Here are the first words of “Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore,” journalist Char Adams’ history of Black-owned bookstores in the U.S., published by Tiny Reparations Books.
“I love to tell people’s stories,” she writes.
It’s a fitting sentiment from Adams, a former reporter for People magazine and NBC News; she has dedicated her career to bringing to life the accounts of people, including Black immigrants, Black homeschooling families, and abuse and assault survivors.
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For her first book, Adams decided to delve into Black-owned bookstores, which have served as community gathering places for Black Americans since 1834. Her book focuses on “the businesses’ most active and successful eras: the 1960s, the 1990s, and the 2020s.”
Adams writes that there are currently around 130 Black-owned bookstores in the country, including a number in Southern California, including Malik Books and Reparations Club in Los Angeles; Octavia’s Bookshelf in Pasadena; and the soon-to-reopen Get Lit Books & Things in Moreno Valley. Adams has a list of Black-owned bookstores in the U.S. on her website.
Adams discussed her book and the history and importance of Black-owned bookstores via telephone from her home in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. This conversation has been condensed and edited for length and clarity.
Q: What made you decide to write a book about Black-owned bookstores?
I actually had not set out to write a book. I first came to study Black-owned bookstores back in 2018. I read an article in the Atlantic by Joshua Clark Davis, about how Black-owned bookstores were targeted by the FBI back in the ’60s and ’70s. My interest was piqued because I found myself wanting to know Black booksellers’ personal stories from that time. I really wanted to get a sense of what that targeting felt like and looked like. At first, I really just set out to collect people’s stories for my own personal interest, and a few years later, that grew into a book.
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Q: How did you start your research into the topic?
I actually started my research by interviewing people. I started tracking down Black bookstellers from that time period who were still alive, basically collecting their personal stories from that time, and research grew out of those conversations.
Q: Did any of them seem surprised that you’d reached out?
I don’t know if they were surprised, but they all did say how grateful they were, because it seemed like they had just been waiting for a chance to have their stories told in full, and just waiting for a project like this to be done. I would say that they were more excited than surprised.
Q: Your research led you to a pioneering figure, David Ruggles. Can you discuss who he was and why he’s so important to the legacy of Black-owned bookstores today?
He was a monumental figure. He was the first known owner of a Black-owned bookstore. He opened his bookstore in 1834 in Tribeca, and his store was only a small part of his work as an activist and an organizer. He was an anti-slavery activist and organizer, and he traveled, giving speeches and holding rallies. He did so much work to win people over to the side of abolition, and he was part of the New York Committee of Vigilance, which helped to free about 600 enslaved people. He is actually credited with helping to free Frederick Douglass as well. He was a passionate, principled guy, and his bookstore was only a small part of his work.
Q: These stores that you write about, they’re more than just bookstores, they’re something greater. Can you share what that is and what they represent to their communities?
Black-owned bookstores aren’t just where people buy books. It’s where people find community and a sense of belonging and an educational home as well. They’re also places where people found safety in terms of shared cultural experience. That community piece of it has lasted, and has been very, very vital.
Q: You write that in 2014 there were just over 50 Black-owned bookstores operating in the U.S., but now there’s about 130. What do you think accounted for that growth?
I think there are a bunch of factors that go into why a person opens a bookstore. And I do want to make clear that it’s impossible to know exactly how many Black-owned bookstores were opened at any time, because there is no official agency that keeps that information, and bookstores are constantly closing. But the number of Black-owned bookstores has been on the rise, and I think that could be in response to the political climate that we’ve been in since before 2015. With the rise of social media and these past 15 years, I think that people are beginning to grasp more and more what Black bookstores are in terms of community and why they are important to combating systems of oppression. I think that plays a part in why there are so many now.
Q: Are there any Black-owned bookstores that you find particularly unique or compelling, whether it’s because of their history or their mission or anything else?
I really like Baldwin & Co. in New Orleans. Their space, how it’s laid out, the art they sell, I feel like everything they have in there is super intentional. It has a place for people to come in and make art. It has a little bakery, a café. I feel like it really leans into stretching beyond what we know a bookstore to be.
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