Passing Strange: A Gilded Age Tale of Love and Deception Across the Color Line

Summary (from the publisher): The secret double life of the man who mapped the American West, and the woman he loved.
Clarence King was a late nineteenth-century celebrity, a brilliant scientist and explorer once described by Secretary of State John Hay as "the best and brightest of his generation." But King hid a secret from his Gilded Age cohorts and prominent family in Newport: for thirteen years he lived a double life-the first as the prominent white geologist and writer Clarence King, and a second as the black Pullman porter and steelworker named James Todd. The fair, blue-eyed son of a wealthy China trader passed across the color line, revealing his secret to his black common-law wife, Ada Copeland, only on his deathbed. In Passing Strange, noted historian Martha A. Sandweiss tells the dramatic, distinctively American tale of a family built along the fault lines of celebrity, class, and race- a story that spans the long century from Civil War to civil rights.  

 

Review: This work of non-fiction explores the double life of Clarence King. King was a late nineteenth-century celebrity who was well known for his work as an explorer in the American west and his best selling writing. He was from a prominent family from Newport, Rhode Island and was friends with well known individuals of the day including Secretary of State John Hay and Henry Adams, who was descended from two American presidents. Yet little did his family and friends know that Clarence King had a second life in which he was known as James Todd, a light skinned black Pullman porter and steelworker married to Ada Copeland and father of five children. Not until he was on his deathbed did his reveal his real identity to his wife.

 

King's double life was possible because of the fluid nature of racial identity in America at the time, which allowed him to convince his wife that he was indeed a light skinned black man. "Grasping that appearance alone did not determine his racial identity, the fair-haired, blue-eyed King presented himself as a 'black' man named James Todd. Rather than moving toward legal and social privilege, he moved away from it. He glimpsed something he sought in Ada Copeland and her African American world" (7-8). By dissembling to his wife about his true identity, he rightly assumed that for her it was easier and safer to be married to a well off Pullman porter than to be known as a woman in an interracial marriage. He was also clever in selecting a fictional profession of Pullman porter that affirmed his supposed black identity and that would explain both how he afforded a fairly affluent lifestyle and to explain his frequent absences.

 

The most tantalizing part of this incredible story is the scant lack of details. Although much is known about King's life as Clarence King, little is known about his secret life as James Todd and very little details are known about his wife. Indeed, much of the details about her life are from decades after his death, when she went to court to try to win the inheritance her husband had promised her when he was dying. The author uses historical research to imagine what Ada's life was like, but the reality is that no one knows exactly how the two met or their courtship or many details about her childhood or family background. Furthermore, although it appears clear that Ada truly did not know her husband was Clarence King until his death, it would be interesting to know exactly what she did know or what he did communicate to her about the time they spent apart. A fascinating story that was well told by Sandweiss but would have been even more fascinating if somehow had thought to interview Ada or her children for more details during their lifetime. A true shame that so much of this story was lost to history.

 

Stars: 4