[Kirkwood]

There is a documentation of their taking place, if you don’t want to take my word for it. Do a google search of blackface or minstrel shows. These reports match my recollections very well. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minstrel_show
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackface

I never said they were in the South. I remember them up north from the theater circuit and on broadcast TV shows.

General public performances in the US trailed off at the end of the 1960s, but certainly private shows went on for another decade. The All in the Family program in the 70s was making a social comment on the fact that these minstrel shows still existed.

[Meet the New Boss]

Here’s what I can tell you. In those days I lived in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Mississippi and Louisiana.

I did not lead a sheltered life, far from it. I attended all manner of shows, circuses, sporting events and other performances.

NEVER ONCE did I see or hear of an honest-to-god blackface minstrel show performed for the general public. I’m not talking about what some jerkface fratboys were doing, or some skit on a tv show, or what some liberal d-bag writers had Archie Bunker doing.

Now if you are telling me that white folks up north performed straight-up blackface minstrel shows for the public, then I’ll just take your word for that.

I don’t remember the black church burnings in Arkansas either, but Bill Clinton did tell me about them.