Part 1 (2/2)

Joseph and Katherine.

Joseph Walter Jackson was born on 26 July 1929, to Samuel and Chrystal Jackson in Fountain Hill, Arkansas. He is the eldest of five children; a sister, Verna, died when she was seven. Samuel, a high school teacher, was a strict, unyielding man who raised his children with an iron fist. They were not allowed to socialize with friends outside the home. 'The Bible says that bad a.s.sociations spoil youthful habits,' Chrystal explained to them.

'Samuel Jackson loved his family, but he was distant and hard to reach,' remembered a relative. 'He rarely showed his family any affection, so he was misunderstood. People thought he had no feelings, but he did. He was sensitive but didn't know what to do with his sensitivities. Joseph would take after his father in so many ways.'

Samuel and Chrystal divorced when Joseph was a teenager. Sam moved to Oakland, taking Joseph with him, while Chrystal took Joseph's brother and sisters to East Chicago. When Samuel married a third time, Joseph decided to join his mother and siblings in Indiana. He dropped out of school in the eleventh grade and became a boxer in the Golden Gloves. Shortly thereafter, he met Katherine Esther Scruse at a neighbourhood party. She was a pretty and pet.i.te woman, and Joseph was attracted to her affable personality and warm smile.

Katherine was born on 4 May 1930, and christened Kattie B. Scruse, after an aunt on her father's side. (She was called Kate or Katie as a child, and those closest to her today still call her that.) Kattie was born to Prince Albert Screws and Martha Upshaw in Barbour County, a few miles from Russell County, Alabama, a rural farming area that had been home to her family for generations. Her parents had been married for a year. They would have another child, Hattie, in 1931.

Prince Scruse worked for the Seminole Railroad and also as a tenant cotton farmer, as did Katherine's grandfather and great-grandfather, Kendall Brown. Brown, who sang every Sunday in a Russell County church and was renowned for his voice, had once been a slave for an Alabama family named Scruse, whose name he eventually adopted as his own.

'People told me that when the church windows were opened, you could hear my great-grandfather's voice ringing out all over the valley,' Katherine would recall. 'It would just ring out over everybody else's. And when I heard this, I said to myself, ”Well, maybe it is in the blood.”'

At the age of eighteen months, Katherine was stricken with polio, at the time often called infantile paralysis because it struck so many children. There was no vaccine in those days, and many children like Joseph's sister Verna either died from it or were severely crippled.

In 1934, Prince Scruse moved his family to East Chicago, Indiana, in search of a steady job. He was employed in the steel mills before finding work as a Pullman porter with the Illinois Central Railroad. In less than a year, Prince and Martha divorced; Martha remained in East Chicago with her young daughters.

Because of her polio, Katherine became a shy, introverted child who was often taunted by her schoolmates. She was always in and out of hospitals. Unable to graduate from high school, she would take equivalency courses as an adult and get her diploma in that way. Until she was sixteen, she wore a brace, or used crutches. Today, she walks with a limp.

Her positive childhood memories have always been about music. She and her sister, Hattie, grew up listening to country-western radio programmes and admiring such stars as Hank Williams and Ernest Tubbs. They were members of the high school orchestra, the church junior band and the school choir. Katherine, who also sang in the local Baptist church, dreamed of a career in show business, first as an actress and then as a vocalist.

When she met Joseph, Katherine fell for him, immediately. Though he had married someone else, it lasted only about a year. After his divorce, Katherine began dating Joseph, and the couple soon became engaged. She was under his spell, gripped by his charisma, seduced by his charm, his looks, his power. He was a commanding man who took control, and she sensed she would always feel safe with him. She found herself enjoying his stories, laughing at his jokes. His eyes were large, set wide apart and a colour of hazel she had never before seen, almost emerald. Whenever she looked into them, as she would tell it, she knew she was being swept away, and it was what she wanted for herself. Or, as she put it, 'I fell crazy in love.'

They were opposites in many ways. She was soft. Joseph was hard. She was reasonable. Joseph was explosive. She was romantic. Joseph was pragmatic. However, the chemistry was there for them.

Both were musical: he was a bluesman who played guitar; she was a country-western fan who played clarinet and piano. When they were courting, the two would snuggle up together on cold winter nights and sing Christmas carols. Sometimes they would harmonize, and the blend was a good one, thanks to Katherine's beautiful soprano voice. Michael Jackson feels he inherited his singing ability from his mother. He has recalled that in his earliest memory of Katherine, she is holding him in her arms and singing songs such as 'You Are My Suns.h.i.+ne' and 'Cotton Fields'.

Joseph, twenty, and Katherine, nineteen, were married by a justice of the peace on 5 November 1949, in Crown Point, Indiana, after a six-month engagement.

Katherine has said that she was so affected by her parents' divorce, and the fact that she was raised in a broken home, she promised herself once she found a husband, she would stay married to him, no matter what circ.u.mstances may come their way. It didn't seem that she had much to worry about with Joseph, though. He treated her respectfully and showed her every consideration. She enjoyed his company; he made her laugh like no one ever had in the past. Importantly, there was a tremendous s.e.xual bonding between them. Joseph was a pa.s.sionate man; Katherine, less so a woman. However, they were in love; they were compatible and they made it work.

The newlyweds settled in Gary, Indiana. Their first child, Maureen, nicknamed Rebbie (p.r.o.nounced Reebie), was born on 29 May 1950. The rest of the brood followed in quick succession. On 4 May 1951, Katherine's twenty-first birthday, she gave birth to Sigmund Esco, nicknamed Jackie. Two years later, on 15 October 1953, Tariano Adaryl was born; he was called t.i.to. Jermaine LaJuane followed on 11 December 1954; LaToya Yvonne on 29 May 1956; Marlon David on 12 March 1957 (one of a set of premature twins; the other, Brandon, died within twenty-four hours of birth); Michael Joseph on 29 August 1958 ('with a funny-looking head, big brown eyes, and long hands,' said his mother); Steven Randall on 29 October 1961, and then Janet Dameta on 16 May 1966.

Early Days.

Talk about cramped quarters... once upon a G.o.d-forsaken time, all eleven members of the Jackson family lived at 2300 Jackson Street. 'You could take five steps from the front door and you'd be out the back,' Michael said of the house. 'It was really no bigger than a garage.'

Katherine and Joseph shared one bedroom with a double bed. The boys slept in the only other bedroom in a triple bunk bed; t.i.to and Jermaine sharing a bed on top, Marlon and Michael in the middle, and Jackie alone on the bottom. The three girls slept on a convertible sofa in the living room; when Randy, was born, he slept on a second couch. In the bitter-cold winter months, the family would huddle together in the kitchen in front of the open oven.

'We all had ch.o.r.es,' Jermaine remembered. 'There was always something to do scrubbing the floors, was.h.i.+ng the windows, doing whatever gardening there was to do,' he said with a smile. 't.i.to did the dishes after dinner. I'd dry them. The four oldest did the ironing Rebbie, Jackie, t.i.to, and me and we weren't allowed out of the house until we finished. My parents believed in work values. We learned early the rewards of feeling good about work.'

Joseph worked a four o'clock-to-midnight s.h.i.+ft as a crane operator at Inland Steel in East Chicago. In Michael's earliest memory of his father, he is coming home from work with a big bag of glazed doughnuts for everyone. 'The work was hard but steady, and for that I couldn't complain,' Joseph said. There was never enough money, though; Joseph seldom made more than sixty-five dollars a week, even though he often put in extra hours as a welder. The family learned to live with it. Katherine made the children's clothes herself, or shopped at a Salvation Army store. They ate simple foods: bacon and eggs for breakfast; egg-and-bologna sandwiches and sometimes tomato soup for lunch; fish and rice for dinner. Katherine enjoyed baking peach cobblers and apple pies for dessert.

There are few school pictures of the Jackson children today, because they could not afford to purchase them after posing for them. For the first five years that they lived on Jackson Street, the family had no telephone. When Jermaine contracted nephritis, a kidney disease, at the age of four and had to be hospitalized for three weeks, it hit Katherine and Joseph hard, financially, as well as emotionally.

Whenever Joseph was laid off, he found work harvesting potatoes, and during these periods the family would fill up on potatoes, boiled, fried or baked.

'I was dissatisfied,' Joseph Jackson remembered. 'Something inside of me told me there was more to life than this. What I really wanted more than anything was to find a way into the music business.' He, his brother Luther and three other men formed The Falcons, a rhythm and blues band that provided extra income for all of their families by performing in small clubs and bars. Joseph's three oldest sons Jackie, t.i.to and Jermaine were fascinated with their father's music and would sit in on rehearsals at home. (Michael has no recollection of The Falcons.) In the end, The Falcons was not commercially successful; when they disbanded, Joseph stashed his guitar in the bedroom closet. That string instrument was his one vestige of a dream deferred, and he didn't want any of the children to get their hands on it. Michael referred to the closet as 'a sacred place'. Occasionally Katherine would take the guitar down from the shelf and play it for the children. They would all gather around in the living room and sing together, country songs like 'Wabash Cannonball' and 'The Great Speckled Bird'.

With his group disbanded, Joseph didn't know what to do with himself. Now working the swing s.h.i.+ft at Inland Steel and the day s.h.i.+ft at American Foundries, all he knew was that he wanted much more for himself and his family. It was the early sixties and 'everybody we knew was in a singing group', Jackie recalled. 'That was the thing to do, go join a group. There were gangs, and there were singing groups. I wanted to be in a singing group, but we weren't allowed to hang out with the other kids. So we started singing together 'round the house. Our TV broke down and Mother started having us sing together. And then what happened was that our father would go to work, and we would sneak into his bedroom and get that guitar down.'

'And I would play it,' t.i.to continued. 'It would be me, Jackie and Jermaine, and we'd sing, learn new songs, and I would play. Our mother came in one day and we all froze, like ”Uh-oh, we're busted,” but she didn't say anything. She just let us play.'

'I didn't want to stop it because I saw a lot of talent there,' Katherine would explain later.

This went on for a few months until one day t.i.to broke a string on the guitar. 'I knew I was in trouble,' t.i.to recalled. 'We were all all in trouble. Our father was strict and we were scared of him. So I put the guitar back in the closet and hoped he wouldn't figure out what had happened. But he did, and he in trouble. Our father was strict and we were scared of him. So I put the guitar back in the closet and hoped he wouldn't figure out what had happened. But he did, and he whooped whooped me. Even though my mother lied and said she had given me permission to play the guitar, he tore me up.' When t.i.to tells the story, his words tumble out and he gets tongue-tied. So many years later, one can still sense his anxiety about it. 'She just didn't want to see me get whipped,' he said, sadly. 'Not again. me. Even though my mother lied and said she had given me permission to play the guitar, he tore me up.' When t.i.to tells the story, his words tumble out and he gets tongue-tied. So many years later, one can still sense his anxiety about it. 'She just didn't want to see me get whipped,' he said, sadly. 'Not again.

'Afterwards, when Joseph cooled off, he came into the room. I was still crying on the bed. I said, ”You know, I can play that thing. I really can.” He looked at me and said, ”Okay, lemme see what you can do, smart guy.” So I played it. And Jermaine and Jackie sang a little. Joseph was amazed. He had no idea, because this was the big secret we had been keeping from him because we were so scared of him.'

Joseph later said that when his sons revealed their talent to him, he felt a surge of excitement about it. 'I decided I would leave the music to my sons,' he told me, many years later. 'I had a dream for them,' he said. 'I envisioned these kids making audiences happy by sharing their talent, talent that they'd maybe inherited from me.' He seemed touched by his own words as he looked back on the past. 'I just wanted them to make something of themselves. That's all I wanted,' he added.

Joseph went off to work the next day and, that night, returned home holding something behind his back. He called out to t.i.to and handed him the package. It was a red electric guitar. 'Now, let's rehea.r.s.e, boys,' Joseph said with a wide smile. He gathered his three sons together Jackie, nine, t.i.to, seven, and Jermaine, six and they practised. 'We'd never been so close,' t.i.to would recall. 'It was as if we had finally found something in common. Marlon and Mike, they would sit in the corner and watch. Our mother would give us some tips. I noticed our mother and father were happy. We were all happy. We had found something special.'

In the sixties, Gary was a tough, urban city, and the Jacksons' neighbourhood was sometimes a dangerous place for youngsters. Katherine and Joseph lived in constant fear that one of their children would be hurt in the streets. 'We were always protected by our parents,' Jackie recalled. 'We were never really allowed to have fun in the streets like other kids. We had a strict curfew. The only time we could actually play with people our own age was in school. We liked the social aspect of school.'

Katherine Jackson, a strong force in the lives of her children, pa.s.sed on to them a deep and abiding respect for certain religious convictions. She had been a Baptist and then a Lutheran but turned from both faiths for the same reason: she discovered that the ministers were having extramarital affairs. When Michael was five years old Katherine became a Jehovah's Witness, converted by a door-to-door worker. She was baptized in 1963 in the swimming pool at Roosevelt High in Gary. From then on, she asked that the rest of the family get dressed in their best clothes every Sunday and walk with her to Kingdom Hall, their place of wors.h.i.+p. Joseph, who had been raised a Lutheran, accompanied his wife a couple of times to placate her, but stopped going when the children were still young because, as Marlon put it, 'it was so boring.' As time went on, Michael, LaToya, and Rebbie would become the most devout about their religion.

Had that religion been any but the Jehovah's Witnesses, Michael Jackson would probably have evolved in a completely different way. So removed are Jehovah's Witnesses from mainstream Protestantism, they were sometimes considered a cult, especially in the fifties and sixties. No matter where they live, no Jehovah's Witness will salute a flag (they believe it is idolatrous to do so) or serve in any armed forces (each Witness is considered an ordained minister and, therefore, exempt). They don't celebrate Christmas or Easter or birthdays. They usually will not contribute money to any group outside their own church because they consider preaching the gospel the most worthwhile, charitable deed. Jehovah's Witnesses periodically make news because they refuse to receive blood transfusions for themselves or their children, no matter how gravely ill the patient may be.

In the strictest sense of the teachings, Jehovah's Witnesses considered themselves the sheep; everybody else is a goat. When the great battle of Armageddon is fought it was expected in 1972 and then in 1975 all the goats will be destroyed at once and the sheep will be spared. The sheep will then be resurrected to a life on earth as subjects of the Kingdom of G.o.d. They will be ruled by Christ and a select group of 144,000 Witnesses who will reside in heaven by Christ's side. At the end of a thousand years, Satan will come forth to tempt those on earth. Those who succ.u.mb to his wiles will be immediately destroyed. The rest will live, idyllically. Of course, as with those who adhere to religious beliefs, some Witnesses are more adamant about those teachings than others.

Estimates are that 20 to 30 per cent of its members are black. Witnesses are judged solely by their good deeds their witnessing, or door-to-door proselytizing and not on new cars, large homes, expensive clothes and other status symbols. Because of her devotion to the Jehovah's Witnesses, Katherine was mostly satisfied with what she had in Gary, Indiana. She enjoyed her life, and had little issue with it other than her concern that the city didn't offer much promise for her children's future, other than work in factories for the boys and domestic life for the girls. Would that be so bad? Yes, Joseph would tell her, absolutely, yes. Sometimes, she agreed. Sometimes, she wasn't so sure what to think about any of it.

Every day, for at least three hours, the boys would rehea.r.s.e, whether they wanted to do so or not, with Joseph's only thought being to get his family out of Gary.

'When I found out that my kids were interested in becoming entertainers, I really went to work with them,' Joseph Jackson would tell Time. Time. 'When the other kids would be out on the street playing games, my boys were in the house working, trying to learn how to be something in life, 'When the other kids would be out on the street playing games, my boys were in the house working, trying to learn how to be something in life, do do something with their lives.' something with their lives.'

Though the Jacksons' music may have brought them closer together as a family unit, it also served to further alienate them from everyone else in the neighbourhood. 'Already, people thought we were strange because of our religion,' Jackie would remember. 'Now they were sure of it. They'd say, ”Yeah, look at those Jacksons. They think they're something special.” Everyone else used to hang out on the corners and sing with their groups. But we weren't allowed to. We had to practise at home. So the other kids thought we thought we were too good to sing with on the corner.'

Rehearsals were still held twice a day, before school and after, even though their peers in the neighbourhood thought the Jacksons were wasting their time. As they practised, voices from outside would taunt them through open windows, 'You ain't nothing, nothing,' you Jacksons!' Rocks would be hurled into the living room. It didn't matter to the Jacksons; they ignored the taunts and focused on their practice sessions.

By 1962, five-year-old Marlon had joined the group, playing bongos and singing, mostly off-key. (Marlon couldn't sing or dance, but he was allowed in the group anyway because Katherine would not have it any other way.) One day when the boys were practising while Joseph was at work, Katherine watched as Michael, who was four years old, began imitating Jermaine as he sang a James Brown song. When Michael sang, his voice was so strong and pure, Katherine was surprised. As soon as Joseph got home, she met him at the door with some good news: 'I think we have another lead singer.'

Joseph Hits Michael.

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