A piece of personal history of Bebop Jazz and Muslims

Submitted by Susan (United States), Dec 29, 2013 at 09:08

Dr. Pipes,

Thanks for this interesting article which really pricked at some of my personal history! I am also a child of the 'beat generation' 1950's and 60's pop jazz culture. It was cool to call 'black Muslims' your buddies if you were and art/ intellectual/ poet type making a statement against the age of segregation before it became a 'movement'. I share some of that history with David Horowitz's description of himself as a leftie. My husband and I, then dating, were among the few whites who frequented the Showboat and Peps music bars in South Philly to hear people like Coltrane and Mingus play. It was a friendly atmosphere for the few 'artsy, intellectual' whites who would hang out there. Later, of course, in the 60's black Muslims took on a strong militant and political edge. Who knew then that it would become a full fledged ideological/ cultural/ religious war. I appreciated the tour through old times.

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