Nonfiction

Every calendar month, regardless of the year, decade or century, shepherds in its own joyous and heart-wrenching moments.

September is no exception.

This month regularly calls to children and adults of all ages to start or settle into a new school year. Its Labor Day marks the unofficial end to relaxed summer living and the beginning of more spirited fall days. And September is the month that four young African American girls senselessly lost their lives in a racially motivated 1963 Birmingham church bombing, while approximately 3,000 Americans of all races and backgrounds died in plane-fueled terrorist attacks on this month’s 11^th day in 2001.

September 2016 will provide its own unique milestone. Years in the making, the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) will open its doors on Washington DC’s National Mall this September 24th. This museum promises to illuminate the depth and breathe of the Black American experience in all its innovation, pain and progress.

NMAAHC Director Lonnie Bunch III says that the museum will tell “the quintessential American story.” While that story may be based in a specific culture, Bunch maintains that it is everyone’s story. In that declaration, Bunch echoes the sentiments of pioneering and award-winning African American writer/dramatist Richard Durham – born 99 years ago this September 6^th. 

Back in the late 1940s, Richard Durham believed that the Black American experience represented a microcosm of “the human condition of the main body of people in the world.” In Durham’s view, oppression combined with poverty, inadequate education and health care, adversely affected most of the world’s population. Therefore, he said, the story of Blacks in America would resonate with millions of people who “also want to uproot poverty and prejudice.”

Based on this philosophy, Durham created compelling radio and TV dramas, newspaper articles and other media products about African American heroes and heroines like Harriet Tubman, W.E.B. DuBois, Lena Horne and Muhammad Ali. The artifacts of many of such notable men and women will be featured in the NMAAHC.

So why not join me in celebrating Richard Durham’s 99^th birthday and the highly anticipated birth of the Smithsonian’s newest museum by visiting Washington, DC’s National Mall this month? And to read more about Director Lonnie Bunch’s journey to make the NMAAHC a reality, click here.

This April 11^th and 12^th, PBS member stations nationwide aired Ken Burns’ documentary about baseball legend Jackie Robinson.

Robinson, a Georgia-born, right-handed batter, debuted on the Brooklyn Dodgers team on April 15, 1947. He primarily played second base. But he knew his way around the other bases, running and stealing them with ease. Robinson became the National Baseball League’s MVP in 1949, and during his 10 years with the Dodgers, the team won six pennants.

Jackie Robinson was also the first African American to play in the then all-white major leagues.

The Brooklyn Dodgers recruited Robinson from the Negro League’s Kansas City Monarchs team during a time when America legally mandated that black and white races remain separate – and unequal. Robinson’s endured countless racially motivated threats, insults and discrimination as he integrated one of the country’s most popular sports.

But Robinson persevered. As a result, scores of black and other players of color followed him onto America’s baseball fields. And because of his fortitude and talent, Robinson became a Baseball Hall of Fame inductee in 1962.

Burns’ Jackie Robinson documentary is just the latest in a long line of media tributes. One of the earliest dramatic rendering of Robinson’s feats aired November 21, 1949 on WMAQ in Chicago.

The Rime of the Ancient Dodger was writer Richard Durham’s poetically whimsical take on Robinson’s story – an episode in his award-winning Destination Freedom radio series.

To hear Durham’s show, featuring a young Studs Terkel (who would go on to become an award-winning writer and radio personality) as an ancient, all-knowing Dodgers fan, and an even younger Oscar Brown Jr. (who became a popular entertainer and activist) as Robinson, click here (and choose episode #16).

And to hear a minute long tribute to Robinson from one of my Howard University students, click below.

Picture this:

You’re in your twilight years – many years from now!  🙂

You’re talking to your grandchildren about what they missed from this great “old” mass medium called radio – circa the early 2000s and dating back to the 1990s, the 1980s, the 1970s, and to even more ancient times during the Twentieth Century.

Your young audience looks at you glassy-eyed.  They’re confused.  They’ve never heard this “radio” thing you’re so excited about. But one brave youngster finally asks if there’s anyway they let hear what you’re describing.

Well, thanks to an organization formed about two years ago by the Library of Congress (LOC), you’ll be able to positively respond to that request.

During the end of February 2016, the LOC’s Radio Preservation Task Force (RPTF) Conference – Saving America’s Radio Heritage: Radio Preservation, Access, and Education  – brought together scholars, archivists and all manner of radio lovers from throughout America and beyond, to talk about ways to find and preserve radio programs, documents and history.

Denison University Associate Professor Bill Kirkpatrick was one of the conference attendees, and he spoke with the RPTF ‘s National Research Director Josh Sheppard, National Recording Preservation Foundation Executive Director Gerald Seligman, the Archives Center’s Audiovisual Archivist Wendy Shay and myself.

So check out the feature Prof. Kirkpatrick produced using those interviews, along with archival tape, for the Society for Cinema and Media Studies’ ACA-MEDIA podcast.  

Happy listening!

Last month, through a collaboration between Goggle and Indiana University’s Archives of African American Music and Culture, an exhibit exploring the “Golden Age” of Black Radio debuted online.  To hear NPR’s feature about this unique digital exhibition, click on the headline below.

Archive Spotlights The “Golden Age” Of Black Radio

In addition,  you can view and listen to this exhibit – organized in four parts –  by clicking here.

Don’t miss Part I of the  Golden Age of Black Radio: The Early Years.  Writer Richard Durham’s pioneering radio dramas are talked about in interviews with late veteran DJ Jack (the Rapper) Gibson and Durham’s wife Clarice Davis Durham.

Many of the audio clips featured in this fascinating online exhibit were pulled from interviews recorded for the Smithsonian Institution’s multi-award winning radio documentary series, Black Radio: Telling It Like It Was.

This 13-part series aired on public radio stations nationwide and featured the voices, stories and insights of African American men and women who worked in front of and behind radio’s microphones from its earliest days through the mid-1990s.

Happily, I was one of the three writers/producers who brought the Black Radio series to life, and who interviewed some of the many colorful radio personalities and innovators.

So visit this historic online exhibit at your leisure…and enjoy!

Late last month, one of the Facebook articles featured by the Zinn Education Project of the nonprofit Teaching for Change organization, honored Muhammad Ali and his historic rise to fame in a Miami, Florida arena fifty-two years ago.

A young Ali, then known as Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. – his birth name – won the heavyweight boxing championship title in a stunning upset.

To read this article and learn about writer Richard Durham’s connection with Muhammad Ali, click on the headline link below.

http://zinnedproject.org/2016/02/muhammad-ali-boxing-title/