EPISODE 4

JBMV Discussion w/ Randy F. Weinstein, founder of the W.E.B. Du Bois Center at Great Barrington, Massachusetts.

Episode Transcript

(00:10):
Welcome to the Just Buy My Vote podcast.
I am Joseph Simmons,
the host and also author of the new book Just Buy My Vote,
African American Voting Rights and the Chicago Condition.
I am truly honored to have the opportunity to speak with my guest today,
William Edward Burkhart.
Du Bois,
better known as W.E.B.

(00:32):
Du Bois is described as an author,
American sociologist,
historian,
civil rights activist,
and outspoken public intellectual and even at an early age was an advocate of voting,
well known as one of the foremost black intellectuals of his era.

(00:52):
I reference a lecture by a Professor of Sociology at Northwestern University named Aldon Morris.
He makes the case that the work Du Bois made to modernize the field of sociology has never been properly acknowledged,
pointing out that Du Bois pioneered urban sociology in the 19 twenties becoming the and I'm quoting first American sociologist to develop structural analysis of social inequality. Relevant to these times.

(01:25):
Du Bois work established truth as a standard.
According to Professor Morris,
Du Bois had a clear mission to interject science into sociology.
And thus in Du Bois hands,
sociology became and I'm quoting a masterful science capable of generating social change,

(01:48):
unquote.
Speaking with me today from the W.E.B. Du Bois native town of Great Barrington,
Massachusetts.
I have the distinct privilege to be joined by Mr. Randy F Weinstein.
Mr. Weinstein is the founder of the Du Bois Center at Great Barrington.
He has published works on Franklin D Roosevelt and Black History,

(02:11):
including his book Against The Tide.
Commentaries on a collection of African Americana 1717 to 1987 with a forward by Henry Louis Gates Jr.
In 1997 Randy founded North Star Rare Books and the Museum of Civil Rights Pioneers,

(02:34):
which was designated the W.E.B. Du Bois Center in 2006,
Randy Weinstein.
Welcome to the Just Buy My Vote podcast.
Thank you for the nice introduction.
I appreciate it.
Absolutely.
I must say while I am familiar with Du Bois work and contribution to American history,
I never took notice that Great Barrington was his place of birth and he is given tribute there.

(03:00):
Well,
sir,
please tell us about the Du Bois Center.
Great Barrington,
for sure.
I I think I'll start off by what you had mentioned uh talking about Du Bois just for a second as a sociologist and how that translates into to an object I have in front of me,
a copy of Du Bois Great uh work uh uh Philadelphia Negro.

(03:22):
This particular copy is inscribed to the Great Barrington Public Library where he was where he studied pretty remarkable artifact.
Absolutely tell us more about that.
For sure.
Ever since I was born,
I was addicted to books.
Um,
I can't remember a time growing up that I didn't have one in my hand.
And it became important to me because eventually I became a collector of books and understood the value of books.

(03:48):
And so that when I became a special ed teacher and ran a residential treatment center,
it's very hard to reach kids.
And I found that objects were a good way into their hearts.
And what I mean by that,
if you hand them a first edition of Frederick Douglas' autobiography,
it's not gonna excite a kid.
But if you say to him,

(04:08):
you know,
something,
this is worth $5000 it captures their attention.
What could be worth $5000 you know,
and there's an entries entrance way into uh into Fred Francis Frederick Douglas anyway,
while working with these kids.
And I lived in Great Barrington.
I always felt as though Du Bois was misunderstood and bullied by the town.

(04:30):
They shunned him,
they uh disrespected him and they lumped his whole life some into being a dirty communist.
And so at some point,
I felt that I wanted to push back.
But me as a person,
oh,
me as a person that wasn't the point of anything was to try to look at this community and see where it went wrong and how I could help them,

(04:56):
try to correct that and I felt the first thing to do is to provide them with viable information.
And I felt a good way to do that was to be the spotlight on Du Bois.
What better way than to have a center dedicated to him.
That's the first of its kind in Western Mass or anywhere else.
And so anyway,
I,
I open in 197 I opened up a museum of civil rights pioneers.

(05:17):
And before opening it up,
I went to,
uh,
to the local VFW and VFW proponents were uh very much against Du Bois.
At that point in time.
We're talking,
you know,
that's almost 30 years ago.
And I said to the,
and I said to them,
I don't want to open up anything unless I've got your support.

(05:37):
I would like five minutes of your time.
And I spoke to a group of veterans.
And what I talked to them about was I went to a primary document which was Du Bois application for the American Communist Party in 1961.
And I said,
I want to talk to you about Du Bois and his communism.
And I quoted a portion of the letter,

(05:59):
but the thing that I felt was really important and I asked them to listen carefully and I repeated it twice.
I said,
and this is Du Bois,
in Du Bois words,
the path of the American Communist Party is clear.
They'll provide the United States with a real third party and thus restore democracy to this land.
He's not talking about running off to,

(06:19):
to China or to Russia.
He's talking about a homegrown party and this is what he believed this party would do.
It might,
it would,
it would be behind social medicine with hospitalization and care for the old free education,
for all jobs and training jobs for all discipline,

(06:39):
for growth and reform,
no dogmatic religion.
And so I said to the group,
after my five minutes was up,
what do you think about those things that he said?
He says,
and they said,
uh he's OK,
that's fine.
And I never ever had an issue with the VFW after that.
And I realized they had no idea anything about him and what he stood for.

(07:01):
And that seemed to be the key to the heart of the community.
And so I was waiting for an ideal time to open up the center and that came when I discovered right next to the Mahaiwe cemetery.
And that to me is sacred ground.
That's where the Du Bois family is buried.
There was a building that was just being put up and I went to the landlord and I said,

(07:21):
I would like to rent a section of this and he said,
sure thing.
And I was able to actually design how I wanted it.
And,
you know,
with within six months or so I had this magnificent center that I was renting that abutted the Mahaiwe cemetery where the Du Bois family was buried.
And I started the Museum of civil rights pioneers.
And that just really and truly,

(07:43):
it was just a collection of artifacts that I gathered over the years I put them on display under glass,
the originals and not facsimile.
And I invited the public,
I,
you know,
and um I started to do programs and I decided that for every program I did,
I wanted to co-host it with an administrator from the town.

(08:05):
OK.
Which sounds pretty strange perhaps.
But there were five select board members and I sat down with each of them individually and tried to talk to them a little bit about um what was Du Bois experience like in Great Barrington?
Why is it that at the end of his life?
He returned to Great Barrington and let me just back up by saying to you that I read you this letter that Du Bois wrote to the American Communist Party in 1961.

(08:33):
He was three months before he wrote that letter.
OK.
He had visited Great Barrington to uh bury his daughter Yolande.
He could have buried his daughter anywhere on this planet he chose at the age of 93 to come back to his hometown.
Great Barrington.
And that just really has always struck me.
He's not a guy that bailed out in his town.
He's not a guy that,

(08:54):
that left and went to Ghana uh and just threw his hands up in,
in America at all.
You know,
he had two passports and he had,
he had um,
well,
anyway,
that gets,
I don't want to get,
yeah,
Because in 1961 he was uh two years before he actually passed in Ghana.
That correct.
That is correct.
So,
I mean,
so,
so,
so basically he comes up here buries his daughter.

(09:16):
He,
he joins the American Communist Party and three months later,
he heads off to Ghana,
try to figure that out.
Now,
my understanding,
you can straighten this out.
My understanding was that application was in some response to the lack of progress that uh that African Americans were getting in the United States.

(09:37):
Absolutely.
Du Bois was frustrated as he's never been before in his life.
But he's dealt with,
he dealt with frustration all of his life and he overcame frustration by a plan and I thought that his next plan was to uh to go to Ghana to Accra.
And uh he was offered a full time job there writing an encyclopedia of,

(09:57):
you know,
a black history and culture.
And he accepted that and he had a group of graduate students to work with him.
Interesting.
OK,
what happened to that work?
It ended up being farmed out by a number of people and I think it came out in separate publications.
I am not quite sure whether Du Bois vision is the thing that drove it though.

(10:17):
Got you.
OK.
Interesting what else do you have there at the center that you can tell us?
Uh We don't know for sure.
I've got a copy,
the dedication copy of Black Reconstruction.
He had dedicated it to John Hope from Atlanta University and my copy is inscribed to John Hope the first copy of the press.
Wow!

(10:38):
Ok.
I've got a number of books that he wrote,
especially when he was,
when he was arrested in the early fifties.
He had started the peace movement in the country and they referred,
and they thought of him as an alien or as a uh as a Russian,
you know,
uh sort of um a spy almost.
And they had him arrested at the age of 83.
And uh I've got the story of his life that is inscribed by him to Paul Robeson.

(11:04):
Interesting.
That's interesting as a Robeson is another one that uh left the United States.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
And so in this museum of civil rights pioneers,
I mean,
some of the kinds of things that were featured,
I decided to include Du Bois and his circle.
So I have,
and I still have um the original uh uh contract that uh Robeson had to play Othello on Broadway in 1943 with all of his hand annotations.

(11:32):
And it's fascinating to note at the time he was offered X amount of money,
I don't recall now was more than the president United States was making.
And how quickly someone so popular can all of a sudden disappear from the history books?
It's absolutely,
yes,
absolutely.
You know,
it's interesting,
the,
A number of African Americans or really the story of African Americans in the New England area.

(11:57):
I mean,
typically when we look at or when we think about history,
we think about,
you know,
black folks coming from the south and slavery and all of that.
But the New England area is interesting to me in terms of uh African American history.
OK.
I'll tell you one thing that is,
that's very striking.
And if you haven't heard about it,
you'll just stop for a second in 17 81 on the steps of Great Barrington Town Hall,

(12:21):
which is right next to the library where good boy studied in 17 81 a slave woman by the name of Mumbet with her lawyer came up and wanted to be freed and sued her master from nearby Sheffield and she won the case the first time in American history on the steps of Great Barrington.
And she changed her name at that point to Elizabeth Freeman.

(12:44):
Interesting.
Very good.
And if,
if you were to read Du Bois autobiography or autobiographies,
you'll see that he,
he touches upon Mumbet as somehow being related to him,
you know,
his family way back.
I'm not quite sure if that's accurate,
but the thing is Du Bois thought very highly of him to her too.

(13:05):
Sure.
Sure.
That's interesting.
What else can you tell us about Du Bois?
Ok.
Well,
I think,
you know,
in terms of mobilizing the town to be behind Du Bois,
I went to department heads and I like,
for instance,
the folks that dealt with,
uh,
highway patrol and,

(13:25):
um,
you know,
with climate and,
you know,
uh,
green energy.
I spoke to that actually to the committee there and,
and said to them,
did you know that Du Bois was one of the earliest environmentalists we had.
Do you know that the river that goes through Great Barton,
the Huston river,
which Du Bois talks about an awful lot in his,
his,
his writings,
OK.

(13:45):
He advocated for 50 years not to pollute it.
And the town got very interested in that.
And so I said to them,
how about if I take his essay on the Huston River and that's what it's called?
And I blow it up and we hang it up in Town Hall.
They all love the idea and I worked with the University of Mass out of Amherst.
They've got the Du Bois collection papers and they blew me up four by six of five pages of his essay.

(14:10):
And when you go into the town hall,
now,
that's what you see.
No,
no pushback at all.
OK.
The next thing was approaching the select board,
talking to each one individually.
What have you heard about Du Bois?
OK.
And just very,
very quietly sort of correcting the record always talking about Du Bois and his family.

(14:32):
And at some point,
I got permission to,
to have a large picture of Du Bois and his family take for the uh 18 98 or so with his wife,
daughter.
And at that point,
son Burkhart,
a large photograph blown up that hangs right above where the select board meets once a month.
Wow,
very nice.

(14:52):
So would you say that Great Barrington has fully embraced your vision?
Well,
here is the thing and to answer your question,
it has.
And I think the culmination of my,
my years doing this.
Ok.
And other people as well.
I don't mean to,
to,
to grandstand here was to convince the town,
it didn't take much convincing to have a town,

(15:15):
a pointed Du Bois Legacy committee.
And so let me read to you what the town charges the committee which I chair.
Ok.
But this is the town speaking now it's etched into their bylaws.
OK.
The mission of the town is to preserve and promote great Barrington native W.E.B. Du Bois legacy as a scholar and activist for freedom,

(15:38):
civil rights,
progressive education,
economic justice,
and racial equality.Excellent
So those are really,
as you say,
those are excellent words.
But how do you transcribe that into action?
Ok.
So I spoke to the select board and I said,
we've got a wonderful main street here.

(16:00):
How about if we had banners up and down main street talking about the pillars.
Uh you know,
the uh the progressive education,
economic,
just uh justice and the other three or four things,
why don't we put them on banners?
So the people driving through our town,
understand that along the way,
we,
why don't we announce that Du Bois was alive at one point and prospered in this town.

(16:25):
How about signs to the five entrances to our town saying birthplace of W.E.B. Du Bois.
And after that took some some push and shove.
But eventually,
if you were to come to Great Barrington,
now you'd be welcomed by one of those five signs depending on which entrance you came in.
I love it.
I love it.
I love it.
I love it.
I love it.

(16:45):
So that's taking words and translating words into some kind of visible,
not necessarily action but putting your heart,
you know,
you know,
out in the open,
you know,
we stand for the voice in this community.
OK?
That sounds great.
Listen,
Mr. Weinstein,
before I let you go,

(17:05):
I mean,
you're a huge source for me.
Uh And you also have a couple of favorite sources to share with the JBMV Avatar.
I do,
I do.
I think that all roads lead to Frederick Douglas,
in my opinion,
to his three autobiographies and to his collected writings.

(17:26):
And I think it's in five volumes.
I have found no one more candid in American history than Frederick Douglas.
He spoke with that what was on his mind.
And um I use him often as a frame of reference,
especially when I study Reconstruction because he called things the way they were.
I also am enamored by University of Massachusetts,

(17:50):
uh Du Bois papers and have spent a great deal of time there.
Anything and everything you ever want to know about Du Bois,
you can access digitally at the UMass website.
No pro no charge at all.
Interesting.
Ok.
Well,
I appreciate that for sure.
You know,
and I guess the third one to me would be the papers of Ulysses S Grant and especially during Reconstruction,

(18:17):
you see him struggle,
you see how he maneuvers and tries to get Congress to endorse the 15th amendment,
how he establishes the Department of Justice,
how he came up with enforcements acts including the KKK uh act which,
uh,
you know,
was recently,
uh,
the news has been all over the place on it because Jack,

(18:39):
uh Smith,
uh,
the,
the fourth,
uh,
you know,
indictment is based upon Grant's,
uh 1871 KKK Act conspiring as a group.
Isn't that fascinating?
It is.
It is,
I'm not sure that it has been used since then almost,
right.
Um You know,
something,
there was a Eric Swalwell,
is that his name?

(18:59):
A,
uh,
a congressman from California?
He had a lawsuit a couple of years ago against Trump and I think he used that as well,
but I'm not quite sure where that went or anything else?
Got you got you.
Yeah,
they,
they thought that it was unique that Jack Smith was using that,
but it was perfectly in,
in terms of on target.
But we'll see.

(19:21):
Absolutely.
Well,
this has been a real pleasure for me,
Randy Weinstein.
Thank you so much and thank you for sharing with our listeners today.
Absolutely.
I thoroughly enjoyed myself.
Well,
well,
we hope you enjoyed that episode of the Just Buy My Vote podcast.

(19:41):
We're looking forward to the next episodes.
You can find the book at Just Buy My Vote dot com and feel free to follow us at Just Buy My Vote podcast dot com for notification on upcoming podcasts and events.
We thank you for the privilege of your time and until next time Just Buy My Vote.