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URL of article: http://www.nebraskahistory.org/publish/publicat/history/full-text/NH1990McCarys.pdf Date: 12/1/2010 Article Summary: This article presents various aspects of light-skinned black people “passing” for whites by examining the 1919 case of Francis Patrick Dwyer’s suit to annul his marriage to Clara McCary Dwyer after becoming suspicious that their new baby boy had Negro blood. While Dwyer was correct, he failed to win his suit, and his wife was able to divorce him and receive child support in 1923. Cataloging Information: Names: Clara McCary Dwyer, Francis Patrick Dwyer, Mattie Juliet Balfour, Douglass P McCary, Thomas A Walsh, Joseph Dwyer, Mattie Balfour, Robert McCary, James McCary, William Johnson, Fitzgerald Family, Barland Family, Winn family, John R Lynch, William McCary, Lavinia Miller, Horace Cayton, Hiram Revels, Wallace McCary, John O Geiser, Franz Boas, A C Troup, John Albert Williams, Nick Chiles, Frederick Douglass Place Names: Omaha, Nebraska; Washington, D C; Natchez, Mississippi; New Orleans, Louisiana; Cuba; Longview, Texas; Chicago, Illinois; Topeka, Kansas; Seattle, Washington Keywords: negro blood, Jim Crow balcony, Negro ancestry, racial identity, Capital Savings Bank [Washington, DC], Mississippi Railroad Company, blue vein society, Alcorn A&M College, Howard University Law School, Twenty-fifth Infantry, St Augustine’s Roman Catholic Church [Washington, DC], Washington Bee, Columbia University, The Monitor, Topeka Plain-dealer, Cayton’s Weekly, Nebraska Supreme Court, Manasseh Society Photographs / Images: Douglass P McCary; John R Lynch; Horace Cayton Sr THE PERILS OF PASSING: THE McCARYS OF OMAHA By Willard B. Gatewood, Jr. A strikingly handsome young woman among blacks in the United States. One the risks posed by any legal proceeding and her three-year-old son, both fair­ was temporary or convenience passing which might raise the question of the haired and blue-eyed, were the star by which fair-complexioned Negroes family's racial identity. Dwyer's attractions in a sensational court case occasionally crossed the color line in brother-in-law, Thomas A. Walsh, in Omaha, Nebraska, in the summer of order to secure decent hotel, travel, claimed that McCary and his wife had 1919. Her name was Clara McCary and restaurant accommodations or to visited him shortly after the separation Dwyer, whose husband, Francis Pat­ attend the theater without having to sit of the couple and before the initiation rick Dwyer, had filed suit to have their in the Jim Crow balcony. Another form of the annulment proceedings to obtain marriage annulled on the grounds that was known as "professional passing," his assistance in persuading Dwyer not she had "negro blood in her veins."· where by a person passed for white in to take the matter to court. McCary, Until 1913 Nebraska law prohibited order to hold jobs open only to whites according to Walsh, insisted that his marriage between whites and persons but continued to maintain "a Negro family "could not afford the publicity" possessing one-fourth or more Negro social life." The third form was passing that legal action would attract. McCary blood. In that year the legislature permanently for white, which involved promised that if such action were changed the law to ban marriages be­ blotting out the past and severing all avoided, "everything might be adjust­ tween white persons and those having contacts with the black community. ed." Once Dwyer filed the annulment "one-eighth ormore negro, Japanese or Among other risks was that of suit, McCary took the position that the Chinese blood."2 exposure. Because of the secretive plaintiff should be allowed "to proceed The courtroom drama, which nature of permanent passing, it is as prayed for in his petition" without occurred during the Red summer of impossible to ascertain how many contest. Dwyer and his attorney 1919 when twenty-five race riots black Americans actually passed. assumed, quite incorrectly, that the occurred in the United States, Estimates ranged from a few hundred McCarys would not deny their Negro epitomized the prevailing white to many thousands annually.3 ancestry and hence would not fight attitudes toward race and color. Francis Dwyer, a clerk in a jewelry the annulment. S Throughout the spring and summer of and leather goods store owned by his It is not altogether clear why the that year, the denunciation of blacks as brother-in-law, assumed his wife was McCarys decided upon a different criminals, especially rapists, by the white until the birth of their son in 1916, course. But the decision was appar­ press and trade unions in Omaha when the attending physician, for ently made by Clara Dwyer and her undoubtedly had heightened racial reasons that are unclear, raised the mother. In all probability their main tension in the city that ultimately possibility of Negro ancestry. Once concern was to avoid having the child, erupted in a riot there late in Septem­ Dwyer became suspicious of his wife's Joseph Dwyer, declared illegitimate. ber 1919. A complicating factor in the racial heritage, he apparently refused According to Nebraska law, upon the Dwyer case was that it involved the to live with her and their son. He joined dissolution "by decree or sentence of phenomenon of "passing," a process by the army in 1917 and upon being nullity of any marriage between a white which fair-complexioned people of mustered out of military service, and a Negro, any issue of the marriage Negro ancestry "crossed over the color decided to end the marriage legally on would be deemed to be illegitimate."6 line" into the white world. the grounds that he had been deceived Throughout the trial Clara McCary Several forms of "passing" existed by his wife. Because he was Catholic Dwyer and members of her family, and had been married in the Catholic whatever their reasons, resolutely church, he insisted upon an annulment denied that they possessed any Negro 4 Willard B. Gatewood, Jr. is Alumni Dis­rather than a divorce. ancestry or had ever been identified tinguished Professor ofHistoryat the Univer­Douglass P. McCary, Clara Dwyer's with blacks. Douglass P. McCary tes­ sity ofArkansas, Fayetteville. father, apparently was fully aware of tified under oath in a crowded court­ 64 The McCarys of Omaha room that his family was "pure white," He described his grandfather as a "red headed Irishman" and slave owner and his grandmother as a school teacher from Massachusetts who "went South to teach. " He testified that he had "always considered himself a white man, that no negroes ever entered his house and that his children had never associated with negroes." McCary told the court that he was a native of Natchez, Mississippi, where his father had been a politician after the Civil War. Although his father had died, he declared that his mother, whose maiden name was Mattie Balfour, lived in Washington, D.C.' // When pressed by Dwyer's attorney, / ,' ; McCary admitted that prior to moving to Omaha he had resided in / /i Washington and worked for the Capital ,/ . / /. ., ,//:/ (II I ,. Savings Bank, an institution identified I .' . 1// .' . / " . I " " . t;' with the Di strict's black community. /, ,///, r' ' J While the bank president was a Negro, , / ' . ( ' j / , .( ') . he testified, its officers and directors I .Jr{;t:...jr included men of both races. Since ,/I ',J- · , McCary had held civil service r appointments in the post office depart­ ment, Dwye r's attorney asked whether he had identified himself as Negro or Caucasian on the civil service applica­ tion. McCary could not remember nor would he consent to being photo­ graphed in the event the case was ap pealed. He also emphatically denied Dwyer's charge that he had attempted to hide his racial identity and had avoided meeting his daughter's fianc e until after the marriage. On the con­ trary, McCary insisted, Dwyer had • been a frequent guest in his home dur­ J ing the courtship of his daughter and Douglass P. McCary. Courtesy of the author. that he had often conversed and played ga mes with him,R father, James McCary, a cabinetmaker. sissippi Railroad Company. His closest While portions of McCary's tes­ Both inherited town lots in Natchez friend was William Johnson, also a free timony about the hi story of his family and received the income from the labor man of color and a barber, whose were essentially correct, his in sistence of two slaves. The executor of James lengthy diary provided a unique view of that all his forebears were white and McCary's will was scrupulous in his antebellum Natchez. The McCarys, had always been so identified was efforts to carry out its provisions, along with the Johnsons, Fitzgeralds, patently erroneous. The McCarys especially in providing for the educa­ Barlands and Winns, made up the aris­ traced their origins to Robert McCary tion of Robert McCary and his sister· tocracy of the free black population of of Natchez, Mississippi, who, born a Robert became a barber in Natchez, the city.