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Reaching early adolescence in Mobile, Alabama, where responsible black people might be harassed or even killed if they dared to register to vote, Moore’s parents hastily transplanted the entire family to California after the savage murder of young Emmett Till, evoking Moore’s racial and cultural questioning. Even in California, he encountered racism as ingrained, hateful, and dangerous as it was in the South. His technically qualified father had to take work that prevented him from entering the homes of white people, and his mother would work as a maid for racially biased white folk. In high school, Moore was berated by a nun for suggesting gender equality and told that his brain size was “only a fifth of Caucasians.” After military service, Moore became an influential teacher of Black studies and embarked on a deeply meaningful journey to Egypt and other African countries, where his view of himself and his race took on new meaning.
With photos, maps, language exploration, and a broad knowledge of world and Christian history, Moore effectively shares his fresh perspectives. He logically asserts that the Egyptians who conceived and built the pyramids and created such fine sculptures as the Great Sphinx and other lasting monuments would, in fact, have been black people. He believes this ancient history has been largely ignored in the US in favor of “400 years of slave history.” Seeing an undeniable similarity between his own facial features and those of the pharaohs was further confirmation, making him feel both proud of this heritage and betrayed by the socio-cultural norms he was raised with. A visit to a Nigerian village, surrounded by black-skinned folk and welcomed as an ancestral relative, provided unique insights. Moore’s lively, intelligently arrayed memoir can provide inspiration for persons of every race and could easily prompt others to engage in their own research into racial history and injustice..