The Book
The Story of an American Family
The documented and remembered record of one Black American family across nine generations — from a Maryland origin, down the river to Louisiana, and into the present day. Begun in the voice of the author's uncle, John Arthur Jones, and finished in his memory.
About the book
Nine generations, by name and place — and the woman restored to memory at last.
Once Proud Lions follows a single family line from Maryland through the parishes of Louisiana and into the twenty-first century — kept, generation to generation, in records, headstones, and remembered speech. It is a sequel to Keeping Up with the Joneses (2008), the earlier volume co-authored with the author's uncle, John Arthur Jones (1942–2005), in whose voice this book began.
At its heart stands Ritta — an ancestor the rolls nearly erased — brought back, at last, by name and to memory. What a reader carries away is the shape of an American century as one family lived it: what was taken, what was kept, and what it costs to remember. She taught us, reads a headstone in a Smoke Bend cemetery. This book is the proof.
The Newsletter
Follow the journey of Once Proud Lions to publication — and the hidden mathematics behind the modern world, in occasional, considered letters.