Black History Month: Assaults on Black intelligence--Part I

Get the Point!

What I am about to share is a nightmare that many Blacks my age experienced during the first decade after Jim Crow segregation formally ended but now, in the social media era, are being routinely chronicled in the public square.

The year was 1979, and I was finishing first grade at Apple Grove Elementary School in Oxon Hill, Maryland. As I joked on my Facebook page last week, there was a time that year when my teacher, Mrs. Hasenclever, had a conference with my mother about my behavior that was surely a harbinger of things to come during my academic journey. 

Fortunately, "getting that lesson," as the Black elders used to say, was never a problem for me, but I was born talker, and talk I did—all day every day—to my classmates, other schoolmates, and even the faculty and staff! Which is why the very first "big" word that I learned was "incessantly," as in "talks incessantly," the comment that was left on my report card after each marking period that year.

Now, the first time that I saw it was after the first nine weeks, and as I proudly showed my folks my report card and they observed "talks incessantly" in muffled tones, I innocently asked "what does incessantly mean," to which my Dad curtly replied, "it means you're talking too damn much at that schoolhouse."

Duly noted, Sir! But I didn't stop talking...

Young Hobbs, incessant talker, circa ‘79

So when the conference was held later that Fall, I remember being rather surprised when I walked into the office and there sat my mother, looking rather perturbed, in part, because she had to leave her own job teaching English over in Calvert County, Maryland because once again, I was in trouble for, well, talking incessantly. 

In fact, that year, I often found my name written on Mrs. Hasenclever's board, a designation that meant that I would have to stay after school for detention, a routine that included cleaning up the classroom and the chalkboard. My sister that's closest in age, Traci, was in sixth grade and was one of the School Safety Patrols (licensed snitches 😂), but she was also Hella cool because she could have told on me to our parents every time I had detention—or, when she came down the hallway with her friends to see me working at a desk that had been put completely out of the class—but she never did! Which is why Mom was surprised that day when my teacher pulled out a stack of referrals that included all of the in-school disciplinary measures she had been taking because I wouldn't hush my mouth. 

Years after keeping my elementary school secrets, my sister Traci flanked me with my God Brother Michael Bouldin during high school graduation ceremonies…

Now, the entire time the adults were talking during the conference I was rather nervous because to be perfectly honest, I thought that I was gonna get a whoopin' when I got home. But Mom was extremely calm throughout the process, perhaps because as an educator, she understood the deal (even when I didn't get "it"). In fact, one exchange between those two veteran educators, both of whom had begun their careers on the opposite ends of Jim Crow, went something like this:

Teacher: "Mrs. Hobbs, Chuck is really smart, but he talks incessantly and no matter what I do, he finds a way to talk or act up all of the time."

Mom: "I understand, and do know, Mrs. Hasenclever, that his father and I do NOT condone such poor behavior (looking at me), do we Chuckie?"

Me: (Nervously) "No ma'am..."

Mom: "But ma’am, when I see these high grades that Chuckie is making, as a talented and gifted teacher at my own school, I have to ask whether my son is being challenged with the type of work that will keep him busy?"

Teacher: (Looking at the Guidance Counselor and back at mom) "Well, he hasn't been tested for gifted, I don't believe..."

Guidance Counselor: "No, he has not..."

Mom: "Ok. So, I must respectfully ask why not? Well, actually, what's past is past, so my question now is what’s the plan moving forward to make sure that my son isn't sitting here bored all day and as a result, 'talking incessantly’?"

Mom and me during a break in my studies at the University of Florida Levin College of Law circa ‘96

Now, there was far more said during that meeting, and as my Mom and I have discussed it many, many times through the years, the end result was that about a week later, just when my classmates and I were talking trash as we headed out to recess one afternoon, I was rerouted right back to the front office, where I was given a series of tests in an adjacent room. (Be sure to check out Part II of this blog for more commentary about the racist roots of "intelligence" testing in Europe and the United States). 

Not long after the solo test day in the office, I was called to yet another meeting, this time with BOTH of my parents sitting there waiting for me along with the school principal, a large Black man with a booming voice named Mr. Clements. Now, I was really nervous because while both of my parents swung a mean belt, Dad had his military uniform on that day and a stoic mug that had me thinking that he, too, had seen all of those referrals and detention slips and was about to show his disapproval with a military issue belt in front of all of the staff or, God forbid, my classmates 😲.

Dad, circa ‘80, and his typical expression when he had enough of the BS…

But I wasn't in trouble...

At this meeting, the results of my testing were discussed with my parents and at that time, Mr. Clements said that after speaking with my teacher and the counselor, that it was their recommendation that I move from 1st grade to 3rd grade immediately. 

Yay! Or so I thought in the first instant…

But when I quickly thought through Mr. Clements’ comments, while I was a tad bit saddened to have to leave my boys James, Derek, and Stephen, and I would no longer get to sit next to Gaylen and gaze at her two perfectly plaited pony tails that smelled like fresh TCB hair products each day, it would mean that I’d be in classes with my next door neighbors, David Brown and Jay Bynum, and my baseball teammate, Chuck Beckwith! 

But Momma Hobbs wasn't having it; shaking her head with a series of "no, no, no's," Mom thanked them for their thoughts, but added her own, saying that she didn't like the idea of me being grouped all day with kids two and three years older. Surely, I didn't understand why, because my best friends were in those upper classes AND I more than held my own with them and their classmates on the playground! But Momma, totally adamant, suggested a compromise that lasted the rest of the year and on into the next, which is that I would be required to do the same class work as the kids two grades my senior, while occasionally participating in academic activities and field trips with them but otherwise, remaining in Mrs. Hasenclever's physical classroom.

Looking back, the genius in Momma's advocacy was this: I was FAR busier each and every day, and I had far less time to talk—let alone play the court jester in class. Separately, Momma's move was wise because several years later, by the time I was 11 and 12 years old, had I been skipped up two grades, I would have been one of the less physically developed boys in the Class of '88 during middle school at FAMU High (K-12), instead of one of the larger boys in my Class of '90. That move paid off all sorts of psychological dividends that six year old Chuckie, eager to be with his eight and nine year old buddies, wasn't wise enough to comprehend the teasing that would lie ahead during middle and high school!

9th grade Hobbs (arms folded with white T-shirt back right), with my actual classmates (from left) Jason Ward, Sterling Hollingsworth, Chris Henry (RIP), Ken Rice, and Fred Higgs…

But in the end analysis, as I conclude this first part, the first question that I leave today is why wasn't I tracked earlier by my teacher and guidance counselor when signs were there that I was academically bored? And, knowing MANY other Black men and women my age who had similar experiences or, the polar and equally repressive opposite, which was being slow tracked when they were indeed brilliant, why were such things routine during the first decade after Jim Crow had supposedly died?

Again, check out my analysis of “why”in Part II..