(Reviewed by JD Jung)
“This story would reveal parts of who I am, as a Black woman in America, by discovering who my grandfather was.”
This was not her original intention though. She wanted to learn more about her grandfather’s legal battles and his subsequent kidnapping, that all started in 1954. Initially this research was to be strictly historical. However, it did prompt her to connect what happened then to what she and others are going through today. From this research, she learned more about herself.
Author Sharon Tubbs obtained her information from interviews, newspaper articles and filings at government offices. She met some relatives for the first time and others she hadn’t seen in years.
This absorbing account not only reveals to us of the racial incidents that happened to her family in Alabama in the mid-twentieth century, but how this past affects people today, no matter where they live. For example, she interviewed her grandfather’s brother, who at eighty-nine years old and living in Indiana felt unsafe based of what happened decades ago in Alabama. The people who could serve retribution were already dead. This fear also affects subsequent generations. This leads to the question; how can we repair “cultural trauma”?
This fear is not unfounded. For example, she describes what happened to her brother in a 1984 McDonald’s parking lot in Indiana. Just as disturbing, her nephew explained to her the continual racist attacks that he experiences during online gaming parties. Unfortunately, he says he has learned to live with it.
Tubbs structures the book going back and forth between what happened to her grandfather, her past, the role of the Church and life today. This is engaging to the reader as we learn about life from her perspective while we eagerly await to find out what finally happens to her grandfather.
They Got Daddy is a must- read for all people so that we can appreciate those who have experienced life differently than we have as individuals. Though we will never completely comprehend what others go through, this will give us a glimpse and a better understanding.
