Questions about race in Northern KY/Florence & OH (Covington: condos, house)

[MovingAgain1234]

My husband is up for job promotion in Florence,KY. He really wants to take the job but I am worried about problems with racism. I am black, my husband is mixed race and we have two small boys. 1 in preschool and 1 baby. I worry about my children being discriminated against. I worry about discrimination against myself and my husband and of course violence. I've never been called the n-word to my face and I like to keep it that way. I don't want my boys to hear that either. And I don't want them to be the only brown face in their classroom either.

Would Florence be a good area for us? What area would be better for us? It must be near Florence since that is where my husband's job would be.

Thank you for your help!

[Mr. In-Between]

There is racism here, but it's no worse than most places. People have learned to co-exist. You can't swing a dead cat down here without hitting a half dozen mixed-race couples, and most people won't even give you a second look. It's very unlikely you'll need to worry about your kids' faces being the only brown ones in the room. One of our office admins lives in Florence; I'll ask her some detailed questions on Tuesday.

[MovingAgain1234]

Thank you Mr. In-Between. I look forward to your colleague's response too.

[Mr. In-Between]

I'm in a two-tone marriage myself, and we don't have any problems - but it's not the same as your situation. In our case, I'm white, but Mrs. In-Between is Asian. We do get an occasional look, but I think it's more about our age difference than the different races. She's over 20 years younger, and looks even younger than that. I think that draws a double-take every now and again.

[staarklo]

I decided to move to Florence in a couple of year's time. I visited Florence for a few times to see the demographics and how people interact. I went to Kroger, Home Depot, strip malls, antique malls and even Goodwill (selling donated stuff to help keep people employed). Yes, you are right. I can't see much colored persons. However, whites here will not spent time scrutinizing you up and down, in and out. From my observation, 90% are white, 5% are Asians (mostly Japanese and Taiwanese, large Japanese car factory nearby) and the rest are Blacks and Hispanics.

Yeah I understand your concern.
Hope your family can settle in peace.


ps look for good neighborhoods and schools when you are finding house or condos.

[Oldhag1]

Most of the region’s AA do live on the Ohio side of the river, but that doesn’t mean no AA live on the KY side. Covington and Newport, both of which are in a stone’s throw from Florence, are 10-12% African-American. Kenton County, just north of Florence also has a larger AA population, if you are concerned about your children having no AA peers.

Just FYI, you are no more likely to be called the n-word in Northern Ky than you are wherever you are currently living.

[flashfearless]

To the OP, the older segment of KY considers northern KY to be the "Yankee KY". Which to me forbodes well to your question. Expect norhtern KY to have more gentile tendencies than the rest of the state.

[CraigCreek]

Originally Posted by flashfearless

To the OP, the older segment of KY considers northern KY to be the "Yankee KY". Which to me forbodes well to your question. Expect norhtern KY to have more gentile tendencies than the rest of the state.

"Gentile"?? Technically, most black folks are gentiles, if you're going by ancient Hebrew teachings.

Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky are historically heavily German and conservative. That's changed to some degree in recent years, but that influence is still very present.

When I lived in Cincinnati in the early 1970s, I was surprised to find much more casual racism than I was used to encountering in my rather courtly (and much more friendly) Central Kentucky hometown, or in a larger Southern city where I have lived for a year while attending grad. school. I remember overhearing and being shocked by REALLY inappropriate, ugly racial comments being made by supposedly educated older white life-long Cincinnatians, including some of my co-workers.

There seemed to be a much greater gulf and a lot of suspicion between black and white people, though they often lived within a few blocks of one another and their kids attended school together. There were race riots in the projects near downtown about a year before I moved to Cincinnati, and that certainly hadn't helped matters. Younger people seemed more open-minded than the older generation, however.

I hope things have changed for the better since then. To me, it seems that Northern Kentucky is more friendly and outgoing than is much of Cincinnati, but that may just be my perception, since I don't live in either place.

The OP and her family have probably settled long ago and I hope their experience was pleasant.

[KY_Transplant]

Originally Posted by flashfearless

To the OP, the older segment of KY considers northern KY to be the "Yankee KY". Which to me forbodes well to your question. Expect norhtern KY to have more gentile tendencies than the rest of the state.

Generalization?

Northern KY and the other side of the river don't have the best record on race relations (Early 2000's Race Riots). I have seen more racist behaviors, comments and ideologies while living in Cincinnati metro than I ever have throughout other parts of Kentucky. If anything, I find the Ohio side of the river to have more racist tendencies outside the Cincinnati city proper. The suburbs of Cincinnati are incredibly conservative compared to Kentucky's major cities, which has more liberal and moderate suburbs.