Augustus Jackson | The Father of Ice Cream
How a 19th Century Black Ice Cream Maker From Philadelphia Helped Me Find My Place In History.
I love studying history.
Funny enough, if any of my previous history teachers read this, you know what they would tell you? “Ryan is lying to you because he did terribly in my history class.” Well, I’m not lying to you. My high school history class grades were indeed abysmal.
I ended my Junior year with a D+ in History class (and the + may be generous). I had some free room in my Senior year schedule, so I retook the class with a different teacher to improve my grade. Well, it didn’t matter because I didn’t do any better. I enjoyed my teachers, and by all accounts, they were great, but when it came to studying history in school, I just couldn’t get into it.
The subject matter was unclear to me, and memorizing dates was difficult. When Outkast’s ‘Hey Ya!’ hit the radio, I learned every single word within a week of its release, but somehow memorizing the order of events that led to the revolutionary war was a hard pass.
I’ve spent much of my adult life wondering why I wasn’t a better student. Even in elementary and middle school, I spent a lot of time with teachers and counselors, all of whom questioned my ability to retain information. I could read chapter after chapter of the…
