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2006, 2012

How’s your paycheck? Does size matter?

By DHughes|2016-12-10T00:41:14-05:00June 20th, 2012|Categories: business, social|Tags: Apple, CBS, Cummins, Larry Ellison, Murdoch, Nooyi, Oracle, Pepsico, Solso, Tim Cook, Top CEOs|0 Comments

Compare it to Apple's Tim Cook at $348 million or WWP's Martin Sorrell who didn't get his $10.5 million or a lot of rich CEOs in between How much Read more...

2006, 2012

In the flotsam of the digital avalanche, Warren Buffett is still buying newspapers. What’s going on in media?

By DHughes|2016-12-10T00:41:14-05:00June 20th, 2012|Categories: business|Tags: Amazons, Arianna Huffington, Buffalo News, Elle Accessories, Facebook, Jeff Bezo, Pinterest, Twitter, Warren Buffett|0 Comments

No, that's not Warren Buffett but the Buffalo News is his newspaper and Stanford Lipsey is the publisher. They do look a little alike. (photo: bbannon/NYT) Just when you thought you Read more...

1906, 2012

Masters of the uterus, repent! The Dark Ages are over

By DHughes|2016-12-10T00:41:14-05:00June 19th, 2012|Categories: politics, social|Tags: Barb Byrum, Detroit News, Eve Ensler, Lisa Brown, Michigan Capitol, Vagina Monologues, vasectomies|0 Comments

16 years after its debut, The Vagina Monologues is packing them in everywhere, including State legislatures (photo: wikipedia) What is it about women, politics and vaginas that don’t Read more...

1306, 2012

Marketing with product placement: When subtle can go viral

By DHughes|2016-12-10T00:41:15-05:00June 13th, 2012|Categories: business, social|Tags: Bridget Moynahan, CBSSports, ESPN, Funny or Die, Gisele Bündchen, New England Patriots, Tom Brady|0 Comments

Three-time Superbowl champion, Tom Brady goes on a rant (see short video below) If you want funny, get truly funny people to create your spots If you haven’t Read more...

1206, 2012

We know where the insanity is. So where’s the outrage?

By DHughes|2016-12-10T00:41:15-05:00June 12th, 2012|Categories: politics, social|Tags: Eaton Centre, George Zimmerman, gun laws, National Rifle Association, obama, Second Amendment, Stephen Harper, Thomas Jewfferson|0 Comments

When it comes to guns, why does insanity trump outrage? It’s actually fairly simple. Insanity resides with the minority, outrage with the majority. And it’s much Read more...

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My personal history is the stuff they write books about. And that's what I am doing. The working title, "Chains of My Father: Marry White."

"The ghostly image of the tragic mulatto trapped between two worlds." - Barack Obama

This perspicacious line from the Prologue of Barack Obama's "Dream from My Father" wrenched my aspiration into action. I started writing, furiously. Unlike Obama's perspective, my pain had been for the opposite reason: I was not seen by whites as a "tragic mulatto," rather I lived every day of my childhood hoping whites were not "searching my eyes for some telltale sign" that I WAS mulatto. This is my story.

It's historical fiction because I cannot find enough records to substantiate all facets of the story. I've combed the genealogy, traveled to my father and grandmothers' birthplace, walked the graveyards, searched the churches and ... well, all the facts aren't there. I have written three books based on the genealogy of other families but my ancestors emerged from a journey that left too few records – slavery.

My paternal, great grandmother was a "freed slave." My grandmother, Amelia, was born to a mixed race slave named Mary (we do not know her last name) and a white, French plantation owner, the Count de Poullain, in Grenada, West Indies. Amelia was raised in the "Big House" and in adulthood, in an attempt to escape her black heritage disowned her mother, telling her, "Get out and never come back." Amelia, as a mother of twelve children, enshrined into the family commandments, "Marry white." Many did, including my father. My mother was a lovely, white, Anglo-Saxon protestant born in England. They met in Canada where my dad studied and became a doctor.

It has taken five generations for the descendants of Mary to free themselves from the stigma of their black heritage but today my children embrace it. Unfortunately, the past 250 years have been a wasteland of bigotry, racism and bullying. But, on closer look, we see not only the brutality, fear, violence, and murder but also the self-respect, dignity, love, kindness, perseverance and indomitable spirit.

As of the spring of 2025, the depth of historic perspective and the sweeping inspiration of oppressed people has created a two-volume duology of which I have only arrived at the middle of the 19th century. 1840 is the year my great grandfather was born, the beginning of Volume II, and he's pushing me to make sure our story is published by the summer of 2026.