
individuals Poston knew: Cousin Blind Mary, a fortune teller who
can see into someone's future only after consulting with the
servants of the family in question; Ted's father, Ephraim, "the
only Negro Democrat in our Hopkinsville, Kentucky, or in the whole
state of Kentucky for that matter"; Fertilizer Ferguson, whom Ted
credits with coining the phrase "eating higher up on the hog"; and
Ted's schoolmate Knee Baby Watkins, the "catalytic agent who
precipitated the most disasterous social feud in the history of
Hopkinsville." Though the presence of prejudice--both within and
outside the race--is acknowledged throughout the stories, that
social reality does not lessen the characters' exuberant enjoyment
of being young. After watching Bronco Billy and his black sidekick,
Pistol Pete, at the nickel movie on Saturdays, Ted and his friends
make Pistol Pete the hero and Bronco Billy the sidekick of their
games in "The Werewolf of Woolworth's." In "The Revolt of the Evil
Fairies," Ted uses Palmer's Skin Success ("guaranteed to give you a
light complexion in just seven days") so that he can play Prince
Charming opposite his fair-skinned sweetheart in the school
play.
Kathleen A. Hauke has annotated the stories with recollections
of the author's family and friends, who are often major characters
in the stories. An extended biographical and critical introduction
offers background information on the life and work of Ted Poston,
and on old Hopkinsville and its residents.
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