Angeleno leads tours to Ghana, Africa’s emotional site of slave trade

LOS ANGELES - As FOX 11 honors Black Heritage during Black History Month, my story on African ancestry got personal.

There is a saying "we stand on the shoulders of giants." When I learned of an Angeleno leading tours to Africa, I knew I wanted to learn more, and for very personal reasons.

His name is Gregory Johnson. We'd met years ago during his 25 years at KJLH radio, the station owned by Stevie Wonder, and a primary voice of the Black community. Johnson was the longtime marketing director and produced major events like Taste of Soul on Crenshaw.

He is now president of the board of the Arts Council of Long Beach. It's a nonprofit that gives out grant money in the arts. Johnson is a US Marine veteran.

I've been on his text message loop for years and got intrigued when I saw a text on Ghana tours. A conversation on that matter had come up last year with another acquaintance who had gone there, was telling me about her trip and even introduced me to a Prince and Princess of Ghana royalty. I was already intrigued.

You might say Johnson is an Angeleno highlighting Black history and in a global way. He started going to Africa for the Cape Town Jazz Festival in South Africa. His most emotional tour is to a major historical site of the slave trade in Africa. He's documenting his trips and on a visit to Ghana, selfie-style he notes "we're on our way to the slave market in Cape Coast, Ghana."

In a moving video he shows us the river and water spot that was for the last bath before the enslaved were put on the slave market.

He shows a grand all white castle that was a slave dungeon. Seeing the vast Cape Coast Castle and economic enterprise for the first time he says "brought me to tears. It brought me to tears."  

Johnson, through his company Hannibal Media Group, and with his life partner Rhonda Love is documenting these trips. He has been to Africa 20 times. 

One trip took him to the African Ancestral Wall where 92 faces represent the Pan-African movement and the global fight against slavery, racism and for racial equality and independence.

On that African Ancestral wall are Egyptian pharaohs, Reggae legend Bob Marley, and American figures like Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther King, and Muhammad Ali.

The African Ancestral Wall is on the property of a former Californian, Jerry Johnson(no relation to Greg) who happens to be from Long Beach. Jerry had repatriated back to Ghana. He created the wall to educate children in Africa.  Greg says he found the wall on YouTube and now has his own YouTube video and interview with Jerry. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ko1rQ0A0ZvE

My interview went personal when I shared news of my own family story. My Black bloodline is from Brazil. It’s a LONG story, and for another time, but note for the first time I met my Brazil family just this year.

I told Johnson I was learning all about a relative through marriage, Brazilian civil rights leader Abdias Nascimento. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdias_do_Nascimento.

To my surprise, Johnson's response was, "he's on the wall!"

Johnson tells me, "Mr. Nascimento was a very powerful voice toward liberation. He's an essential figure in Brazil's struggle for freedom. Essential."

The facts and figures on slavery are sobering, and even more so when you hearing of the history of Brail. While North America received 400-thousand slaves. The number taken to Brazil was four million. He says "secondarily, Brazil was the last nation to outlaw slavery."

Nascimento died in 2011. A book on life as an artist, a poet, an actor, an educator, and a politician has him pictured as a Senator and welcoming South Africa's Nelson Mandela. His first wife was the cousin of my father(but like a sister) legendary actress Lea Garcia. I’m learning a lot about her too and the film that won Brazil an Oscar in 1960 that launched her career, Black Orpheus. 

Hearing Nascimento’s story through Johnson’s eyes, I felt an overwhelming responsibility to step up... in life.

Johnson says, "that's what happens for us. It's necessary. Because of them, we are."

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