While reporting today's story about the Sequoia Valley Farm Trails Map, I saw something at Bravo Farms that I didn't expect.
Instead of blueberries on a conveyor belt or cheese curing on shelves, here was a tall bookcase filled with objects that were reproductions of the Jim Crow era: figurines of black children carrying large watermelon slices, a sign with a mammy asking "We wants today?" above a list of foods, and others.A nearby bin had an advertisement for the Coon Chicken Inn, a chain of restaurants from the 1920s to 1950s. Its logo was a caricature of a black man with exaggerated facial features.I was taken aback by the abundance of images that unmistakably referred to racist stereotypes. If there were only a few figurines, it wouldn't have been striking. But folks could see this bookcase from across the room.I asked Lois Phelps, a black woman visiting Bravo Farms, what she thought."I think that's a little unbelievable," Phelps said. "I thought this was the [new] millennium."Halim Azar, the proprietor of the gift shop, says he initially was hesitant to sell these items. But black collectors told him they appreciated the selection. Eighty-five percent of his customers who buy these collectibles are black, mostly in their 50s and 60s."I just did it because people asked me," he says.In the 10 years he has been carrying the figurines, Azar says he has received only a couple of complaints. He also says he's not trying to make a racist statement. "That's not who I am or what I am."Among African-Americans, there is lively debate about this type of black memorabilia. Filmmaker Muriel Jackson captured some of the tension in her 1996 documentary, "Objects of Hate, Objects of Desire.""There are African-Americans who are terribly offended," says Jackson, a former assistant professor at California State University, Fresno. "Then there are other black collectors who would argue endlessly about the historical value of these things."As we move further away from the Jim Crow era, Jackson says, younger vendors of these collectibles may not feel the same cultural significance that older sellers did. For some, these items simply are merchandise."Their motivation is to make money," Jackson says. "They're not trying to promote a racist point of view."During their heyday, some of these images were advertisements. Aunt Jemima is an example of the mammy stereotype of the loyal house servant. And the caricature from the Coon Chicken Inn branded various items."There was an abundance of those kinds of materials that were food-related," Jackson says. "They were created to sell products."There's another reason why some Jim Crow stereotypes are tied to food. As field hands and house servants, blacks helped grow food and cook it.Watermelon, for example, is an African crop that spread to America. But history has given it an alternate meaning."Watermelon is associated with slave food," says Malik Simba, a Fresno State history professor. There's "the stereotype that if you eat watermelon, you're still a slave."Given our point in history, these conversations were interesting. There's a huge gulf between Jim Crow stereotypes and Barack Obama, the first black presidential candidate to win a major party's nomination.For his part, Azar has decided to stop selling the items. "I don't want people to get the wrong impression," he says. "I don't want the focus of Bravo Farms to be on that."