“Each step of success has never meant arrival for Charles McPherson. Growing up in the rural south of Hickory Hill, South Carolina, among the suppression of the 1960s, he set his vision on a place far beyond his environment. The author, husband, and father of two now lives and writes in Jackson, New Jersey, where his career as a computer engineer and financial advisor pauses to write about a place he has come to appreciate, a place he willingly thought he had left behind, a special place where family and community build strong character, untiring work ethic, and determination.”
LifelineExtensions: Charles, LifelineExtensions.blog is absolutely honored to have you as our guest today. Would you start out by telling our readers a little bit about yourself – your background, education, and career?
Charles: Thanks for having me as today’s guest. Well, I was born in South Carolina and attended all-black schools in South Carolina through high school. Once I’d graduated from high school I moved to New Jersey, and soon after moving enlisted in the Navy.
After serving in the Navy, I returned to New Jersey and the Navy covered the cost of my attendance at William Paterson University, where I received a degree in Business & Economics. It was there that I met wife, Tauilei, whom I’ll celebrate 28 years of marriage with this August of 2009. We have two children, ages 13 and 15; and we live in Central New Jersey.
LifelineExtensions: Who is your primary target audience for South of Charleston, The Journey?
Charles: I think I wanted the book to be a book that talks about family, and how family molds your character. My hope is that families of all kinds and from all walks of life will grasp the idea of how the family unit works together to make the family a whole, secure, and stable entity.
I’d also like for readers of the book to clearly see the importance of understanding how traditions and customs are carried on in different families.
South of Charleston, The Journey hopefully shows that the best way to do this is to make sure you have valid documentation about the traditions and customs, so that the messages are fluidly translated and passed along from one generation to the next.
The other portion of my target audience are those people who feel they may go through life without clearly defined direction or purpose. If you have a strong faith like I do, you know it is okay to sometimes not have clear direction at a given time; but, you have to always be working toward something.
Whether you know or not exactly what that “something” is…and it will be different for everyone simply because our experiences are different… you have to be working toward something. I talk about that in the book.
After moving from South Carolina to New Jersey, I enlisted in the service because I just wasn’t quite sure at that point exactly where I needed to be heading. I consider that decision a good one since I not only learned about service and discipline while in the Navy, but the Navy allowed me to go to college once my term of service had ended. That’s when I moved back to New Jersey, got accepted into William Paterson University, and met my wife.
Overall, the diverse target audience of readers should all know that their individual journeys are extremely important and worthy to be shared and heard. And, whether or not your journey seems important to someone else, it has to be important to you.
LifelineExtensions: How would you describe South of Charleston, The Journey to high school teachers and college instructors who might consider including the book on their annual book lists for students? What description would you give to others who might consider the book as a monthly read for a book discussion group's talk?
Charles: Focusing on my specific family in the post-slavery era provides another current learning tool for teachers and instructors to use during instruction with this current generation.
South of Charleston, The Journey is a user-friendly way to help the students understand that their parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents came through a time filled with a tremendous amount of local and global controversy and obstacles.
However, despite the conflicts and hurdles our ancestors had to overcome, they managed to raise their families and stay focused on a designated purpose. Having a source of belief and faith in their lives and in their ability to excel and succeed provided them with the strength and help they needed to remain focused.
I’d also like for the teaching and learning about South of Charleston, The Journey to include helping readers of all ages find out what their individual roots are. This helps to give a good understanding about how different modern times are from the times when generations of people before us lived.
If we can point kids back to their critical foundational roots so they get a clearer picture of who they currently are; they will automatically begin to gain a firmer understanding and appreciation of why they are who they are.
However, despite the conflicts and hurdles our ancestors had to overcome, they managed to raise their families and stay focused on a designated purpose. Having a source of belief and faith in their lives and in their ability to excel and succeed provided them with the strength and help they needed to remain focused.
I’d also like for the teaching and learning about South of Charleston, The Journey to include helping readers of all ages find out what their individual roots are. This helps to give a good understanding about how different modern times are from the times when generations of people before us lived.
If we can point kids back to their critical foundational roots so they get a clearer picture of who they currently are; they will automatically begin to gain a firmer understanding and appreciation of why they are who they are.
This will also provide clarity about where they presently are in life; as well as where and how far they may be destined to go in the future.
LifelineExtensions: What led you to write the book?
Charles: When I looked back on my days of growing up, I quickly recalled that I was fortunate to have had my parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents living either with or close by me. Something these individuals always did was to tell stories about people. But, there was never anything written down – all of the re-telling about people and events was shared orally.
The only things written down were kept in bibles about births and deaths. When I considered writing about my childhood and experiences, I knew this was something that I wanted and needed to put on paper.
This way, my own kids, nieces, and nephews would be able to read the accounts and say, “Oh, this is what Dad or Uncle Charles and his grandparents and great-parents were like. Now we get what he was saying about the time when…”
Realistically, I knew I couldn’t document everything – there is a lot of history by the time you reach mid-adulthood. But, I really wanted to provide short, easy-to-read, and easy-to- comprehend stories about the history and traditions enjoyed and embraced by my own family.
LifelineExtensions: How long did it take you to complete the book from start to finish?
Charles: I started the book in 2000 while vacationing on a beach in Manasquan, New Jersey. The thoughts just started coming back to memory, so I simply wrote down each thought as it came to me.
During the first five years of writing, I would just throw thoughts on paper. This was without having any real documentation – just memories of mine, those of my siblings, and of other members of my family.
In 2006 I began actually formatting the book in terms of coming up with the content, and framing it so that it would have a logical and sensible flow. The published book has now been released in 2009.
LifelineExtensions: Which parts of researching facts for the book were the most personally interesting to you? Tell us why the interest level was so high for those parts.
LifelineExtensions: Which parts of researching facts for the book were the most personally interesting to you? Tell us why the interest level was so high for those parts.
Charles: I’d mentioned earlier that I grew up around my parents, grandparents, and great-parents, but I really never thought as a child growing up about their backgrounds and how they grew up. Nor did I ever even consider the possibility that their childhoods may have been significantly different than my own.
For me, when I started gathering data and information about my grandparents and great-grandparents, I was finding out things I never knew about them. When I started asking questions about how they made their living and how they came together as couples that allowed me to get to know more things about my mother and father; let alone about the generations before them.
Very honestly, I didn’t have a clue as a child about the specific details regarding my family members. I suppose I should have known as a child or teenager, but I didn’t become aware of intimate details about my parents, grandparents or great-parents until the book writing process began; and I dove into asking a lot of specific and pointed questions.
And remember, these relatives either lived in the same house with me or just up the road from my house!
But, in keeping with being a typical kid; the importance about this kind of rich family information about our history didn’t take shape until my mid-adulthood that day on the beach.
LifelineExtensions: If readers would like to complete their own personal memoirs or self-published books, what recommendations would you give to them to help at least start the process?
Charles: If that’s in your heart and you feel like you want to put some memoirs or family stories together…start right where you are.
Sit down and take the time to think about the things that you currently value and think are important for family and for life, in general. Thoughts, ideas, customs, and traditions you want to leave behind for future generations to build their lives upon and continue progressing with.
I didn’t go the traditional way of following the blueprint spelled out in some of the current books about writing and self-publishing. For some individuals using the advice in these resources has served them well, but I opted not to take that route.
Basically, I said, “I have these thoughts in mind so I’m just going to start noting them on paper.” I had no idea the outcome and result would include me actually holding the book South of Charleston, The Journey in my hands to speak with you about today.
LifelineExtensions: Charles, tell us about a book or a few books that most influenced your life?
LifelineExtensions: Charles, tell us about a book or a few books that most influenced your life?
Charles: Going through college there were a lot of books that came across my path that increased my curiosity about African-American culture.
Stolen Legacy was a book I read in one of my college classes. This book really got me interested in finding out about my roots.
Then, when I began to write South of Charleston, The Journey; Alex Haley’s Roots helped greatly with how to best document and chronicle the genealogy portions.
James McBride’s The Color of Water is another book that really touched me. And, President Barack Obama’s Dreams From My Father served to further motivate me to share the story about my own individual journey.
http://www.jamesmcbride.com/
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Dreams-from-My-Father/Barack-Obama/e/9781400082773
Everybody has a story. The authors I’ve named are very famous people. But, I said to myself: “I’m just Charles McPherson and no one knows me.” For me, reading the books mentioned and other books I've read helped me to understand that my story is just as important as everyone else’s; and that I, too, have a journey to boldly speak and write about.
LifelineExtensions: Before we wrap up, please share anything else you would like LifelineExtensions.blog readers to know either about you, or about South of Charleston, The Journey.
Charles: I did not know when this project started back in 2000 exactly where it was headed; and I certainly didn’t know I’d have a finished and published product in my hands nine years later. Even though I started and had the faith to continue writing the book, I just didn’t know what the end result was going to be.
But, I continued to have the faith to believe that the writing process would turn out to be something extremely good and useful to many others. I also knew there was a reason things would turn out good -- there would be people of all ages and from any and every walk of like who would read the book to draw upon as they began to frame out stories regarding their own lives.
There are some individual stories in South of Charleston, The Journey about things that happened to me.
But, at least one common link that is evidenced between people of every race, ethnic group, nationality, background, and position in life is that there are individual stories that we all have about our journeys.
I encourage everyone to get their hands on a copy of South of Charleston, The Journey to read for themselves about my own story and that of my family’s history, traditions, and customs. Let the reading inspire you to write your own journey's story.
LifelineExtensions.blog readers can also go to our website for a book or author overview, and for information about ordering copies on-line:
But, I continued to have the faith to believe that the writing process would turn out to be something extremely good and useful to many others. I also knew there was a reason things would turn out good -- there would be people of all ages and from any and every walk of like who would read the book to draw upon as they began to frame out stories regarding their own lives.
There are some individual stories in South of Charleston, The Journey about things that happened to me.
But, at least one common link that is evidenced between people of every race, ethnic group, nationality, background, and position in life is that there are individual stories that we all have about our journeys.
I encourage everyone to get their hands on a copy of South of Charleston, The Journey to read for themselves about my own story and that of my family’s history, traditions, and customs. Let the reading inspire you to write your own journey's story.
LifelineExtensions.blog readers can also go to our website for a book or author overview, and for information about ordering copies on-line:
Or, people can Google my name and type in South of Charleston, The Journey to find excerpts from the book. There’s one chapter posted on the website to provide a clear understanding about the theme and focus of the book.
Finally, if anyone would like to contact me directly about arranging book signings or about having me speak at conferences, meetings, or workshops; they can e-mail me directly at: charles.mcp@gmail.com.
Finally, if anyone would like to contact me directly about arranging book signings or about having me speak at conferences, meetings, or workshops; they can e-mail me directly at: charles.mcp@gmail.com.
LifelineExtensions: Charles, on behalf of all of LifelineExtensions.blog readers, thank you for not only this interview; but for sharing the story of your journey with the world. We can already sense that great things beyond your expectations will result from your writing of South of Charleston, The Journey.
Sharon M. Biggs, M.A.
Educational Leader
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