tctpod-season1-05: Before I was an African-American artist
In this podcast episode, I talk to Harold Johnson – poet, novelist, musician, artist, teacher, editor, and more. Harold is an African-American man who was born in 1930s Yakima, Washington and I really wanted to listen to him talk about growing up in this time and place. It is only one piece to the story of who he is, but a piece I definitely wanted to hear. So I hope you’ll join me on this journey into 1930s & 1940s rural Washington.
Links:
Harold’s poetry appears in Beyond the Frontier: African American Poetry for the 21st Century
…and in How to be This Man: The Walter Pavlich Memorial Poetry Anthology
Show outline:
00m:00s - Introduction
02m:59s - The first thing I remember
06m:09s - Falling in love with the trumpet
09m:42s - On being an athlete
15m:15s - It was a big trip
16m:26s - Johnson's got good form
17m:52s - We have some new children and they're Negroes
21m:59s - My first sports heroes were white
24m:19s - The war
26m:05s - Identified as an artist (mentors 1)
32m:15s - Girls
35m:36s - Buddies
39m:14s - Jews from Brooklyn (mentors 2)
44m:53s - A flair for writing
47m:04s - College
50m:27s - Growing up in the Pacific Northwest
56m:48s - Harold as a poet
1h:04m:19s - You look good! You look good!
Meta links:
Download the show directly (NO LONGER AVAILABLE)