BLACK NO MORE
Being an Account of the Strange
and Wonderful Workings of
Science in the Land of the
Free, A. D. 1933-1940
By George S. Schuyler
McGrath Publishing Company
College Park, Maryland
Reprint McGrath Publishing Company 1969
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 75-76119
Manufactured in the United States of America
by Arno Press, Inc., New York
Copyright, 1931, by
The Macaulay Company
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO ALL
CAUCASIANS IN THE GREAT REPUBLIC
WHO CAN TRACE THEIR ANCESTRY
BACK TEN GENERATIONS
AND CONFIDENTLY ASSERT THAT
THERE ARE NO BLACK LEAVES,
TWIGS, LIMBS OR BRANCHES ON
THEIR FAMILY TREES.
PREFACE
Over twenty years ago a gentleman in Asbury Park, N. J. beganmanufacturing and advertising a preparation for the immediate andunfailing straightening of the most stubborn Negro hair. Thispreparation was called Kink-No-More, a name not wholly accurate sinceusers of it were forced to renew the treatment every fortnight.
During the intervening years many chemists, professional and amateur,have been seeking the means of making the downtrodden Aframericanresemble as closely as possible his white fellow citizen. Thetemporarily effective preparations placed on the market have so farproved exceedingly profitable to manufacturers, advertising agencies,Negro newspapers and beauty culturists, while millions of users haveregistered great satisfaction at the opportunity to rid themselves ofkinky hair and grow several shades lighter in color, if only for abrief time. With America's constant reiteration of the superiority ofwhiteness, the avid search on the part of the black masses for some keyto chromatic perfection is easily understood. Now it would seem thatscience is on the verge of satisfying them.
Dr. Yusaburo Noguchi, head of the Noguchi Hospital at Beppu, Japan,told American newspaper reporters in October 1929, that as a result offifteen years of painstaking research and experiment he was able tochange a Negro into a white man. While he admitted that this racialmetamorphosis could not be effected overnight, he maintained that"Given time, I could change the Japanese into a race of tall blue-eyedblonds." The racial transformation, he asserted, could be brought aboutby glandular control and electrical nutrition.
Even more positive is the statement of Mr. Bela Gati, an electricalengineer residing in New York City, who, in a letter dated August 18,1930 and addressed to the National Association for the Advancement ofColored People said, in part:
"Once I myself was very strongly tanned by the sun and a Europeanrural population thought that I was a Negro, too. I did not suffermuch but the situation was disagreeable. Since that time I havestudied the problem and I am convinced that the surplus of the pigmentcould be removed. In case you are interested and believe that with theaid of your physicians we could carry out the necessary experiments,I am willing to send you the patent specification ... and my generalterms relating to this invention.... The expenses are so to saynegligible."
I wish to express my sincere thanks and appreciation to Mr. V. F.Calverton for his keen interest and friendly encouragement and to mywife, Josephine Schuyler, whose coöperation and criticism were of greathelp in completing Black No More.
George S. Schuyler
New York City,
September 1, 1930
BLACK NO MORE
CHAPTER ONE
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