by Rebel Girls
Copyright © 2019 by Timbuktu Labs, Inc.
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Text: Denene Millner
Cover and Illustrations: Salini Perera
Cover Lettering: Monique Aimee
This is a work of historical fiction. We have tried to be as accurate as possible, but names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents may have been changed to suit the needs of the story.
www.rebelgirls.co
ISBN 978-1-7331761-9-4
Madam C. J. Walker (Sarah Breedlove Walker)
December 23, 1867 - May 25, 1919
United States of America
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
AFTERWORD
CHAPTER ONE
Mama parted Sarah’s hair into three sections: one in the front, two in the back. Sarah wiggled as Mama started at the root and worked her way to the ends. She loved feeling her mama’s fingers in her hair.
“Sit still, wiggle worm,” Mama said. Sarah’s older sister, Louvenia, sat off to the side, scratching her freshly-done braids. She made faces at Sarah until Mama gave Lou a sharp look. “Cut it out, Lou. Sweep the porch if you ain’t got nothing better to do.”
Sarah Breedlove, the littlest of five siblings, was her family’s hope for the future. Born in 1867, she was the first member of her family who hadn’t been born into slavery. Now she would be the first to go to school.
Even though Sarah was only five years old, last harvest season she had bent down right next to Mama, Papa, Lou, and her three older brothers, Alexander, Owen, and James. The whole family had pulled fluffy cotton planted in neat rows that stretched beyond the horizon. Sarah remembered sweating in the hot sun. Sometimes the prickly parts of the plants would poke right through her fingers. But Sarah kept right on working, filling her bag no matter how heavy it got. She knew her family could not survive without it.
After her hair was close to perfect, Mama put Sarah to bed and hummed a lullaby.
“You, chile, are going to school tomorrow. No more cotton picking for my baby. You’ll be bigger than all these fields. Bigger than the Mississippi River.”
The thought made Sarah smile as she drifted off to sleep.
The Breedloves couldn’t always pay for what they needed, like food, shoes, or home repairs. During the winter, cold air crept through gaps in the rough wooden walls where the slats did not quite meet. But that year’s cotton harvest had been bountiful. The whole family got new clothes and shoes, and Pa finally bought oil to fix the squeaky cabin door. Best of all, Mama and Papa could finally get married!
“It costs a hundred dollars to tie the knot,” Mama said, grinning as she shook the rattling jam jar. “Guess how many dollars I got here?”
“A hundred!” Sarah and Louvenia chorused, dancing their way around Mama’s feet.
They held the ceremony right there in the backyard under the trees. Mama’s eyes sparkled as she stood in her best dress, holding Papa’s hands.
The pastor sweated, fanning himself as he read from his big, black book.
Sarah squeezed Louvenia’s hand on one side and her brother Alexander’s on the other. “Pastor looks like he swallowed a bug,” she whispered.
“Shhh!” hissed Louvenia.
Alexander’s body shook as he snorted to keep from laughing.
After the ceremony, out came rickety tables and chairs scattered across the grass. The whole neighborhood filled the yard, bringing piles of food that made Sarah’s mouth water. An old man strummed on a banjo sitting in the cool shade. Children shrieked with delight, playing hand-clapping games in the field nearby.
Then came Mama’s cake: sweet and thick with crinkles at the top. Mama sliced a piece special for Sarah. As she let the sugar dissolve on her tongue, Sarah felt that life, like Mama’s cake, was the sweetest it could be.
~
On the first day of school, Mama wrapped up a biscuit in a piece of cloth and tucked it into Sarah’s pocket. Then Papa walked her down the road to the schoolhouse.
Sarah’s heart beat faster when she let go of Papa’s hand and stepped into a dimly lit room with wide open windows. She marched right up to her teacher and introduced herself: “Hello, ma’am. I’m Sarah Breedlove.”
“Why hello, Sarah! It’s lovely to meet you. I’m Mrs. Peacott.” The teacher led Sarah to an empty table.
Sarah perched on a wooden bench and picked up her very own piece of chalk.
Sarah loved school. She loved how the chalk slid across the board. She loved learning how to form letters and numbers in wobbly lines at first and then in careful swirls.
But Sarah’s education ended as quickly as it had begun.
After only three months, the state of Louisiana decided not to spend money on school for black children like Sarah. Hundreds of children went back to work in the fields, never to become politicians, lawyers, or business owners. But Sarah had learned a valuable lesson in the classroom: to dream of possibility.
CHAPTER TWO
Louvenia took all that Sarah owned and put it in the middle of a scratchy wool blanket on their parents’ bed: a metal cup, a small plate, Sarah’s Sunday dress, Papa’s work scarf, and Mama’s spoon. These few belongings were all that was left now that Sarah’s parents had passed away.
As Louvenia was about to tie the blanket into a sack to make it easier to carry, Sarah grabbed Papa’s work scarf and held it to her nose. It smelled like his sweat after a long day’s work, thick and earthy. The scent brought fresh tears to Sarah’s eyes.
At eight years old, Sarah became an orphan and had to leave the only home she’d ever known to live with her older sister Louvenia, her brother-in-law Jesse, and her baby nephew Willie.
Sarah had barely set down her sack in her new home when Jesse stood over her. She felt a shiver travel down her spine.
“You can stay here, but you’re going to earn your keep,” Jesse told her. “You will clean the house, cook breakfast, pick cotton, and watch your nephew. You can find washing work in town, too.”
Doing laundry was the hardest job of all. Every morning, Sarah carried clothes to the river and scrubbed them clean against a wooden washboard. Then she struggled up the slope with the wet clothes weighing on her small body. She reached up high to pin them on the clothesline to dry.
The next day, she had to do it all over again.
On Sundays, Sarah felt a little spark of joy when she got to see her brothers at church. Even then, they only managed a quick hug after service. Jesse snapped at her to hurry up so that she could get her chores done.
James bristled when he heard the impatience in Jesse’s voice. “Stay strong, little sister,” he whispered.
The pennies Sarah earne
d didn’t make up for the fact that work was getting scarce in their small town. The family hoped to make a better living in nearby Vicksburg, Mississippi. They moved but life wasn’t much different, Sarah realized.
~
“Sarah!” Alexander tugged Sarah into a warm hug.
All of Sarah’s brothers had moved to Vicksburg, too. Alexander had a good job at a grocery store, stocking shelves, mopping floors, and helping customers with heavy bags. He worked hard but he still had some time for his baby sister.
“You’re late,” Alexander chuckled, turning the grocery store sign from open to closed.
Sarah grinned and grabbed his hand. “Come on. Let’s go!”
Brother and sister stepped out into the sunlight. Sarah peered in all the shop windows. She wondered what it would be like to sit on a sofa with cushions soft as clouds. She wanted to pluck a feather from one of the hats on display and feel it glide across her fingers. What if she could wear shoes so shiny she could see her face in them?
A steamboat horn thundered, making Sarah’s body rumble. She watched the boat chug up the river and wondered where it was headed. She hoped that it was going somewhere magical, to a place where no one went to bed hungry and little girls could go to school instead of working so hard.
“Sarah,” Alexander said, setting a heavy hand on her shoulder. “I’m leaving Vicksburg soon.”
“Leaving? But you just got here!”
“Don’t look at me like that.” Alexander’s face got so serious that the center of his forehead wrinkled. “It’s not safe for me here anymore. We’re going to St. Louis where there’s more black people and hopefully less lynching.”
Sarah didn’t say a word. She knew what happened to black people sometimes. She knew white men got angry and rode their horses around: burning houses and churches, yelling, even killing black people. Mama and Papa had called it “lynching.” She’d heard them whispering, but they’d stopped whenever Sarah got near. They hadn’t wanted her to know about those things.
“C’mon, lil sis.” Alexander’s voice got soft and low as he tugged her along the riverbank. “Let’s get something from the sweet shop. What would you like?”
“Peppermint?” Sarah asked in a small voice.
“Peppermint it is.”
A few weeks later, Alexander, James, and Owen headed to St. Louis, Missouri, to find work in a barbershop. Her brothers all kissed Sarah goodbye and promised to write.
But her heart ached, just like when Mama and Papa died.
CHAPTER THREE
Sarah dreamed she was sitting on the porch in Papa’s lap, with Mama close by. The three of them gazed at the stars . . .
“Get up!” Jesse growled, startling Sarah out of her sleep. Jesse snatched the small wool cover off Sarah’s body and tossed it to the floor. “You gonna sleep the day away? Get out there, gather the eggs, and fix me some breakfast. I won’t stand any laziness in my house! Lazy girls don’t deserve to eat.”
The day before, Sarah had awoken before the sun rose to churn butter, prepare breakfast, and haul laundry down to the river, and she’d worked hard until long after it had set. But that didn’t matter. Every day was the same.
Sarah’s brothers still hadn’t sent for her, so she needed to find a way out of her misery on her own. But Sarah was only fourteen and couldn’t afford to live alone yet. The quickest way was to share the burden of earning a living with someone else. She thought she knew of someone.
She put her plan into action at the next church fish fry.
“Miss Olive, let me take my turn at serving,” Sarah said, stepping in to take the spoon. For a few months, she’d had her eye on a nice young man at her church named Moses. And now here he was, waiting in the serving line.
“Hi, Miss Sarah,” Moses said with a big ole smile on his face.
Moses admired how kind and eager Sarah was. She was always the first to raise her hand to answer questions at Bible study, and the first to volunteer at bake sales. He loved her wide brown eyes and how her smooth skin glowed in the sunlight.
“Hi yourself, Moses. I fixed this special for you,” Sarah said sweetly. She handed him a plate heaped high with fish, field peas, cornbread, and pickled watermelon.
It didn’t take long for Sarah to convince Moses she’d be the perfect partner.
Within weeks, Sarah and Moses snuck off to get married. The young couple exchanged vows, took each other’s hands, then jumped over a brightly-decorated broom handle together. This was called “jumping the broom” just like Sarah’s parents had when it was illegal for slaves to get married.
~
Sarah liked her new life. Although she missed her sister, she didn’t miss Jesse’s yelling. Moses had two good crop seasons in a row, allowing Sarah to breathe a little easier. They had extra money to buy what they needed and even some of what they wanted.
Each night, Moses came home, set his boots by the door, and greeted his wife. One night, he brought home two peppermints sticks: Sarah’s favorite!
“What’s the special occasion?” Sarah laughed as she held the sticky candy.
“To remind you how sweet life is when we’re together,” Moses said.
Three years later, Sarah and Moses had a baby girl named Lelia. Sarah adored her daughter. She wanted to build a world around Lelia full of joy and kindness.
“Good morning, sunshine!” she sang every morning, bouncing Lelia on her knee.
Sarah especially loved her baby’s hair because it was nothing like her own. Sarah’s hair was dry, crunchy, and itchy. She wished she had the tools she needed to style it. Though even if she did, she didn’t know any hairstyles to try. It was thin and kept falling out, so she wrapped it up in a big piece of fabric.
Sarah worried that Leila’s hair would end up like hers, so she tried to protect it. Once a week, she sat Lelia on her lap and combed out the tangles in her baby’s hair. Then she styled it into little puffs tied with brightly-colored ribbons.
Sarah remembered how good it felt to have her Mama play with her hair. It felt like love, and she wanted Lelia to feel that, too.
“I’m going to make your dreams come true, little baby,” she whispered into Lelia’s ear.
For a while, it seemed those dreams were possible. Then Sarah’s happiness came to an end. One night, her beloved Moses went out to a meeting and did not return.
Sarah rocked Lelia to sleep and sat anxiously by the door, waiting to hear her husband’s footsteps on the porch. The hours ticked by and still, no Moses.
The next morning, Sarah received the terrible news. Moses had been killed, and someone whispered that word again: “Lynching.”
Just like that, Sarah was a widow at age twenty with a toddler to raise by herself.
~
After Moses was buried, Sarah knew she had to leave Vicksburg. She bought two tickets on a boat headed north up the Mississippi River.
Sarah sat on the floor in the belly of the boat among the pigs, sheep, and goats. It was the only space onboard she could afford. Everything she owned was wrapped in a blanket once more. She held Leila tight in her arms, cupping her little daughter’s head against her chest, trying to drown out the throb of the engine.
After a while, they both fell asleep to the rocking of the boat.
CHAPTER FOUR
St. Louis, Missouri, was unlike any place Sarah had ever seen! She nearly hurt her neck standing on the sidewalk to gaze up at the tall buildings. She heard words in languages she’d never known existed. Her attention jumped from store to store and person to person as she tried to take it all in. She wondered what it would be like to have dinner at a restaurant instead of having to cook every meal. She gaped at the tiny train called a “streetcar” that shuttled people to and from their destinations like a colorful steel horse.
St. Louis felt big, electric!
The first place Sarah went was her brothers’ barbershop. “I’m so proud of you!” she cried and looked around, beaming. Every mirror in the place smiled back.
Alexander plucked Lelia out of Sarah’s arms and held her up in the air, laughing. “Well aren’t you pretty, lil peanut!”
Lelia giggled back.
“We’re glad you’re here, Sarah, but it’s tough to make a city living. What will you do for work?” James asked.
“I’ll be a barber just like you,” Sarah teased.
“You can if you put your mind to it,” Owen piped up.
Sarah was grateful for her brothers’ encouragement and hopeful for her future. But without an education, she could only work the same jobs she had before. With a sigh, Sarah went back to washing laundry and cleaning houses.
Sarah made just a dollar a day so she lived in the only place she could afford: the Badlands. The Badlands was the most polluted, dangerous part of St. Louis. But Sarah found joy, despite it all. She joined a church and made new friends. Her friends told her about an affordable school for Lelia.
Sarah worked harder than she had in her entire life to make sure her daughter received the education she never had. Sixteen years flew by. Lelia thrived at school and went on to earn top grades. Sitting in the audience at Lelia’s high school graduation, Sarah thought this had to be the proudest she’d ever felt.
Then Lelia got accepted at Knoxville College in Tennessee!
Like her Mama had scraped coins together in jam jars to pay for a wedding, Sarah made sure Lelia had enough for her tuition. She was determined her daughter would never have to work as a washerwoman, and encouraged her to get a beauty degree.
While shopping for Lelia’s college supplies, Sarah spotted a bottle that made her stomach turn. It had a picture on the front showing a black woman with kinky hair next to what looked like a white woman with straight hair. “You too can be beautiful!” the label read.
“They’re calling us ugly,” Sarah grumbled, stomping down the aisle to show Lelia the bottle. “Just look at this shampoo!”
Lelia’s nose wrinkled in disgust. “I don’t want that, Mama.”