BOOK NOTES: ‘Tasting Freedom’ — shame, heroism, heartbreak

By Joan Ruddiman, Special Writer
   I’ve waited a long time for this one.
   Seven years ago, Daniel R. Biddle and Murray Dubin — long associated with the Philadelphia Inquirer as reporters and Mr. Biddle as an editor — came to Allentown, New Jersey, seeking local lore about a young black man who had been a student at the community’s Presbyterian Academy in the mid-19th century. They were writing a book about Octavius Valentine Catto, whom they described as a Renaissance man, graced with the oratorical skills of a Martin Luther King Jr. and the baseball prowess of a Jackie Robinson.
   Mr. Biddle and Mr. Dubin were obviously captivated with their subject and intrigued by what they had already discovered from distant relations of Catto. Moreover, they were humbled by the depth of pain in this story of a promising young man’s murder — and the poignant history of black Americans.
   Now years later, their search for O.V. Catto has yielded a book that encompasses not just his extraordinary life but the power of the 19th century civil rights movement. “Tasting Freedom: Octavius Catto and the Battle for Equality in Civil War America” (Temple University Press, 2010) delivers on its promise to “change your understanding of civil rights history.” The authors acknowledge that the work has indeed changed their lives.
   They relate that “B.C.,” or “Before Catto,” they did not even realize that the 19th century was a hotbed of civil rights activism. And though both are natives of Philadelphia, they had never heard of Catto. Independent of each other, they discovered the remarkable Catto — Mr. Dubin, as he worked on a book about his longtime neighborhood of South Philly, and Mr. Biddle, who “stumbled onto Catto ten years ago” when he listened to a program that mentioned Catto on a Haverford College radio show.
   Both wondered, “Why have we never heard of this guy?’ In 2003, they collaborated on an article about Catto for the Inquirer that generated so much response that they continued to dig into the forgotten history. They met 101-year-old Lily Dickerson, a cousin of Catto’s lady friend, Cordelia Sanders, who still had vivid memories of Catto’s neighborhood and the climate of those contentious times. One connection led to others as black families shared stories scarcely told among themselves — let alone to anyone who was white.
   They had intended to write a biography of O.V. Catto. But their editor prodded them to understand Catto’s significance in the turbulent 19th century. So Mr. Biddle and Mr. Dubin reached back to 1800 when “Octavius Catto’s grandmother was being dragooned into slavery in South Carolina.” Like good historians, they explain the context of those complex times. For example, to understand South Carolina’s slave society, they probed the history of Charleston, founded in 1670 and “the first English city in North America to be born with slavery as part of its initial breath.”
   It is an ugly story. Ultimately, it is worth following the dense details as the authors mine for nuggets related to Catto’s story, such as their search for the origin and the pronunciation of the surname. (It is pronounced CAT-toe.)
   The authors can be forgiven their tone of wide-eyed amazement at what they uncovered as they wrangled massive amounts of information that span the entire 19th century. What in early chapters seems like name-dropping — Harriet Beecher Stowe! PT Barnum! — becomes quite personal, as Catto’s world encompassed a Who’s Who of Black History. Frederick Douglass and his daughter, Rosetta, are Catto’s friends, as are William Still, Charlotte Forten, William Lloyd Garrison, Lucretia Mott, the Grimke sisters. The infamous John Brown makes the list of acquaintances.
   The authors are to be admired for so carefully developing their thesis — “Tasting Freedom.” Each time civil rights activists like Catto thought they were close to America’s promised freedom, it was snatched away. Brutal mob action and subtle political apathy thwarted even Constitutional amendments granting basic human rights and the right to vote.
   Nothing I have ever read so fully expresses the oppression of racism and the interminably long struggle to be free of its evils. Using newspapers of the times, including the black press, archived records from black institutions, diaries and letters, and the aforementioned oral history, Mr. Biddle and Mr. Dubin bring to life national events and neighborhood indignities.
   As one heartbreaking example, the authors describe the building of the magnificent Pennsylvania Hall in May 1838 with funding and the physical labor of men both colored and white. The ornate lecture hall could accommodate thousands and was the center for the abolition movement. It also was a testament to black pride and achievement — and friendship between blacks and whites. Within the month, it is torched and burned to the ground.
   But this is only one part of the story — the crushing oppression — which is often told. The other history that Mr. Biddle and Mr. Dubin tell is incredibly inspiring and needs to be as well known.
   O.V. Catto was a member of a dynamic community of intellectuals, artists, and widely admired athletes. Though his accomplishments as a speaker, teacher, second baseman and baseball manager were highly respected, he was just one of countless extraordinary black men and women. Many were, like Catto, graduates of the rigorous, highly prestigious Institute for Colored Youth, where each year only a few students passed the challenging written and oral exams that tested their abilities in Latin, Greek, advanced maths, the sciences and poetry. Even the audiences at I.C.Y. commencement services were tested with sections of the program printed in Spanish, Latin and Greek.
   The men and women of I.C.Y. established schools across the South, ran publishing houses, were active in politics — and always were activists for rights for black Americans.
   Though the authors early on in their research thought Catto’s educational experience at the academy in Allentown was important, further research revealed a more nuanced understanding. The local lore was true that Congressman Newell, a man of significance in Allentown, had come to know and respect the circuit preacher at Allentown’s A.M.E. church. Newell, a staunch Presbyterian, offered Pastor William Catto’s “most-favored son” a place in the Presbyterian boys’ academy up the street from his home.
   ”Octavius was its first colored pupil,” the authors write. “Octavius was fourteen. The experiment of placing a light-skinned Negro in a school of white boys lasted one academic year. Then came word from Philadelphia of a new possibility.”
   The impression is clear: What made O.V. Catto was Philadelphia’s Institute for Colored Youth.
   The irony of the story is that the more black Americans advanced educationally and economically, the greater danger they were in, as they threatened race and class standings, particularly of the working -class Irish who shared South Philadelphia. Catto — better educated, better paid, better dressed than the South Philly Irish — was a target.
   Like the reporters they are, Mr. Biddle and Mr. Dubin uncover and tell the story of Catto’s assassination, doing justice to a century-old crime that went unpunished. With their telling, the book becomes a heart-in-throat page-turner.
   When asked what two white guys were doing writing about African American history, Mr. Dubin replied, “Doesn’t matter if you are black, white or green. It is a great story.” And they both noted, “The story of Catto’s life is an amazing story that no one has ever told. Even more important is the story of the civil rights movement in the 19th century, which has been little told. We thought that putting the two together would be a great yarn.”
   Indeed it is. And it was worth the wait.
Joan Ruddiman, Ed.D., is the K-12 Gifted and Talented Resource Specialist for the West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional School District. She lives in Allentown.