As soon as she said this to me, I felt relief, confirmation that our comfort was not simply born of luck, based on a given day’s number. It was strived for, built and sustained by my mother’s efforts and yes, pride. We would never lose everything, because she would make sure we didn’t.
But now, in the early days of Michigan’s brand-new lottery, it wasn’t clear yet just how much harder her job had become.
Original lottery tickets, 1972 and 1977
Seven
Fannie and Burt, date unknown
Mama and I are shopping inside Bonwit Teller at Somerset Mall in Troy. A saleswoman approaches us. “We have some nice things marked down on the sales rack,” she says, gesturing with a sweep of her arm.
My mother eyes the white woman. “Did I ask you what was on the sales rack?”
The woman mutters an apology and steps away as we continue shopping. Once we’re done, Mama seeks out the same saleswoman and hands her our selections to ring up, their full-price tags dangling.
“Cash or charge?” asks the saleswoman as she stands before the register.
“Charge,” says Mama, and flips open her Louis Vuitton wallet to reveal a plethora of credit cards, the array in full view of the saleswoman. She runs her fingers past the Carte Blanche, Diners Club, Saks, B. Siegel’s, Jacobson’s, and Hudson’s cards and pulls out her Bonwit’s.
The saleswoman studies the card, looks up. “Could I see some ID, please?” she asks.
“Sure,” says Mama, and she pulls out her driver’s license, Blue Cross/Blue Shield medical card, and Social Security card and hands over all three. She has pulled out her checkbook, about to show that too, when the saleswoman holds up her hand to stop her.
“Oh, that’s okay,” she says. “Really, this is sufficient.”
“You sure?” asks Mama. “Because we can call my bank if you like. Or your manager.”
The saleswoman shakes her head vigorously as she hands back Mama’s multiple forms of ID. She tries to make small talk as she rings us up, but Mama has very little to say. We take our Bonwit’s bags adorned with their signature violet bouquets and leave the store.
I’ve seen variations of this scene play out often with my mother, and every time, I’ve watched closely. I never cringed from embarrassment over all the fuss, because I knew the point my mother was making. Still, those scenes made me feel a certain kind of way: First, I loved that she, as this black woman, had her own credit cards in her maiden name—Fannie M. Drumwright. I loved that she bought what she wanted when she wanted it from any part of any store she wanted. I loved that she had her own money and ran her own business. And I could tell that she loved it too. I didn’t actually know back then that she was one of only two Detroit women banking the Numbers. But I knew enough to know she was unique, that none of my friends’ mothers were like her. This fascinated me because I was also newly interested in her as my mother.
And so I took note. Mama was making sure, without a doubt, that these saleswomen, that all people on the outside, acknowledged her value. She demanded it, in fact, and I was beginning to understand that her secret profession was part of the reason. She had something to prove: Because I’m a brown-skinned black woman, you think you’re better than me; and if you knew what I did for a living, you’d look down your nose at me. Well, I’m going to make you respect me.
This sense of gravitas permeated my mother’s entire life, with friends, business associates, her own siblings, us. As approachable and helpful as she was, she invited a kind of decorum from others, a hint of formality. People of all ages, men and women, watched their words and their behavior around her. People didn’t curse or raise their voices around her.
Now I see how she commanded respect as a woman, and there’s no question she was a feminist. But back then I wouldn’t have called her that. Yes, it was the seventies and I had a subscription to Ms. Magazine, an obsession with The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and a devotion to Marcia Ann Gillespie’s “Getting Down” column in Essence. But despite seeing my mother daily pushing against expectation and assumption, I associated feminism with white women. Besides, I didn’t witness any contradiction or struggle or “balancing act” in her quest to be both homemaker/mother and business owner. When many years later I read Toni Morrison’s comment that “Black women seem able to combine the nest and the adventure…they are both safe harbor and ship; they are both inn and trail. We, black women, do both,” I felt she was describing my mother.
Meanwhile, I was more influenced by the Black Power movement, enough to briefly wear my hair in an Afro, or a Natural as we called it, which I created by an elaborate process of applying lotion to my hair, then curling it with twisted strips ripped from a brown paper bag. I was swayed by the catchy TV commercial airing weekly during Soul Train that showed a man and woman sporting perfect Afros as background voices sang, partly in Swahili: Watu Wazuri, use Afro Sheen! Beautiful people, use Afro Sheen! Yet more often I joined my mother in the basement salon of Miss Evelyn, her hairdresser, where we’d both get our hair press-and-curled.
Too, I often accompanied my mother on visits to her girlfriends’ homes, these funny, hardworking, and ever-supportive women who always knew about my latest achievements in school. (Mama apparently bragged about me, but never in my presence. That was her way.) She had a special relationship with each friend, and none more special than the one she shared with Lula. Although Mama didn’t believe in godmothers (No one is gonna do for you like what I can do, so what’s the point?), Lula was Rita’s unofficial godmother. As Mama’s closest friend, she came over nearly every day. Many, many nights Lula would fall asleep on my mother’s bedroom chaise lounge until Burt came to bed. He’d wake Lula, walk her to the side door, watch as she got into her car parked in the driveway, and wave as she backed out, headed for home.
I also sometimes went with my mother to the bank, watched as she requested the help of a particular bank teller or manager, always an African-American woman whom she had a working relationship with. Mama would hand the woman a mixture of cash and checks to deposit, all collected from customers, some of who paid their Numbers bills with portions of their pension and Social Security checks. My mother needed a banker to accept these signed-over third-party checks without question.
Other times, she’d rely on her friend Miss Lucille, who owned a check-cashing business with her husband, LaVert. Any checks that the bank wouldn’t accept, Miss Lucille would cash for Mama. More important, Miss Lucille could help Mama out with cash flow. If Mama needed to “get up the money” for a big hit, she could turn to Miss Lucille for a large sum to borrow; they had a close friendship built on trust, and Miss Lucille knew Fannie was good for it, would return the money within a couple of weeks, if not a couple of days. I enjoyed visiting Miss Lucille, because she also loved beautiful things, and her home was a display of wondrous tchotchkes and furnishings. She collected elephant figurines, often showing off the newest addition to Mama and me. Miss Lucille was also a heavy Numbers player, but she didn’t turn in her numbers to Mama. This was how my mother kept healthy relationships with her close friends; she didn’t let them play Numbers with her. “I’d rather have your friendship over your business any day,” she’d say.
It worked. “Fannie was my mother’s best friend, outside her bridge club members,” confirms Miss Lucille’s son, Eric. “Something good always happened when the two of them got together.”
One of my mother’s most vital friendships was with Pearl Massey, the only other woman in Detroit known to be a major banker for the Numbers. They didn’t share customers, but they did have each other’s back. Given that both women dealt with significant amounts of cash, each could borrow from the other when she had a cash-flow issue. She and Mama could discuss the vagaries of the business in a way neither could with anyone else. I liked when we visited Pearl for this reason alone, to hear my mother open up about her challenges in a way I never otherwise would.
With my own dawning awareness, I began to notice my mother’s do
uble allure, one secret and one out in the open: while many folks saw her as a wise and nurturing maternal figure, with great instincts about human nature and people’s character, a way of helping others with their problems, and a generous spirit, these same people didn’t even know she ran Numbers. Meanwhile, for others, she had a special aura specifically because she ran Numbers, and she was seen as successful, and yes, lucky. (Of course there was overlap, with some people part of both of her worlds, doubly admiring her.) As I matured, I realized that I knew of no man or woman in the Numbers business, or outside of it, quite frankly, who was lauded that way, which made me believe Mama wasn’t just liberated; she was powerful.
“She was a big honcho!” is how Renita, Tony’s mother, puts it. “I didn’t understand that at the time, but that’s what she was.”
I also paid more attention to the way people were drawn to Mama, wanted to be in her orbit. “Sometimes, I’d be in the area and I’d go over to see if you were home,” recalls Stephanie, my close friend since junior high. “And even if you weren’t there, I could just slip into what was going on. It was easy to get sucked into your house, anyway. You sit at that kitchen table and the next thing you know, somebody is coming in and this and that is happening, and your mom might say, ‘Can you go get this thing for me?’ You felt needed, and a part of things.…It was just a comforting feeling to be in your mom’s presence.”
Many folks came over just to sit at our kitchen table and listen to my mother dispense advice, what one friend called “a little counseling clinic.” My sister Rita’s high school friend Jill put it this way: “She could help you think yourself out of a situation. Your mother was one of those people that knew just enough about everything.”
She was certainly a lifelong learner, thanks to her voraciously reading books, magazines and the daily newspaper; she not only watched the local and national news each night but also Face The Nation on Sunday morning. She had genuine interest in politics and current affairs; as she put it, “I like keeping up with the news.” This largely contributed to her deft debating skills. Mama’s political views were a blend of progressive and conservative, and her views on racial matters could aptly be summed up in her assessment that “All black folks should be in therapy at the government’s expense.”
Another distinction of my mother’s was that she didn’t judge others based on what they looked like or where they came from or what impediments or disabilities or imperfections they had. She welcomed all different kinds of folks into her life. “That taught me a lesson,” recalls Stephanie. “Certain people we sometimes shy away from, but your mother had a variety of people coming through, who could be totally free and at home and embraced and accepted.”
Having such a cool mother made me feel special. Plus, she was married to a man who obviously adored her, and I liked that fact too. Whenever he traveled to out-of-town golf tournaments, my stepfather would send Mama postcards, always signed Your Loving Hubby. And sometimes Burt playfully patted my mother’s behind, or pulled her to him in a bear hug, landing a sloppy kiss on her cheek. She’d act like she didn’t have time for such horseplay, but it was obvious she was flattered by her husband’s sexual attraction for her being put on display.
Mama was also, however, no-nonsense. As her children, when she told us to do something, we did it. One of her favorite Bible passages to quote was “Honor thy mother and thy father and thy days will be long.” Given this, my siblings and I had an understanding. If one of us faced a crisis or problem, our goal was to work it out among ourselves. “Don’t tell Mama!” was our go-to command to one another. To be clear, we all knew that if we needed real help, she’d be there to do whatever she could. We knew that. But if we could solve the situation on our own, we did. That’s because none of us wanted to disappoint her. In fact, on those rare occasions when I did have to confess to her something I’d done wrong, the most bruising thing my mother could say to me was one simple sentence: “I’m disappointed in you.” I’d cry for a day.
Sometimes, she’d get angry and “go off” on someone she felt deserved it. This didn’t happen often, but my mother had a sharp tongue coupled with a quick mind and no one wanted to be on the receiving end of that. Curse words came easily to her lips. (“I got to say it the way that makes sense to me.”) What could really set her off were liars, anyone trying to get over on her, and greed—folks trying to take more than they deserved, or what didn’t belong to them. “Ooh, that thing has really unnerved me,” she’d say. “I don’t like being around people I can’t respect.”
She revealed herself mostly by what she liked and disliked, by what she embraced and what she disdained; and she seemed genuinely unconcerned with what most people thought of her, or as she put it, “I don’t give a damn.” The one thing Mama often said about herself was “I’m very sensitive.” This statement had a twofold meaning for my mother, and she expected everyone in her life to deal with her accordingly. First, it meant, “Watch your mouth. You’re not gonna just say whatever you feel like to me.” She let you know that her feelings could be hurt by your words, and “You took it the wrong way” was not a good defense. “Maybe you said it the wrong way,” she’d shoot back.
Also, she used her sensitivity to pick up on social cues, a skill she prided herself on, and one she felt too many others lacked. “Some people aren’t sensitive enough,” she’d say.
As a young teen, I thought Mama was scared of virtually no one and nothing. I’ll always remember the day she got a call from Renita saying that my brother, Anthony, had taken her car and now Renita’s own crazy brother, Dwight, had threatened to “go out looking for him” and teach him a lesson. Mama grabbed her .38 pistol and drove over to Dwight’s house to confront him. Burt, Rita, and I jumped into Burt’s car to follow behind and try to stop her.
“Girl, I got out of Dodge when I seen her pull up,” recalls Renita. “’Cause just from being around her you wouldn’t know it, but I knew she was tough.”
When we arrived, Mama was standing before Renita’s brother, hand in pocket, clearly gripping her gun. “Nigger, you lay a hand on what’s mine,” she told him, “and I’ll kill your fucking ass!”
“You got no problem with me, Mrs. Davis,” said Dwight, backing down. “None.”
Anthony then pulled up in his wife’s car, and when he refused to hand her the keys, Mama was so angry she began beating Anthony with her hands, which made my sister Rita jump in to stop her. Frightened by it all, I began crying, and according to what I wrote in my turquoise one-year diary, “lost my best pair of earrings!”
My diary from those junior high days is filled with praise for Mama. In between excruciating detail about a boy I had a crush on, my experiences attending Patricia Stevens Modeling School, visiting Daddy on weekends, being part of a modern dance group, attending church youth group functions, and my first after-school job at a nursery school called Timbuktu, I also show lots of gratitude for my mother. After a shopping spree: I got a good momma and I love her like mad. When I realized my mother was paying close attention to my behavior: Really, I want to impress my mother. I love her! After she chastised me for something, and that made me cry, and that upset her, I wrote: She really is a precious person and I love her to all ends. And in another, exuberant entry: I found an exciting new friend. My mother! Today I was laughing and joking with her as if she were my best friend! Actually she is my best friend.
When I was thirteen, just as an interminable six-week public school strike finally ended, my mother made possible one of my most treasured experiences: she took me to see the Josephine Baker perform at Detroit’s Fisher Theatre. “She’s a legend and you should see what a legend looks like up close,” Mama told me about the woman who went from the slums of St. Louis to become the toast of Paris, the first black sex symbol of the twentieth century. I was invited up onstage, alongside other young people from the audience, to dance with Baker during her finale; even though I was startled to see the sixty-seven-year-old singer up close, as she’d lo
oked much younger from my seat, I was thrilled nevertheless. Afterward, I became fascinated with the legendary performer, pulling the World Book Encyclopedia off our den shelf to learn more about her. I found inspiration in her life and started toying with the idea of bigger possibilities, of ways I might reinvent myself as a black girl, dream big.
Suddenly, Mama seemed pretty ordinary by comparison. La Baker was the exotic one, and very much unlike Mama—famous, talented, mother of a rainbow tribe, once-sexy topless dancer, Parisian. Today, the parallels are obvious to me: Mama, like Baker, took stock of the life she was born into and used her skill set to reinvent herself, become someone who hadn’t existed before. But back then all I saw as a young teen was inspiration to leave home, explore new places, really become somebody. I began to see that, compared to a citizen of the world, being a number runner meant being trapped at home all day; you were tied to a schedule that could begin at the crack of dawn, when a customer would call to put in her numbers before she “heads out fishing,” until late evening after the number came out and you needed to check the business for hits. It dawned on me that Mama only got one day off a week, Sunday. And the rough patches in her business could last for a while, with all the stress and household tension that came with them. My mother lived constantly with the fear that too many big hits back to back would put her “in the hole,” as she called it, from which she’d have to dig herself out, i.e., start from scratch to build up a cash cushion.
I found out that Momma has been hit for $10 in the last two days, I wrote in my diary barely a month after seeing Josephine Baker perform. That’s $5,000.00 dollars.…It scares me. This has been a tough year for Momma. Sometimes I wish we weren’t in Numbers cause this way, we don’t get a steady paycheck. But then I ask myself do you want to give up your luxuries along with the Numbers? And the answer is “no.”
The World According to Fannie Davis Page 16