A Newark Childhood; A Memoir

by David Hugo Barrett

Overview

Weaving through African American music, folklore, and mores, A Newark Childhood is a coming-of-age story that journeys from the author’s years in kindergarten through high school graduation. It covers the period from 1948 to 1961 when he heads off to college.
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During this period, he struggles to find his place in an environment that at every turn explicitly questions; even resents the legitimacy of a colored/Negro/black boy’s existence. His Clay Street tenement is perilously located in the North Ward of Newark, NJ just on the fringes of Little Italy. With eager anticipation, we follow along as he informs us how his uncle’s benign intervention saved him from being aborted. He tells us of his memories of his Christian Scientist mother and her attempts to teach him survival skills by both word and deed.

​We witness how he applies these skills to survive physical confrontations with Italian boys as he and his younger brother take their lives into their own hands every time they have to walk through Little Italy to get to the swimming pool. Ironically, he is confident in his world despite its intersection with Little Italy because he knows what to expect. But he is uneasy and feels inferior as he ventures into Jewish neighborhoods and neighborhoods of “regular” white people. That fear is conflated with envy as he watches the “fake” white people on TV and in the movies. When he has a brutal fistfight with a fellow student, he imagines himself a white-hatted, white cowboy as he pummels the unfortunate bully who had referred to his girlfriend as a “bitch.”

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781733112215
Publisher:	David Hugo Barrett
Publication date:	07/12/2019
Pages:	268
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.63(d)

About the Author

David Hugo Barrett spent his formative years growing up in Newark, NJ where he attended public high schools and the Newark campus of Rutgers University where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics. He also holds a Master's degree in Computer Science from Howard University. In 1997 he co-founded the Alpha Achievers, an academic club of African American high school young men who have a 3.0 or better grade point average and who are dedicated to academic excellence and community service. As of 2019, there are chapters in all twelve Howard County public schools with memberships of 350-400. He is the past president of the Howard County Library System, immediate past chairman of The Alpha Foundation of Howard County, Inc., past chairman of the Howard County Poetry and Literature Society, former board member of the Horizon Foundation and a life member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. and the NAACP.

Table of Contents

Part I The Neighborhood

Chapter 1 In the Beginning

Chapter 2 Religion

Chapter 3 Discovery

Part II Leaving the Security of the Neighborhood

Chapter 4 Webster Junior High School

Chapter 5 Learning the Hard Way

Chapter 6 Bloomfield Technical High School

Part IV Central High School and Beyond

Chapter 7 Ernie

Chapter 8 The Bel Chords

Chapter 9 From Camp to College

Editorial Reviews

"I strongly endorse the publication of David Barrett's A Newark Childhood: A Memoir. David Barrett's account of growing up in Newark, New Jersey in the 1950s and 1960s is propelled by his compelling, concise observations of a city in flux and a family that sustained him." - Dr. Julia Rabig, Assistant Professor of History, Dartmouth College

From the Publisher