Harry Golden of the Carolina Israelite, One of a Kind

[donbosco]

The first Jew that I knew was my freshman college roommate. Growing up there ‘had’ been a salesman that came by my father’s hardware store infrequently that I knew to be Jewish. I say infrequently because he was the bottle rocket and smoke bomb provider, two commodities that I, along with the other #Bonlee Boys cherished dearly - but unfortunately used up rapidly. My roommate, Scott, was a good guy, from Charlotte like what seemed like 70% of the #UNC student body in those days, had gotten a fine education in math at Myers Park High, and was a helluva wrestler. On move-in day - Everett Dorm - our families met. Southern Baptist to Orthodox Jewish. At the time what I thought that I knew about Jews came almost entirely from the banter of the guests on The Johnny Carson, Dick Cavett, and Merv Griffin Shows and a WUNC-TV production of ‘Fiddler on the Roof.’

Who could have predicted that our fathers would hit it off so famously? The reason? Through both of their veins flowed the Miracle Elixir of HARDWARE! Both had made their livelihood providing for people that simply wanted to improve or fix things. Retail. The two of them were soon off to the side literally talking about nuts and bolts. Scott and I made it through the year fine - he pledged TEP, where I played a good deal of hoops, had some memorable dinners and made some friends, majored in Math, and moved to Georgia after graduation. He’s doing well from what I can tell.

As for a Jewish presence in North Carolina, I have come to understand that despite my own isolation in #DeepChatham there is quite a robust history in more urban places like Greensboro, Charlotte, Durham, and Asheville. The historian Leonard Rogoff has chronicled this in books like, ‘Down Home: Jewish Life in North Carolina.’ From Polish Jewish cigarette rollers brought to their tobacco factory in Durham by the Duke family to the textile empire built by Moses and Ceasar Cone in Greensboro. Jews have been both workers & entrepreneurs in NC. The history is, in fact, far more wide and deep than my rural upbringing and education indicated and I am still on a learning path.

From 1944 to 1968 it was the voice of Harry Golden that represented, for good or ill, a Jewish point of view for many Tar Heels. By way of his newspaper, ‘The Carolina Israelite,’ Golden regaled his public with stories of migration (in his case from NYC) to the South, the absurdity of segregation and racism, and the confluence of Yankee and Southern cuisines. He wrote about weighty topics like lynching, the Klan, the Jerusalem trial of Nazi Eichmann, and was a champion of non-violence in the pursuit of equal Civil Rights for all.

#OTD (October 2) in 1981 publisher/humorist Harry Golden died. His ‘Carolina Israelite’ (44-68) mocked southern racism, showing it ridiculous. MLK Jr., said, “he was one of our white brothers who have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it.” Golden noted that white Southerners didn’t mind standing with African Americans: “It is only when the Negro ‘sets’ that the fur begins to fly.” His satirical, ‘Vertical Negro Plan’ suggested schools could be integrated by providing stand-up desks. He was advisor to RFKennedy. Harry Golden of the Carolina Israelite, One of a Kind

 

[superrific]

For someone who doesn't know who Harry Golden is -- and that would be most people, I suspect -- your thread title comes across as incredibly racist. The sarcasm is by no means apparent. Perhaps you could do something about that. There are people here who understand your politics, but there are probably lurkers who do not know you, who will look at the board, and think, "WTF is a vertical negro plan"?

How about Harry Golden, Sarcastic Scribe or if that's not lionizing enough for you, Harry Golden, the Jonathan Swift of Charlotte?

 

[grimes70]

The first Jew that I knew was my freshman college roommate. Growing up there ‘had’ been a salesman that came by my father’s hardware store infrequently that I knew to be Jewish. I say infrequently because he was the bottle rocket and smoke bomb provider, two commodities that I, along with the other #Bonlee Boys cherished dearly - but unfortunately used up rapidly. My roommate, Scott, was a good guy, from Charlotte like what seemed like 70% of the #UNC student body in those days, had gotten a fine education in math at Myers Park High, and was a helluva wrestler. On move-in day - Everett Dorm - our families met. Southern Baptist to Orthodox Jewish. At the time what I thought that I knew about Jews came almost entirely from the banter of the guests on The Johnny Carson, Dick Cavett, and Merv Griffin Shows and a WUNC-TV production of ‘Fiddler on the Roof.’

Who could have predicted that our fathers would hit it off so famously? The reason? Through both of their veins flowed the Miracle Elixir of HARDWARE! Both had made their livelihood providing for people that simply wanted to improve or fix things. Retail. The two of them were soon off to the side literally talking about nuts and bolts. Scott and I made it through the year fine - he pledged TEP, where I played a good deal of hoops, had some memorable dinners and made some friends, majored in Math, and moved to Georgia after graduation. He’s doing well from what I can tell.

As for a Jewish presence in North Carolina, I have come to understand that despite my own isolation in #DeepChatham there is quite a robust history in more urban places like Greensboro, Charlotte, Durham, and Asheville. The historian Leonard Rogoff has chronicled this in books like, ‘Down Home: Jewish Life in North Carolina.’ From Polish Jewish cigarette rollers brought to their tobacco factory in Durham by the Duke family to the textile empire built by Moses and Ceasar Cone in Greensboro. Jews have been both workers & entrepreneurs in NC. The history is, in fact, far more wide and deep than my rural upbringing and education indicated and I am still on a learning path.

From 1944 to 1968 it was the voice of Harry Golden that represented, for good or ill, a Jewish point of view for many Tar Heels. By way of his newspaper, ‘The Carolina Israelite,’ Golden regaled his public with stories of migration (in his case from NYC) to the South, the absurdity of segregation and racism, and the confluence of Yankee and Southern cuisines. He wrote about weighty topics like lynching, the Klan, the Jerusalem trial of Nazi Eichmann, and was a champion of non-violence in the pursuit of equal Civil Rights for all.

#OTD (October 2) in 1981 publisher/humorist Harry Golden died. His ‘Carolina Israelite’ (44-68) mocked southern racism, showing it ridiculous. MLK Jr., said, “he was one of our white brothers who have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it.” Golden noted that white Southerners didn’t mind standing with African Americans: “It is only when the Negro ‘sets’ that the fur begins to fly.” His satirical, ‘Vertical Negro Plan’ suggested schools could be integrated by providing stand-up desks. He was advisor to RFKennedy. Harry Golden of the Carolina Israelite, One of a Kind

The Temple of Israel in Wilmington was organized in 1872. It is the oldest congregation in North Carolina and one of the earliest Reform synagogues (built 1875–76) in the South.

There were once quite a few Jewish communities in eastern NC. Originally travelling peddlers settled in to retail businesses. Stadiem Men's Wear in Kinston used to advertise on Raleigh TV. Met a daughter at UNC. Long history of Jews in the state.

 

[donbosco]

“Annamaboe was the largest slave trading port on the eighteenth-century Gold Coast, and it was home to successful, wily African merchants whose unusual partnerships with their European counterparts made the town and its people an integral part of the Atlantic’s webs of exchange. Where the Negroes Are Masters brings to life the outpost’s feverish commercial bustle and continual brutality, recovering the experiences of the entrepreneurial black and white men who thrived on the lucrative traffic in human beings.

Located in present-day Ghana, the port of Annamaboe brought the town’s Fante merchants into daily contact with diverse peoples: Englishmen of the Royal African Company, Rhode Island Rum Men, European slave traders, and captured Africans from neighboring nations. Operating on their own turf, Annamaboe’s African leaders could bend negotiations with Europeans to their own advantage, as they funneled imported goods from across the Atlantic deep into the African interior and shipped vast cargoes of enslaved Africans to labor in the Americas.

Far from mere pawns in the hands of the colonial powers, African men and women were major players in the complex networks of the slave trade. Randy Sparks captures their collective experience in vivid detail, uncovering how the slave trade arose, how it functioned from day to day, and how it transformed life in Annamaboe and made the port itself a hub of Atlantic commerce. From the personal, commercial, and cultural encounters that unfolded along Annamaboe’s shore emerges a dynamic new vision of the early modern Atlantic world.”


Reminds me of how a student told me that they were not going to read this book because it was racist.

 

[superrific]

Reminds me of how a student told me that they were not going to read this book be a use it was racist.

You can't be a progressive if you can't take other peoples' feelings into account when making your decisions. There is absolutely no reason that your thread title should read the way it does. Again, nobody knows who Harry Golden is, and from the thread title, it sounds like he's a raging racist.

But you do you. I would have thought deddy taught you better but guess not.

 

[grimes70]

You can't be a progressive if you can't take other peoples' feelings into account when making your decisions. There is absolutely no reason that your thread title should read the way it does. Again, nobody knows who Harry Golden is, and from the thread title, it sounds like he's a raging racist.

But you do you. I would have thought deddy taught you better but guess not.

I know who Harry Golden was. You really shouldn't be talking out your ass on subjects you know nothing about. Perhaps you should have gone to UNC and taken a NC history course.

 

[superrific]

I know who Harry Golden was. You really shouldn't be talking out your ass on subjects you know nothing about. Perhaps you should have gone to UNC and taken a NC history course.

I'm not talking out of my ass on subjects I know nothing about. I am literally saying that I don't know this. I guarantee you that a significant number of posters and lurkers do not know who Harry Golden was (note: "nobody knows" is a rhetorical term). He is not a particularly famous person.

Last I checked, this board was not only for people who took NC history courses at UNC. One of the purposes of the board is to discuss things in a way that people can learn. Offensive and misleading thread titles do not advance that cause. But you do you.

 

[donbosco]

I appreciate y’all being brave enough to open the thread.

 

[05C40]

In Wayne County in Eastern NC, the leadership of the Weil family, a Jewish family, made it a better place to be. The Weil family founded what at the time was the best department store, Weil's. They also had the biggest agricultural fertilizer and chemical company. They founded the public libraries in Wayne County. They gave the land on which the old Boy Scout camp was built, Camp Tuscarora. Any time a worthy cause needed something, the Weils were always there. One of the stories about one of the Weil men was that when he attended a BBQ fundraiser, he would hold his hands over the BBQ plate and proclaim he had transmuted it into beef.

When I was high school, I did a term paper on the Book of Ecclesiastes. Researching the paper, I went to the Synagogue in Goldsboro (founded by the Weils) to talk to the Rabbi so I could get his take on Ecclesisates and compare to the Methodist take in my home church. When I sat down with the Rabbi, he was wearing a short-sleeve shirt and there was a number tattooed on his arm. He was a Survivor. I just about lost my s$&t right there. But I made it through the interview and came away with some really interesting perspectives on Ecclesiasties.

 

[hedge]

One of the scions of the Weil family was a freshmen at Old East when I (also a freshman) was there...

 

[farce©]

I regularly walk my dog past this historical marker. You might want to sit this one out, super.

 

[McAdooSmackinYou]

For someone who doesn't know who Harry Golden is -- and that would be most people, I suspect -- your thread title comes across as incredibly racist.

Speak for yourself.

Actually, don't. You talk too fucking much. Do you have to ruin every thread on this board? Isn't there an LSAT somewhere you could be taking?

 

[McAdooSmackinYou]

I remember my dad telling me about the article on the OP but had never seen it. Thanks for posting.

 

[UNCatTech]

You can't be a progressive if you can't take other peoples' feelings into account when making your decisions. There is absolutely no reason that your thread title should read the way it does. Again, nobody knows who Harry Golden is, and from the thread title, it sounds like he's a raging racist.

But you do you. I would have thought deddy taught you better but guess not.

I don't know of Harry Golden, but based on my knowledge of the OP and the general position of this board, I was intrigued to open the thread and read. While the title could be taken as racist, my knowledge of the board lead me to believe it wouldn't be.

 

[UNCatTech]

The first Jew that I knew was my freshman college roommate. Growing up there ‘had’ been a salesman that came by my father’s hardware store infrequently that I knew to be Jewish. I say infrequently because he was the bottle rocket and smoke bomb provider, two commodities that I, along with the other #Bonlee Boys cherished dearly - but unfortunately used up rapidly. My roommate, Scott, was a good guy, from Charlotte like what seemed like 70% of the #UNC student body in those days, had gotten a fine education in math at Myers Park High, and was a helluva wrestler. On move-in day - Everett Dorm - our families met. Southern Baptist to Orthodox Jewish. At the time what I thought that I knew about Jews came almost entirely from the banter of the guests on The Johnny Carson, Dick Cavett, and Merv Griffin Shows and a WUNC-TV production of ‘Fiddler on the Roof.’

Who could have predicted that our fathers would hit it off so famously? The reason? Through both of their veins flowed the Miracle Elixir of HARDWARE! Both had made their livelihood providing for people that simply wanted to improve or fix things. Retail. The two of them were soon off to the side literally talking about nuts and bolts. Scott and I made it through the year fine - he pledged TEP, where I played a good deal of hoops, had some memorable dinners and made some friends, majored in Math, and moved to Georgia after graduation. He’s doing well from what I can tell.

As for a Jewish presence in North Carolina, I have come to understand that despite my own isolation in #DeepChatham there is quite a robust history in more urban places like Greensboro, Charlotte, Durham, and Asheville. The historian Leonard Rogoff has chronicled this in books like, ‘Down Home: Jewish Life in North Carolina.’ From Polish Jewish cigarette rollers brought to their tobacco factory in Durham by the Duke family to the textile empire built by Moses and Ceasar Cone in Greensboro. Jews have been both workers & entrepreneurs in NC. The history is, in fact, far more wide and deep than my rural upbringing and education indicated and I am still on a learning path.

From 1944 to 1968 it was the voice of Harry Golden that represented, for good or ill, a Jewish point of view for many Tar Heels. By way of his newspaper, ‘The Carolina Israelite,’ Golden regaled his public with stories of migration (in his case from NYC) to the South, the absurdity of segregation and racism, and the confluence of Yankee and Southern cuisines. He wrote about weighty topics like lynching, the Klan, the Jerusalem trial of Nazi Eichmann, and was a champion of non-violence in the pursuit of equal Civil Rights for all.

#OTD (October 2) in 1981 publisher/humorist Harry Golden died. His ‘Carolina Israelite’ (44-68) mocked southern racism, showing it ridiculous. MLK Jr., said, “he was one of our white brothers who have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it.” Golden noted that white Southerners didn’t mind standing with African Americans: “It is only when the Negro ‘sets’ that the fur begins to fly.” His satirical, ‘Vertical Negro Plan’ suggested schools could be integrated by providing stand-up desks. He was advisor to RFKennedy. Harry Golden of the Carolina Israelite, One of a Kind

Thanks for the interesting read that I've come to expect from you.

 

[donbosco]

Appreciate the comments. I’m very glad that some folks are reminded of the story of Harry Golden and that some were introduced to it here. Deddy would be happy.

 

[superrific]

All right, since y'all [MF] are doing it this way, I will say expressly what I had hoped would be implied.

What, exactly, do you think a "vertical negro" is? Perhaps if you already know the man's identity, you know. But otherwise, a "vertical negro" sounds like a black man hanging dead in a noose. I'm sure y'all have read or heard the type of language that the lynch mobs would use. "Vertical" would be a likely euphemism.

So here I am looking at the board, and a thread pops up with "Harry Golden And The Vertical Negro Plan." That sounds like a terror campaign involving public lynchings. And I don't think that image, of vertical negros, is something that our board should broadcast. So I kindly asked for a thread title change after realizing that wasn't what was discussed.

One would think that self-styled progressives would be care about the implications of their posts, and not do this MAGA "fuck your feelings" thing. But apparently not. So now live with the fact that you created a fucking thread that looks to all the world like a discussion of hanging black men dead from a tree. And I shouldn't have had to recount the gory details to get that done.

So GFY every single one of you geezers calling me out about this. [MOD EDIT for crossing line of civility]

 

[superrific]

I don't know of Harry Golden, but based on my knowledge of the OP and the general position of this board, I was intrigued to open the thread and read. While the title could be taken as racist, my knowledge of the board lead me to believe it wouldn't be.

Oh, odd. Obscure, inconsequential historical figure isn't well known to everyone? Just as I said.

The title is racist. It might not have been intended that way. But it's the most loathsome thread title I have seen in a long time. Doesn't matter, though, 'cause don bosco wants to share ancient stories from his childhood.

 

[superrific]

Speak for yourself.

Actually, don't. You talk too fucking much. Do you have to ruin every thread on this board? Isn't there an LSAT somewhere you could be taking?

Put me on ignore then, [MOD EDIT]

 

[superrific]

I regularly walk my dog past this historical marker. You might want to sit this one out, super.

What does that have to do with anything? Oh, there's one historical marker for a dude somewhere? Ever been to NYC? You can find markers like this all sorts of places. In Central Park, there's a whole monument to some guy named King Jagiello. Do you know who that is? Of course you don't. He's there because a Polish guy decided to make a statue of him for the World's Far. Was King Jagiello a good guy? I don't fucking know, because I don't know who he is, because I'M NOT POLISH. So sure there are probably markers all over the south for some minor local figures but that doesn't mean the person is well-known outside of your little coterie.