The acceptance of the facts of African-American history and the African-American historian as a legitimate part of the academic community did not come easily. Slavery ended and left its false images of black people intact.

When I was able to go to school in my early years, my third grade teacher, Ms. Harris, convinced me that one day I would be a writer. I heard her, but I knew that I had to leave Georgia, and unlike my friend Ray Charles, I did not go around with 'Georgia on My Mind.'

You shouldn't bear humiliations.

What we might have been dealing with here - with the building of the Pyramids - is an age that got lost. Man had to learn again what they previously had known.

African people need to stop shouting 'nationtime' until they are clear about the responsibilities of running a nation.

You look at a clock and it tells you it's eight o'clock, you know the number of hours that has been before eight; you know the number of hours you've got after eight. You can now measure your time to see if you can get done a number of things you've got to get done. History serves the same purpose.

I have gone up in the Pyramids and the stones are so close together you can't force a playing card between them and (they are) in perfect alignment. So those people must have had some hydraulics or something. You take 20 men, put them around a big stone, their legs would get in the way. Even if they could lift it, 20 pairs of legs hitting against each other would throw it off balance. And they would not have it in exact alignment. Not even a fraction of an inch off.