Our Roots Run Deep: the Black Experience in California, Volumes 1-4, changed the lens that California heritage has been viewed through. Since the publication of Volume 1 in 1991, Our Roots has established the role of the story of Queen Calafia and her island nation of black women warriors as the founding narrative for California history. Editor John William Templeton has built the series on the primary sources that engage and confirm the amazing stories of 500 years of black presence in the state. The series won a Sesquicentennial Commendation from the California Sesquicentennial Commission in 1998 and the Laureate award from the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library in 2002.

Special sale offer! Through November 30, 2006. All seven titles in the Our Roots Run Deep classroom kit plus the DVD of the Our Roots Run Deep documentary for just $99.95

It was the source of the exhibitions Our Roots Run Deep at the California Historic State Capitol Museum in 1995 and the Los Angeles Central Library in1996 and Queen Calafia: California Black Heritage Confirmed Through Public Art at the William Grant Still Arts Center in Los Angeles in 2004 and the San Francisco African-American Historical and Cultural Society Gallery in 2005.

The primary sources can be used to localize and stimulate learners who tackle California, U.S. and world history in grades four, seven and eight.

Volume One covers the period from 1500 to 1900, including the Gold Rush years when black land barons and merchants battled between each other for political supremacy in the Mexican province of Alta California, leading to decisions to tether the area's fate to the United States.

Volume Two addresses the years from 1900 to 1950 when Pullman porters established many of today's contemporary neighborhoods in major coastal cities, ex-Buffalo Soldiers built all-black towns in the Central Valley, black farmworkers dominated the Imperial Valley and entertainers helped create the motion picture industry and the idiom of jazz music.

Volume Three looks at the transformational period from 1950 to 2000 when the talent and initiative of the demographic wave that migrated to California during World War II burst forth into political prominence, sports glory and entertainment magic. It also tracks the frustration of civil disturbances in major locales as many of the hopes went unmet. The final chapter includes maps and guides to hundreds of historic sites on the black experience around the state.

The Black Queen: How African-Americans Put California on the Map, Volume 4 of Our Roots Run Deep, is a unique resource geared to parents and educators with twelve themes on the black experience in California, geared to grade-levels. Following those lesson plans are the short features on the 150 Most Historic Black Californians.

Other Learning Resources

The Black Students Internet Guide is an annotated guide to more than 400 pages with useful, culturally congruent content by subject relevant for learners of African descent. Rather than unleashing students into a world of unhelpful images, teachers can guide them to the significant learning resources to supplement written materials which often ignore the black experience.

Reach Wisely: the Black Cultural Approach to Education is the product of fifth generation teacher Annalee Walker's comparative analysis between the successful black-run schools of the rural South with the conditions facing black students in most urban classrooms. She concludes that there are ten critical differences in teaching strategies and outlines those distinctions in an easy-to-apply fashion that is well-loved by teachers. One Los Angeles educator says, "I go to sleep with my copy by my bed."

Do Not Call Us Negros: How Multicultural Textbooks Perpetuate Racism by Professor Sylvia Wynter, patron saint of Caribbean intellectuals and founder of black studies at Stanford University. This iconic treatment was originally submitted to the California State Board of Education to refute the decision to adopt a Houghton-Mifflin social science textbook. She gives an intellectual paradigm for assessing the impact of race and racism in the educational process. In concert with the work of Carter G. Woodson, Wynter shows teachers how to counteract the negative impressions that many students come to class with.