African Diaspora at Internet Archive: Portia Smiley

Since I've been sharing older collections of folktales from South Carolina, I thought I would include this article from the Journal of American Folklore which feautures 38 stories plus riddles, proverbs, toasts, and folkways: Folklore from Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and Florida by Portia Smiley, published in 1919. (Stories #11-25 are the ones from South Carolina.)

Portia Smiley was a graduate of Hampton Institute, and Mary McLeod Bethune later hired her as one of the first teachers at the Bethune-Cookman School in Daytona Beach, Florida in 1910. You can read more about Mary McLeod Bethune at Wikipedia.

Here is a list of the story titles in Smiley's article: Does a Cow have Pigs? ~ Big-'Fraid and Little-'Fraid ~ Digdee Owl ~ Takes No Risk ~ Don't help the Bear ~ Wolf's Tail to the Hungry Orphan ~ The Lord and Toby ~ Master Disguised ~ Dirt-Dauber ~ How Duck saw Day ~ Out of her Skin ~ The Lover warned ~ The Murderous Mother ~ Us ~ Witch-Cat ~ Zip! Zip! ~ The Blind Old Woman ~ Running Hand ~ Incriminating the Other Fellow ~ Racing a Ghost: Buried Treasure ~ Buried Tail ~ The Girls who could not talk Proper ~ Seeking the Lord ~ The Imitative Choir ~ The Diviner ~ The Single Ball ~ The Deer-Stalker ~ Jonah ~ Who darkens that Hole? ~ Where did Adam hide? ~ Three Sweethearts ~ Two Daddies ~ You ridin', you walkin'? ~ The Little Girl and her Snake ~ The Deacon and his Son ~ Heaven Hot, Hell Cold ~ Hell in Heaven ~ Dilatory Buzzard.

For more contributions from the Black folklorists affiliated with the Hampton Institute, see the anthology: Strange Ways and Sweet Dreams: Afro-American Folklore from the Hampton Institute.

Meanwhile, the stories collected by Portia Smiley await you, just a click away at the Internet Archive!

Folklore from Virginia, South Carolina,

Georgia, Alabama, and Florida

by Portia Smiley