March 2, 2006

By Diane Chiddister

Erika, left, and Nerak Patterson reading a poem at the black history program last Sunday the First Baptist Church. At right is Madelyn Johnson.

At last Sunday’s “Light of America” program, a celebration of African-American history that took place at the First Baptist Church, two things stood out — a sense of community and a sense of pride.

The sense of community seemed apparent in the warm greetings among the 50 people, all but two African-Americans, who either took part in or observed the event.

Children received many hugs from adults, and men and women seemed pleased to see each other, and to be there. The church has always played a significant role in the lives of African-Americans, said the master of ceremony, Regina Djigal.

“Throughout our history African-Americans have always drawn strength from God,” Djigal said in her opening remarks. Also critical to the lives of black Americans, she said, have been “family, food and friends.”

The sense of pride among those who attended took many forms, including the beautiful dresses and hats worn by the women, and the straight posture and strong voices of the children as they impersonated famous African-Americans in the program.

First Baptist Pastor Vurn Mullins called on this pride in his welcome. “We’re here to celebrate the great heritage of African-Americans,” Mullins said.

He said the program would honor “all of the sweat, blood and tears” of the past. “It ain’t been easy,” he said.

But while the past needs to be honored, Mullins also encouraged those in attendance to take pride in the present, and in the future as well.

“We must let that light shine that others see the will of God as we move forward,” he said.

Madelyn Johnson, a storyteller and minister from Dayton, led the audience through the “Light of America Time-Line,” in which she spanned 400 years of history by highlighting influential African-Americans.

First Baptist young people personified some of the leaders and delivered short speeches, with Christopher McElroy as George Washington Carver, Victor McElroy as Thurgood Marshall, Cinnabar Conyers as Shirley Chisholm and Michelle Conyers as Mae C. Jemison. Nerak and Erika Patterson read a poem about Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks.

The timeline presentation began in the early 1600s, with the “dark day,” when hundreds of thousands of West Africans were captured and taken to North America to be sold as slaves. For the next several hundred years “always there was the yearning to be free,” Johnson said. This yearning took many forms, she said, from being docile to escaping and aggressive actions.

“It took all kinds of behavior,” she said. “But always people wanted to be free.”

Johnson told brief stories of African-American slaves who played significant roles in fighting for freedom, including Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass and Sojourner Truth. After the Civil War and the freeing of southern slaves with the Emancipation Proclamation, Reconstruction “came and went,” Johnson said, and “in its place came Jim Crow.”

The following period saw heightened fears, and increased acts of hatred against African-Americans, including lynchings and the beginnings of the Ku Klux Klan. But the late 1800s also brought the first stirrings of civil rights activity, with the Niagara movement that later became the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP.

One of the most influential voices of the time was Dayton poet Paul Laurence Dunbar, Johnson said, whose writings “expressed hope for new beginnings, new ways of thinking and being,” according to Johnson.

A “period of creativity” took place among African-Americans around the turn of the century, she said, citing blues singers Bessie Smith and Billie Holiday and writer Zora Neal Hurston, along with those who made up the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s.

African-Americans contributed to the nation’s war effort during both World War I and World War II, she said. They also became increasingly influential in national politics, with the contributions of Mary McCloud Bethune during the FDR administration and the appointment to the Supreme Court of Thurgood Marshall.

While the civil rights movement “started with the first slave,” Johnson said, it intensified in the 1950s and ’60s under the leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other leaders, and included massive marches and sit-ins. While the 1960s brought the passage of the Civil Rights bill, it also brought the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, King and Robert Kennedy.

“The ’60s were a time of great hope and great loss,” Johnson said.

Since that time, African-Americans have played a greater role in the political and creative life of the country, Johnson said, citing Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm and writers Maya Angelou, Lorraine Hansberry and Ntzake Shange. And in 1992 Mae Jemison became the first African-American woman selected by NASA to enter space.

In 2001 the nation was rocked by the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11. The event’s lesson was clear, Johnson said.

“The most important thing that came out of 9/11 is that it shook us up to realize that we are a part of each other, that we belong together,” she said.

Music has always played a significant part in the African-American experience, said Johnson, and the program also included Helena Baxter’s powerful versions of “Amazing Grace” and “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”

The program was followed by a soul food dinner.

Organizer Shonda Sneed said the event’s purpose was to “reach out to the community. We want to share the rich heritage and accomplishments that African-Americans have achieved.”

Contact: dchiddister@ysnews.com