Just Another Nigger: My Life in the Black Panther Party by Field Marshal Don Cox (PDF)

Description

Just Another Nigger is Don Cox’s revelatory, even incendiary account of his years in the Black Panther Party. He participated in many peaceful Bay Area civil rights protests but hungered for more militant action. His book tells the story of his work as the party’s field marshal in charge of gunrunning to planning armed attacks—tales which are told for the first time in this remarkable memoir—to his star turn raising money at the Manhattan home of Leonard Bernstein (for which he was famously mocked by Tom Wolfe in Radical Chic and Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers), to his subsequent flight to Algeria to join Eldridge Cleaver in exile, to his decision to leave the party following his disillusionment with Huey P. Newton’s leadership. Cox would live out the rest of his life in self-imposed exile, where he began writing these unrepentant recollections in the early 1980s, enjoining his daughter to promise him that she would do everything she could to have them published—with the title he insisted upon, a nod to W. E. B. Du Bois’s remark that “In my own country, for nearly a century I have been nothing but a nigger.”

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “Complex, provocative…. A gripping record of a fraught era.”—Kevin Canfield, San Francisco Chronicle“Plainspoken and direct, Cox’s writing achieves an eloquence that makes it exceedingly readable, never losing the drama of the story he is telling.”—Ron Jacobs, CounterPunch“An excellent addition to the pantheon of Panther literature.”—Publishers Weekly“Intimate and exciting…a valuable primary-source recollection from a turbulent time.”—Kirkus Reviews About the Author Born in Missouri in 1936, Don Cox joined the Black Panther Party one year after its founding in 1966. Appointed as the party’s field marshal, known as “D.C.,” he was inducted into the party’s high command as a member of its central committee and founded the party’s San Francisco office. In 1970, he helped open the party’s international section in Algiers. Two years later, he resigned from the party. Except for a brief trip when he entered and exited the United States incognito, using a false passport, he lived in France in the village of Camps-sur-l’Agly, where he died at age seventy-four in February 2011.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Much better than expected. This is an excellent recount of one perspective from the struggle.

⭐Absolutely fascinating, and relevant to what’s going on in today’s world.

⭐Good, straightforward memoir, with apparent honesty that probably wouldn’t have been available in 1972 or while he was still alive (he intended that publication be posthumous), with many passages almost an unfunny comedy of errors, by a Black Panther Party warrior leader who likely kept a warrior’s frame of mind till he eventually died nearly 40 years later.The author was, according to the book (I read a library’s hardcover), in charge of various military operations for the Black Panther Party, what he described as part of war, and he clearly was skilled and professional, professional and legal not being the same thing. The Party was a legendary and inspirational American leader in the Black civil rights movement or Black Power movement, along with Martin Luther King Jr.’s SCLC, Malcolm X’s Nation of Islam, the NAACP, SNCC, and some others. The Party was murderous and Marxist and its peak period was about six years; given what they undertook to do, the counterpressures were largely inevitable; there were murders, attempts, and threats by and against Panthers and by and against police; the people who run any organization are humans with variables and the Party was no different in that regard. Where he omits facts, probably to protect people, you can read between the lines for the idea of what likely was left out. His take on Cointelpro is interesting. His take on the role of women in the Party is also interesting; he wanted to read a book by a sister, although that led me to wonder about the omission of Elaine Brown. He discusses the split between members who would coalesce with allies (maybe not the Weathermen) and those who would not, Black nationalists; he favors building alliances. He argues that the larger societal conditions that led to the Party’s formation and violence have gotten worse since, but he may have finished the manuscript before Obama’s Presidency (also, he died before Trump’s candidacy). Various former Party leaders have gone in different directions, as is true of people from most organizations, just as the society around them has changed; he seems to have changed not so much as another Panther did. There’s not much on the political, economic, or social conditions of the 1960s U.S. but other books cover that and the omission left room for the important content that he gave. It lacks an index.A linguistics side point: The book illustrates both acceptable and unacceptable uses of the n-word. The author was entitled to use it as he did.The book will be useful mainly to community organizers and law enforcers seeking to understand what can happen and to academics as a source. It is an important part of understanding how civil rights were sought.

⭐An honest commentary on Field Marshall DC’s experience in the Panther movement. What is important to know is that he believed he had an obligation to improve life for black people. His idealism contributed to his success, but left him disappointed when he realized that not everyone shared his motivation. In light of some of the recent movies, If Beale Street Could Talk, Black Klansman, The Green Mile, this narrative allows a glimpse into the original purpose of the party.The book is an easy read and provides a more accurate picture of the Panthers which is very different than the narrative the FBI and the media portrayed. This is aA must read for anyone who would be interested in understanding of the country’s Civil Rights movement.

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