CHICAGO — It’s been awhile since I can recall adults in a frenzy to purchase something not centered around technology (iPhone XS) or a hot Christmas toy (Hatchimals).

Something that compels you to break through a digital paywall without hesitation — to brave the elements, checking store after store to get a copy of something printed and tangible.

The New York Times created that frenzy last Sunday with “The 1619 Project” — a collection of essays and poems about the aftermath of slavery in America. It spans the 400 years that have passed since a ship arrived at Point Comfort in the British colony of Virginia in late August 1619 with enslaved Africans.

As local Chicago author and activist Charlene Carruthers tweeted: “Baaaaabay. The #1619project got people out here going from store to store trying to find the NYT like it’s the 2019 Tickle Me Elmo!”

The project’s goal: “To reframe American history by considering what it would mean to regard 1619 as our nation’s birth year” instead of 1776.

“During this moment, when there is a broad sort of movement going on about the recognition of slavery, I think the New York Times put its stamp on that movement and entered into it,” said Jane Rhodes, professor and African American Studies Department head at University of Illinois at Chicago. “I thought that was a call to arms in many ways. I think the Times is trying to respond to the profound political backlash against the commemoration of slavery and the recognition of the historical damages of slavery, not only on black people, but on the nation.”

I pored over every word, every example of how this country wouldn’t exist without my people. I read it like a dissertation I’d have to present, looking for details yet uncovered in stories that I know all too well.

I read and reread phrases, thinking how much the macro (the continual change of subject when slavery is talked about on a national stage) is still impacting the micro (black lives today from health care to housing).

As I turned the pages, I thought of “Roots” and the furor the 1977 miniseries had on the societal landscape. ABC’s original eight-part series is the third-highest rated program in history with a 51.1 rating, with 36 million households tuning in when it aired live, according to Nielsen ratings. The show was a conversation starter unseen in the pop culture lexicon until that moment, and something that lasted well beyond water cooler talk.

I’m hoping the same holds true for The 1619 Project, which will have an upcoming audio component, curriculum and an educational outreach aspect to bring the information to students. If nothing else, I hope it shows the world that a bipartisan commission to study the issue of reparations is necessary and way past due.

It’s past time to connect the dots of America’s original sin to the black resistance of today. Nikole Hannah-Jones, Times staff writer and the mind behind the project, talks about how current democracy wouldn’t be what it is today had the civil rights movement not laid the foundation for every modern rights struggle.

But lest we forget, this information is nothing new.

“For people who spend their lives studying the black experience and studying slavery and it’s influence on Jim Crow order and modern black inequalities, none of this information is earth-shattering or new,” said Alvin Tillery Jr., director of Northwestern University’s Center for the Study of Diversity and Democracy (CSDD). “But what is important is the venue. I don’t think we’d be having reparation debates televised over HR40, if it weren’t for The Atlantic publishing Ta-Nehisi Coates’ piece on reparations. I think this ‘1619 Project’ has the potential to have the same kind of impact. The profundity of the moment is that there is now a discourse where there wasn’t one before, and that is so powerful. I give so much credit to Ms. Jones and the New York Times for taking the step.”

And even though it’s nothing new, naysayers will come. Case in point: Newt Gingrich’s tweet: “The NY Times 1619 Project should make its slogan “All the propaganda we want to brainwash you with.”

But we have to continue to push back. This is not propaganda. Many American businesses benefited from black bodies as property —human beings who yielded generations of free labor and profit for those who saw them as inferior and not human. It’s America’s ugly truth, and avoiding the conversation will not lead to progress.

“You have one of the nation’s preeminent newspapers saying to people yes, these things are real, you can’t imagine it away,” Tillery said. But it’s not enough to have a white newspaper give its stamp of approval on the history of slavery in this country. Have you written to your member of Congress on racial equity framework? Have you written to your city council?”

Rhodes questions why The 1619 Project has been trending on Google for two days in a row when academia has been talking about slavery and its effects for so many years. “Why does it have to be a TV show like ‘Roots’ or The 1619 Project by the New York Times to get traction?” she asked.

Traction is what’s needed, and I hope The 1619 Project is one more toehold on the rock that we’ve been climbing for hundreds of years. America has deep, psychological trauma and amnesia around the reality of slavery. Now, let’s see whether The 1619 Project can affect the national narrative.

America wouldn’t be the world power it is today without my brethren. It’s time to hold our neighbors, leaders and politicians accountable, and not let up when asking: What are you doing to address the issues connected to this seed that was planted 400 years ago?

Darcel Rockett is a writer and curious soul —the latter informing the former. Her curious nature has led her to write for news organizations in London, the Virgin Islands, Los Angeles and Phoenix. Currently, she writes life and culture pieces for the Chicago Tribune, where she’s served as a digital editor and features reporter for almost a decade.