Clarence V. Matthews was born and raised in Fayetteville, North Carolina — where he completed his elementary, as well as a portion of his high school education. He relocated to New Jersey in 1955 where he completed his high school curriculum and received his diploma at Dickinson High School.
Clarence was married for 31 years before becoming a widower, and is the father of five children. He worked in various capacities in the warehousing, merchandising and manufacturing industries for a span of well over 22 years. He was also licensed as a real estate sales associate for well over 30 years; and is currently employed with the Jersey City Board of Education. He is also a devoted, 50-year, active member of Monumental Baptist Church located in Jersey City, NJ. He has served on the Trustee Board and as the Black History Instructor for just over 20 years.
Clarence began his writing as the Black History Instructor, who wrote and produced black history plays for the church's annual program in celebration of Black History Month. He then transitioned his writing from screenplay to novel and developed a three-part series known as Jacob's Rite of Passage. This trilogy chronicles the life of a young man raised in the South and takes the reader through the three segments (youth, teen and adult) of the life of the protagonist, Jacob Pete Manor.
In March 2010, the first novel, Young Jacob was released and Clarence was introduced as a “new” author. During the promotion of this new release, a rising awareness of the plight of the family surfaced and the "GET RITE" campaign emerged and the overall theme was, "It takes a village to raise a child. It's time to reclaim the village."
The second novel of the series, Teen Jacob, was released in February 2011 and takes the reader into the teen experiences of the main character Jacob. The finale' to the trilogy, The Man Jacob, was published and released in early spring of 2012. Though written as fiction, the real life lessons of God, family, community and MANHOOD emerge from the pages of this storyline.
Author's Media Kit
Includes: the author's biography, book synopsis, press release, author inspiration and contact information.
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In this segment of the Elder’s Ledger, I thought I’d speak a bit about the origins and grass roots of our publishing company, DeeClare Publishing, LLC. I am the Co-founder and my daughter, Deneen Matthews is the Editor-in-chief.
In this and future blog posts, we will tackle and discuss the issue of economics and its impact in our community.
As best we can, we need to make a concerted effort to commit to making our hard-earned dollars work for us. As the largest consumers, if all we earn is spent outside of the community, how can we sustain? Even if you have left the community, or moved outside of the immediate area, visit and seize opportunities to give back. Be intentional.
This week, I would like to further expound on this principle. I pose this question for all to ponder, “Just what if…”
What if we stretch, expand our thinking around collaboration among churches, organizations and non-profits. What if they came together, joined forces so to speak?” What if we could then improve our purchasing power?
We can borrow a lot from times not so far in the distant past to help us overcome what is before us. Times are not what they used to be and there is no use shutting our minds to the fact that times-a-changing.
This week, I will begin this post with a true story.
In my community, there were two-black owned and operated florists who have gone out of business, who were forced to close their doors. Both of whom I know personally and patronized, and received exceptional service. How can it be that they were not able to sustain? That’s the question I pondered then and even now.