Statewide series of marches to end in Raleigh as NAACP conference begins
Marchers took to the street this week, calling for the state to make reparations for the 1898 Wilmington riots.
About a dozen people marched to the courthouse in Durham on Sunday. It was one of 13 such marches held across the state leading up to the 65th annual conference of the state NAACP, which starts Thursday.
The marchers are asking state legislators to make payments to the descendants of those harmed in an insurrection that led to the deaths of at least 14 black people and perhaps many more.
The riots were brought to the forefront when the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission report was released in 2006 after six years of study by a state-appointed panel.
The panel found that the riots that led to a government overthrow in Wilmington were started by white supremacist leaders in a conspiracy to strip political power from black people and their allies.
State legislators have apologized for the conspiracy, but the state NAACP and other groups in a statewide coalition are calling for the state to make reparations to the families of those who died or lost their livelihoods as a result of the riots.
“You want to apologize, but you don’t want to share the wealth with these people,” said Fred Foster, head of the Durham branch of the state NAACP. “The only way to bring closure is to set things right.”
The group also seeks reparations for forced sterilizations under a state program aimed at preventing the mentally ill and those with low IQs from having children. North Carolina’s State Eugenics Board presided over a eugenic sterilization program from 1929 until 1974 that sterilized at least 7,600 people, almost all of them women and about 60 percent of them black.
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WASHINGTON - The Democratic presidential nomination his, Barack Obama reached out Wednesday to mend fences with his defeated rival as Republican opponent John McCain tried to frame the fall campaign on his own terms. “I think he has exercised very bad judgment on national security issues and others,” McCain said.
Hillary Rodham Clinton was angling to become Obama’s running mate and her aides ramped up the speculation on that matter Wednesday. “I think a lot of her supporters would like to see her on the ticket,” Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe said. But Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs cautioned “there is no deal in the works.”
Clinton has yet to acknowledge Obama’s victory in the bruising Democratic race and her aides - also dodging that conclusion - said on the morning talk shows that she would take a few days to decide what comes next for her. Obama spoke by phone with her Tuesday night and both sides predicted he and Clinton would sit down together before long.
“When the dust settles and it makes sense for her, he’ll meet whenever she wants to,” Gibbs said. “She’s accumulated a lot of votes throughout this country. We want to make sure that we’re appealing to her voters.”
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More than 60 percent of non-traumatic, lower-limb amputations occur among people with diabetes. Don’t become one of them.
(NewsUSA) - Nearly 21 million people in the United States are afflicted with diabetes, which accounts for 7 percent of the population. The prevalence of the disease is even higher among African Americans. In fact, approximately 13 percent of African Americans aged 20 years or older have the disease. And while diabetes is a chronic disease that can be managed, people need to be more aware of the complications associated with it.
Diabetic complications can cause nerve and vascular damage, which can eventually lead to foot ulcers. If not treated in time, these ulcers can result in amputation. In fact, more than 60 percent of non-traumatic, lower-limb amputations in the United States occur among people with diabetes.
What can you do? The American Podiatric Medical Association (APMA) recommends regular visits to an APMA podiatric physician as part of a comprehensive foot care plan to help reduce your risk of amputation. Additionally, the APMA suggests following these simple tips at home.
* Check your feet every day
Especially if you have a loss of sensation, visually inspecting your feet daily will help you notice any cuts, sores, blisters or changes in the skin or toenails. You can use a hand mirror to help you check the bottoms of your feet. If you notice a change in your feet, see your podiatrist immediately.
* Clean your feet daily
Washing your feet will help avoid the build-up of bacteria. Be sure to wash in warm water, rather than hot. Completely dry your feet after washing, and pay special attention to drying between the toes.
* Keep skin healthy
By lightly applying lotion or moisturizer to your feet, you can help prevent dry, flaky or cracked skin. Use lotion on the tops and bottoms of your feet but never between the toes because excess moisture between the toes creates conditions favorable to forming an infection.
* Always wear shoes and socks
Soft, lightly padded socks will help you avoid blisters and sores. Socks with no seams are best. Also, examine the insides of your shoes to be sure there is nothing harmful that will injure your feet.
* Choose shoes that fit well and protect your feet
One of the best ways to avoid injuries to your feet is to wear sturdy and supportive shoes at all times.
For more information on diabetes and your feet or to find an APMA podiatrist in your area, visit www.apma.org.
(NewsUSA) - During the 1963 March on Washington, Martin Luther King, Jr. stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and delivered what would become his most famous public words. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech left an indelible imprint on hundreds of thousands of civil rights demonstrators that day and would continue to do so for generations to come. Now, more than 45 years after King’s inspirational words rang through the crowd of more than 200,000 people, plans for King’s legacy to be immortalized in a large-scale memorial are fast becoming a reality.
In early 2008, construction will commence at the site of the the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial, a four-acre plot located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. For the past 10 years, the Washington, DC Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial Project Foundation has led this historic effort, taking the helm after it was conceived more than two decades ago. Throughout this time span, the Foundation has remained committed to King’s legacy, virtues and humanity for all people -; regardless of race, color or creed.
“This year we will see the culmination of a decade’s worth of work,” said Harry E. Johnson, Sr., president and CEO of the MLK National Memorial Project Foundation. “We enthusiastically anticipate reaching a number of key milestones that will bring the national MLK Memorial one step closer to taking its permanent residence on the National Mall in our nation’s capital.”
The MLK Memorial will be situated adjacent to the FDR Memorial, directly between the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials. The centerpiece of the MLK Memorial is the “Stone of Hope,” a three-story statue of King that emerges from a stone wall of granite. A grove of cherry trees will also encompass the landmark to underscore themes of justice, love and hope.
“To date, we have raised nearly $90 million for the MLK National Memorial Project -; but we are still working tirelessly to meet the $100-million goal required to actually build and maintain the memorial,” Johnson said.
For more information on the Washington, DC Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial Project, or to find out how to contribute, visit www.BuildtheDream.org or call 1-888-4-THE-DREAM.
The ACG recommends that you talk to your doctor about colorectal cancer screening.
(NewsUSA) - Colorectal cancer is the number-two cancer killer in the U.S. Unfortunately, few people realize that there are a number of simple screening tests that can make colorectal cancer one of the most preventable cancers.
Most colon cancers begin as polyps which, if not removed, can become cancerous. The development of more than 75-90 percent of colorectal cancer can be avoided through early detection and removal of these pre-cancerous polyps. The digestive health specialists from the American College of Gastroenterology (ACG) urge you to get screened for colorectal cancer.
Colorectal cancer is most common after age 50, but it can strike at younger ages. The chance of colon cancer increases with age. It’s suggested that screenings begin at age 50 for men and women at average risk for colorectal cancer. African-Americans should begin colorectal cancer screening as early as age 45. African-Americans are diagnosed with colorectal cancer at a younger average age than whites, and African-Americans with colorectal cancer have a decreased survival rate compared with whites.
Colonoscopy is considered the best test for colorectal cancer screening and prevention because it allows physicians to look directly at the entire colon and identify suspicious growths. It is the only test that can detect and remove pre-cancerous polyps from the colon during the same examination.
For average-risk individuals, the ACG recommends colonoscopy screening every 10 years beginning at age 50 as the preferred strategy. Alternative strategies for average risk individuals include annual stool tests to detect blood and flexible sigmoidoscopic exams every five years, although unlike colonoscopy this approach does not allow visualization and removal of polyps in the entire colon. The ACG urges you to talk to your doctor about what screening tests are right for you.
There is no reason for someone to die from a preventable cancer. With improved use of colon cancer screening, we can save lives. Colorectal cancer screening with colonoscopy is among the most powerful preventive tools in clinical medicine. To learn more about the benefits of colorectal cancer screening, speak with your doctor or visit www.acg.gi.org.
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - There was a time when the term “African-American literature” referred to the work of literary giants such as Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison, Alice Walker and Zora Neale Hurston. Today, it includes “Desperate Hoodwives” by a pair who go by the pen names Meesha Mink and De’nesha Diamond.I usually go for books somewhere in the middle between the Pulitzer Prize winners and the stuff littering the literary landscape.
In honor of Black History Month, here’s my salute to some of my favorite contemporary novels by black authors. They are well-written and entertaining. Their characters either made me laugh out loud or cry. Some ticked me off. Others wouldn’t leave me alone, dancing in my head for days after I closed the book on them.
Bottom line: They left a memorable impression. And that’s what a good book should do.
“Sugar” by Bernice L. McFadden (2001)
Pearl’s life changes forever when she forges an unlikely friendship with Sugar, a prostitute with an eerie resemblance to her dead daughter, Jude. The high and mighty Christian women of Bigelow, an African-American town in 1955 Arkansas, shun Sugar and are mortified by Pearl’s relationship with her. Sugar helps Pearl, frigid since Jude’s brutal murder 15 years earlier, find joy again. And Sugar, an orphan raised in a brothel, finds love for the first time. But a horrific act of violence nearly destroys Sugar and reveals the truth about Jude’s murder.
Why it’s on my list: McFadden had me at the first sentence, “Jude was dead,” and kept me hooked with her poetic language, vivid descriptions and rich characters. “Sugar” invaded my dreams weeks after I finished this riveting tale.
“Disappearing Acts” by Terry McMillan (1989)
Franklin, a high school dropout, alcoholic and in-and-out-of-work carpenter, is taking a vacation from women while he gets his “constitution” together. Music teacher and aspiring singer Zora is trying to figure out why she always chooses the wrong man. They meet, and love knocks them for a loop. Things get sticky when Zora learns he’s a father of two and still legally married. They’re further complicated when she gets pregnant and he loses his job.
Why it’s on my list: It’s been more than 15 years since I met Franklin and Zora, but I still remember taking them to bed with me every night. It was the first book I’d read with characters so lifelike that I forgot they weren’t real. I’ve been a fan ever since.
“The Other Woman” by Eric Jerome Dickey (2003)
A workaholic television news producer is pushed to the edge when she learns her husband, a teacher, has been cheating on her. The other woman’s husband turns out to be the person who informs her of the affair, and the dejected spouses form an alliance. When the two couples finally come face to face, their lives are forever altered.
Why it’s on my list: When my sister suggested it, I was reluctant to read yet another story about adultery. This is anything but, and it reads like a fast-paced thriller. Dickey’s ability to get inside the head of a female is a skill to be envied. And I was so engrossed in the story, I didn’t even realized Dickey never tells us the protaganist’s name.
“Love on the Dotted Line” by David E. Talbert (2006)
Morgan has had it with failed relationships. When the contract lawyer learns her latest lover is not monogamous, she decides her next man is going to pledge his fidelity in writing. Enter Charles, a former NBA player who owns a car dealership. In the heat of passion, Morgan whips out a contract and asks Charles to sign on the dotted line. When he eventually cheats, she takes him to court, and the games begin.
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Exhibition features Durham man’s pictures of a troubled era
The woman is holding her infant carefully, almost reverently, but she cannot shield him from the reality etched above their bus seat: “For colored patrons only.”
Alexander M. Rivera Jr. took the photograph more than half a century ago, but when he sees it on the museum wall, he pauses to look at it once again.
“This is the kind of world that this kid was born into,” says Rivera, 94. “That’s what they had to look forward to.”
That photograph — along with dozens of others that Rivera took as a journalist covering the civil rights struggle during the 1940s and 1950s — went on display Friday at the N.C. Museum of History. Rivera’s work will remain a part of the museum’s collection until early next year.
Rivera, a North Carolina native who lives in Durham, spent nearly 30 years writing and photographing for black newspapers, including the Pittsburgh Courier, one of the nation’s most prominent at the time. He traveled the Southeast, documenting lynchings, wrongful prosecutions and the push for integration.
He wrote stories that the mainstream media avoided, covering both the accomplishments of black athletes and performers and the suffering of the families of lynching victims. He wrote about a 14-year-old boy sentenced to a 30-year prison term for stealing a flashlight, and a sharecropper arrested for “unlawfully looking” at a white girl.
He recorded the stark trappings of segregation. One photograph shows the audience at a 1948 spring dance in Rocky Mount. Whites and blacks sit on the same expanse of bleachers, but a wire strung from the ceiling neatly divides the races. The dividing line, in Rivera’s day, was no metaphor.
Rivera says he had little sense at the time that he was recording history. He says he was just supporting his family, doing “a job that needed to be done.”
Shirl Spicer, the museum curator overseeing the exhibit, said Rivera was a pioneer, one of the South’s most prolific and respected black journalists. He earned national awards and in the 1950s struck up a friendship with then-Vice President Richard Nixon, who invited Rivera along on a 1957 diplomatic trip to Ghana.
But in the years since, she said, his work has been largely forgotten, with only a handful of photos permanently displayed in the N.C. Central University library.
“We have, in our midst, a living legend,” Spicer said. “But very few people know it.”
Rivera’s work often drew ire rather than respect. He was jailed in Lumberton in 1948 for photographing the three separate entrances to a movie theater, one for whites, one for blacks and one for Indians.
And on a rural road in Montgomery County, Georgia, Rivera feels sure that his life was saved only by the chauffeur’s cap he happened to be wearing. He was on his way back from interviewing the widow of Isiah Nixon, who was shot in his front yard in 1948 after angering whites by voting.
Sallie Nixon told Rivera that a group of men lured her husband to the fence, and then shot him while his children watched. When the gun went off, she told Rivera, “my children scattered like a covey of birds.”
He snapped a picture of Nixon on the porch of her wooden shack — the kind that has become emblematic of rural Southern poverty. She is surrounded by her six children, one of whom is only a few weeks old. The face of one child is clenched in a sob.
As Rivera drove the winding road away from her house, he rounded a curve and found a car blocking the road, he remembers. The sheriff was one of several white men inside. The sheriff got out and demanded to know what Rivera had been doing.
The photographs of Alexander M. Rivera Jr. will be on display until March 1, 2009, at the N.C. Museum of History, 5 E. Edenton St., in downtown Raleigh. The exhibit, on the third floor, is free. The museum is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday, and from noon to 5 p.m. on Sunday.
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Bishop presides at dedication of modern home for traditionally black parish
Etheldreda Guion came to Durham a newlywed in 1963, a Catholic from New Orleans looking for a new parish. She visited Immaculate Conception Catholic Church in downtown Durham, which she learned was for whites.
Black Catholics, they told her, went to Holy Cross, a small stone church across the street from N.C. Central University, which then was known as the N.C. College for Negroes. Guion began attending and soon found that the small church boasted such a devoted following that parishioners refused to let it be closed.
Holy Cross is now the last traditionally black Catholic parish in the Raleigh diocese, which covers the eastern half of the state. But the church’s quaint stone home has been replaced with a modern building of brick and pine a couple of miles south on Alston Street.
The need for a new home was evident Sunday morning, when Bishop Michael Burbidge presided over the new church’s dedication. The 420-seat church holds five times as many people as the old church, and it was standing room only on Sunday.
“All I can say is, it’s just an awesome, awesome sight,” said Guion, a parish council chairwoman, as she waited for the dedication to begin.
The church dedication was Burbidge’s first since he was appointed bishop of the Raleigh Diocese in June 2006.
Holy Cross stayed true to its traditions, with the choir belting out gospel-style renditions of hymns that had parishioners clapping in rhythm. Chuck Davis, who founded an African-American dance group in Durham, dressed in traditional West African mudcloth and pounded a kenkeni drum as he led the congregation into the new church.
Humble origins
Holy Cross’ beginnings trace back to a Christmas Day Mass celebrated at the dental office of Dr. Norman Cordice on South Mangum Street in 1939. A beauty parlor also served as a home for Durham’s few black Catholics until the church opened in 1952.
The parish began scouting for a new location five years ago. By then, NCCU had already purchased most of the old church’s 20-acre site. Guion said council members feared that the university would take the rest under eminent domain if they did not sell it first.
The new church cost about $3.5 million, with roughly a third of the money raised from members and others in the community. Among its features are a stained-glass window above the main entrance that depicts a wide, leafy tree. A large chunk of the old church’s original stone wall serves as the backdrop behind the altar
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Davie Street Presbyterian looks back on a turbulent time after the historic black church hired a white pastor
Members of Davie Street Presbyterian Church were accustomed to the injustices that came with being black in North Carolina in the 1960s — school segregation, political disenfranchisement, separate lunch counters.
But they were caught off guard when a four-foot-tall cross wrapped in burlap and doused with gasoline was set on fire on the front yard of the parsonage.
The church’s offense? The mostly black downtown Raleigh congregation had just hired a white pastor.
The Rev. Frank Hutchison and his family had moved into the parsonage on South East Street in January 1965. One month later, they awoke to find their house — and their whole neighborhood — aglow from the burning cross outside. Although no one was hurt and the fire was soon extinguished, members of the church were horrified.
“We knew there was some restlessness,” said Lethia Young Daniels, a church member, now 87. “But we didn’t know it was to that extent.”
Last weekend, during the church’s 139th anniversary celebration, members reflected on those four turbulent years, from 1964 to 1968, when Hutchison served the church. The Presbyterian pastor, now retired and living in Florida, was the guest of honor.
Cross-burnings were typical across the South during the civil rights era, and especially in rural areas as white supremacists tried to intimidate African-Americans. They were less common in Raleigh. Still, as the struggle for equality swept through various sectors of society it affected the churches, too.
Some blacks tested the waters by trying to attend white churches. They were often rebuffed at the door by ushers who asked them to leave. Most white churches remained mum on the subject of integration, hoping to tamp down a potentially explosive issue.
“The most typical response of the white church was passive,” said Collins Kilburn, a retired minister and a former leader of the North Carolina Council of Churches. “They didn’t offer any aggressive leadership.”
A good fit
Davie Street Presbyterian was not seeking the limelight when it called a white man as its pastor. Hutchison, who spent a year in Detroit training to serve in interracial settings, applied for the opening, and the church accepted him.
“We felt very comfortable with Frank, and as a matter of fact, he felt very comfortable with us,” recalled Harry Payne, a longtime member of the church.
The church had always had good relations with whites. It was a group of Northern white missionaries who came down to Raleigh after the Civil War that helped get the church started. Davie Street is part of the mostly white Presbyterian Church USA. The local New Hope Presbytery, stretching across Eastern North Carolina, includes 130 churches, of which 13 are mostly black.
But the church was not quite prepared to serve on the vanguard of the civil rights battle.
After the cross-burning, the men of the church got together to develop a strategy. They tapped Payne, who served in the U.S. Army Special Forces, to figure out how to prevent future cross-burnings.
“All we were trying to do was make sure the minister and his wife were safe,” said Payne.
Their first task turned out to be persuading the Hutchisons to stay. It didn’t take long.
“That they would open themselves up to the trouble of having a white minister impressed me,” said Hutchison. “The commitment of the people was outstanding.”
As misfortunes often do, the cross-burning led to closer ties between the church and its pastor. Church women stayed with Hutchison’s wife and daughters until 9:30 every night, and friendships were quickly formed.
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With hundreds of television channels to choose from today, it’s hard to imagine a program truly capturing the attention of the nation. Yes, there are moments from the tragic (Sept. 11, 2001) to the ridiculous (O.J. in the white Bronco) that rivet us, and the Super Bowl has become a national religious service for the country’s secular denomination. But when it comes to scripted shows, even the most hyped ones reach only slices of the population.But from Jan. 23 through Jan. 30, 1977, the nation collectively turned its eyes to a 12-hour miniseries called “Roots.” The drama, based on the book by Alex Haley, traced several generations of a slave family, beginning with Kunta Kinte, a young West African man kidnapped by slave traders and shipped to America. Now, in connection with the show’s 30th anniversary, Warner Home Video has released “Roots: The Complete Collection” ($119.98), which includes “Roots: 30th Anniversary Edition” plus the sequels, “Roots: The Next Generations” and “Roots: The Gift” (a Christmas-themed movie). “Roots: The Next Generations” is also available by itself ($59.98).
Previous miniseries such as “Rich Man, Poor Man” (1976) were successful but ran over several weeks. So it was a ratings gamble for ABC to schedule “Roots” on eight consecutive nights, particularly considering its frank depiction of slavery and the fact that the black characters were the story’s heroes and the white characters its villains. The gamble paid off beyond anyone’s most optimistic hopes. “Roots” earned higher ratings than any entertainment program before it, averaging a 44.9 rating and a 66 audience share. The final night’s single-episode ratings record wasn’t broken until 1983, with the finale of “M-A-S-H.”
The show had an impact far beyond mere numbers, though. For a while at least, it made race and racial history a topic of conversation in America. More than 200 colleges and universities developed courses around it. Genealogy became a fast-growing hobby as Americans decided that they, too, wanted to know the story of their families.
Among the collection’s extras are featurettes (”The Struggle to Make Roots,” “Connecting With the Past”) and an interview with Haley by British journalist David Frost. Also included is the informative documentary “Crossing Over: How Roots Captivated an Entire Nation” and “Roots: One Year Later,” a program from 1978 that, while a tad self-congratulatory, is nonetheless interesting.
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