Ira Smith Sr. is a name that probably means nothing to you. Yet, it means everything to me. You see, he was my maternal grandfather and the glue that held our family together until his transition in 1992.
He was born on August 2, 1913, in Columbus, Mississippi into a family of sharecroppers and received only a third-grade education. In those days, the racists of Mississippi placed a higher priority on “nigras” working in the field than providing them with an education.
My grandfather, “Granny” as we referred to him, detested the glorified slavery of the cotton fields and was determined that he’d find a way out of those hot Mississippi fields.
A few years before marrying my grandmother, Pearl Lewis, he put down his cotton sack and became the chauffeur and valet for a wealthy Mississippi cotton broker by the name of Gaston Therrell.
Therrell’s son, Gaston II hated my grandfather and promptly told him that he’d soon be returning to the cotton field.
Therrell appreciated my grandfather’s easy-going personality, excellent driving skills, and dapper appearance. He hired him to drive his 1930 Cadillac V16 Fleetwood Roadster throughout the South as he conducted business in the lucrative cotton industry.
Their travels took them to New Orleans, throughout Kentucky, Arkansas, Alabama, and Tennessee as his boss entertained governors, mayors, and other dignitaries.
Many of those people would ride with Therrell while liberally referring to Black people as “niggers,” as if my grandfather were invisible.
I got a steady dose of these vignettes from my grandfather during my weekly Sunday dinners with he and my grandmother. Thankfully, I began to record our discussions, not thinking that I’d ever find them useful for anything other than reminiscing with family.
Granny would recall how Therrell would ask his racist business acquaintances not to refer to his chauffeur as a “nigger” but, rather, as “colored,” “darkie” or simply “Smith.”
Considering that in 1930’s Mississippi many Black men were lynched, that was a sign of relative respect.
On another occasion at the segregated Peabody Hotel in Memphis, my grandfather was told that he’d have to sleep in the basement with the domestics. Therrell, overhearing this, demanded to speak with the manager of the hotel and, after threatening to never conduct business with them again, a rollaway bed was taken to Therrell’s suite for my grandfather.
That was the South of the 1930’s. Yet, my grandfather was blessed to travel, albeit as a servant, in a luxury auto. He wore freshly pressed suits and shirts, spit-polished shoes and ate well. But he never forgot that he was only one step removed from being a slave.
That reality set in quickly after Therrell died. Therrell’s son, Gaston II hated my grandfather and promptly told him that he’d soon be returning to the cotton field.
But that wasn’t punishment enough. After sending my grandfather on a delivery run to a female dorm at a Mississippi college, Gaston II, conspired with Columbus, Mississippi police. My grandfather was arrested for reckless eyeballing of white females. He was promptly convicted and sent to a Mississippi work camp where his driving skills were utilized hauling rocks.
An empathetic work camp inmate who observed my grandfather’s work ethic suggested on more than one occasion that he should leave the camp. My grandfather planned his escape and hauled a load of rock outside of the work camp gates, swam across the Tombigbee River, went home, hastily packed some belongings and, with the help of family, came to East St. Louis. He later sent for his family.
Sadly, there were many Black men who were railroaded by racists or otherwise, unceremoniously forced to leave their Southern homes.
The alternative was, invariably, lynching or incarceration at the hands of racists who wanted nothing more than to see them remain glorified slaves.
Ira Smith, Sr. was an unfortunate victim of that history and I’m proud to say that my tenacity and resilience is the legacy that he gave to me.
Email: jtingram_1960@yahoo.com Twitter@JamesTIngram
