The Person Who Influenced Dad's Decision In Joining The Marines

The fateful meeting with James Huger in Clifford Primus' hometown of  Daytona Beach, Florida obviously influenced the teenager. Even today, my father vividly described the six stripes up and six stripes down on Huger's uniform. James Huger, as my dad would say in his own parlance, "Is a heavy dude." Heavy meaning "serious and intense", for my English as a Second Language Readers.

Source: newsjournalonline.mycapture 

Mr. Huger credits two women for making a difference in his life:  His wife of 71 years, the late Phanye Huger, and Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune. Dr. Bethune founded Historically Black Bethune-Cookman College in Daytona Beach, Florida. She was also close friends with Former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and was a leader in civil rights. I envision Phanye Huger as a very supportive and intelligent woman; she was a school principal who I am willing to bet impacted many lives.

 Source: vintageblackglamour tumblr.com
Dr Bethune and students at the college* she founded. 

James Huger moved to Daytona Beach, Florida from West Palm Beach, Florida. His father was a prominent minister who housed Dr. Bethune at the Huger home in West Palm Beach, as people of color could not stay in hotels. Later on, James Huger worked at Bethune Cookman and earned a degree in Business Administration from West Virginia State University. Bethune helped him get a job in the War Department, and he enlisted into the U.S. Marine Corps in 1941. 1941 was the year that the Marine Corps finally accepted African-Americans. The Marines were the last branch of the American armed forces to do so.


James Huger also served as general secretary for Alpha Phi Alpha, Inc., the nation's first Black fraternity and service organization, in 1939.  It was Huger and several of his Alpha brothers who years later went to fellow Alpha brother Dr. Martin Luther King's Miami trial. Mr. Huger and his friends "were shocked how King was treated by his own attorney." Dr. King's attorney  referred to his client as that boy. (Iinformation obtained by Daytona Times, April 6, 2012.) Huger and others assisted Dr. King financially. They raised significant amounts of money for the civil rights movement.

Huger was asked by Bethune to be in charge of the first UNCF (United Negro College Fund) for Bethune Cookman-College. To date, UNCF has raised more than 2 billion dollars to help a total of more than 350,000 students to attend college, more than any entity outside of the government. (Source: UNCF.org)

Source: alumniunit.com

If you were African American and were fortunate enough to go to college in the South during the first half of the 1900s, you went to a Historically Black College or University (HBCU). Higher institutions of learning did not accept African Americans, hence Black land grant and private intuitions were established. Most were established after the American Civil War and in the South except for two in the state of Pennsylvania and two in Ohio. Ohio and Pennsylvania prohibited slavery;  three of these Northern HBCUs were established before the Civil War.     (Source: U.S. Department of Education, 2008-01-17, White House Initiative on HBCUs)

What better person to get my father to enlist in the Marines than James Huger? A hometown hero, college graduate, officer, and a man of honor?


*White Hall, a building on Bethune-Cookman's campus, is listed in the National Registry of Historical Sites

Jim Crow and Segregation

                                                                 Source: socialstudiesforkids.com



Can you imagine living your entire adult life making a sacrifice for your country and not even being acknowledged? Some people get upset when they hold open the door for someone and they don't even get a thank you. Or when driving, a driver might let another car enter in front of them in traffic. Where is the courtesy wave, you might ask? The door and driving incidents are slights that one can basically brush off. But putting your human life on the line is pretty serious. The thousands of African American who enlisted in the Marines during the 1940's did so willingly, and my father insisted that he wanted to serve as a soldier in combat.

What is also interesting to note is that the United States had Jim Crow Laws, which were laws that prohibited Blacks from living in certain neighborhoods, to work in certain occupations, or to eat in restaurants. Segregation was the law of the land and water fountains, rest rooms, movie theaters, schools, buses, and trains insured that races were kept apart. Interracial marriages were illegal and a Negro could be arrested if they broke these laws. Jim Crow Laws were intense in the South, where slavery had a stronghold. The South was considered the area of the country below the Mason- Dixie in Maryland. Northern states, which did not allow slavery had discrimination as well, but the discrimination was less intense, covert and subtle.

When discussing Jim Crow with my students, many of them wondered why Blacks were treated so badly during these times. I would explain that in order to enslave someone, you had to make them feel inferior. You  had to make sure that their living conditions were substandard, and not allow them to read or congregate. Families were separated. Rules were established to make Negros "know their place". Tragically, Negros were beaten if they did not obey their slave masters.

The Civil War (1861-1865) was fought to preserve the country, because Southern states seceded over the issue of slavery. Enslaved Africans provided free labor for wealthy Southern plantation owners. Blacks worked long hours picking cotton and farming, creating a thriving economy. Enslaved Africans often tried to escape slavery by fleeing to the North. Sophisticated networks and codes were enabled to outsmart slave owners and slave catchers. Both Northern Blacks and Whites participated in the Abolitionist Movement, a movement that included women to officially end slavery. Once the Civil War ended and slaves were free, the same Segregation Laws persisted. Montford Point Marines were/are descendants of enslaved Africans. Such were the conditions that many of Montford Point Marines grew up in: discrimination and Jim Crow.

                                                           " Separate But Not Equal"                      
                                                               Source: worldfamousphotos.com

But despite this, Montford Point Marines signed up to be a recruits. They signed up and served their country even though they were treated like second class citizens. The Montford Point Marines were some of the  brightest African American men selected.  According to my dad, he loved his dress blue Marine Uniform. He was proud to wear it when he returned to Florida, but it was challenging to wear the heavy wool jacket in the humid weather!  He wore it during a visit  home in July, parading his uniform up and down Second Avenue in Daytona.