keep kids from starting to smoke . … So , that influenced me a lot to think about the fact that the time when people are really influenced is during the middle grade years . That is when I was most influenced . I remember being in eighth grade and being impacted and changing a lot of my attitudes about a lot of things about people and the world . I also I have to tell you , my initial career goal was to be a middle school teacher . So when I graduated from college , I ... was getting a master ’ s in education and also teaching in New Jersey public schools . That didn ’ t work out for me , but I never forgot the kids that I worked with . my grandfather was different , you know , and it was very close . So the relationships in the book reflect the relationships in my nuclear family in Greensboro and in my grandparent ’ s home in Wilmington , where they were raising their grandchildren . And I went to visit them every summer . And we stayed anywhere from two weeks to a month and it had such a profound influence on me . And that is why my debut novel is not about the home that I grew up in , but the environment that my grandparents created .
TM : Why set the novel in 1939 ?
TM : You certainly remembered well . I will say that I was not a 12-year-old boy in 1939 . But I can think back to when I was 12 and it certainly resonates with me , now . Something else that resonates with me , Sandra , is that you make it clear that while the story is fictional , some of the characters are based on real people , and you explain in an appendix some of the names you chose to use . But what I ’ m wondering about , beyond the people , are some of the relationships in the book and if those are based on real people — because this is the real magic of this novel . You create a secure , nurturing world in a place of segregation , extreme violence , bigotry and hatred , but that nurturing place seems very , very real . Where did these relationships between Cato and Grandpa Vee , Hope , Luke , Rev , Trace and others come from ?
SH : My homes . The homes I grew up in . First of all , my grandfather and my grandmother just established a very welcoming and warm home . What people don ’ t realize is that even in segregated times , Black children were often insulated from a lot of things . Some were not , many were not , but many were . I grew up in Greensboro , North Carolina , which is the Piedmont area . It is , you know , the home of many colleges . … So it ’ s a different kind of environment . I felt that , after I grew up , I know that I was insulated from a lot of the racism that was going on at the time . I lived right down the street from my elementary school , my middle school and my high school . And I had a five-minute walk to school . My father worked at the post office , my mother was a hairdresser . … My grandfather was very strong ; I call him fearless . I mean , in a time when people might call a Black man boy , everyone called him Mr . Arthur . Wow . And I thought , wow , you know , there ’ s something different about this . He could read at a time when many of the people in his church could not . So no ,
SH : The kids I ’ m trying to reach . I wanted the era to be pre-war and I wanted to find an era that I could , in some sense , relate to that was not so far ago . So , I didn ’ t want it to be my grandfather ’ s childhood , because that would have been a little too foreign to me . ( In the story ) my grandfather is actually Papa Vee . My grandfather ’ s reflected in Cato ’ s grandfather . I was born in ’ 47 , so I figured I could I pick a time that I could relate to and do some research and recreate that world for everyone . Now , the specific year 1939 is because there ’ s a scene in there where Gran ( tends ) the wounds of Isaac , her grandson , after his injury , and I discovered that the fishing line that was used in that scene was not available to the public until the year 1939 .
Author Sandra W . Headen Photo courtesy of Holiday House
TM : I wouldn ’ t have guessed that answer . The friendships that develop between Cato and Trace and finally Luke and Rev are born out of forgiveness and a willing to go past the personal and kind of societal ignorances that they were dealing with at that time to keep them separated . And this was 1939 . So this is a difficult question , but how are we still dealing with the same issues today — and what do we do about it ?
SH : Well , that is a hard question , and I don ’ t have an answer . I can ’ t tell you how those friendships exist in the book because I ’ m not sure I got this accurate as a child as I look back on it . My grandfather had … a man who used to come by , a white man , who used to come by and help him do things . And I perceived them to be friends . Later , it wasn ’ t so ( clear ) they were really friends . But I perceived them to be friends and I thought , oh , that ’ s interesting , and I grew up thinking that they were friends . So that was one piece of information that went into my making the friendships in the book . I had a writing teacher who told
34 • MERIDIAN LIFE