Editor’s Note: This article was featured in our June/July 2008 issue. John Hope Franklin passed away in March 2009.
John Hope Franklin is an elegant name, and the man fits the moniker.
When shown into the combination dining room-study in his settled home on a curving, tree-shadowed street in the Rockwood section of town, I saw historian Franklin, now 93-years-old, hard at work. Papers were scattered about and the professor held one up, perusing it carefully with his ever-present glasses and pursed lips. Teaching himself about something, as he so often does.
We shook hands, and his assistant asked if I wanted to do the Durham Magazine interview in the adjoining room. I said: “Well, he looks pretty comfortable right here.”
Franklin pointed out, “You know, I have a comfortable chair in the living room, too.”
We both laughed, and some distance that might have existed between interviewer and subject seemed to dissolve. Franklin moved some papers to the side and I sat down next to him.
“Dr. Franklin, this is a most distinct pleasure.” The scholar of seven decades waved dismissively. “John Hope,” he said. “That’s what people I know call me.”
I asked where he got that soft but striking name. His parents, he said, named him after a college professor they both studied under and deeply admired. Professor John Hope, of Roger Williams University in Nashville, now defunct. This was before the turn of the 20th century.
“Very few African-Americans went to college then,” Franklin said. “But my parents did.”
Franklin is the James B. Duke Professor Emeritus of History at Duke University. He has written more than a dozen books, including From Slavery to Freedom in 1947. It’s widely considered that this seminal work helped change the recorded history of African-Americans in this country because he wrote the truth.
The scholar has borne witness to the seismic changes in racial attitudes in this country — Franklin assisted in preparing the Brown v. Board of Education briefs, for example — and his peers and fellow citizens have acknowledged his extraordinary contributions. Among the Harvard Ph.D’s honors: a Presidential Medal of Freedom and an institute at Duke named for him.
When I spoke to him recently, Franklin was recovering from an illness but sure didn’t show it. Presumably he’s slowed down over the years but it’s not readily apparent; he’s still energetic and curious. He continues to travel and give lectures at universities across the country. In fact, it’s fair to say, the world has been his classroom, and I was just another student the day we spoke. Following is an edited transcript of our conversation:
I hear you’re not just a leading historian and famed grower of orchids, but a fisherman, too.
You’ve done your homework. I love to fish. Crappie, bass … whatever’s biting is my favorite fish to fish for that day.
And I know you still fly fish in Montana every summer. What about fishing in Durham?
I’ve fished in ponds, lakes and rivers in Durham … you name it. I can’t always reveal my secret spots, of course (laughing). But one of my favorite places to fish years ago was on a friend’s private property down toward Jordan Lake.
It was just a small pond, but it was perfect. I miss going there.
Fishing is the quiet sport.
Most historians do well with quiet.
You live in this beautiful old, brick house … and have for many years. You’re just a stone’s throw from Nana’s restaurant. I’ve seen you there.
I’m seen there a lot. Course, my wife and I, we’d stroll down to Nana’s every now and again, but now friends drop by and take me. Good food.
I remember hearing you speak about Aurelia, your wife, on television one night a few years ago. I remarked that I never felt so much affection through a TV screen.
You know, Bill Clinton called and told me the same thing.
His wife, Hillary, has fallen out of favor with you, though. You endorsed Senator Obama. Was that a hard decision?
Not hard at all. Not at all. He’s the future of this country. He’s brilliant, unflappable and doesn’t play politics the same old useless ways.
Different subject. You were born in 1915 and have seen so much. The last decade or so, when you read about another “gang-related” crime in Durham, what do you think? How do you feel?
I feel like that’s another black child that’s been neglected at home and at school. It means that boy didn’t get nurtured like I did growing up, nurtured like all children deserve. Then, without attention and understanding, they don’t know what they’re doing. Some of them start killing people. [He shakes his head and pauses.] It’s not as complicated as people make it out to be.
When you look at Durham and see a black mayor, a black school superintendent, a black city manager for a number of years, what goes through your mind?
I take note of it as an historian, and I am also proud of it. One reaction is objective, the other is personal. It tells me that race doesn’t matter, really, as long as you’re good. That’s what’s important. And it’s wonderful for urban health and for kids to see they can do anything they want.
What’s special about Durham, the town you came to some 25 years ago?
Oh, so many things. So much education. Duke, Central, Durham Tech. All excellent. We’ve got culture, music, art. Great libraries. My wife was a librarian, you know. She had an orchid officially named after her. It’s pale yellow. Precious, like she was.
And Durham’s history?
Well, while many cities were going through painful change during the earliest Jim Crow years, Durham’s black residents were building a vibrant business environment here. And it has endured.
What’s one thing few people know about you?
I’ve been a world traveler. And my favorite place is Florence.
Why?
If you’d been there, you wouldn’t have to ask me that. [Laughing]. It’s the art.
I remember reading that when you were 6, your mother told you that you were going to be the first black president. And that you repeated that prediction for years after.
That’s true. Guess there was one thing I didn’t do, after all. Well, I’m still happy right where I am. DM
