How Black Men Courted Women in the 1950s That No Woman Could Resist

In 1955, a young man in Sweet Auburn, Atlanta, courted a girl 4 months before he ever held her hand. He came on Sunday evenings and sat where her grandmother could see. He brought something small for the house each time, never for the girl, not yet. He spoke to her father first, her mother second, [music] and her last.

By the time he was allowed to walk her to church alone, the whole block had decided he was a serious man. He had courted her the way his uncle taught him, slow, in the open, [music] on her family’s terms. Most of what he knew went quiet the year courting moved into the back seats of cars. He was not unusual. From Harlem to Bronzeville to the Fillmore, black men courted women with a patience and an openness that looked near impossible now.

It was never just romance. It was a craft, and in that world, it was also a proof that a man could be trusted with something precious. Every word was weighed before it left the mouth because a careless one could end a courtship [music] and shame two families. They turned tenderness into a discipline so complete the [music] men who carried it never thought of themselves as romantic.

They thought they were carrying themselves right. We inherited the longing for that. Most of us were never taught a word of it. Number 23 took months of Sunday evenings on a front porch and built a bond a single date never [music] could. Number 11 contradicts everything modern advice tells a man about chasing what he wants, and it made a woman trust him more, not less.

And number three, the rule that decided more courtships than charm ever did, was the reason a man could win a woman by first winning every elder in her house, though that winning had rules of its own, and breaking one ended everything. These 25 ways were never about being smooth.

They were about being trusted with a woman’s heart in a world that gave black families little margin for a wrong man. That was the whole point. We let those ways go quiet, not because they stopped working, but because we mistook patience [music] for weakness and openness for old-fashioned. We are turning the sound back up. Hit that subscribe button.

Let us count down the 25 ways black men courted women in the 1950s that no woman could resist. Number 25. Ask her people first. You started with her family, not with her. You found her father or her uncle and said it plain, “I would like to call on your daughter.” Then stood still while he looked you over. Marcellus Boyd was turned down once and earned a yes the next year.

In the 1950s, a courtship opened with the family, a custom the migration carried north. He did not chase her. He asked to be let in. Number 24. The hat in the hand at her door. The hat came off at the bottom of the steps, not the top. You climbed the porch bare-headed, nothing hidden, and greeted whoever opened the door before you looked for her.

Cleveland Fry held his hat to his chest the whole first visit, and her mother said that was when she decided. For men the world refused to honor, the bared head claimed a respect they were denied the right to give. The hat said he came humble. The bared head said he came serious. Number 23, the front porch patience.

He courted in full view for as long as it took, weeks, months, a whole season before a walk alone. You came when welcome, left before you wore it out, and talked to the family as much as to the girl. Ellsworth means courted a whole summer and never once asked to be left alone with her. >> [music] >> The porch was where two families measured a man slowly in the light with nowhere to hide.

The patience was not waiting. >> [music] >> It was proof he would still be there in the morning. Number 22, walk the street side. He took the side nearest the road, always. You shifted without a word at every crossing, your body between her and the traffic. She never asked. She only noticed it had been done. Gerald Pinkney switched sides so smooth his sweetheart missed the habit for a year.

In a world that left a black woman to fend for herself a dozen hard ways, the street side said one thing. Not while you were with me. He took the danger so she would not have to. Number 21, come bearing something for the house. He never came empty-handed and the gift was for the house, not the girl. A sack of oranges, a cut of meat.

You put it in the mother’s hands, not your sweetheart’s, and called it nothing. Odell Carter brought pecans every Sunday for 2 years and that mother fed half the block on them. Courting a daughter meant joining a family’s economy of care, and the offering said where you stood. It was never about the gift. It was about whose hands you put it in.

Number 20, the Sunday walk home. After church, he asked to walk her home, and the walk was the courtship. You offered your arm on the church steps before the whole congregation and took the long way on purpose. Booker Vance walked one woman home 11 Sundays before he held her hand, every porch on the route pulling for him.

The church steps walk was black courtships most public vow, witnessed by everyone who counted. He did not steal time with her. He earned it in daylight. Number 19, the letter in his own hand. He wrote to her, and he wrote it himself, slow, careful, in ink. Not a note, a letter. You said the thing your mouth got shy about and signed your whole name to it.

Wendell Sharp wrote every week he was gone on the rails. She kept the bundle till the day she died. For people whose words were so often waved off, a letter in a man’s own hand was a thing she could keep. The talk faded by morning. The letter stayed forever. Number 18, court her in the light. He courted in the open, never in secret.

Daylight, front rooms, church socials, the porch. You did not ask her to hide you, and you did not hide her. Roosevelt Banks told his own mother and hers inside the first month. The openness became his [music] name. Where a woman’s reputation was one of her few unguarded riches, courting in the light shielded her from every whisper.

Secrecy was for men with something to hide. He had nothing. Number 17, dressed as if she mattered. He wore his [music] best to call on her, and the dressing said how he saw her. Shoes shined, collar pressed. >> [music] >> You did not save your good self for strangers and bring her the leftovers. Lawrence Pope pressed his one good shirt every Saturday night on a wage that barely stretched.

For a man the world dressed down on sight, arriving sharp made a plain statement of her worth. The suit was not vanity. It was a message addressed to her. Here is what nobody talks about. Somewhere between the closing of the dance halls, the emptying of the porches, and the day a car door got more private [music] than a parlor, a whole apprenticeship in tenderness disappeared.

There used to be a way a young man learned to love a woman well, >> [music] >> from uncles and deacons and old married men who had done it right. The barber taught him how to ask, the grandmother taught him how to wait. The old couple down the street taught him, just by lasting, what he was aiming at. Nobody charged for it.

It happened on porches and church steps, in the time between things. We did not decide to stop teaching it. We lost the rooms. And we have been sending young men out to love without a single lesson ever since. Number 16, ask for the dance the right way. At a social, he did not reach for a woman. He asked, and the asking had a shape.

You came near, waited for her eyes, and offered an open hand. If she said no, you thanked her and stepped back without a flicker. Sylvester Dawes was known at the hall for taking a no as easy as a yes. On a black dance floor, one of the few rooms that belonged fully to its people, the ask showed he could be trusted close.

The dance was not the prize. The asking was the audition. Number 15, win the mother and the grandmother. He courted the women of the house as careful as the woman he wanted. You greeted the mother first, the grandmother before her, and carried the heavy thing unasked. Tommy Joe Greer spent more of his courtship in the grandmother’s kitchen than on the porch, and she argued his case better than he could.

The old women held the real say over a daughter’s future, and their blessing outweighed any flattery. He did not flatter the elders. He earned them. Number 14, on time, every time. He said an hour, he came at that hour, not after. You arrived when you said you would. A man who kept a woman waiting was telling her where she ranked.

Curtis Yates was never once late in 9 months, and she said the steadiness was the thing she married. For families who knew how often the world broke its word to them, a man who kept his small promises was unforgettable. Lateness was easy. On time, every time, was the proof. Number 13, the small, true compliment. He told her one true thing, plain, and let it stand.

Not flattery, a fact handed over. You noticed something the kindness in how she spoke to a child [music] and said it once with nothing asked for it. Alfonso Webb told a woman her laugh made a hard room easier. She held that sentence 50 years. For women, the wider world rarely praised honestly. A quiet true word went deep and [music] stayed.

He did not pour it on. He meant it. And meaning it was the gift. Number 12, never let her stand. A woman entered or had nowhere to sit and he was already up. The seat was hers before she thought to want it >> [music] >> and you found the wall without a word. Hollis Pruitt rose so reflexively the younger men teased him until they heard how women spoke of him.

For men the world tried to shrink, rising for a woman declared that decency lived in them, watched or not. Sitting was easy, standing was the whole sermon. Number 11, make her wait [music] and be worth the wait. He did not rush her and he did not let himself be rushed either. You moved at the pace the courtship deserved.

You did not press for more than she could give [music] or chase her like a thing to be caught. Garrett Sims courted a full year before he spoke of marriage. >> [music] >> The waiting made her certain in a way speed never could. Modern advice says, “Seize it. Push. Close.” These men knew the slow way built a trust that could not be hurried.

He was not slow, he was sure. Number 10, speak her name like it was precious. He said her name with care every time like it cost something to hold. You used it when you greeted her and when you left her and never wore it common. Nathaniel Combs said his sweetheart’s name so gently, she swore [music] it sounded different from him than from anyone alive.

For a woman whose name the world mispronounced, shortened or ignored, a man who said it right handed her something rare. The name was not a habit. It was a small act of reverence. Number nine. Listen like she was the only one in the room. He listened the way most men only pretend to, fully. You set the talk down and turned toward her.

You let her finish all the way out before you said a word. Percy Dade let a woman tell a whole story without once steering it back to himself. No man had ever done that. In a world full of men waiting their turn to speak, the one who truly listened was unforgettable. He did not perform attention. He gave it, the rarest thing one person can hand another.

Researchers who study how attraction lasts keep landing on the same plain finding. The things that pull two people together and hold them are not clever and not new. Attention paid without being asked. A name said with care. Patience that lets a thing grow instead of forcing it. Stediness a person can lean on.

These are the exact things uncles and grandmothers drilled into boys long before anyone had the studies for it. The conclusion the work keeps reaching is the one these men reached without a laboratory. The surest way to win a heart is to prove slow that it is safe with you. The ways worked not because they were old, but because they were correct.

Number eight. The door held, the chair pulled. The small ceremonies were never small to him. The door opened ahead of her, the chair drawn back, the coat taken at the threshold. You did them quiet every time till they were less a gesture than a climate. Emanuel Heart held doors so out of habit his sons thought it was just how men were.

For a woman the world jostled and overlooked, that steady care said one plain thing. Here, you are looked after. The acts were tiny. The message was the whole courtship. Number seven. Walk her to the door and wait. [music] He never let a woman see herself in. You walked her up the steps, waited till she was safe inside, and did not turn for home until the latch caught.

Clarence Roby did it in rain and cold for two years, never once cutting it short. In neighborhoods where a family’s care was one of its few unbreakable riches, the wait at the door was the period at the end of a good sentence. He did not drop her off. He saw her home. Number six. Protect her name on the block.

He guarded her name as careful as his own, more careful. You never spoke of her loose, never let another man speak of her wrong in your hearing. Theodore Glass shut down a careless remark with one level look, and it was never tried again. Where a woman’s good name was one of the few things the world could not take by law, the man who shielded it was worth a hundred who flattered.

He did not boast about her. He stood between her name and every mouth that came for it. Number five, spend on her without keeping count. What little he had, he spent on her glad and never tallied it back. Not to show off, to honor. You gave from what you had, a soda at the picture show, a Saturday’s wage on a dress she’d admired, and never let her feel the cost.

Ulysses Frank saved three weeks to take a woman somewhere fine and never said so. For men paid less than the man beside them for the same work. Spending free, refused to let the world’s stinginess reach her. He did not count it. Counting it would have spoiled the meaning. Number four, remember what she said. He held on to the things she told him, the small ones most of all.

The hymn she loved, the aunt she worried over. You listened the first time so you never had to ask twice, then brought it back weeks later. Solomon [music] Pratt caught a passing word about peach cobbler and set one on her mother’s table a month on. For a woman used to being half heard, a man who remembered saw her whole.

He did not just listen. He kept what he heard. Number three, be vouched for by her family. The deepest rule of all, a man could not talk his own way in. He had to be vouched for. An uncle, a deacon, an old friend put his name behind the young man who then owed that name a debt of conduct for life. Horace Little was vouched for by his own pastor, and to wrong the girl was to shame the man who spoke for him.

The vouch opened a door charm never could, but it bound him. He did not win her family. He was entrusted [music] to them. Number two, mean every word you give her. When he told her a thing, it was true, and when he promised, it was done. You did not say what you would not stand behind, not even to please her.

A sweet lie was still a lie. Booker Tellers never once told a woman a thing he did not mean. And she said that was why she never had to wonder. Where the world handed black families broken promises by law and habit, a man whose word held was steady ground. He did not say the easy thing. He said the true thing and lived it.

Number one, be the same man every day. The simplest way on this list, and the one that won every woman who was won for good. You were the same man Tuesday that you were Sunday, the same in her kitchen as on the corner, the same when her father watched as when no one did. No performance for the courtship, no different man once the ring was on.

There was no act to keep up because there was no act. Just a man who had decided who he was and showed her that man plain day after day until the steadiness became the thing she could not live without. The man who never wore a second face was the one she could finally rest beside. He did not sweep her off her feet.

He gave her solid ground. And solid ground is the rarest thing one person can offer another. None of these ways needed a smooth line, a fine car, or a thing bought on credit. They needed attention, a man willing to look at a woman honest, with no front, and prove over time that she was safe with him. The men who came up through the porches and the dance halls knew something this country has spent a long time trying to make us forget.

That being wanted is not the same as being cherished, and that a man who cannot be patient and pay attention has nothing worth handing a woman who trusts him. These were the habits of men who decided to court with dignity in a world that did not require it of them. The porches have gone quiet. The walks home are shorter now, or gone.

But the thing those porches did is not complicated, and it is not lost. It is waiting to be picked back up. How you make a woman feel safe and seen still matters more than anything you say. >> [music] >> And the men who knew that, the patient ones, the steady ones, the ones who took their hats off at the bottom of the steps, built something that outlasted every one of them.