Dominoes

Game played with small plastic black rectangles encrusted with white circles representing number values, which was a traditional pastime favored by southern blacks. “Bones,” as the game is called colloquially, became a welcome form of entertainment within other African American communities in the nation as well as in areas populated by blacks during the African Diaspora, such as in Jamaica.

The game of dominoes, along with bid whist and spades, has a significant place in the social history of African Americans as a form of entertainment. The game has long been played by African American men as a leisure-time activity. In the mid-1800s, for example, black patrons of the Boston Saloon in the historic mining town of Virginia City, Nevada, fre-quently played dominoes while drinking liquor and recalling the day's events. There are also stories of black schoolteachers in the South using domino pieces to teach children (and sometimes adults) how to count.

Dominoes was considered such a focus of social interaction among African Americans in the South that a number of southern Jim Crow laws, which touched every aspect of everyday life, were set up to disallow the game from impinging on the segregation of white and black Americans. In 1930, for example, a law in Birmingham, Alabama, made it illegal for blacks and whites to play checkers or dominoes together.

The game of dominoes has also made its way into the visual arts. In 1958, the African American painter Jacob Lawrence, who had been an important figure in the Harlem Renaissance, created the painting Dominoes, now one of his signature creations. The work is a representation of two African American men engaged in a domino game. Dominoes also found its way into the music world. In 1951, a black musical group named The Dominoes produced the sexually risqué song “60 Minute Man,” which became the first rhythm and blues recording to become a hit on the pop Top 40 music charts.