Every tear wiped away,
Pain and sickness gone;
Wide awake there with Him!
Peace goes on and on!
Description:Pain and sickness gone;
Wide awake there with Him!
Peace goes on and on!
Ed Clark (American, 1911-2000)
FDR Funeral, Warm Springs, Georgia, 1945, printed c. 1982. Titled and dated in ink below the image l.l., signed and inscribed "Edward Clark - Life" in ink below the image l.r., signed by the subject Graham Jackson and dated "1982" in ink below the image l.c., signed and numbered "8 of 10" in ink on the backing. Gelatin silver print, image size 8 7/8 x 12 3/4 in. (22.5 x 32.3 cm), matted, framed.
Condition: Taped to overmat with masking tape, gently light-struck, solarization or similar in dark areas of image.
N.B. As a staff photographer for LIFE, Ed Clark drove all night from his home in Nashville to Warm Springs, Georgia, after learning of the death of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. As the President's body was transported to the train station for the journey back to Washington, Clark captured United States Navy bandsman Graham W. Jackson, Sr., playing "Goin' Home," one of Roosevelt's favorite tunes, on his accordion. The now iconic photograph of Jackson with tears streaming down his cheeks, a poignant and moving symbol of the nation's grief, was published in the April 17, 1945, issue of LIFE.
FDR Funeral, Warm Springs, Georgia, 1945, printed c. 1982. Titled and dated in ink below the image l.l., signed and inscribed "Edward Clark - Life" in ink below the image l.r., signed by the subject Graham Jackson and dated "1982" in ink below the image l.c., signed and numbered "8 of 10" in ink on the backing. Gelatin silver print, image size 8 7/8 x 12 3/4 in. (22.5 x 32.3 cm), matted, framed.
Condition: Taped to overmat with masking tape, gently light-struck, solarization or similar in dark areas of image.
N.B. As a staff photographer for LIFE, Ed Clark drove all night from his home in Nashville to Warm Springs, Georgia, after learning of the death of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. As the President's body was transported to the train station for the journey back to Washington, Clark captured United States Navy bandsman Graham W. Jackson, Sr., playing "Goin' Home," one of Roosevelt's favorite tunes, on his accordion. The now iconic photograph of Jackson with tears streaming down his cheeks, a poignant and moving symbol of the nation's grief, was published in the April 17, 1945, issue of LIFE.
No, it's not the dashed playoff hopes of the Oakland Raiders that has me posting this iconic print.
I just happened to be browsing popular photos of African-Americans taken during the 1930's and 1940's. This print of Navy bandsman Graham W. Jackson crying his heart out over the loss of American President Franklin D. Roosevelt is a moving historical document.
Here is a black man enlisted in a segregated military playing a eulogy song of tribute (Going Home) for a fallen white President in front of a mourning, segregated southern audience. Well, at least a few in the audience seem in mourning; many are caught up gawking at Graham and perhaps wondering why a Life magazine photographer would be interested in taking such a shameful photograph of a crying Negro. If only they knew.
I'm sure throughout the years this photograph has been viewed with wonder at why this black man playing his accordion was crying so hard and what could be so tragic to bring about such a grieving face. His grief seems so much more than just one of patriotic tribute to a great leader.
Well it turns out that Graham was a renown musician and personal friend of Eleanor and President Franklin Roosevelt. His grief was one of deep personal loss and friendship; and it shows. Maybe the southern audience did know and found such close personal friendships between blacks and whites shameful during that time. Unfortunately for me, an African-American knowledgeable about America's history of racial prejudice, in looking back I tend to see the ghosts of hate that caused so much pain and suffering for my peoples.
If we take out the southern gawkers from the photograph, which it seems many newspaper editors did at the time, the hint of racial unacceptance and/or shamefulness is erased and you're left with a feeling of total tribute to a leader and friend. It's like using the Photoshop Application today to alter or enhance photographs; perception becomes reality. That is, until viewers come face to face with a not so perfect reality.
Its possible that what I see in this picture is nothing more than figments of my imagination. Disturbing photos like that of the lynched Tom Shipp and Abe Smith (Beitler Photo), or that of the brutalized body of 14-year old Emmett Till continue to haunt that era of American systemic racism and can never be fully erased from the minds of black folks. I suppose seeing a 1945 photo of a black man crying while southern whites look on in the background just somehow awakens the ugly ghosts of racial prejudice past and present. The fact remains that for whatever reason, there have been and continue to be white people who dislike people of color based solely on the tint of their skin. It's a curse our country seems to be doomed to live with.
If we take out the southern gawkers from the photograph, which it seems many newspaper editors did at the time, the hint of racial unacceptance and/or shamefulness is erased and you're left with a feeling of total tribute to a leader and friend. It's like using the Photoshop Application today to alter or enhance photographs; perception becomes reality. That is, until viewers come face to face with a not so perfect reality.
Its possible that what I see in this picture is nothing more than figments of my imagination. Disturbing photos like that of the lynched Tom Shipp and Abe Smith (Beitler Photo), or that of the brutalized body of 14-year old Emmett Till continue to haunt that era of American systemic racism and can never be fully erased from the minds of black folks. I suppose seeing a 1945 photo of a black man crying while southern whites look on in the background just somehow awakens the ugly ghosts of racial prejudice past and present. The fact remains that for whatever reason, there have been and continue to be white people who dislike people of color based solely on the tint of their skin. It's a curse our country seems to be doomed to live with.
(May 2016)
Headline News: Lynching mural sparks debate in Illinois town
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