Notes of a Radical Son

An ambitious and vast family history, told from the perspective of the son of Black Panther martyr Jonathan Jackson, who is also the nephew of celebrated prison writer George Jackson, two figures who redefined Black Power and American dissent in the early 1970s.

In thirty-six minutes on a sweltering day in August 1970, there occurred one of the most tragic days in American history. Jonathan Peter Jackson, then a seventeen-year-old boy, attempted to free the Soledad Brothers, who included among them his older brother and hero George Jackson. Jonathan’s son, the writer of this book, wasn’t yet born and would only learn who his father was nine years later.

To better understand, Jonathan Peter Jackson Jr. reconstructs and restores the entire family history on both sides, going back almost hundred years, to the period of slavery that his paternal grandparents and great-grandparents had endured and escaped, as well as his white mother’s own history, including her Kansas roots. As a writer, Jonathan Peter Jackson Jr. comes to know who his father was, who his uncle was, and in this way, through writing this book, comes to know who he himself is.

Notes of a Radical Son is many things. It is a story of a family that rose through struggle into the Black middle class. It is a story of how a young woman's courage kept the sacrifices of two martyrs and a movement alive for her son. It is also a story about the incarceration of a promising and bright young man, engaged in a freedom struggle, and his younger brother’s devotion to him and wish to see him free. Most urgently, Notes of a Radical Son takes us on an affecting journey through three generations of a family’s enduring resilience.