Bringing People Closer Together

<p>Jon and Randall talk with Thomas C. Marsh and Thomas Daniels, Co-Authors of Black and White Like You and Me, about how to bring people closer together.</p> <p>Thomas C. Marsh<br /> Nickname | Cookie</p> <p>Born in 1951 in Laurel, Mississippi, I moved to Detroit, Michigan with my family as an infant and I’ve been here ever since. We spent summers in Mississippi to visit family. I had a public school upbringing but was firmly grounded in church. I have a graduate degree in social work from the University of Detroit. I’m married to Annette and we have seven children. My wife and I enjoy our yearly trips to Jamaica or some other Caribbean locale.</p> <p>My nickname of “Cookie.” When I was little, I loved cookies and would charm my great aunt into making them for me. So I became known as her “cookie nephew.” The name stuck all these years. If you’re in the city of Detroit and you mention Cookie Marsh, most people will know who I am.</p> <p>My ancestors can be traced to slavery and African roots. I realize the fear, anger, and hardship these relatives went through only for one reason: the color of their skin which they had had no control over. My Mother and Father settled into Mississippi because that is where their parents and grandparents were born. Obviously, they had no control of how they looked or where they lived during their younger years.</p> <p>My dear, deceased Father, in search of a better life for himself and his family, heard of work at the car companies in Detroit, Michigan in the early 1950s. Can you imagine the courage it took for him to uproot leaving everything familiar behind? Can you perceive the fear he must have faced in order to find a better opportunity for him and subsequently for me? I adore him for that decision.</p> <p>Coming to Detroit afforded him a job, a better way to make a living. But where would he live? The choices for blacks were limited to say the very least. My Father settled us in at the Jeffries Project which I tell you about in the book. He left the comfortable and familiar