During the Jim Crowe Era in Alabama, African-
American children were told by their parents and
teachers that they had to be ten times better than their
white counterparts, just to stay even. Striving to be ten
times better became the standard of behavior for Dr. Joice
Christine Bailey Lewis who achieved success with ten
times fewer resources and against ten times greater odds.
What sustained her during the most diffi cult times was
the evidence that her people had survived the hardships
faced during two periods of slavery: the enslavement of
Africans and the era of Sharecropping. Raised on a sharecropping farm and having
no money to go to college, Dr. Lewis, nevertheless found a way to achieve a
doctoral degree and experience success as an educator.
My Ancestral Voices