Out of the Archives 16: Africa Adventure series profiles African industrial relations, music students in Detroit and Chicago in 1967 film
The US Information Agency (USIA) was a Cold War propaganda and public diplomacy agency. The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) contains a large collection of USIA’s film, photography, and textual records, with many of these holdings still to be explored. As I make research visits to NARA, I’ll be sharing occasional updates of my discoveries, especially those materials related to post-independence Africa, from the USIA archives.
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As I mentioned in Out of Archives installment 6, the USIA Adventure Africa short film series deals “with the experience of African visitors to the US, and are designed to reflect a balanced view of American life through their eyes.” Africa Adventure No 6 (out of at least 61 episodes) features, according to NARA catalogue, “Gershon Konditi of Kenya discussing his summer job in the audiovisual section of the United Automobile Workers union in Detroit, Mr. Konditi’s visit to the home of an American worker, and Nigerian composer Sam Akpabot, discussing his experiences at the University of Chicago, and as a member of a popular Chicago based musical group.”
After opening artwork by Elton Fax (more on him in that Out of the Archives installment 6) host Mike McClellan, standing outdoors somewhere in DC with the Washington Monument in the background, introduces this 15-minute, B&W film as being about “sharing the adventure of working, studying, and living within the spirit of self-improvement here in the United States.” McClellan provides some additional narration as the film unfolds. As is typical of the Adventure Africa series, the two profiled visitors also speak directly to the camera as well as provide voice-over to b-roll footage.
The film moves first to Detroit, “one of the largest industrial centers in America,” where it shows Kenyan Konditi in his role in the film program at the UAW offices meeting with Carroll Hutton (Director of the UAW’s Education Division), interacting with other UAW staff, and running the projector at a training. The film describes him as having worked there for two summers and having “just received his undergraduate degree in economics from Southern Christian College at Tougaloo, Mississippi. He will take a post graduate degree in Industrial Relations at the University of Wisconsin.” (According to Tougaloo College’s history, the school’s name was changed to Tougaloo College in 1962, a few years before this film was made, so it’s not clear why the outdated name is used). At the end of the workday, Konditi spends a relaxing evening with Chrysler factory worker and union member Leon Crawford, his wife, and children.
My research suggests that, while at Tougaloo, Konditi might have been student-body president. A February 1964 article in the Mississippi Free Press describes how he and two other foreign students protested ill treatment from public officials in Jackson, MS, when they were prevented from entering a concert hall. Konditi went on to get a Ph.D. in political science in 1967 from the University of Wisconsin on “The Development of Kenya Labor Law, 1937–1965.” As of January 1976, African Graduate Fellowship Program records noted he was “Employed with Ministry of Labour as Labour Officer. Studying for LLB by correspondence through University of London.” Konditi, who passed away in 2018, became Executive Director of the Federation of Kenya Employers, as well as engaging in other international labor activities over his career.
Konditi’s story is an excellent example of the long-term engagement and cultivation by American labor unions of African union leaders that I described in Out of the Archives 12. This film also typifies USIA’s boosterism of American labor. McClellan’s narration, for example, says “The United Automobile Workers, with more than a million members, is one of the largest American labor unions. Because of what it has been able to do for its members, it is also one of the most respected.”
Africa Adventure No 6 then moves on to Chicago, where it finds Nigerian Sam Akpabot, a trained organist we’re told, practicing in a chapel. We learn that Akpabot, after studying in London, is a musicology student at University of Chicago’s School of Music. He’s shown going to class, working on composing at his desk on a commission for what he calls the Pittsburgh Wind Symphony Orchestra (actual name American Wind Symphony Orchestra), going to a discotheque (“quite a swinging place,” Akpabot says), and playing in a band at the university’s International House. Akpabot’s Wikipedia entry doesn’t mention his University of Chicago studies but does note he received a doctorate from Michigan State University in the mid-1970s and had a notable composing and academic teaching career.
USIA’s Africa-related films exhibited a consistent interest in African musicians, profiling just within the Adventure Africa series Ben Aning of Ghana (episode No 4); Saka Acquaye of Ghana (No 5); Pierre Kazadi of Congo-Kinshasa (No 24); Hugh Masekela of South Africa (No 36); and a handful of musicians-scholars in No 48, The Invisible Bridge. Meanwhile, episode 18 of the television series Nigeria Personal Report, Winds on the River, focuses on Akpabot plus two fellow Nigerian musicians, Akin Euba and Wilberforce Echezona.
One aspect of Africa Adventure No 6 stands out from previous episodes in this series that had emphasized African visitors’ genial interactions with white Americans, and thus indirectly countered Communist criticisms of American racism. In contrast, the majority of people with whom Konditi and Akpabot are shown in this film are Black. This includes, in Chicago, fellow disco attendees, International House party-goers, and Akpabot’s band; and, in Detroit, several Black union staff and members and, most notably, Kenditi’s host for dinner, Leon Crawford. So far, the only other time I’ve seen a Black host family is Animal Doctor (1968), in which a Ugandan student gets on-the-job experience with a Black veterinarian in South Dakota.
Possibly to highlight the family’s middle-class status, Konditi points out that Crawford owns a car and a house (Crawford is also shown amiably chatting over the fence with his white neighbor.) Further, the film spends several minutes painting a portrait of warm domesticity at the Crawfords’ house — Leon and his wife exchange kisses on the cheek when he arrives home, finding her in the kitchen where she’s making biscuits (all the most striking because I’ve yet to see other examples of physical affection between any couples in the films); the Crawford family and Konditi assembled around a full dining table; and the children watching a Black performer on TV.
According to USIA records, Africa Adventure No 6 was retired from circulation in 1973.
