http://www.netstrider.com/documents/whites/index.html#I.1
The Jackson Whites": The Ramapough Mountain People, also known locally, and in the pejorative as "The Jackson Whites," are an extended clan of closely interrelated families living in the Ramapo Mountains and their more remote valleys principally in Bergen County, New Jersey, but also in immediately adjacent Passaic County, New Jersey, and Rockland County, New York. Their largely Dutch surnames, de Groot, de Fries, van der Donck, and Mann, in all their variant spellings, are among the oldest in the countryside and predate the Revolutionary War. They live only thirty miles or so from downtown Manhattan which lies just across the Hudson River (see map). They are shy, gentle, proud, and reclusive people who, until relatively recently, seldom ventured far from their mountain homes.
They are clearly racially mixed. There are elements from native Indian, Negro, Dutch, and possibly German (Hessian) and Italian blood lines. Their isolation has resulted in a high degree of intermarriage among the families which has, on occasion, produced genetic anomalies such as syndactyly (fusion of fingers or toes), polydactyly (extra fingers or toes), pie baldness, albinism, sometimes distinguised by a grayish skin color, and mental retardation.
The majority of the members of the extended clan, however, are robust, intelligent people with striking good looks. In general, members of the clan have light to dark bronze complexions, light eyes, and curly hair, usually jet black or brunette but occasionally pure white. Their facial features display a mixture of Indian and Negro characteristics that have set them apart from their neighbors for centuries. More than any other aspect, it is their looks that have isolated them, marked them, and engendered the many lies, misconceptions, myths and legends that surround them in the local oral history of the region.
The clan now prefers to be called the Ramapough (or Ramapo) Mountain People or the Ramapough Mountain Indians. In the 1980s, as a result of an activist movement led by tribal author and historian, Mozelle Van Dunk, they petitioned the Bureau of Indian Affairs, with support from the Attorneys General of New Jersey and New York States, for recognition and status as a bona fide Indian tribe. To date, their efforts have been unsuccessful. The Bureau classifies them as Black not Indian.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Doug Henwood" <dhenwood at panix.com> To: <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org> Sent: Saturday, October 09, 2004 12:18 PM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Sopranos
> Carl Remick wrote:
>
>>That lost-in-the-woods episode is another of the all-time greats. Tony's
>>henchmen Paulie and Chris take a Russian gangster (apparently a highly
>>trained former commando) off into the woods to whack him.
>
> An episode rich with New Jersey content. They're in the Pine Barrens in
> central Jersey, and they worry about being attacked by the "Jackson
> Whites." I have no idea who the Jackson Whites really are, but I grew up
> hearing about them as a horde of inbred hillbilly types who preyed on
> outsiders.
>
> Hmmm, Bartleby <http://www.bartleby.com/65/ja/JacksoW.html> says the
> Jackson Whites inhabited the Ramapo Mtns of northwestern NJ, but that's
> not the legend I grew up with, nor is it the one Paulie & Chris are
> repeating.
>
> Doug
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>
>
>