To wrap up our celebration of Black History Month and the Afro-Latino identity, we take a look at the life of author and activist Piri Thomas.
“I am ‘My Majesty Piri Thomas,’ with a high on anything like a stoned king. … I’m a skinny, dark-face, curly-haired, intense Porty-Ree-can—Unsatisfied, hoping, and always reaching,” wrote Piri Thomas in the prologue of his famous memoir, Down These Mean Streets. The memoir, which Thomas once called “an explosion from [his] very soul,” details his crime ridden youth, the racial bitterness of his experience as a dark-skinned Latino, and the ultimate rebirth that led him to pursue a life of activism to turn youth away from crime.
Juan Pedro Tomas was born to Puerto Rican and Cuban parents in El Barrio, East Harlem, in 1928. In the first years of his life, his father lost his job during the Great Depression and his family lived through a period of extreme poverty. Thomas inherited his father’s black skin, and grew up feeling isolated even from his own lighter-skinned siblings. When his family moved to Long Island, he faced intense racism from his schoolmates and peers and even within his own family. He moved back to Harlem as a teenager, where he began to use drugs and became involved with youth gangs. As he befriended African Americans, he began to grapple with issues of race and status in society, which eventually motivated him to travel the South with a black friend. In later years he recalled being forced to give up his bus seat as they crossed the Mason Dixon line.
In the 1950s, Thomas landed himself in prison for seven years after a botched nightclub robbery resulted in the near-death of an off-duty police officer. While in prison, Thomas turned to writing and earned his high school diploma. After being released, he vowed to use his own street and prison experience to help steer other youth away from lives of crime. He began work in a church-supported group ministering to Harlem youth, and became one of the most effective “gang workers” in New York.
In 1967, Thomas received a grant from the Rabinowitz Foundation that helped him publish his memoir, Down These Mean Streets. In his book, Thomas vividly captured his youth, upbringing, his time in prison, and his understanding of race, identity, and painful social truths. The book details his tale of personal growth and commitment to a socially responsible existence, and made him one of the first Puerto Ricans to win literary acclaim. In his lifetime, he published three more books and wrote a play and other material for television specials. He also lectured in schools and universities throughout the country. In the 1990s, Thomas and his second wife, Suzie Dod, launched and promoted a program called “Unity Among Us,” which emphasized the dignity of all human beings. After a long life of activism, he passed away in 2011, at the age of 83.
Check out the rest of our Black History Month features: Afro-Latino studies pioneer Miriam Esther Jiménez Roman, Queen of Salsa Celia Cruz, and the only Dominican member of the Tuskagee Airmen, Esteban Hotesse.