This is such a bizarre concept in the modern age that you almost wonder if Sowell has gone bonkers and is inventing the memory of it.
An era when the people of Harlem were too proud to take charity?
To the modern ear, it sounds like a fairy tale.
No, I’m only 48 years old, and I remember it. Sometimes it does seem like I dreamed it, though.
I’m 57. I grew up poor but I didn’t know it at the time. My parents looked on getting money from the government as a shameful thing. It was an admittance of failure. They never took the available even though some neighbors did. My parents spoke disparagingly of them, and rightfully so.
I guess I'm an old fart. I recall my mother giving an older lady bags of clothing with the statement that "...she might know someone who could use these...we had out grown them."
There was a time when the preservation of dignity, even in charity was paramount.
Demean a few generations, though, and there is no pride left.
My dad tells tales of their childhood, when they were poor (large farm family) during the depression, but too proud to take charity.
Our (my siblings and I) favorite story is one about his school lunch. The other kids in grammar school would take regular sandwiches, of bread and meat or the like to school. My dad took a biscuit with collards or tomato gravy (i.e. something they had grown in their garden on a leftover biscuit from breakfast.) They ate in a common area, outside, and he was often teased at lunch, so his teacher would bring a "regular" sandwich from home and offer it to him. He refused, because he knew it was charity.
But the wise teacher soon outsmarted the elementary school boy. She'd ask him, "What did you bring for lunch today?" To which he'd reply, "A biscuit with collards." Then her standard line became, "I love biscuits with collards, do you want to trade me for my sandwich?" And to trade was "okay"...so he would, and then he'd go outside to eat with the other kids, "regular" sandwich in hand.