Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing

It isn't necessary for us to trace our lives back to kings and queens to inspire the next generation. There is inspiration in the way ordinary people do ordinary things.

The notation in the plantation journal of planter Iverson Graves, written in 1866 and discovered by Mjenzi Traylor in the summer of 2014 at the Emory University library, is an example. The short six-word notation, "Jim Shaw returned with his family today," tells us volumes about who Jim Shaw was.

He was born in 1817 on one of the islands of the Caribbean, where he was enslaved. His granddaughter, Corene Durden Perry, tells the story that he told her:

“He remembered his enthusiasm when he was sailing away on a ship at the age of nine. He left his mother crying on the dock. He was so happy because he thought he was taking a ride and then would return to his mother. He arrived in Newton County, GA with a group of slaves and was bought on the courthouse steps by Joseph Shaw as a body servant for his son who was the same age. When the son left for college, Grandfather Jim went along.”

We don’t know much about what happened to Joseph Shaw, his son, or how Jim Shaw came to be connected to the Iverson Graves plantation. But we do know this: After the Civil War, in the chaos of the defeated South, with few material resources but with the love of his family powering him, Jim Shaw helped nurture one of the four (or five) original branches of the Traylor family.

How? He adopted and cared for Malinda, the daughter of Susan Graves, the woman who became his wife, and the plantation owner Iverson Graves. Malinda was 11 when Iverson Graves made his six-word notation in his journal. Note that he did not write "Jim Shaw returned with his family and my daughter today."

But we can be grateful that Malinda Shaw never wanted for a father. Jim Shaw cared for her the same way he cared for Cora, the infant daughter he and Susan had together in 1866. Twelve years after her birth father noted that her adoptive father had returned with his family, Malinda started her own family with Elijah C. Traylor, Sr.. She gave birth to eight Traylor brothers and one sister. We should all be grateful that she had the amazing example of Jim Shaw, who lived to be 111 years old, to teach her what to expect from a real father.

Jim Shaw is not related to the Traylor clan by blood. But he helped to make the Traylor clan possible. We should all know more about the people who have made our families possible, through slavery, war, lynching, world wars, the Great Migration, the Civil Rights Movement, and more.

We believe that every family has ordinary people whose stories should be known, celebrated, and shared.

We are Lift Every Voice LLC, and we do stories. Find out how we can tell your family story at www.lifteveryvoicellc.com

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