Being a Hip Hop fan, I’d heard many rappers namedrop some of the most notorious crack / cocaine dealers of the 1980s. With Rich Porter, Alpo, Azie, Supreme, and Fat Cat being some of the most famous. But when doing some research, I learned about the man who might possibly have been the most classy drug kingpin in the Bronx and Harlem area back in the 80s. That man is Kevin Chiles, and The Crack Era – The Rise, Fall and Redemption of Kevin Chiles documents his experience as a 1980s drug kingpin.
The reason I say that Kevin Chiles was one of the most classy of the dealers, is because his intentions were always to take care of this closest friends and family. He wasn’t as boastful as the likes of Alpo and Rich Porter. Maybe he did flaunt his wealth at times, but his reasoning for living the life came from a good place and he never sold out his friends like one aforementioned kingpin.
What The Crack Era does well is show how many young minorities fell into the drug dealing life pretty much by accident. Back when Kevin was a teen, cocaine and heroine were the big drugs. Heroine was something that the older demographic primarily dealt with, and cocaine was so commonplace in the culture —being that it was a party drug— that people didn’t even think of it as a harmful drug that ruins society. Therefore, to a young man who wanted to help out his poor parents and siblings, selling cocaine didn’t come across as a rebellious act. It was simply one of the only opportunities available in a poor community.
That’s what makes books like The Crack Era so important, because oftentimes people run with the narrative that minorities choose a life of crime, when in fact they had little to no other opportunities for survival. Today, opportunities are more plentiful for Black and Hispanic youths, so you could say that they’re able to make a choice now. But in the 80s and 90s, there’s no denying that minorities were systematically held back.
As well as breaking down the economics of the streets, The Crack Era shows the determination many hustlers of the time had to make something of themselves. It also highlights many of the tragedies that occurred once the crack epidemic came around and once violence crept into the culture.
Reading The Crack Era was like taking a trip back through my childhood, and I got to understand what was really happening in the world when I was just a baby. As a Hip Hop nerd, it was also amazing to see how Kevin’s story was connected to so many other come up stories in the 80s and 90s.
Kevin also has a lengthy breakdown of being followed by the FBI, being arrested and beating two trials. He eventually was forced into taking a plea deal, but for someone of his stature in the streets, it was a hell of a deal (10 years in prison). Kevin talks about how prison changed his thinking, and how he started his new venture, Don Diva Magazine, while he was serving time. It was all made possible with the help of his now wife Tiffany Chiles.
The Crack Era is a book that gives an honest account of the mid 80s crack epidemic in Harlem, without glorifying the lifestyle. Kevin makes it clear that the younger generation has no reason to ever want to live that life. He merely breaks down what he was able to achieve and what he lost in the process.
For lovers of True Crime books, The Crack Era should be the go-to book if you want to get an idea of how drugs impacted the black community.
