The second part of our interview with Mr. Griffin Lotson brings us to our final episode of season two. Mr. Lotson continues his story about Kumbaya. Works discussed: Drums and Shadows: Survival Studies Among the Georgia Coastal Negroes and its connection to Mr. Lotson’s story about Kumbaya as well as the infamous Old Man Thorpe father to my third great grandmother Ethel “Effie” Proctor. He also shares how he became the manager of the nationally acclaimed Geechee Gullah Ring Shouters.

Music in this episode is courtesy of the Free Music Archive from Makaih Beats “Reflection” (licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License) and Tlebi by Noura Mint Seymali is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 'Come by Here,' aka 'Kumbaya sung by H. Wylie. Recorded by Robert Winslow Gordon in 1926 (courtesy of The Library of Congress)

Episode Image: Du Bois, W. E. B. The Georgia Negro Darien, McIntosh Co., Ga. Distribution of Negro inhabitants. Georgia Paris Darien France, ca. 1900. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2013650364/.

Rounding out the final two part episode of season two, is Mr. Griffin Lotson, Georgia Commission Vice Chair for the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor Commission,Chief Executive Officer of the non-profit Sams Memorial Community Economic Development, Inc., and manager of the nationally acclaimed Geechee Gullah Ring Shouters. I sat down with Mr. Lotson last year to discuss his own deep roots in McIntosh County, Georgia heritage and his work to share Gullah Geechee culture globally. He talks about being a part of the beginnings of the creation of the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor Commission and how this culture work brought him to share the true story of the famous folk song Kumbaya. He also shares a very personal story about how he altered the patterns of his cultural speech to meet the violent expectations of assimilation to “buckra culture" and how proud he is to see so many returning and reclaiming the culture as he did many years ago.” Music in this episode is courtesy of the Free Music Archive from Makaih Beats “Reflection” (licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License) and Igaghi Anwu by Ugo Mbaise is licensed under a Attribution 4.0 International License. 'Come by Here,' aka 'Kumbaya sung by Henry Wylie, Recorded by Robert Winslow Gordon in 1926 is courtesy of The Library of Congress.

We continue our conversation with Adolphus Armstrong of the Lowcountry DNA Project in this episode. We return once again to the issues of land, removal, heirs property, and exploited labor as those topics relate to Harris Neck and beyond. We also talk about the book The Half Has Never Been Told : Slavery And The Making Of American Capitalism by Edward E. Baptist and how the patterns of enslavers trafficking stolen African people across the country are seared into the DNA of Black folks today. We also talk about the fantastic podcast Tilling the Soil put out by the staff of the Whitney Plantation, a 200 acre former sugar plantation in Louisiana. You can contact Adolphus about the Lowcountry DNA project on Ujima Genealogy’s Facebook page if you think you have Coastal Georgia roots and want to learn more.. Music in this episode is courtesy of the Free Music Archive from Makaih Beats “Reflection” (licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License) and ”Umbigada” by Kiko Dinucci, Juçara Marçal, Thiago França (licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License).