Dominickers
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 1950 (census) | 60[1] |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Holmes County, Florida, eastern United States | |
| Languages | |
| English | |
| Religion | |
| Baptist | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Brass Ankles, African-Americans, Free Black people, Melungeons, Carmelites, Lumbee, Beaver Creek Indians, Wesorts, Chestnut Ridge people, Redbones, Alabama Cajans | |
| Part of a series on ethnic |
| African Americans |
|---|
The Dominickers are a small biracial or triracial ethnic group, ostensibly known since the 1860s.[2]
They were centered in the Florida Panhandle county of Holmes, in the southwestern part of the county west of the Choctawhatchee River, near the town of Ponce de Leon. They were known to be of mixed Black and white ancestry, to the degree that Dominicker became a term for any person who was mixed Black and white.[3][4] They were classified as one of 200 presumed "triracial isolates". Researcher Calvin L. Beale noted forty existed in Holmes County in 1950, and were marked as white on the census.[5][1]
Etymology
[edit]The nickname "Dominickers", taken as pejorative, was said to come from a local man in a divorce case describing his estranged wife as "black and white, like an old Dominicker chicken."[2]
History
[edit]The first known mention in print of the Dominickers was in a 1939 American Guide series on Florida.[6] The subsection "Ponce de Leon" identifies the Dominickers as being mixed-race descendants of the widow of a pre-Civil War plantation owner's widow and one of her Black slaves, by whom she had five children. Said children married both Black and white spouses, and their descendants multiplied over time. They populated the backwoods, typically in poverty with large families.[3][7]
Before integration, their children were required to attend a one-room, twenty student segregated school (as required by Florida's Jim Crow laws). They were not provided with busing and had to walk twenty miles to school. A Dominicker graveyard adjoined the school.[3]
Dominickers were not accepted as social equals by the white community, but they kept themselves apart from the main black community. They formed a small middle layer of Holmes County society separate from both whites and blacks. Academic Ralph D. Howell suggested they looked Spanish or Cuban, noting some claimed Spanish origin, but stated some appeared to be Black.[3] The Redbones of southwestern Louisiana, who the Dominickers were mapped as residing nearby to, were sometimes called Dominics.[8]
After desegregation, locals had varied opinions on if most Dominickers had assimilated into the main populations.[4]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ a b Beale, Calvin L. (December 1957). "American Triracial Isolates: Their Status and Pertinence to Genetic Research". Eugenics Quarterly. 4 (4): 187–196. doi:10.1080/19485565.1957.9987328.
- ^ a b Green, Jonathon (2026). "Dominicker". Green's Dictionary of Slang. Green's Dictionary of Slang. Jonathon Green and Abecedary Limited. Retrieved 12 March 2026.
In adjacent back country live 'Dominickers,' part Negro and part white, whose history goes back to the early 1860s
- ^ a b c d D. Howell, Ralph (1972). "Dominicker: A Regional Racial Term". American Speech. 47 (3). Duke University Press: 305–306. doi:10.2307/3087971. JSTOR 3087971. Retrieved 12 March 2026.
- ^ a b Lindstrom, Andy (14 September 1986). "U.S. 90: Retracing North Florida's first highway reveals a road well-traveled in spots, abandoned to the Interstate in others". Tallahassee Democrat. Tallahassee, Florida. p. 76. Retrieved 13 March 2026.
- ^ Stout, Wesley (21 September 1966). "Lumbees Among Raceless Americans". The Orlando Sentinel. Orlando, Florida. p. 19. Retrieved 13 March 2026.
- ^ Federal Writers' Project (1939). Florida: A Guide to the Southernmost State. American Guide Series. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 445-446. Retrieved 14 March 2026 – via Internet Archive.
- ^ Rose Bird, Stephanie (2009). Light, Bright, and Damned Near White. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers. p. 45, 48-49. ISBN 9780275989545. Retrieved 12 March 2026.
- ^ Price, Edward Thomas (January 1950). Mixed Blood Populations of Eastern United States as to origins, localizations, and persistence. Oakland, CA: University of California. p. 112, 115, 116a, 118, 121, 299a. Retrieved 16 January 2026.
External links
[edit]- Piney Woods History, Presents transcripts of original documents mentioning the Dominickers, as well as a number of local family trees, photographs, and other pertinent materials
- Daniel J. Sharfstein, "The Secret History of Race in the United States," Yale Law Journal, Volume 112, Number 6, March 2003.
- "Antebellum Louisiana and Alabama: Two Color Lines, Three Endogamous Groups," October 15, 2004
- "The One-Drop Rule Arrives in the Postbellum Lower South" October 1, 2005
- "The Antebellum South Rejects the One-Drop Rule" November 15, 2004
Further reading
[edit]- Bird, Stephanie Rose. Light, Bright, and Damned Near White: Biracial and Triracial Culture in America. Praeger, 2009.
- Carswell, E. W. He Sold No 'Shine Before Its Time. Taylor Publications, 1981.
- Eidse, Faith. Voices of the Appalachicola. University Press of Florida, 2007.
- McGregory, Jerrilyn. Wiregrass Country. University Press of Mississippi, 1997.
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