“[The following article was written by Kathryn Henry, a reporter for the  Clovis News-Journal, and appeared in the News-Journal last week.]

With a Grandchild or great-grandchild for every one of his 77 years, Frank M. Boyer, resident of Vado, lays claim to being the head of the largest Negro family in New Mexico. He had been a resident of New Mexico 50 years and was a member of one of the survey gangs which laid out the city of Clovis. The aged man is well known to many of the early day residents of Eastern New Mexico.”

Las Cruces Sun-News, Sunday, March 30, 1947

Roswell Daily Record Tuesday, May 4, 1920

In March of 1947, Kathryn Henry, a reporter for the Clovis News-Journal, interviewed a “Vado Negro Leader” named Frank, who claimed to be head of the largest Black family in the State of New Mexico. Francis (Frank) Marion Boyer lived many lives in the Borderlands, and the Blackdom Oil Company was one of them. In Mexico’s northern frontier, Frank co-founded and helped build Blackdom; an institution to generate sovereignty for free people under the condition of Blackness.  He delivered on his promise of sovereignty and the evidence showed in him being the head of the largest “Negro” family in New Mexico. Kathryn was the last known person to interview Frank before he passed away two years later in 1949. 

by Dr. Timothy E. Nelson ©

Tuesday, April 20, 1920 “Will Drill at Blackdom”

The Ragsdale family was an early Blackdomite dynasty to help establish #TheAfrōFrontier; successful in all the ways that mattered. Moses, the patriarch, and Clinton, his son, was the visionary who migrated from Mississippi to Chaves County, New Mexico. In 1906, Clinton in his mid-30s lived with the Boyer family until 1907. In the freedom of the Borderlands, Clinton was eager to build and often pitched a tent to spend star-filled nights on his land.

The Ragsdale family epitomized Blackdomite society as #AfrōFrontierists®️ when Clinton signed in partnership with the infamous #MittieMoore. Her land added a whole square mile to Blackdom commons. In 1919, her story was the antithesis of Blackdomite society and she added to Blackdom’s greatest triumph. Mittie’s addition brought higher royalty when leasing to oil companies and wildcats. 

Blackdom Oil Company was on the horizon of Clinton’s vision and it included Mittie. The more land Blackdomites had in the pool, the greater the royalty. 

#NoteToTheReader: One can not overstate the inherent tension that came as a result of the interaction between the deeply intellectual, rural, religious Black people in opposition to Black people associated with sinful commercial vice.

Shortly after building a home, Clinton brought his wife, Molly, in her early 30s. The family came together on the homestead with son Ezell. Molly’s mother Jennie was in her 60s when she joined them along with all four Ragsdale children. The whole family was able to read and write. By the 1930s, the Ragsdale family homesteaded (3)Sq miles in Blackdom—Clinton (1913,1920, and 1926), Ezell (1917, 1920 and 1921).

Roswell Daily Record: Tuesday, April 20, 1920 [Pg2]

The Ragsdale family structure was the business of intergenerational wealth. Ezell completed a homestead before he was conscripted into military service during World War I. When he returned from military service, Ezell began a second homestead that he completed in partnership with the Blackdom Oil Company.

Early in Blackdom’s revival (1909-1919), the masonic vision manifested into grand meetings of substance. Clinton Ragsdale, along with all other family patriarchs of Blackdom were accountable to one another and responsible to research, consume and enlighten others of certain knowledge. At Blackdom’s annual Thanksgiving Galas, with Frank Boyer as Toastmaster; Monroe Collins was responsible for reporting on all processes related to homesteading. George Wilson was functionally a veterinarian, which required him to acquire knowledge about livestock. Clinton was responsible for pumping and windmills. 

In 1919, Clinton Ragsdale, Joe Blue, Henry Smith, and #ErastusHerron of Blackdom were signatories for the infamous #MittieMoore’s final homestead proof adding 320 acres and later another 320 acres. Clinton’s expertise in pumping was a rare commodity that made him one of the elites among Blackdomites. Blackdom was moving toward oil exploration and pumping could produce endless amounts of money. Clinton’s knowledge, skills, and abilities could solidify royalties for generations.

Imagine Clinton Ragsdale, Mittie Moore, and Erastus Herron on Tuesday, April 20, 1920, opening the Roswell Daily Record and reading, “Will Drill at Blackdom.”

by Dr. Timothy E. Nelson ©

[3/20/2020 Quarantined in New Mexico| Miles Davis begins to play and light snow begins to fall on Santa Fe.]  Saturn in Aquarius

~#ÑēɡrōDamus: Yes. And, in this Apocalypse, Blackdom can serve as a reminder for people under the conditions of Blackness to nurture sovereign spaces as a solution-based model. Global disaster provides an opportunity in the midst of the chaos. Past is often prologued, and this depression will present collective action as a solution. Those seeking sovereignty will have the opportunity. 

The good news; Black liberation movements excelled during times of global transition.  By 1820, collective action was needed to maintain order in, what was, the struggling and ever-expanding United States of America after the War of 1812 and other world events. Meanwhile, some of the illuminated people under the conditions of Blackness planned and executed schemes to achieve their sovereignty from narrow platforms of freedom. 

El Paso Herald

Thursday, March 4, 1920

[Pg 8]

During the 1820s, the American Colonization Movement spawned an enclave of free people under the conditions of Blackness to begin the Liberian colonization experiment on the Western coast of Africa. Liberia was to border Sierra Leone, which was a previous attempt at repatriation and sovereignty by Black British Loyalists of the 1780s. Liberation Theology and colonization informed the sovereignty movements to colonize Western Africa after the American Revolution.

In Mexico, the world of oppressors and the oppressed morphed into something neither recognized after the Mexican Independence movement. The abolition of slavery in Mexico lent itself to liberation and colonization movements that developed over the course of the 19th Century. 

At the turn of the 20th Century, Black colonization movements sought to exploit Mexico's frontier spaces and the presence of sovereign dark-skinned peoples. Circa 1919, in the United States of America, free people of African descent sought to thrive as sharecroppers. Other free people under the condition of Blackness chose a chance at sovereignty in Mexico’s northern frontier spaces. Black towns had the potential to bring wealth and money, like in the cases of Little Liberia in Baja California and the Blackdom Oil Company of Blackdom in New Mexico. Black peoples had to invest in integration or segregation; sovereign spaces allowed for both circumstances to work in their favor. There is no clear advantage to either, except investing in sovereignty was a chance at a life beyond freedom.  

Blackdomites were not immune to the chaotic global or local transitions. Instead, Blackdom served as a quarantine from the virus of White supremacy that infected the Mexico-U.S. Borderlands and limited opportunities for sovereignty. Blackdomites maintained their freedom in quarantine and gained sovereignty by investing before, during and after the chaos. They capitalized on opportunities by employing collective action in 1903, 1909, and 1919. 

In 1910, Blackdomites faced New Mexico statehood and the adverse shift to local municipal governance in favor of local White Supremacists. Blackdomites decided to further develop an Afrotopia (Afro-Frontier) in anticipation of chaos and new jurisdictions as the space they inhabited transitioned from a federal territory to a state. Meanwhile, the region was destabilizing because of the Mexican Revolution in progress. 

By 1917, after World War I, Blackdom was in the midst of a renaissance while the 1918 flu pandemic raged across the world. Two years into the pandemic, March 4, 1920, in the El Paso Herald, the headline read “Mexico Expels American Reporters.” Open to page 8 and the first headline read, “To Sink a Deep Roswell Well.” In the article on page 8, “A Buffalo group of oilmen have signed a contract with the Blackdom Oil Company.” 

Yes, the world as you know is over. Yes, this moment of transition can be a good thing.