Author Condenses 400 Years of Black Plight and Triumphs into 950-page Book

John Burl Smith's "The 400th: From Slavery to Hip Hop"

John Burl Smith hasn’t given up the fight. He’s just using a different tactic, a different course of action. Now he speaks and writes about the plight and triumphs of Black people rather than organize protest marches. 

A founding member of The Invaders, a ‘60s-era militant group boasting Black power in Memphis, Smith has cobbled together his experiences and perspective on the Black man’s journey in his new book, “The 400th: From Slavery to Hip Hop.” 

Published by Nelson & Nelson Press, LLC in July (2021), the 950-page book is perhaps Smith’s crowning achievement since joining the Black Power Movement decades ago. 

If not his crowning achievement, the book is certainly a literary feat for Smith. As with any book that traces the history of a people – as in the “400th” (1619-2019) – or major events throughout history, thorough research is required.

But first comes the idea before the story is written, which, for Smith, had been simmering ever since he was old enough to discern the way Black people are treated in this country.

“I’ve always been baffled by the fact that we as a people never had a story that seemed to explain who we were, why we were here, and why it seemed we could never change our status as a people.” 

As a child, Smith said stories that were relayed to him about his great great-grandfather were bandied around by his great grandfather, whom he’d known and talked with and, “unlike most people,” forged a relationship. 

“And the stories they told, and the way they told them [just] didn't match with the history that I was always exposed to in history books and movies and things,” said Smith, calling this a “duality” that just didn’t jibe.

While the Black Power Movement was Smith’s foray into activism, writing has become his forte, his mode of expression, and a passion that keeps him working at the grindstone. 

A blurb from “The 400th” summarizes the Black man’s plight on his meandering journey throughout history: “The unending love story of a people who fell in love with being themselves.”

Or is it the love story of a people trying to mitigate the harsh reality of pain and suffering at the hands of the white man, the book’s nemesis or antagonist? There is a villain in books of this nature.

There are pitstops in the book – from one era to the next – that leads to a modern-day art form (hip hop), which encompasses the collective experiences and sighs of being Black in America. 

Smith conveys in the book the power that Black people possess collectively, as a bloc per se, even after undergoing the torrent of slavery and grappling with age-old racism, discrimination and disparity. 

He didn’t start out with the idea of writing a book, he said, but 400 years in this country morphed into one. Why? “We needed to celebrate, commemorate all our ancestors that had given their lives and efforts to get us here,” he said. 

There is much more within the pages of this book: eight categories, Smith said, “that’s responsible for our survival.” 

• Family and Building Communities: Slaves had to build families and communities in order to survive, he said.

• Education and Communication: “We needed to be able to understand the written language,” he said, “and be able to communicate the written language.”

• Entrepreneurship and Entertainment: “Entertainment has produced more wealth for descendants of American slavery than any other enterprise,” he said.

• Political and Cultural Development: Smith said, “Politics is really the last thing we have been able to get into…because it is power in the U.S.”

“The 400th: From Slavery to Hip Hop” is a history book of sorts written with candor from a Black man’s perspective. Smith said he wrote the book for high schoolers and college students.

“My concern is to get young people to understand the level of power that they actually have,” he said.

John Burl Smith can be reached by email at jbsmith908@gmail.com.

Authors – and their works – speak to ASALH mission

Toussaint Louverture, Nathaniel Turner, Sengbe Pieh, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, and Harriet Tubman are familiar iconic symbols of heroism whose struggle in the United States, Africa and the Caribbean helped to change the status quo of their day: racism and slavery.

     Celeste-Marie Bernier, the Dorothy K. Hohenberg Chair of Excellence in Art History at the University of Memphis, traces the lives and histories of these six men and women in her book, “Characters of Blood: Black Heroism in the Transatlantic Imagination.”

Dr. Earnest Jenkins (seated left), associate professor of art history
at the University of Memphis, and Celeste-Marie Bernier, the Dorothy
K. Hohenberg Chair of Excellence in Art History at the university.

Currently on leave as professor of African American Studies at the University of Nottingham, UK, Bernier was among dozens of authors showcasing their literary works at the 99th Annual Association for the Study of African American Life and History Convention (ASALH).

     The four-day convention at the Peabody Hotel, Sept. 24-28, drew a smorgasbord of authors locally and nationally, including Circuit Court Judge D’Army Bailey, who autographed copies of his books, “The Education of a Black Radical: A Southern Civil Rights Activist’s Journey, 1959-1964” and “Mine Eyes Have Seen: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Final Journey.”

     Although the theme of ASALH was “Civil Rights in America,” the number of authors and their scholarly works were particularly broad-based, noteworthy, and coincided with the bevy of academics, government officials, community leaders and activists in attendance.

     The struggle for civil rights and the residual effects of slavery were duly noted in many of the authors’ works and also among the vendors who stocked their booths with artifacts, art, African clothing, and educational material that was reflective of ASALH’s mission.

     The mission is “to promote, research, preserve, interpret and disseminate information about Black life, history and culture to the global community.”

People aren’t telling the story…

Bernier’s work is representative of ASALH’s mission. She researches and writes extensively about racism, inequalities and slavery from the vantage point of a white Briton. There is very little difference between racism, inequalities and slavery in the United States, she said, and racism, inequalities and slavery in Great Britain.


“The big issue in Britain is empire and maniacal, aristocratic inequalities,” Bernier explained. “Growing up there as a kid I learned about slavery through people trading…and slavery was a word that was never used. So we have forces of amnesia that are still very powerful.

     “Currently, governmental practices are to remove references to black British history in favor of mythologizing a white Briton,” she said, “because, it suits current ideas around immigration and conservative policies and racists practices.

     “One of the most powerful experiences has been understanding black British histories and how fascinated black British performers and musicians are with African American histories. So many of them will ask me questions about what I know about African American life and culture.”

     Bernier’s assorted transatlantic experiences and scholarship drew her to Memphis and, of course, the ASALH convention.

     “One of the most powerful things about being in Memphis is teaching courses and research that I do about slavery… (The) city very much has a long history, and a powerful history, not only in terms of social, political, legal issues about slavery, but also music, art, photography.

     “I grew up in a French, Canadian, Irish community. When my mom was dying, she wanted to read Harry Jacob. She didn’t want to read the great white British classics,” Bernier said. “So that notion of understanding poverty and class and nationhood, I was very careful to let people know how I came to this story, why I’m interested, and what it is that I’m trying to do.” 


People aren’t telling the story, she said.

‘Repositories of ongoing history…’

During a mid-day luncheon at the convention, Bailey – lawyer, judge, civil rights activist, actor and author – relayed his experiences growing up in Memphis, participating in the sit-in movement in Louisiana, becoming a black radical and birthing the National Civil Rights Museum

     While “The Education of a Black Radical” encapsulates Bailey’s collective experiences in the civil rights movement in the ‘60s, the book “Mine Eyes Have Seen” is mostly pictorial. Both books, however, trace the author’s journey during that turbulent era.

     An avid reader, Bailey also has a penchant for writing. The world he grew up in and the struggle to overcome the vestiges of Jim Crow laws and the racist practices of its perpetrators is now fodder for his books and lectures.  

     Bailey is telling his own story, which made him the man he is today. And he is not willing to yield that narrative to someone else. The ASALH convention was important to him for that reason, he said, and also because it served as a disseminator of “information about black life, history and culture.”

     “These things are about connections and getting to know people and people getting to know you,” said Bailey. “It’s a chance to talk to people who’re interested in works of history and stories about struggles.”

     The written word is important and books can be “repositories of ongoing history,” Bailey said. For this reason, the authors book signing and the various panel discussions was the underpinning for the ASALH convention.

     “There’s a different breed of people who buy books…hold them…and read the pages,” Bailey said. “It’s more than what the information is in it. It’s an experience when you make the commitment to read a book. The important thing is understanding how the written word can be used to communicate.”