Reclaiming a Black family’s history as American history
Written by Black Hot Fire Network on October 26, 2022
ALBANY — As a boy growing up in Albany’s South End, Jahkeen Hoke often heard his grandfather and great-uncle punctuate a family story with the adage: “Ain’t it great to be a Hoke?”
This puzzled young Jahkeen.
Abandoned early on by his father, Hoke and his younger sister were raised by a single mother who worked weekends, extra shifts and grinding hours as a CDTA bus driver to provide for them.
They sometimes needed public assistance to carry the household from paycheck to paycheck as poverty loomed like storm clouds on . . .
