The Hobbit contains no female character. Sure it's a children book but not one female character is a rare thing. That doesn't mean Tolkien was sexist or racist: Galadriel is the most powerful elf of Middle Earth in LOTR. Luthien, Morwen, Niena Niniel ; all very powerful female characters in Tolkien's masterpiece The Silmarillion.
If you read the books, you are free to "color" the characters to your liking. Saying "that's the first black guy" is wrong because Tolkien never speaks about skin tan. We know orcs are supposed to be gray and dusty but Hobbits, Elf and Man are never specified.
Unless you consider "fair" a synonym for white...
I think it's quite obvious from the text that Tolkien did in fact mean "fair" as a synonym for white and that the peoples of middle earth were (in a modern context) profoundly racist. The hobbits are mistrustful of hobbits from the village over, let alone different "races".