Passe Pour Blanc

About the Book

Passé Pour Blanc is a provocative, exciting, and tragic story. It vividly depicts the ongoing struggle and frustrations of a very unique nation - the French Creoles of Louisiana. Although this story and its characters are fictitious, they are based upon reality, and a lifetime of obsservations and experience. Also, through this most powerful and commanding story, one can get a better understanding about the mysteries surrounding this nation which has been severely abused by the domination of American racism. The term nation is used in this description for three reasons. First, contrary to popular belief, not all people designated as "colored" were brought to North America on slave ships and in chains. Thousands of the ancestors of Louisiana French Creoles emigrated as refugees from the war torn French colonies (Haiti for the most part) in the West Indies. Secondly, those ancestors were educated, wealthy and self-sufficient long before Louisiana became a part of the United Stataes. Therefore, the United Stataes had absolutely nothing to do with their social status. And thirdly, the guarantees stipulated in the Louisiana Purchase Treaty set this community apart from all others - into a category all its own. Now, it can readily be seen that Passé Pour Blanc has a mission to accomplish.

Since the contents of Passé Pour Blancreveal actions and occurences common only to the Creole community, and those actions and occurences are expected to distinguish Louisiana French Creoles from all other nations in America, the readers are challenged to try to appply them to any other group. IfPassé Pour Blanccan be applied as being common to any other ethnic group, then its main purpose has not been served. If it cannot be thusly applied, then this book, although fictionalized, shall take its place among the tremendous amount of evidence, already gathered, which points toward recognized nationhood for Louisiana French Creoles. This author firmly believes that Louisian French Creoles, especially those in and from New Orleans who have been frequenting both sides of the color line for centuries, have no real counterparts. No cultural equivalents.

About the Author

Gilbert E. martin was born in the Seventh Ward section of the city of New Orleans in 1923. The Seventh Ward was the heart of the Crescent City's Creole community. In that community this author spent all of his formative years. During that time it was not uncommon to hear the Creole language spoken every day all day, in every part of the city. And passing for white was practically an art form - it was done to perfection. Many people in Martin's environment spent their working days as white people and their nights and weekends as blacks, or Coloreds" as they were then called. For a number of times, Martin, in one way or another, participated in the chameleon games. He attended Valena C. Jones Elementary School where every morning the French and American anthems were sung. This basic background shaped his life. And it was because of this background he would later be able to initiate and lead the current struggle for French Creole treaty rights.

At the age of nineteen, Martin enlisted in the United States Marine Corps and served overseas during World War II. And it was his first real experience with clashing cultures. After leaving the Marine Corps, he went on to become an informally educated architect and builder and worked in those areas until the late 1970s.

In 1973, Martin was made aware of the numerous publications which stated that people with African lineage were not to be considered Creole except as possessions of Creoles. A book called Louisiana Guide, written in 1945 cleaerly stated that the "Creoles of Louisiana were the pure white descendants of the French and Spanish settlers of the State." So, in October of that year, this author went into research vowing to set the records staight by contradicting the writers and historians of that opinion.

By 1979, he had gathered enough information to start him thinking about Creole nationhood. So, in defiance of the works of previous writers, including writers of Louisiana history, Martin, in 1979 coined the phrase "French Creole." Then he founded and chartered the International French Creole Cultural Society and received a Louisiana charter dating the founding February 14th, 1979. Afterwards, he spoke at several places including three consecutive years at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. And at each engagement he openly and directly challenged the state and any other entity to produce the so-called "pure white descendants of the Spanish and French settlers of the State." No one ever stepped forward.

Gilbert E. Martin has written and self-published several books pertaining to French Creole history, heritage and culture. And because no one before him had the audacity or resolution to search for French Creole history beyond the boundaries of the state of Louisiana, and to bring the French Creole nation out of the shadows of abuse, ridicule, and uncertainty, he now considers himself the foremost authority on the subjects of French Creole history and culture.

Before Martin, and for almost a decade after he started, most Creoles were afraid to even breathe the word Creole in public, except among close friends and relatives. Today, however, it's a different story. Creoles are coming out of the woodwork. And many are unsatisfied that Martin has proclaimed that, although borm in the bosom of catholisism - composed of various mixtures of African, French, Spanish, and Indian bloodlines, French Creole culture is and emanation of the Mali empire of Africa's Old Western Sudan. In other words, in spite of the anger it causes, this author still argues that Creole culture is Mandingo culture. No other origin can be found. Therfore, Martin further argues that the idea of Creole culture being developed in Louisiana is absolutely ludicrous. Besides, according to Martin, Grace King, in her 1894 book, New Orleans: The Place and The people, tells us about the people of color who began to pour into New Orleans in 1791. King Wrote, Besides the white and slave immigration from the West Indian Islands, there was a large influx of gens de couleur into the city, a class of population whose increase by immigration had been sternly legislated against. Flying, however, with the whites from massacre and ruin, humanitarian sentiments induced the authorities to open the city gates to them, and they entered by the thousands. Like the white emegres, they brought in the customs and manners of a softer climate, a more luxurious society, and a different civilization...they represented a distinct variety, a variety which their numbers made important, and for a time decisive in its influence on the home of their adoption. The French Creole nation portrayed in Martin's book, Passé Pour Blanc,are the descendants of those gens de coleur and the slaves mentioned in the above excerpt from Grace King's book. Martin believes that that excerpt alone, which is partly responsible for getting him involved in the very beginning of his research, has enough information to support his claim for French Creole nationhood. And he claims that it does not even scratch the surface.