VERNON JOHNS
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
There is actually very little material
on Vernon Johns. As long as the country remains pretty solidly racist,
it will not honor the real Vernon Johns.
Connie Chung helped kick off the rediscovery of Vernon Johns with a television
program on "God's Bad Boys," one of whom was Vernon Johns. Or as Johns would
object: you mean, "God's Good Boys."
Then Taylor Branch in his book Parting the Waters went a long way to saving
Johns' reputation and achievements. We thank Mr. Branch, but do want to add
that the liberal racists in the South kept Johns pretty much without an audience.
And even when the civil rights movement itself started, Johns was still not
given the recognition or the platform he deserved. At that time the civil
rights movement was too scared of what Johns might have said. He was never
one to be politically correct and might have said things that possibly could
have been used against the movement, but at what price this silence? Silencing
Johns was a terrible loss to the entire society, not just the civil rights
community.
The movie "The Vernon Johns Story" aired January 15, 1994. We have not seen
it aired since. The movie obviously did not generate that much interest.
And the movie was done in the current popular self-empowerment mode of current
politically correct thinking. In other words, Johns was made out to be pretty
much just another black hero meant to inspire African-Americans. These stories
have their place, but the tragedy is that they push out any real attempts
to analyze why American racism continues to this day, nearly 400 years after
the first slaves arrived.
Several authors are working on biographies of Vernon Johns. These are not
yet published.