I was asked recently about my favorite thought leader. First, I needed to understand what a thought leader is. Forbes defines a thought leader as, “An individual or organization recognized as an authority in a specific field known for generating innovative ideas and influencing others.” As I read that definition, it was easy for me to put at the top of my list my mother Phyllis Redd King.
How do you say in 600 words or less what someone has meant to you and how they have impacted your life and in turn the life of your children. Well, you can’t, so this story will be in 3 parts.
My mother was born in Long Island, New York in September 1943. She spent most of her younger years living with her maternal grandmother on Long Island. Back then Long Island was farmland, and her grandmother owned a farm and was a leader in her church. I believe that is where my mother started her leadership training. We are talking about the late forties and early fifties, and it was rare that a Black woman would be a landowner and a leader in the church. I believe that is why my mother always instilled in us that if we put in the work anything is possible no matter the challenges and my mother faced many hardships and roadblocks.
Her grandmother died and my mother came to Boston to live with her mother. My mother was the second oldest, so she took care of her younger brothers and sisters. She did not have much of a relationship with her father. She would share with me a story about having to tape the soles of her shoes together and her father seeing her and telling her she needed new shoes and to go ask her mother. There were years when she did not get a present on Christmas. She would wrap presents for her brothers and sisters, but there would be none for her or her older sister. I think that is why she would work hard and get us everything we asked for. There was never a Christmas that we didn’t have a tree filled with presents.
Right after she graduated from High school, she married Charles W Redd Jr. A U.S. Marine. My father served two tours in Vietnam. We even lived a year in Parris Island, South Carolina. I was 4 or 5 years old then. I have some fading memories, but I do remember it was the first time someone called me the “N-word”. It was a group of kids who yelled it from a school bus. I was only 5 and I didn’t understand what it meant, but as I grew older it was a word I learned to hate and a word I vowed to never use.
When we moved back to Boston, my father returned from his second tour, and my mother asked him to leave. She never said why until we were older, but she felt it was for the best. I will tell you that I never heard a negative comment about our father from her, but I also don’t remember ever asking about him. It was for most of our growing up time Phyllis, me, Ken, and Tracy.
Those early years were challenging for my mother. In the beginning she went to the Red Cross and to the welfare office (1970’s), but no one would help. My mother decided from that point that she would not depend on anyone and that she would do whatever she needed to do to raise her 3 boys. Me and my brother would always say Polaroid and Sears and Roebuck help raise us.
My mother worked hard and that work ethic is part of the DNA of her 3 boys. The amazing thing about it is that we never felt like we didn’t see our mother enough. She was always there even though she worked more than 40 hours a week. I remember watching my mother tile floors and putting up wallpaper on the weekends. I remember her having to drag 3 boys along shopping on the weekends. We always had new clothes every school year. We were poor growing up in the inner-city, we were challenged as a family with a single parent, but we were blessed because we had our rock our mother to guide us.
I will continue next week with the story of my mother and the most important decision she made in 1976 when Boston implemented forced busing.
Charles Redd RN
Dignity Freedom Fighter
Dignity Freedom Fighter 