personalities on Heart To Heart with Belliyah On Tuff Classic, going by the series of events related to this powerful woman activist in America and the world, in which a smaller dream of hers, drove into a massive achievement, is what could be likened to the life and struggle of the emancipation of Africans, the Mental Slavery and being a voice of the Mother-Land in general in which Queen Mother, Dr Delois Bakely represents.
In this interactive interview, she takes us inside her world, to the time of her early days as a child, and her dreams while riding through memory lane which had pushed her to become a world-known voice. Let’s meet Queen Mother, Dr. Delois Bakely.
Interview Excerpts
Belliyah: Queen Mother, it is an honour to have the privilege to go on this journey of rare interaction with you and have seen and heard a lot about you, especially your struggles, the big vision and dreams for Africans and African-Americans generally, we would, first of all, want to know who Queen Mother is, where you are from, where did you grow up and who are your Parents?
Queen Mother: It is an honour as an elder to share my life journey with you…I was born on the Independent Day of Nigeria, October 1, 1941. But as an elder, my age will be doubled from another Queen Mother, Queen Mother Audley Moore who lived almost a hundred years old in whom I carry her legacy. As a little girl who grew up in the deep South which is known as Fort Lauder-dale Florida popularly known as the Gator Town with Alligators, and growing up as a youngster, I loved, enjoyed and spent time living with the Native Americans, those referred to as the American Indians or Indigenous people. I was a child who enjoyed the outdoors and ways of life in the community and I enjoyed Berries and being around Berries. So, I had so much freedom in the Deep South as you just never worried about being kidnapped because the community created an environment of security for you. So I had to grow through a society or a community feeling free. And as a child, I felt as free as a bird.
And about my mother, as a child, I lost her in childbirth at a very precious age when I was 3 or about 4 years old, though when she was alive, I was a child that longed for the attention of my mother because my mother was a house-wife and my father was the breadwinner and provided for us, and I was a child you will consider sickly, and this is what can be medically referred to as Asthma, and because of that, I had my mother all to myself and didn’t have to compete with my other siblings. And as a little girl, my mother allowed me lots of freedom and most of the time, I would put on my mother’s wears, like her clothes, shoes, lipstick and makeup, and I would perform in front of the mirror and most times when I ran outside to play, I will be scolded by the neighbours. So I was also raised by the neighbours, and because of this, it was so hard for anyone to get into some very bad behaviours because the neighbours were there to correct them, it was very hard for one to get into mischievous behaviours because someone was always watching you.
And most times, when I go to another extended home where you have an elder, that is, the neighbourhood grandmother, I usually enjoy going over to her place, as I would join her in her kitchen because she bakes and makes some delicious cakes and pies and so because I love the pancake and usually when she’s done, I go over licking the pans because I enjoyed doing that. I usually enjoyed myself so the community was a second family for me, during the early stage of my life many times, I spent a greater part of my time indoors with my mother and because of my Asthma, I got to know about the herbs which is, the traditional form of healing and so I learned to use herbs as a child to treat worms and other things. While growing up, I used to go about without some shoes because I wanted to feel the ground and am glad that I had a mother who allowed me to be a child, and don’t remember my mother spanking me but she gave me a great deal of freedom, and she just had to speak to me, I listened and I followed, even though I still had my way but basically, my mother virtually knows what am doing at any given moment.
So when I lost my mother, as a young child, it was very hard for me to behold as she died during childbirth but even then, I didn’t clearly understand that, so at this point, my father, took up the role of our mother in catering for us, however, when my mother was around before her death, my father being the breadwinner, will come back home and throw me and my sisters up in the air, as he catches us but then the closeness as to my mother who stays with me and who was always at home was not to be compared to that of my Father. However, my Dad did all he could to close the gap and vacuum my mother left, making sure he was there for us throughout, even as we kept growing. And I remember asking my Dad at the time my Mom Dad, where she was and I could still recall my Dad that “Mom was never coming back”.
Related Links:
- Heart to Heart with Belliyah – Learn more about Belliyah’s show and other inspiring interviews.
- Queen Mother Audley Moore – Discover the legacy of Queen Mother Audley Moore, whose legacy Dr. Bakely carries.
- Martin Luther King Jr. – Explore the life and achievements of Martin Luther King Jr.
- Malcolm X – Learn about Malcolm X’s impact on the civil rights movement.
- Traditional Healing Practices – Read about the traditional healing methods that influenced Dr. Bakely.
Belliyah: So, what’s the relationship with your father like, since losing your mother at that very young age?
Queen Mother: When my mother died, my father quickly switched to the role of my mother, taking care of five young girls. My father loved us so much and at this point, that’s when I began to feel my father’s love, though he still goes to work when he gets back, he still does his usual routine of throwing us up and then asking questions of what we ate, how we spent our day, if we went to the playground, he did manage us well even from afar, even though other women from the neighbourhood took up the responsibility of preparing food for us and taking care of us while he was away. So while I and two of my other siblings went to school because we could already talk by then, my two other younger siblings were taken care by the women from the community, since they were still very young and couldn’t properly speak yet. But then, in spite of the circumstances of having to take care of us, all by himself, my father promised he was going to be there and keep us together, and I remember asking my dad “If he was going to give me a lot of food” and he promised he was going to do that, and while many thought my father won’t be able to handle it, raising five girls all by himself or that maybe he will split us, he didn’t do that, so he kept us together as we all grew together.
At some point when we became a little older, we told our father he needed to find us another mother and we found a woman for ourselves. It has nothing to do with my father, though for our sakes, my father accepted our choice which was my mother’s beautician. That was the woman we chose for our father, she was also the same woman who got us prepared during my mother’s funeral.
At some point because of the absence of my mother, I grew quite close to my father that every time he came back, I wanted to follow him everywhere he was going. My father’s name was James, however, called Jimmy.
my older sister was his loved daughter, as she was named after him. But, I was always competing for the love of our father with Jimmi-Lee (older sister) as a little girl but my father loved all of us.
My father worked with the Steel and construction company and he grew up as part of the Indigenous man, his mother was Lizzie Walker, a native American and there was one time when my father took me to my grandmother, Lizzie Walker, and I cried so hard asking my Dad not to leave me behind because my grandmother lived in a different city (Alabama) and she was a tall and was a woman of few words, and during my short stay with her, I didn’t connect with her like I did with my mom and I would often be by myself, talking to myself. However, my father was a man that women loved, especially when my mother died, my father was open to a new relationship, he had this charm about him and was strongly built, and so because we were already longing for another mother, we wanted to make the choice ourselves. But whenever my father got entangled with women, he kept it far off, however, it was the women that came to the house, that he avoided, nonetheless, I know my father loved my mother.
And while we found him a wife, I and my older sisters went and asked the woman if she would like to be our mother and she agreed, I was the spokesperson in the family, when we told our father we already asked out the woman, he didn’t really hesitate. So, on the side of this woman we chose for our father, despite her having a big space house and a big business, my father never moved in there but we constantly visited her and spent some time in her house and as time grew, and then later as time passed, my father began to share his space with her, though in the best of my knowledge, I am not sure my father did marry her legally.
However, in raising us, my father taught us some very vital things, like obedience and while we were growing up, he instructed us not to bring any male friends into the house and we obeyed. And because of that, we didn’t experience so many of the things most young girls had to deal with, because while he provided us with all we needed, he loved and protected us and showered us with lots of love. My father was a good listener, he listens and wants to hear what each of us wants to say and that made us compete even more as we wanted to be heard the most. At a later time, my father got us a bigger house, which made us have our separate bedrooms, my father made sure we lacked nothing so we didn’t have to worry about food and other necessities, and he even went as far as arranging with the manager of a grocery store nearby to give us anything we want, just in case we get we needed anything from the store. While he was away. And so, we lived well as a child and didn’t need to be in want, because my father made sure we had anything we wanted.
Belliyah: You were born in the 1940s, how was your life experience like then, as at the time, when there were no equal rights, no equal justice etc. compared to the era of today, where there’s a craving and fight for absolute equal rights between the Blacks and White, and being a young Black girl, who had to interact and also go to school, what was the general experience like?
Queen Mother: I lived in a black community and went to a public school, you don’t mix with the Whites. We lived in isolation at that time, we lived like a little village in Africa while the Whites lived in theirs, so I went to a black community school, and didn’t mix with them at all as we were not exposed to them.
The only time I experienced the Whites, was when my father took us out to the Grocery store where I wanted to get my step-mother a clock and that was the experience I had as a young little girl of them. So I only knew of the community I lived in.
Belliyah: Did you ever feel desired to mix with the Whites, I mean they were humans like you, after that first encounter or experience you had about their existence, were you inquisitive or did you ever desire to mix up with them and get to know who these humans were?
Queen Mother: I can’t want to do anything with folks I know nothing about. Like I said, we lived in our Black community and everything I needed was in my black community so I wasn’t exposed to the Whites. So I have no idea of them but at that time I was either thirteen or fourteen years old. I learnt about the Catholic Church, while my family were Baptist, they were preachers and religious leaders in the Church. However, my father permitted me to join the Catholic Church if I chose to, and that was how my experience with the whites came about.
When I started attending, I was allowed to sing because of my beautiful voice, even in the all-Black school Community I attended, I was allowed to sing because I sounded like Marian Anderson, and I have always wanted to sing like her, I was told and rehearsed with her records. And again in my Black School Community, there are some of the students who were high yellow, and I had always wondered why they turned out the way they were, while on the other hand instead of longing to mix with them I was always in isolation as I was always bullied because they considered me looking like an African Boo Boo that has rope in between its leg, swinging in the jungles because I was dark, with thick lips, broad nose and nappy, curly hair and I would always go home and cry to my father and tell him I was being bullied by some students because I was ugly and so Black. And most times I would cry in secret wondering why my classmates called me ugly. And the boys didn’t also come for me because of my Blackness as I didn’t look anything like the high yellow girls, so I didn’t experience a boyfriend relationship as I didn’t have to take down my panties for any of one, and that also shielded me from getting pregnant or having babies at such a young age while other girls were getting pregnant and having babies at the early ages of thirteen and fourteen however, my father did tell me one time when I had cried to him about the bullies, and because I was close to him and could tell him anything, and he told me that “Beauty lies within” and that helped build my confidence.
To be continued
