A BIG OPEN SKY, by Lesa Cline-Ransome
From a history book that came out in paperback in 1992, during my freshman year in college, I learned about the thousands of blacks who left the South in the late 19th century to move west, seeking the freedoms promised by the law Homestead of 1862. Feminist Nell Irvin Painter’s “Exodusters: Black Migration to Kansas After Reconstruction,” originally published in 1977, was one of the first detailed studies of this mass movement by an African-American historian.
There is a quote in Painter’s 1992 introduction that stands out as a disclaimer: “Unlike many other histories of Reconstruction, this book does not focus on Washington or the Southern state capitals. My central figures are not officials or men capable of directly influencing politics. (I say men because women, while participating in the Exodus, were not voters during Reconstruction and do not appear as actors or speakers in the sources.)’
Lesa Cline-Ransome’s historical novel in verse, One Big Open Sky, is determined to fill these archival silences. It tells the story of a perilous covered wagon journey of a Black family from Mississippi to Nebraska through the voices of three resourceful and resilient female characters: 11-year-old Lettie; Her pregnant mother, Sylvia. and a young teacher, Filomeni, whom they meet along the way.
Driving the wagon and deciding to gamble everything on the chance of a better life (“We can’t live free/on someone else’s land/harvest someone else’s harvest!”), is Lettie’s father, Thomas. Her two younger brothers, Ilias and Silas, had a hard time, like her mother, adjusting to the idea of leaving the only community they had ever known: “As soon as dad finished his talks/Ilias started to deal with the laces of /… When will we be back?/asked dad/by moving I mean/I saw mom’s eyes fill up/We won’t be back when we leave ‘Lea’/dad told him/Then why are we leaving?/ asked Silas.’
Although it spans just nine months in 1879, Cline-Ransome’s lyrical story reminds us that this often-forgotten Black relocation, which predated the Great Migration (the subject of her award-winning “Finding Langston” trilogy) by some three decades, it was epic in its political ambitions and its actual execution. Movement—in both senses of the word—is strongly captured by the narrative flow of the book.
“One Big Open Sky” mainly features the alternating viewpoints of mother and daughter, until Philomena joins them. Their differences in age, anxieties, and ambitions are so vast that their stories, even when they converge, remain distinct and allow us to understand the conversations and desires that motivate them, and the black male leaders who mobilize them. and the white communities that discriminate against them.
Cline-Ransome’s evocative writing—a combination of richly textured description and lively dialogue—makes the impact of the family’s betrayals by the federal government and their fellow Exodusters all the more poignant.
The emphasis on Lettie’s point of view highlights their vulnerability and foreshadows the harsh conditions and violent conflicts they will navigate on their journey, which begins by crossing the Mississippi River via flatboat, with their wagon and two mules, Tito and Charlie : “Titus is always afraid/of one thing/or the next/So papa had me/stand beside him/on the ride up/… As the currents/pulled us in one direction/the men driving the boat/ they pulled us in another way.”
Lettie chronicles their daily hardships in stark, heartbreakingly eloquent detail: “Too hot today/to sit in the wagon where it got hot/so hot/Mama said/felt like a hot cookie/… We all had to walk now/for to save Charlie and Tito/from being pulled extra/… I held Mom’s hand tight/slick with her sweat/With our other hands/we waved away/the mosquitoes that followed/in the dark clouds above us/like to travel westward as well/We couldn’t speak/or we’d swallow them/whole.”
More often than not, however, despite painful losses, Lettie is optimistic about the unknown, with its endless possibilities. “From where we sat/we could see the lantern/illuminate the cabin,” he thinks as they near their destination, “and imagine/the warmth in/our new home/in the West/in Nebraska/with a fire in the hearth/and beds piled high with quilts.”
We know that the warmth of black families found in Nebraska during this period, and elsewhere during their various migrations over the next century, was no guarantee of full citizenship or racial equality. This battle continues today.
In Lettie’s, Sylvia’s, and Philomena’s stories, enhanced by Cline-Ransome’s meticulous research (and the historical context provided by her author’s note), we learn about the limits of such movements and about black people—and especially black women— who upended their lives in the South to get one step and one generation closer to the American dream.
“One Big Open Sky” shows us that the road there was dangerous, even as democracy loomed on the horizon.
A BIG OPEN SKY | By Lesa Cline-Ransome | (Ages 8 to 12) | holiday House | 304 p. | $18.99