Essie Mae Research Paper

Looking through the eyes of Essie Mae, growing up as an African-American in the south was anything but easy. Within her household, she was relied on heavily from a very young age to contribute, as her father wasn’t the bread winning type. Essie Mae started to notice that she was viewed differently because of the color of her early in her life. It was very apparent that white people held control purely because they were white and could hold the fear of death over the heads of African-Americans. As Essie Mae grew up she learned to despise white people because of the way they treated her and her family. She also looked down on her “fellow blacks” because she felt they were letting white people kill them. Essie Mae was deeply affected by the racism she was surrounded by and was able to learn from the many mistakes of others.
In the very beginning, Essie paints a vivid picture of what her living quarters looked like when she was young. At the time, she lived with her mother, Toosweet, and her father, Diddly on a plantation owned by Mr. Carter, where other slaves farmed. She described her house as resembling more of a “shack” lacking electricity and plumbing. Although Essie’s parents tried their best to make it livable, the shack was still dilapidated. The other slaves lived in similar conditions on the plantation. Shortly after their last child was born Toosweet and Diddly had a falling out after Diddly started seeing another woman on the plantation, Florence. After that, Toosweet and her three children bounced from shack to shack, often working in exchange for housing, barely improving in living space. After slavery ended, it was common for African Americans to live on plantations and work in exchange for food, money or housing where they once were kept as slaves. Essie was required to start working when she was in fourth grade to contribute to her growing family. Many young African-American children worked trivial jobs to contribute to the family’s income. Essie often babysat or did housework for numerous white families while attending school. As for adults, it was hard to land a job in general, nevermind one that paid enough to support your family. From a very early age, Essie was conditioned to see a difference between white people and black people. She was exposed to racism everywhere she went. While being babysat by her uncle in her own home, he made each of the children slingshots but referred to them as a “niggershooter” (page 28). When this same uncle brought them to his house to meet more of their mother’s side of the family, she looked forward to meeting her cousins that were similar in age. Upon arrival, she noticed two white boys with her family, but didn’t make the connection. She was shocked when she found the white boys were her cousins she had once looked forward to meeting. While with them, she was very uncomfortable because although they were family, they were white and all she had known about white people is that they treated black people disrespectfully. She was unsure of how to act and even turned to her uncle for help. She soon noticed that although they were white, she was treated the same way they were. Another instance occurred where Essie and her siblings played with two white children. She admits she “never really thought of them as white before” being segregated in a movie theater (page 40). She had the realization that white people are not only viewed as better than her, but had access to better resources because of the color of their skin. …show more content…
Housing was often run-down and lacked things we’d consider essentials. Although people were starting to fight for African-American rights, they were still struggling with racists especially in the south. The fear of dying kept African-Americans on their toes. Essie saw this as surrendering instead of fighting for their right to be human. She became conscious of the race war that surrounded her and was intrigued. She was a bright young woman with a lot of potential and she knew she didn’t want to waste it. Essie Mae is an inspiration for