six miles across the bay from san francisco the trade center for the area with the port of oakland, the fifth busiest in the u.s. but the population of 400,000, oakland is one of the most ethnically diverse cities in the country and has a history of political activism being the birthplace of the black panther movement. but the help of our comcast cable partners, for the next hour we will learn about the city's literary scene from local authors. >> if you are writer coming need to be good and the bay area has a number of them. but i like about the california writers club is its rich history, connection to oakland, the fact it's been around over a hundred years. it is sustainable. >> when i came to california, poetry was very popular. most of the polls were somewhere else. she read this and saw the poetry to be written by someone in

california about california. >> my parents first started the book tour, their purpose was to offer this resource to the community feeling that black people needed a place to go where they could learn about themselves from other black people mostly. so it was a service they were providing to the community, but also to the community at large because other cultures know about black people, the better it is for everybody as well. so the bookstore is the oldest black bookstore in the country. we are just starting our 56th year. the name is from marcus garvey, the black nationalist leader who

was from jamaica, came here and started back to africa. lots and lots of books. the history of the bookstore is that it was started in 1960 by my parents, doctors may eventually richardson who met as teenagers and eventually they wound up in california. my father had majored in biography and opened a printing business in the soma district, a black district in the four days after he got out of the army which he hated dearly. he wanted to do something for his people. so did my mom. both of them like to read quite a bit and he had difficulty finding books about black people

and you would scour the nation looking for these books. they would get books among them to friends. friends wouldn't give them back they started ordering more than one copy and eventually started putting books in the window of the print shop and it grew into this wonderful as to to shame. he did a lot of printing for black churches, all the black businesses in the fillmore district and then moved from that into publishing very necessary but out-of-print books so he became a publisher as well. we are talking about the 60s and the black arts movement is going on. the civil rights movement, the black power movement. people were hungry for information and we provided a forum for speakers to come in,

for organizations to meet an organized and share our thoughts and strategies and was very well received. >> where in the back market bookstore and this operation was run by thy brother who also has a beautiful stained last he saw outside. so here is the oldest press that we have that is not the oldest we ever had. my dad started printing. my brothers learned how to do that. my sister and i got god collating and stapling and making tuna fish sandwiches. although i did become a typesetter little bit later.

way back when my father was finally able to afford it brand-new prius and it was a big was a big-time inexpensive and all that, but he got it and so one day this young man he wants to have a job and my dad asked him what his name was. he said morgan freeman. he said what can you do? he said well, i am a dancer. my dad said well, we can't use any dances but he offered to show him how to work the press. and he wound up one day to read something and chomps of monkey wrench into the press for about a $10,000.6. my dad being who he was said you really need to get non-with your

career. you want to go to new york and gave him the money to get out there and get away from the press. we've had some really big authors didn't hear and a lot of unknown authors. we had terry mcmillan when she only had one book out as she became a very, very good friend and supporter of the story. we had a legend for tony morris which had everybody shivering in the mood, speechless beating her. probably the biggest event we ever had was mohammed ali. that was just tremendous. there was a line for deep down the corner, around the corner up

to the next stratum that lasted for four or five hours. he was kind enough to stay here that whole time and let everybody sit on his lap, take a picture, shake his hand. i think the community very much appreciate and they let us know that. they support us in every possible way. they understand the important impact in the resource of knowledge about them in their community. more and more people are understanding most of the black book stores have shut down and that is due not only because of online shopping at the big box stores, but also because the lack of consciousness in the community searching for knowledge. i was asked to speak at a junior high school, middle-school a couple years ago and decided

teenagers and that was for martin luther king's birth day. finally talking on a non-about martin luther king and i'm getting this blank looks and i said you ought to know who mark mr. king is, right? one of the hispanic girls raised her hand and gave me the wrong answer. and then a young brother raised his hand. he said he freed the slaves. they weren't laughing. they didn't know. so then i asked if they knew that the black panthers were and somebody said we know that there've pink panther is. they were just clueless. so there was a disconnect somewhere where they don't understand their history, what that means to them today. they don't feel a need to calm

any of them learned about something because they are ignorant of the fact they don't know what they don't know. although we see more and more younger folks coming through, which is great. not an hour goes by so that makes us happy and we are still on that path. >> bought our trip to oakland, california, we spoke with emily brady whose book "humboldt" discusses humboldt, california known for its target of marijuana. >> i wrote this book because i was really curious about the community of marijuana farmers. i grew up in northern california and the wine country san francisco. where i grew up there was this region that was a pot town. i was