One Crazy Summer

One of the important contributions the novel makes to children's literature is its representation of political movements during the 1960s from the perspective of children. The novel demonstrates how the events of one summer help Delphine Gaither understand the importance of black identity and civil rights. 

At the beginning of the novel, Delphine’s perspective of civil rights is largely shaped by the values of an older generation. Big Ma and Louis Gaither (Delphine's father) teach Delphine that one should avoid making a “grand Negro spectacle” (2) at all costs because doing so would shame other African Americans. In Louis’s opinion, the abuse he suffers at the hands of a state police officer in Alabama is “Same old same old” (124)—nothing remarkable that needs to be addressed, not even for his terrified children, who do not understand the poor treatment he receives. Delphine’s outdated beliefs about black identity are evident when she thinks that her mother's natural hair texture is strange. She also finds it strange that Cecile doesn’t keep a hot comb in her house to straighten her hair when pool water makes it revert to its natural texture. 

Children's participation in civil rights marches—as well as the abuse and murder of children by white supremacists during the 1960s—became important moral arguments for ending segregation and legal discrimination against African Americans. Activists such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Huey Newton actively recruited children because their presence made a powerful argument for racial equality. The murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till in 1955 in Mississippi by four white men, who were later acquitted, proved that innocence was no protection against racism for African-American children. The murder of four African-American girls in the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, an important meeting place for civil rights activists in Birmingham, Alabama, forced many to realize how vulnerable children were to white supremacist violence. Newspaper pictures of African-American children being sprayed with firehoses and attacked by police dogs in Alabama in 1964 were crucial in convincing the Kennedy administration to become more engaged in the civil rights movement. By 1968, children such as Delphine were starting to realize that they could play a key role in securing their own equality.

Several experiences in Oakland impact Delphine's beliefs about black identity, black power, and her ability to participate in black liberation, despite her young age. Crazy Kelvin's lecture about the inappropriateness of Fern carrying around Miss Patty Cake, a white doll, is the first event. Kelvin’s harsh tone initially makes Delphine protect Fern and ignore what he says. However, she eventually wonders if there is something wrong with Fern’s attachment to Miss Patty Cake. 

Other events that have an impact on Delphine are the lessons that Sister Mukumbu gives her and the other children at the People's Center. Sister Mukumbu teaches the children 1) that change and revolution are natural processes, 2) an alternate history that celebrates black figures, 3) the importance of one’s rights and how to demand them, 4) evidence of police brutality influencing the lives of children at the center, and 5) the inability of adults to protect children from inequality. All of these lessons raise Delphine’s racial consciousness and help her appreciate the importance of the civil rights movement.

Toward the end of the novel, Delphine has evolved into a girl who understands what her rights and desires are and how to demand them. For example, she identifies Cecile as the authority figure in her life, or the Establishment, and demands that Cecile provide the girls with a TV. She also protects her sisters from the police during her mother's arrest, and she recruits local businesses to advertise a rally. When confronted with racial bias in a souvenir shop in San Francisco, she criticizes the shop's owner and refuses to spend her money there. Finally, rather than seeing the rally at DeFremery Park for Bobby Hutton as an embarrassing “Negro spectacle” (2), she sees the event as a “grand black spectacle” (192) in which she is proud to have played a part. 

The culmination of Delphine's new identity occurs at the end of the novel. Her decision to resurrect Fern's Swahili name, “Afua,” shows that Delphine values her family's connections to Africa. Delphine, who never draws attention to herself at the beginning of the novel, becomes an empowered person who is proud of her black identity by the novel’s close.

The most devastating event in Delphine's life is her mother's abandonment. Delphine is almost 6 years old when Cecile leaves. Williams-Garcia uses Delphine's developing maturity to illustrate the evolution of Delphine's understanding of her mother and her mother's decision to abandon her daughters. 

When the novel begins, Delphine shares Big Ma's ideas about Cecile. According to Big Ma, Cecile neglected the most basic duty of a mother: being present. Cecile’s early actions in Oakland—refusing to allow her daughters into the kitchen, refusing to prepare meals for them, refusing to call Fern by her name, and stating that she “[s]hould have gone to Mexico to get rid” (26) of her daughters (a reference to abortion that Delphine partially understands)—all prove to Delphine that Cecile is indeed a bad mother. Faced with Cecile's refusal to be a traditional mother, Delphine takes on an older sister/surrogate mother role that she finds both burdensome and empowering. 

Delphine’s belief that Cecile is a bad mother is challenged when she convinces Cecile to let her enter the kitchen to prepare a home-cooked meal for Vonetta and Fern. While in the kitchen, Delphine encounters her mother “fixed in prayer” (109); that is, engaged in making poetry and art in the form of prints. After this experience, Delphine is forced to see her mother as something more than the woman who abandoned her daughters. She realizes that her mother is an artist, first and foremost. 

Several events challenge Delphine to re-evaluate her acceptance of her role as an older sister/surrogate mother to her younger siblings. When Cecile insists that Delphine shouldn't “‘be so quick to pull the plow’” (110) and that she should be “selfish” (110) sometimes, Delphine is unable to reconcile this advice with her sense of duty and responsibility as an older sister. Later, however, her younger sisters begin to establish identities of their own. Fern manages to overcome the teasing she receives for carrying around a white doll, and both Fern and Vonetta rebel when Delphine tries to keep them from attending a rally. Delphine also begins forming friendships outside of her family, and she acknowledges her attraction to Hirohito Woods. These age-appropriate developments remind Delphine that she is an 11-year-old girl who can and should act like a child occasionally.

When Delphine decides not to inform her father or grandmother of Cecile's arrest for a full week, Cecile gives Delphine a lecture that makes Delphine angry and causes her to acknowledge that she is indeed a child. Cecile tells Delphine about the difficult life she lived before marrying Delphine's father. Her story is confusing and painful for Delphine to hear, but it forces Delphine to come to terms with her identity as a daughter and Cecile's identity as a mother. Delphine realizes that she has parental figures in her life—her father and Big Ma—while her mother had none at her age. Cecile’s advice to Delphine to “[b]e eleven” (209) encourages her daughter to be a child who relies more on the adults in her life. 

Delphine also adopts a more nuanced understanding of her mother. She is stunned when Cecile tells her that she considered taking Delphine with her when she left their family because Delphine never demanded anything from her. Celine’s confession helps Delphine realize that her mother's decision to leave her daughters behind when she left was a good one because Cecile was not, and still is not, capable of nurturing children. 

It is difficult for Delphine to process the realization that her mother’s abandonment was the best decision Cecile could have made at the time. However, Delphine soon learns to be more compassionate toward her mother. The next morning, Delphine doesn't get upset when Cecile complains that Delphine told Fern that her real name is Afua. This shows that Delphine has decided to accept her mother, rather than hold her to a standard she could never meet. 

Delphine is not the only one who has learned to accept Cecile for who she is. In the final scene of the novel, the three sisters “hug [their] mother and let her hug [them]” (214). The hug signifies that Delphine and her sisters are finally ready to accept whatever love their mother is able to give them.