What sets Detroit’s Black Bottom Community apart from other biographies of African-American communities of the past?
JW: I think it connects the history of black American struggle to the larger one (even at the diaspora level) rather than separate. There were many Black Bottom communities throughout the nation which were connected by origin, racial and economic structural similarities. One of the interesting things I learned about Detroit’s Black Bottom community is that originally the name had nothing to do with color. The name was given by French settlers in relation to its rich soil, just as the many other Black Bottom communities were given their names under the same circumstances. That’s why I decided to dedicate the first chapter to the community’s first inhabitants – European immigrants. The thing that might perhaps set this book aside from others is that it is the first book on Detroit’s Black Bottom community, and it is loaded with great archival photos depicting black and white life in Black Bottom. There certainly are other books on Detroit history that looks at black Detroit history from
