Lettie's Story
We're All Human, No Matter The Hue, Man
Author’s Note: It’s Juneteenth Weekend 2025 so I thought it appropriate to repost this account of my maternal Grandmother Lettie Thompson. We (the Eulenspiegel Puppet Theater and I) had done our third-in-a-row presentation at the Ottumwa, Iowa Juneteenth Festival produced by locally with big help from IWC author and historian Rachelle Chase. I was asked by several attendees to post Lettie’s story along with my 1978 Interview with our family matriarch.
One hundred and twenty-nine years ago Lettie Thompson, my maternal grandmother, was born in Monroe Co. in Southeastern Iowa. The ‘big town’ in the area was Albia but it was the coal mines of Buxton where Lettie’s family lived and worked from 1895 until 1922. It was there that African-American and European-American miners worked together in the danger and the darkness of the mines. It was there where a multi-racial workforce understood that respect and support for each other was essential if they were going to survive the chaos of hatred and ignorance so prevalent in the country in the post-Civil War Jim Crow days.
Faced with the 2024’s updated, rebranded form (think: James Crow Esq.) I went back into my archives to bring you a 1978 interview with Grandmother Lettie at her home in Fort Dodge, Iowa.
As I was editing, my own personal anxiety was alleviated somewhat by the knowledge that my ancestors survived and thrived without hating, without cheating and without the need to denigrate others to make themselves feel superior. The respect with which the workers of Buxton honored each other was a God-given thing. The acknowledgement of a shared humanity and destiny was something that workers needed (and still need) to survive. It created the foundation which succeeding generations benefit from today. Simply stated it was the realization that…..:
“We’re all human, no matter the hue, man”
Lettie Porter Thompson born Nov. 1896 to Ross and Blanche Johnson was the daughter of a Buxton coal miner. The family lived through a fraught time in American history. Post Civil War America was a stark challenge for newly emancipated Black workers born in the old Confederacy.
Buxton, a company coal town owned by Consolidation Coal of Chicago did things differently and after an initial period of Union strife, the place evolved into a community where workers, regardless of ethnicity, supported each other in an integrated, highly productive society most black workers described as a Utopia.
I, of course, witnessed none of that being born in 1949 but the stories and most importantly, the ethic espoused by Black and White friends of the family etched the idea of interracial harmony and cooperation deep within our young memories.
(If you need to go back to the beginning of My Integrated Life, please see my original writing here. )
In 1978, I brought a cassette player with me to record some of Lettie’s stories and memories. It was important for me to hear directly from a woman who quietly, but steadfastly worked to provide stability and opportunity for her three daughters Lenora, Adele and Mary Alice.
The story of Buxton has slipped in and out of Iowa Black (and White) history over the decades and thanks to the efforts of Puppeteer Monica Leo and Author Rachelle Chase the story is rightfully gaining additional prominence.
Rachelle is a member of the Iowa Writers Collaborative and the author of two books on the subject of Buxton, Ia. She devoted years to doing a proper study on the town, its fascinating history and a further glimpse into how the place achieved prominence in the history of Iowa and race relations.
Monica Leo, a longtime friend and collaborator, began the Eulenspiegel Puppet Theatre in the 1970’s in West Liberty Iowa. Her connection to the world of marionettes, puppets and storytelling are deeply embedded in her German ancestry. The Eulenspiegel Puppet Theater works regularly with public school students bringing interactive arts and historically important stories to students across Iowa.
Three years ago, Monica teamed up with Rachelle to write and produce “Remembering Buxton” as an interactive puppet show giving Iowa students and community members an opportunity to have fun working as a creative team.
Monica contacted Yours truly about providing music and sound efx for the puppet show, giving me a reason to dig back into Grandmother Lettie’s life and times to create “Buxton ambience” in the form of songs and sound effects.
Monica and I first worked together as members of the Iowa Arts Council Touring-Artists-Team in the 1970’s. Visiting towns no larger than 1500 residents, we brought music, art, storytelling, dance, and…puppets to lots of rural folks looking to have fun.
Building “Remembering Buxton” gave Monica and I a great opportunity to rekindle a great friendship and tell a wonderful story to kids of all ages. Performing it with students and community members from Des Moines to Muscatine to Oskaloosa, to Creston has been a joy and a blessing to this old teaching artist.
I’ll wind up this section of the story by saying I’m not so clueless as to believe things will be OK soon. Apparently, Iowa and much of the rest of the nation has indicated it’s desire to extend our malignant status quo, at least for the next four years. Only by recognizing and nurturing the things that we share can we traverse this passage with our nation and our humanity intact.
I’m thankful that my personal default position is faith, humanity, empathy, truth and the ability to put in “hard work and plenty of it”
Forever Thanks to Lettie. Even now her inspiration shines bright.
Click the pic above to go the the podcast featuring Lettie Thompson in her own words.
And check out a short version of the Buxton Song I wrote for the puppet show:
Please don’t hesitate to contact the author with inquiries about his work as a composer, sound designer and writer. soundranger@icloud.com
Iowa Writers’ Collaborative
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IOWA WRITERS’ COLLABORATIVE
The Roster of Writers
Nicole Baart: This Stays Here, Sioux Center
Ray Young Bear: From Red Earth Drive, Meskwaki Settlement
Laura Belin: Iowa Politics with Laura Belin, Windsor Heights
Tory Brecht: Brecht’s Beat, Quad Cities
Dartanyan Brown, My Integrated Life, Des Moines
Doug Burns: The Iowa Mercury, Carroll
Jane Burns: The Crossover, Des Moines
Dave Busiek: Dave Busiek on Media, Des Moines
Iowa Writers’ Collaborative, Roundup
Steph Copley: It Was Never a Dress, Johnston
Art Cullen: Art Cullen’s Notebook, Storm Lake
Suzanna de Baca: Dispatches from the Heartland, Huxley
Debra Engle: A Whole New World, Madison County
Daniel Finney, Paragraph Stacker, Des Moines
Arnold Garson: Second Thoughts, Okoboji and Sioux Falls
Julie Gammack: Julie Gammack’s Iowa Potluck, Des Moines and Okoboji
Joe Geha: Fern and Joe, Ames
Jody Gifford: Benign Inspiration, West Des Moines
Rob Gray: Rob Gray’s Area, Ankeny
Nik Heftman: The Seven Times, Los Angeles and Iowa
Beth Hoffman: In the Dirt, Lovilia
Iowa Capital Dispatch, an alliance with IWC
Dana James: Black Iowa News, Iowa
Chris Jones, Chris’s Substack, Iowa City
Pat Kinney: View from Cedar Valley, Waterloo
Fern Kupfer: Fern and Joe, Ames
Robert Leonard: Deep Midwest: Politics and Culture, Bussey
Letters from Iowans, Iowa
Darcy Maulsby: Keepin’ It Rural, Calhoun County
Tar Macias: Hola Iowa, Iowa
Alison McGaughey, The Inquisitive Quad Citizen, Quad Cities
Kurt Meyer: Showing Up, St. Ansgar
Vicki Minor, Relatively Minor, Winterset
Wini Moranville: Wini’s Food Stories, Des Moines
Jeff Morrison: Between Two Rivers, Cedar Rapids
Kyle Munson: Kyle Munson’s Main Street, Des Moines
Jane Nguyen: The Asian Iowan, West Des Moines
John Naughton: My Life, in Color, Des Moines
Chuck Offenburger: Iowa Boy Chuck Offenburger, Jefferson and Des Moines
Barry Piatt: Piatt on Politics Behind the Curtain, Washington, D.C.
Dave Price: Dave Price’s Perspective, Des Moines
Steve Semken, The Pulse of a Heartland Publisher, North Liberty
Macey Shofroth: The Midwest Creative, Norwalk
Larry Stone: Listening to the Land, Elkader
Mary Swander: Mary Swander’s Buggy Land, Kalona
Mary Swander: Mary Swander’s Emerging Voices, Kalona
Cheryl Tevis: Unfinished Business, Boone County
Ed Tibbetts: Along the Mississippi, Davenport
Jason Walsmith, The Racontourist, Earlham
Kali White VanBaale, 988: Mental Healthcare in Iowa, Bondurant
Teresa Zilk: Talking Good, Des Moines
The Iowa Writers Collaborative is also proud to ally with Iowa Capital Dispatch.
Thanks my friend, she was a very special one...and her yeast rolls were in.sane. She endured a little more than we have to put up with. Grace personified.
I first learned about Buxton from archaeologist David Gradwohl at ISU in the 1980s. The history needs to be mandatory content across Iowa’s public schools.