El Cerrito’s First Black Resident Co-founded Weekly Paper for Black Community

Members of the El Cerrito Historical Society were introduced to Walter George Maddox in the December 2020 issue of The Forge. Maddox and his wife, Mary E. White Maddox, were the earliest Black family to live in El Cerrito, as Joanne Rubio wrote. This article by Jon Bashor appeared in the July 2021 issue of The Forge.

The gravestone for Walter Maddox is in the IOOF cemetery in Orland, Calif.

 A Glimpse of Walter G. Maddox

In 1971, Albert Butler sat down for a recorded conversation with Ruth Beckford, a noted African-Haitian dancer, teacher and author. Butler was the grandson of Alfred J. White, a member of a pioneering Black family and the father of Walter Maddox’s wife, Mary “Mamie” E. White Maddox. White was the owner of a barber shop in San Francisco. A recording of their 90-minute conversation is available online, while the original tape is held by the African American Museum and Library at Oakland.

Butler’s recollections tell of Maddox’s hospitality, innate talents and his life as a Black man who rose to a high position in an industry dominated by white men: railroads.

About 10 minutes into the recording, Butler talks about going to live with Walter G. Maddox in Stege. Butler said he was “sort of raised by him.” Butler describes himself as a “puny, under-developed kid,” skinny “like a skeleton” and prone to crying. “They took me out to Stege, a little town, just a hamlet,” where Maddox had obtained a plot of land, built a house and raised a couple of cows, Butler recalled. There was fresh air, he could run wild and soon life in the country “built me right up.”

Butler lived with the Maddoxes for three to four years. During that time, Maddox took the ferry to San Francisco for his job with Southern Pacific Railroad. Butler drove him to West Berkeley every morning in a horse-drawn cart at 7 a.m. and picked him up at 5:30 p.m. After returning from the morning run, Butler did his chores around the house and then went to school. “I was a kid, I was about as big as his leg when I was 10 years old.” 

All in the Timing
Maddox worked his way up from the ground floor at the railroad and became an expert on timetables and offered new ideas on how to improve them, Butler said, becoming the subject of envy and jealousy over his rise up the corporate ladder. Butler recalled one story about how Felix S. McGinnis, who was appointed traffic manager for the railroad’s Pacific coast lines in 1925 and then became vice president in charge of traffic in 1929, convened SP executives from Chicago, New York and other cities for a conference. The men wore suits with white carnations in their lapels, white kid gloves and had fancy walking sticks. 

They offered a number of suggested changes to improve service and to assess them, McGinnis called in Maddox, who said they would never work and would in fact slow down service. When asked why, Maddox explained that the route in question was single-tracked and increasing the number of trains meant traffic would back up as each waited for others to pass. “He showed them that they were wrong, in a nice way,” Butler recalled. “They were amazed that a colored man would make that suggestion.”  

As he adjourned the meeting, wishing the executives a safe ride home, McGinnis said “Mr. Maddox, fix those timetables as you see fit,” Butler recalled. 

Although Maddox never rode any of the longer distance trains, he “knew every spur, every track, every single track, every double track, every station, every hamlet,” and how the trains using them made connections with the eastbound trains, Butler recalled. 

Map of the Southern Pacific Railroad. Wikimedia image.

He described Maddox as unassuming, adding that he usually picked out a corner seat on the ferry so he could read his newspaper. When other men gathered around to ask questions, he would politely answer, then go back to his paper. 

But he was also a good orator when the occasion called for it. “He had good diction, knew how to use his words,” Butler said. In fact, this skill led him to being named president of the Stege school district and its four schools, Butler recalled. 

Signs of success
In addition to owning his land and home in Stege, Maddox was also able to purchase a 20-acre ranch in Orland, a small town 20 miles west of Chico, where he eventually retired. In 1894, Maddox also provided financial backing to start the Western Outlook newspaper. As stated on its front page banner, the Outlook was “A Journal Dedicated to the Interests of the Negro on the Pacific Coast and the Betterment of his Position.” 

The Western Outlook was founded September 1, 1894, by Maddox, Joseph S. Francis and J. Lincoln Derrick. From 1894 until it ceased publishing in 1928, Derrick and Jesse E. Wysinger were the editors and proprietors. In 1928, they had agents in San Francisco, Fresno, Marysville, and Red Bluff. According to the 1902 edition of N.W. Ayer & Son's American Newspaper Annual, the offices were at 425 Montgomery St. in San Francisco, but later moved to offices on 7th Street in Oakland. 

In 1900, a one-year subscription cost $2.50, a six-month subscription $1.25 and a three-month subscription was 75 cents. Published every Saturday, it went out via “the early morning mails,” according to the paper’s masthead. It began as a four-page broadsheet measuring 24 by 18 inches and had evolved to eight pages measuring 22 by 16 inches by the time it ceased publication. 

One of the few, if only, online archives of the Outlook is housed by The Portal to Texas History, a gateway to rare, historical, and primary source materials from or about Texas. Created and maintained by the University of North Texas Libraries, the portal contains just 81 issues from the Outlook’s 38 years of publication, many of them are torn or have pieces cut out. The oldest is from Saturday, Jan. 27, 1900, 1915 is the most complete with 42 issues and there are 12 from 1928, the last year of publication. All of the content described below is from this archive. 

In many instances, the articles published a century ago reflect that many of the civil rights being fought over then are still with us today, though the sides have changed. But many of the articles also point toward improved conditions for the Black community. 

On voting rights and violence
Looking at the current trend of Republican-dominated states adopting restrictive voting measures that are expected to discriminate against Black voters, an article in the Jan. 27, 1900 edition shows that history does indeed repeat itself. The truncated article on page two headlined THE RIGHTS OF THE NEGRO with the subhead Theme of Senator Pritchard of North Carolina.

It begins “Washington, January 22.—At the conclusion of routine business Pritchard, of North Carolina, called up his resolution relating to the proposed amendment to the constitution of North Carolina, which, if adopted, it is alleged, disenfranchises a large class of voters in the State. After reading the resolution Pritchard addressed the Senate in support of it, his address being in answer to that delivered several days ago by Senator Morgan. 

Pritchard said the question involved the peace and welfare of the Nation and the stability of our institutions...He said the Democrats of North Carolina were attempting to deprive certain citizens of guaranteed rights, just as the Democrats of Louisiana had done. Pritchard said that if Senator Morgan was right, then the Democratic party ought to have the courage to propose the abrogation of the fifteenth amendment, which give the Negro the right of franchise.” 

Another short article illustrates that trying to use federal laws to criminalize racial crimes has also long been an uphill battle. Under the headline Aimed at Lynching with the subhead Sweeping Measure Introduced by the Colored Congressman reads “Washington, January 20th. – Representative White, of North Carolina, the colored representative in the House, today introduced a bill for “the protection of all citizens of the United States against mob violence,” etc. It provides that all persons shall be protected from being murdered, tortured or burned to death by mobs known as “lynching bees,” whether spontaneous or premeditated, and all parties participating or abetting in such affairs are guilty of treason against the United States Government and subject to prosecution in the United States courts.” 

An apparently related item on page three is headlined An Anti-Lynching Petition and states “A petition, handsomely bound, and signed by 3,200 colored persons, asking for such legislation as will protect the colored men of this country from the ‘barbarous practice of lynching and burning,’ and whic was presented in the Senate on Tuesday, Jan. 16, by Mr. Cullom of Illinois, caused an interesting debate. In the course of the discussion, Mr. Chandler, the chairman of the committee on privileges and elections, thought it desirable to be perfectly frank. 

“There is no power in Congress,” said he, “to prevent or punish crimes in the various States. If the States do not punish crimes, for the punishment of which they have enacted laws, no Federal law can take the place of useless State laws. Mr. Chandler added that there is no Federal law under which the violator of even the suffrage law could be punished.” 

While such news would probably make today’s front pages, the items were inside. The front page ran mainly feature stories, such as lengthy pieces on how to build your own windmill for pumping groundwater and the history and use of chopsticks. These were accompanied by a compendium of short news items from around the world. 

Fast Forward 15 Years

Fifteen years later, the Jan. 2, 1915 edition led with a feature on LONELY MIDWAY ISLAND where two dozen men and women were stationed, connected to the rest of the world only by a telegraph cable and a supply ship that arrives every three months. In 1942, the island was the center of a massive air battle between the U.S. and Japanese navies, leading to the destruction of much of Japan's ship-based air attack capability. 

The front page also featured ads from the Oakland Bank of Savings, offering 4 percent interest on savings accounts, and “High Grade Beers” from Oakland’s Golden West Brewing Co., “The most soothing, bracing beverage brewed.” Southern Pacific touted three trains daily to Portland, Tacoma and Seattle, with “Mount Lassen in Plain View from Car Windows.” 

The first item on page 2 is this perspective: “Our race equipment is not complete. Every colored man with a purpose who finds it necessary to come in contact with a certain class of white men should carry with him a pair of leather knee-pads. It differs not whether it be a Democratic Wilson or a Progressive Roosevelt, you cannot properly absorb their wisdom unless on your hands and knees. They tell us we will have to use pads for 100 years to come.” 

At the bottom of page 3, an item from the Fresno Republican headlined No Lynching Excuse reads: “Every report of Negro lynching in the South demonstrates the fictitious nature of the usual excuse. Shreveport parish, Louisiana, for instance, just reports its eighth lynching within the year. Seven of these eight lynchings were for supposed murder and robbery. In only one case was there any charge of the offence for which lynching is usually justified. The other cases were all sheer and unmixed barbarism. 

“There is no more excuse for lynching a Negro for murder or stealing than there is for lynching a white man for the same crimes. The law provides its sure and effective remedy in both cases and in Louisiana at least there is little danger of a guilty Negro escaping. 

“Lynching does not prevent or even lessen crime: it merely brutalizes the population. Its only actual explanation is the feeling that Negro criminals are not entitled to be punished by the law…”

The April 17, 1915 edition contained a short item reprinted from the Oakland Tribune that spoke to race in sports and underscored the rivalry between Oakland and San Francisco after a boxing match between reigning champ Jack Johnson, who was Black, and Jess Willard, touted as a “Great White Hope.” “One of the excitable newspapers in San Francisco (a city where excitement comes easy) declares in tremendous head-lines, anent the victory of Jess Willlard over Jack Johnson, “that the honor of the white race is saved.” Behind this bit of hysterics is the curious conception that somehow there is involved an issue of real seriousness in the question of supremacy in the prize ring of a white man as compared with a black man. This idea has long prevailed in certain circles without support either in logic or experience. . .Has anybody ever been able to discover that the honor of one race or another has been in any wise involved in this competition? The thing is ridiculous. Our San Francisco contemporary would do well to calm its mind.”   

Many of the pages through the years also had short jokes, like this from July 22, 1916:

“The Value of Learning.” A precocious child who had been attending one of the public kindergartens fell from a ladder. Her mother caught her up from the ground in terror, exclaiming: ‘O darling, how did you fall?’ ‘Vertically’ replied the child, without a second’s hesitation.”

At the very bottom of page 3 of the same edition is this item: ‘Birth of a Nation’ Loses Fight. COLUMBUS, Ohio--Due to the matchless argument of the State’s attorney-general E. C. Turner, the suit brought by the ‘Birth of a Nation’ films to compel the State board of censors to give the film company a permit to show in Ohio, was dismissed by the State supreme court. Colored people in Ohio are greatly indebted to Mr. Turner for the fight he made, which finally and for all times bars the ‘Birth of a Nation’ films from Ohio.” 

Last words
The last chronological issue in the North Texas University archive was published May 26, 1928. By this time, the front page was filled with local news items, including a note about a smoker at the Athens Lodge of the Improved Benevolent Protective Order of Elks of the World (a Black fraternal organization modeled on the then all-white Elks Club)  on May 20, at which 150 guests dined on squab, chicken, peas, mashed potatoes, spaghetti, French rolls and coffee.

Another item announced a fund-raising effort to rebuild the Mount Pleasant Baptist Church in Berkeley. The church, located at McGee and Stuart streets, “was gutted by fire of unknown origin several weeks ago.”

On the editorial page, several items still resonate loudly today, including the use of firearms by police and disillusionment among younger generations. 

The lead paragraph reads “It looks as though citizens will have to be protected from the guardians of the peace. It is a question whether men who are so ready to use their guns should be entrusted with the authority to carry arms.” 

A second item addresses recent graduates of the University of California at Berkeley: “The University of California has just turned out its usual grist of young men and women who will go forth with the idea that the world is waiting to be conquered. It is too bad that many will be disillusioned when they go up against things that are and not what they seem. To those students whose influential connections will smooth their way to success, the road will not be so rugged. 

“The student of our group who dedicates his life to the high ideals of service and devotion to racial solidity will be the future leaders of the coming race in this country. Let us hope that our young people have visioned the future, and that the foundation of their education has been laid  so deep and enduring in honesty and clean living that they may be living monuments to the less fortunate of our group. Discard that air of superior complex towards your fellows who do not have diplomas. Remember, there is such a thing as an educated fool. Avoid shortcuts to success.It were better that you have the confidence of your fellow man than to be objects of distrust and suspicion.”