James R. Bacote II (1948-2018)

September 16, 2019 
/ Contributed By: Euell A. Dixon

Pat and James Bacote (Hope S. Philbrick)|James R. Bacote

Pat and James Bacote (Hope S. Philbrick)

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James Richardson Bacote was an artist, preservationist, historian and co-founder of the Geechee Kunda Cultural Center in Georgia. Bacote was born on December 18, 1948 in Brunswick, Georgia, to Sally and James Bacote Sr. He attended local schools on the Georgia Coast, as well as a high school in Detroit, Michigan. In March of 1963, along with an NAACP group, a teenaged Bacote visited Jekyll Island State Park, a nearby segregated recreational facility. Caucasians owned homes and motels that only allowed African Americans as domestic workers on the northern side of the island, while other African American visitors were relegated to segregated facilities in the southern part. When the group was denied access to the indoor pool, the golf course, and Peppermint Land Amusement Park, the NAACP filed a lawsuit in June 1964. A federal court ruled that the state-operated facilities at Jekyll Island would be desegregated. Ironically within the next month, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act on July 2, 1964, ending segregation in America’s public places and banned employment discrimination.

Bacoteโ€™s education and career took him to Michigan, Hawaii, California, Pennsylvania and Africa in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He returned to Riceboro, Georgia, purchased land that had been a slave plantation, and built his family home surrounded by grounds that once produced rice, cotton, and indigo harvested by enslaved labor.

Bacote and his wife, Pat, both had a love and passion for their African ancestry as well as their Gullah Geechee heritage. The couple grew up in the same neighborhood in Brunswick, and knew each other in their youth. Bacotes’ wife traces her African lineage to Bilal Muhammad, a well-educated Muslim from Guinea who was taken captive in 1770 and brought to Georgia. The Bacote family tree also includes Rev. Samuel W. Bacote, who in 1898 became the first African American to earn a degree from the University of Kansas, Clarence Bacote, a voting rights activist in Atlanta in the 1940s, and Albert Bacote, a Baptist Preacher and founder of Darlington Stock Company. The Bacote family also traces its ancestry to Dembo, an enslaved African brought to the United States in 1783, the year the thirteen colonies were formally granted independence by Great Britain.

In 1986, the Bacotes joined then Congressman George Crockett on a trade mission to Togo, Africa. The couple made several return trips to Africa and opened businesses. They had a hand-woven fabric center in Burkina Faso, and a textile company in Sierra Leone.

In 1999, The Bacotes founded the Geechee Kunda Cultural Center and Art Gallery in their home in Riceboro, Georgia. The center began with the Bacote personal art collection and family history but over time it grew into the largest facility in the U.S. dedicated to preserving Gullah Geechee culture. The Center eventually had multiple buildings to accommodate schools, tourists, musicians, art shows and weekly cultural events.

James Richardson Bacote died in his hometown of Riceboro, Georgia, on May 6, 2018 of lung cancer that spread to his brain. He was 69 years old and is survived by his wife and two sons.

About the Author

Author Profile

Multiple business owner Euell Dixon (formerly Nielsen) was born on November 3, 1973, in Sewell, New Jersey. The youngest daughter of scientist and author Eustace A. Dixon II and Travel Agent Eleanor Forman, Euell was an early reader and began tutoring at The Verbena Ferguson Tutoring Center for Adults at the age of 13. She has owned and operated five different companies in the past 20 years including Show and Touch, Stitch This, Get Twisted, Dimaje Photography, and Island Treazures.

Euell is a Veteran of the U.S. Army (Reserves) and a member of the Order of Eastern Star, House of Zeresh #103. She is also the 3rd Historian for First African Presbyterian Church, the nationโ€™s oldest African American Presbyterian church, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Additionally, Euell is also a photographer, storyteller, fiber artist, and a historical re-enactor, portraying the lives of Patriot Hannah Till, Elizabeth Gloucester, and Henrietta Duterte. Euell has been writing for Blackpast.org since 2014 and was given an award from the site in 2016 for being the only African American female who had almost 100 entries at the time. Since then, she has written over 300 entries. Euell currently lives in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands.

CITE THIS ENTRY IN APA FORMAT:

Dixon, E. (2019, September 16). James R. Bacote II (1948-2018). BlackPast.org. https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/james-r-bacote-ii-1948-2018/

Source of the Author's Information:

Hermina Glass-Hill, โ€œJim Bacote, engine driving Gullah Geechee Center, dies,โ€ Coastlcourier.com, May 11, 2018, https://coastalcourier.com/news/jim-bacote-engine-driving-gullah-geechee-center-dies/; Orlando Montoya, โ€œRemembering Jim Bacote; Gullah Geechee historian and museum founder promoted coastal Georgia as an epicenter for African culture in the Americas,โ€ Connectsavannah.com, June 6, 2018, https://www.connectsavannah.com/savannah/remembering-jim-bacote/Content?oid=8618900; Larry Hobbs, โ€œThe memory keepers,โ€ June 26, 2015, https://www.goldenislesmagazine.com/features/the-memory-keepers/article_8b16b164-1682-11e5-b366-d3d73ba0ff35.html.

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