BLACK HISTORY MONTH

The journey of five weeks started on Sept. 24, 2024

Jarvis & Joe’s Black History USA Rail Tour — part 2

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Jarvis Harris and Joe Foss are telling local audiences about their five-week, 4,600-mile tour of Black historical sites across the United States last fall.  For additional insights into their journey and anti-racist work, please visit their website, AcceptingOthers.com.

We chose to fly directly from Seattle to Norfolk, Virginia, on Sept. 24, 2024, to conserve our Amtrak USA Rail Pass privileges, which allow for 10 stops in a 30-day period.

Jarvis’ friend, Johnny Kornegay, picked us up in Norfolk, and he and his wife Verna hosted us for a couple of days at their home in Yorktown.

Joe Foss, left, and Jarvis Harris made the Jamestown Settlement museum their first stop.
Joe Foss, left, and Jarvis Harris made the Jamestown Settlement museum their first stop.

Johnny took us to the Jamestown Settlement museum to see the first English settlement in North America, established in 1607, some 12 years before the first African slaves arrived in what would become the United States.

This museum gave us a real sense of life in this settlement through some of their outdoor interactive exhibits. We felt nostalgic standing where we knew that English settlers had arrived to hopefully establish a permanent presence in this new land.

Jarvis and Joe posed in front of Johnny Kornegay's house before driving three hours to the other Washington.
Jarvis and Joe posed in front of Johnny Kornegay's house before driving three hours to the other Washington.

Johnny and Verna were very gracious hosts, and they loaned us a car for our first driving leg, heading north to Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and Baltimore.

This helped save our Amtrak rail passes for our trip.  Since we planned to be traveling the whole month of October, we needed to use a different mode of travel for this first leg of our journey.

Jarvis’ friend Johnny Kornegay hosted Jarvis & Joe on the first days of their Black History USA Rail Tour.
Jarvis’ friend Johnny Kornegay hosted Jarvis & Joe on the first days of their Black History USA Rail Tour.

Driving to D.C. took about three hours and provided an excellent time for us to listen to Jarvis’ specially curated playlist, including Maze, Sam Cooke, Michael Jackson, Sly and the Family Stone, Marvin Gaye, and many more famous Black artists.

This drive time also was just enough to allow us to make our first lodging arrangements on the fly by using our phone to stay at a hotel just outside D.C., which made it more affordable yet accessible via Uber ride so we didn’t have to fight D.C. traffic and parking ourselves. 

Thus far in our journey, we have been very excited and thrilled.  Everyone we’ve encountered and talked to has also been interested and excited.  We’ve interacted with people at the sites along the way who have been encouraging and really supportive about what we are doing. 

It’s great to know what we are doing is something that inspires others as well. We hope you will follow along our journey over the next 18 days, as we share experiences from our Black History USA Rail Tour.

One more thought

Last fall, after we spent several sessions over a couple of months beginning to plan our rail tour, a friend asked if we had seen the Buffalo Soldiers Museum right in Tacoma. Since we had not visited there, we realized that we needed to add it to our list.

Visiting this museum was a great experience and added to our excitement about getting our journey started. Executive Director Jackie Jones showed us around her museum and we learned more about the Buffalo Soldiers and more in our brief trip there. This visit sparked our thinking to be flexible to incoming ideas along this journey being able to pivot and alter our plans to see different places.

Jarvis Harris, of Lacey, is a retired U.S. Army veteran and former Pierce County corrections officer who now dedicates his time to personal passions and volunteering. Born and raised in Philadelphia, he settled in Lacey during his Army service.

Joe Foss, of Tacoma, is a Navy veteran and retired business owner who has been actively engaged in projects addressing racism in America since 2012.

Comments

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  • Honestyandrealityguy

    Remember, originally there was no slavery. Instead, indentured servants: whites primarily from the Barbary Coast and blacks from Africa.

    Then a former black indentured servant, Anthony Johnson, became the first legal slave owner. One of his indentured servants wanted to work for another. Johnson went to court and the court ruled he owned that indentured servant. Hence, slavery began. Johnson began buying and selling slaves to his friends and family.

    The north only tolerated slavery for about 10 years.

    When a white Republican freed the slaves, thousands of black families owned slaves. The Native Indians owned tens of thousands of slaves. About 300,000 whites and 20,000 blacks from the north gave their lives to get rid of slavery. I wonder if there would have ever been slavery if not for that black man, first slave owner, Anthony Johnson?

    5 days ago Report this

  • Snevets

    Thank you for sharing. I look forward to hearing more of your trek.

    4 days ago Report this

  • WayTooOld

    Honestyandrealityguy - wonder no more. Slavery is mentioned in the Bible. It’s not an invention original to the United States, the Dutch, or Mr. Johnson. It became an industry in this country. So, credit where due. Someone long before us invented it, and we ‘merely’ took it farther than any other civilization past or present. Heritage.

    3 days ago Report this

  • Njoy2be

    Honestyandrealityguy

    Africans were kidnapped from their country against their will. They were not given the option of coming to the US. And the US had no sincere interest in freeing them. They treated them less than humans... because that's the way they felt about these people. Blacks were NOT going to Africa to do this. Now I understand that there may have been some Blacks that gained a little prosperity and did have slaves, but to say Blacks started it, is absolutely ridiculous and false!!

    2 days ago Report this