Old West Racial Tension

From Writers Talk
Published with permission from the author, who holds all rights.

THE ROAD TO A HANGING
by Mike Kearby

I grew up in a small West Texas town during the 1960s. This interesting and educational period presented my generation with a real-time view of war, political assassinations, and racial division. One of the early events that shaped my thinking and writing occurred in 1968. At age seventeen, I worked after school at ABC Furniture Company, delivering furniture each afternoon and on Saturdays. Most of our deliveries were to the ever-growing helicopter base located within the town's city limits. I worked with an African American gentleman, sixty-five year old Hilliard Smith. Even though Mr. Smith had worked for the company for many years, we both made the same minimum wage salary. After delivering a set of beds to an officer's house at the military base, we were each presented with a tip of one dollar, a huge sum in those days. I suggested we splurge and eat lunch at a local cafe. Hilliard told me he could not eat in the cafe. I assured him, it would be OK, as he would be with me. He looked at me as if I was very naive and said, "It's not what happens now, it's what happens later that keeps me from going inside." In that moment, I had an understanding of race and racial divisions within my community. I began to understand the problems associated with living two lives, your regular life and the life you carried on just so you could "get along" and survive in a white dominated world.

Later, I combined my love of the Western genre and writing with the historic contributions of African Americans in the West, culminating with, The Road to a Hanging. I had grown up reading Louis L'Amour, Elmer Kelton and Clair Huffaker. Each was a true craftsman who painted images with words and made the West and Western characters come to life in the reader's mind.

Remembering the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and 70s, I realized that very few of the books I read growing up had African American characters in the story line. Nor could I remember seeing African Americans in the films except for the rare subservient character. As I researched African American contributions to the settlement of the West, I began to see a different picture emerge than the one presented by Hollywood or publishers. Ex-Slaves, called "freedmen", were instrumental in the settling of the frontier. They held jobs as soldiers, worked on trail drives, enforced the law, farmed, and owned stores. By some accounts, the late 1800s had as many as 25,000 to 30,000 cowboys working on trail drives or on ranches. Of this number, as many as 9,000 were African Americans.

Armed with a new sense of history, I plotted a story to show the accomplishments of African Americans in the West. I began my story at the last battle of the Civil War. The battle occurred in my home state of Texas and the majority of troops on the Union side were made up of the 62nd United States Colored Infantry. With this historical truth, I began to plot a what-if scenario that was likely played out many times during the period. The plot shows the difficulty of a freedman's life if he decided to challenge a white officer during the historically accurate Union retreat at this last battle. With the conflict established, I needed to provide my hero with a character flaw. What could be the worst flaw for a protagonist during reconstruction? I wondered. My main character, Free Anderson, received the character flaw of naiveté. He truly believed that President Lincoln's proclamation guaranteed he could live with the same rights and freedoms enjoyed by all other men. Free's belief that emancipation granted him the same rights as whites was lethal in his time. This belief could cost him jail time at the very least and a hanging in many cases.

The Road to a Hanging is a "Gump-like" tale in which a few fictional characters are added to historical moments. The book has received high marks by readers, educators and writers. I am very happy with the end product and I think you will be also.

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Mike Kearby lives and works in Caddo, Texas.
Visit his web site and buy an autographed copy of the book at Writers West