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During a recent "vacation" I took to reading old issues of Ebony Magazine. I have a collection of about 30 issues from the 50's and 60's. The images below are from the September 1963 issue. I found the magazine simply fascinating. It can be purchased on Amazon (not for sale by me) and Google has made this issue available online, Interestingly, I see no indication that Ebony has provided an online archive on their website. I still find it amazing, annoying even, that Google profits from Ebony's content while Ebony loses out on traffic and associated revenue. Of course, I've been critical of Ebony's online presence in the past, but it still irks me when they blow opportunities by failing to take advantage of their wealth of information. Run a Google search on Ebony Magazine September 1963, as see how many pages deep you have to go before you even see a link to Ebony Magazine's website. The quality of writing was superb for a magazine marketed to a Black mass audience. The whole idea that these types of articles (long form, written above a 8th grade reading level, not celebrity or scandal driven) don't appeal to Black readers in 2014 does not hold water--particularly with so many more Black people holding college degrees in 2014 compared to 1963. The article depicted below, "Negro in Literature Today" was written by John A. Williams. Williams offered a terrific, now historical, snapshot about the best Black writers in 1963. Most of the authors cited are profiled here on AALBC.com, but there were a couple of writers I was unfamiliar with, but rest assure I will profile them here on AALBC.com shortly. I can't image Ebony or any mainstream magazine publishing a piece like this today. While the contest was the advertised products often left a lot to be desired. Advertisements for cigarettes and hard liquor dominated. I was also surprised to see ad for skin lightening creams. The dichotomy between the advertisements and the content was much more stark back then. Cynique in some ways I envy your generation. Don't get me wrong you can keep the overt racism and segregation you had to deal with, but I think the Black community was better served by their institutions (publications, churches, civil right organizations, HBCU's, etc). What do you think?

The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America by Carol Anderson From the seventeenth century, when it was encoded into law that the enslaved could not own, carry, or use a firearm whatsoever, until today, with measures to expand and curtail gun ownership aimed disproportionately at the African American population, the right to bear arms has been consistently used as a weapon to keep African Americans powerless—revealing that armed or unarmed, Blackness, it would seem, is the threat that must be neutralized and punished.

The same thing that has happened to all the rest of our publications... I know... Imagine we have an entire generation of adults who never new anything different. Thank you so much for expressing the positive sentiments. @Mzuri you and other like you are the only reason AALBC can exist.

*************************************************************************** That's never going to happen, especially not when their website features characters such as Megan Thee Stallion and negroes with their pants hanging down (how long can this disgusting trend last, it's been forty years now). It's like finding buried treasure if you come upon an old copy of Ebony or Jet magazine. Even Essence was great back in the day. Whatever happened to Black Enterprise? That was a must read for anyone aspiring to get into business, wasn't it? Thanks for those links, I'm going to search for that article later today. And thank God for you Troy. What you have done for Black literature, Black books, and Black people is historical and priceless. And I love you for it. ***************************************************************************

Ebony has really not gone anywhere not gone anywhere. They are currently #19 on my list of the top Black owned websites: https://aalbc.com/top_black_websites/#Ebony The real question, to me, is will they ever publish a print version of the quality shown 50 years ago? I did skim the Carmelo Anthony articles and asked them to to send readers to a Black-owned bookstore like AALBC rather than Amazon: Hi Ebony Magazine, this is Troy Johnson, a long time Ebony supporter, and founder of the 24 year old website, dedicated to Black books, AALBC.com. I read your interview with Carmelo Anthony and could not help but notice Ebony is sending their readers to Amazon to buy his book. May I suggest that you consider sending readers to Black-owned bookstores like AALBC.com. Amazon has done a great deal to harm Black-owned bookstores, why not show solidarity with us by directing your readers to a Black-owned store t buy the book? Here is an AALBC link: https://aalbc.com/books/bookinfo.php?isbn13=9781982160593 (where we link to Ebony's Interview with Anthony) You can really spread the love by choosing a different store each time. We can provide a list if you like. Thanks for considering my request. @Mzuri it is sad. it is really a reflection of our culture's collective drive to appeal to are most base desires -- rather then elevating us; like giving us fast food rather than a healthy meal. Did you ever see my article in reaction to an Ebony article about Black Literature written by none other than John A. Williams? The article was published almost 60 years ago and I can not recall anything like it in a publication, that catered to a general audience. Can you image something like this in print today, or even online (save AALBC and less than a handful of other websites)?

Guest anonymous first thanks for posting! You sound relatively young I'd guess late 20s early 30s. The reason I say this is based on comments like this one: I can understand why you might say this given the number of high profile Black men who marry "light skinned/mixed women," but to assume all men desire this based upon that is flawed. I suspect more Black men marry women because of a variety of other characteristics like compatibility. My main reason for saying this your opening statement about Black people "holding on" to the one-drop rule. We don't hold on to anything we do not define this rule. It was a rule white people created and imposed upon the rest of us to ensure white "racial" purity and to keep all Black people down -- no matter what they looked like. I suspect most people, whose ancestors have been in this country for more than a couple hundred years, have some Black ancestry. We know most the the so called Black people who have been here that long have some white (European ancestry), which would make most us "mixed race." @Pioneer1 this is yet another reason we need to dispense with the artificial construct of "race." The ideas of a "mixed race" category and the "one-drop" rule are simply dumb at best and malicious at worse. Nothing about the European's creation of racial hierarchies based upon phenotypical characteristics, and America ingraining it into our culture, has ever benefited anyone -- other than white people -- and only a minority of them benefit.

Mzuri Greg Kelly on NewsMax features a Black person, usually a child, that was killed by gun violence on every one of his shows. I haven't seen it but if racist Greg Kelly is reporting on it, it CAN'T be any good for us no matter how pretty he's wrapping it up as. He's probably doing it as a "sneak diss" to really make Black people look like violent thugs who kill innocent children. Kind of like how they talk about Chicago. They'll do a story about how the "poor residents" of Chicago have to constantly put up with out of control violence. Which is true. But they don't do the story because they feel sorry for the Black residents, but as negative propaganda to portray Black people as violent criminals. I forgot, is she the one that's your tootsie roll? Well....she's ONE of them, lol.

************************************************************************************ @Pioneer1 Greg Kelly on NewsMax features a Black person, usually a child, that was killed by gun violence on every one of his shows. Joy Reid has a huge platform but all she does is sit up there and bash the deplorables instead of providing useful information or doing something constructive. If she cares so much about missing Black women, she should feature them and shut her yap. I forgot, is she the one that's your tootsie roll? ************************************************************************************

tipsyturv Yeah...lol....I remember WELL