“It is awe-inspiring and gives you goosebumps on your arms,” Jason Miller, a poetry professor at North Carolina State University, told USA TODAY Network about hearing the recording for the first time.
King gave the speech on Nov. 27, 1962, before a crowd of about 1,800 people in Rocky Mount, N.C. While the Rocky Mount speech is not as well known, it includes many similarities to the famous August 1963 version King gave from the Lincoln Memorial.
The Rocky Mount speech was covered by local newspapers, but an audio recording was not known to exist until Miller found it while researching his book Origins of a Dream: Hughes’s Poetry and King’s Rhetoric. The book explores the connection between Langston Hughes’s poetry and King’s speeches.
The box where the tape was found was rusted and the plastic reel was broken, but the recording itself was in great shape and has been digitized, Miller said. The tape is 55 minutes long and includes three of King’s most famous phrases — “Let freedom ring,” “How long, not long,” and “I have a dream.”
Miller said that kind of intentional rhetorical practice is a sign of a “master orator.” In the process of researching, Miller was able to confirm that Hughes’ work, and specifically the poem “I dream a world,” influenced King’s speeches. “They knew each other, exchanged letters and Dr. King incredibly revered Langston Hughes,” he said.
Understanding what inspired King’s words and how they changed over time is important, according to Miller. “It sheds light on what is easily the most recognizable speech in American history,” he said.
And the message of King’s Rocky Mount speech holds up today, he said. “The central part of Dr. King’s speech was talking about access to the ballot and voting rights,” he said. “And as you know that’s as important today as it was in 1962.”
Miller is working on an online annotated version of the Rocky Mount speech that will be published for the public in November. article by Lori Grisham via usatoday.com
Tamar Manasseh formed Mothers Against Senseless Killings and said she is looking for more volunteers. (DNAinfo/Andrea V. Watson)
When Tamar Manasseh formed Mothers Against Senseless Killings to patrol the neighborhood in Englewood, IL after a murder in the 7500 block of South Stewart last month, she hoped to stop any retaliatory violence. So far, in the five weeks since a man opened fire on three women on June 23, killing 34-year-old Lucille Barnes, there have been no shootings on the block or on the 7500 block of South Harvard where the patrols have also been set up, according to a DNAinfo Chicago map of shootings in the city.
“When you have sisters like sister Manasseh and others out here just participating, it makes a big difference,” said Johnny Banks, the executive director of the community organization A Knock at Midnight.
But Manasseh, who makes the trek daily from her home in Bronzeville to the neighborhood, said her group really needs more people in the area to join the effort, and that recruitment has been difficult. “Recruiting and getting more volunteers has been quite the challenge,” Manasseh said as she sat on her folding chair on 75th Street and Stewart Avenue, watching over the block, not far from where she used to live at 55th Street and Bishop Avenue.
Tamar Manasseh sits with other volunteers keeping an eye on the neighborhood since a murder on June 23. (DNAinfo/Andrea V. Watson)
Right now there are about 15 adult volunteers who have pledged to be out there every day until Labor Day. That’s about the same number the group had when it started a few days after the June shooting.
Manasseh said she didn’t think it would be this difficult to bring in more concerned residents.
“What we’ve learned since we’ve been out here is that people’s attention spans are short,” she said. “It’s hard to keep their interests between tragedies.”
Andrea Watson says organizers want moms to remain active:
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/216600561″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]
The block and surrounding area where the “army of mothers,” as she refers to it, have set up have been peaceful since the group formed, she said, but the lack of adult volunteers surprised her.
“It’s like some people want to put their children in a bubble because they have good kids,” she said. “They want to separate their good kids from all of these bad kids, but your kids are going to grow up in the world alongside those very kids that you tried to shield them from. So wouldn’t it be better if you tried to save them all instead of just yours?”
She said she had higher expectations for the adults, but underestimated the teens from the neighborhood. At least two dozen teens have taken an interest in keeping their community safe and have taken part in the patrols, Manasseh said.
The ultimate goal is to get people on other blocks to follow her and start their own neighborhood patrols. She said she wants to hold an orientation in the near future to teach them conflict resolution and strategic placement.
Community policing in Englewood and on the South Side is important to Manasseh, she said, because she wants to help save her own children from becoming victims of the violence.
Chicago Police did not respond to a request for comment.
Banks’ group, which provides direct services such as workforce development, family advocacy and more to Englewood residents, encourages more adults to volunteer, but he said he understands why some might be hesitant.
“It’s not easy,” he said. “Our people are afraid so they don’t participate.”
He said that’s all the more reason the group of moms and others should be praised for their courage and determination.
Manasseh said although the neighborhood has changed since she was a child, she is holding on to one day seeing a better, safer community. “It’s like Englewood is the land that time forgot,” she said. “It’s the land that has been forgotten, but I have hope, I see hope here.”
In addition to seeking more volunteers, she’s asking for water and any other donations, which can be dropped off daily between 4-8 p.m. at 75th and Stewart.
To help, people can visit Behindthemask.org. article by Andrea V. Watson via dnainfo.com
Tamar Manasseh formed Mothers Against Senseless Killings and said she is looking for more volunteers. (DNAinfo/Andrea V. Watson)
When Tamar Manasseh formed Mothers Against Senseless Killings to patrol the neighborhood in Englewood, IL after a murder in the 7500 block of South Stewart last month, she hoped to stop any retaliatory violence. So far, in the five weeks since a man opened fire on three women on June 23, killing 34-year-old Lucille Barnes, there have been no shootings on the block or on the 7500 block of South Harvard where the patrols have also been set up, according to a DNAinfo Chicago map of shootings in the city.
“When you have sisters like sister Manasseh and others out here just participating, it makes a big difference,” said Johnny Banks, the executive director of the community organization A Knock at Midnight.
But Manasseh, who makes the trek daily from her home in Bronzeville to the neighborhood, said her group really needs more people in the area to join the effort, and that recruitment has been difficult. “Recruiting and getting more volunteers has been quite the challenge,” Manasseh said as she sat on her folding chair on 75th Street and Stewart Avenue, watching over the block, not far from where she used to live at 55th Street and Bishop Avenue.
Tamar Manasseh sits with other volunteers keeping an eye on the neighborhood since a murder on June 23. (DNAinfo/Andrea V. Watson)
Right now there are about 15 adult volunteers who have pledged to be out there every day until Labor Day. That’s about the same number the group had when it started a few days after the June shooting.
Manasseh said she didn’t think it would be this difficult to bring in more concerned residents.
“What we’ve learned since we’ve been out here is that people’s attention spans are short,” she said. “It’s hard to keep their interests between tragedies.”
Andrea Watson says organizers want moms to remain active:
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/216600561″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]
The block and surrounding area where the “army of mothers,” as she refers to it, have set up have been peaceful since the group formed, she said, but the lack of adult volunteers surprised her.
“It’s like some people want to put their children in a bubble because they have good kids,” she said. “They want to separate their good kids from all of these bad kids, but your kids are going to grow up in the world alongside those very kids that you tried to shield them from. So wouldn’t it be better if you tried to save them all instead of just yours?”
She said she had higher expectations for the adults, but underestimated the teens from the neighborhood. At least two dozen teens have taken an interest in keeping their community safe and have taken part in the patrols, Manasseh said.
The ultimate goal is to get people on other blocks to follow her and start their own neighborhood patrols. She said she wants to hold an orientation in the near future to teach them conflict resolution and strategic placement.
Community policing in Englewood and on the South Side is important to Manasseh, she said, because she wants to help save her own children from becoming victims of the violence.
Chicago Police did not respond to a request for comment.
Banks’ group, which provides direct services such as workforce development, family advocacy and more to Englewood residents, encourages more adults to volunteer, but he said he understands why some might be hesitant.
“It’s not easy,” he said. “Our people are afraid so they don’t participate.”
He said that’s all the more reason the group of moms and others should be praised for their courage and determination.
Manasseh said although the neighborhood has changed since she was a child, she is holding on to one day seeing a better, safer community. “It’s like Englewood is the land that time forgot,” she said. “It’s the land that has been forgotten, but I have hope, I see hope here.”
In addition to seeking more volunteers, she’s asking for water and any other donations, which can be dropped off daily between 4-8 p.m. at 75th and Stewart.
To help, people can visit Behindthemask.org. article by Andrea V. Watson via dnainfo.com
President Obama appears on “WTF With Marc Maron”
This morning I woke up to a barrage of news outlets with one similar statement: The President used the N -Word! Okay…what was this going to be? What’s with that blaring headline? I did my research and vetted the context. And in this case if there were ever a time for the President of the United States to use the word… this made sense.
Released today, President Barack Obama appears on “WTF with Marc Maron”, a popular podcast hosted by comedian Marc Maron. During the interview they touched on Obama’s own struggles with identity, the racially-motivated shootings at Emanuel AME Church in South Carolina, guns and our seemingly unsolvable societal plights. Obama was completely at ease with the humbly likeable Maron, so sitting in his garage/office, Obama chose to make a big point about racism. The President is often so careful and guarded with his use of words regarding the subject – who can blame him…I guess? He’s a politician and has to walk a fine line. But I think in that garage in those moments with Maron he was done being politically correct regarding blatant racism in America and I liked this Obama. Hopefully people will hear his explanation of endemic racism that has caused centuries of pain and wounds that may never close. I’m not saying he’s come up with a solution, but it is certainly an interesting and refreshing way to hear him speak. His use of the N-word attempts to challenge Americans to wake up and do better. Here are the most notable quotes from the President on racism:
I always tell young people, in particular, do not say that nothing has changed when it comes to race in America, unless you’ve lived through being a black man in the 1950s or ’60s or ’70s. It is incontrovertible that race relations have improved significantly during my lifetime and yours.
The legacy of slavery, Jim Crow, and discrimination exists in institutions and casts “a long shadow and that’s still part of our DNA that’s passed on.”
Racism, we are not cured of it. And it’s not just a matter of it not being polite to say n—– in public… That’s not the measure of whether racism still exists or not. It’s not just a matter of overt discrimination. Societies don’t, overnight, completely erase everything that happened 200 to 300 years prior.
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke at UCLA about a month after his triumphant march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, that made civil rights history. (Photo: UCLA)
Clarification posted Jan. 21: The UCLA Library also has recordings of the speech in its collection, available for listening by special arrangement but not online.
A long-lost audio recording of a 50-year-old speech delivered at UCLA by the late civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. has been unearthed in a storage room in the communication studies department, which will put it online. The 55-minute speech (embedded below) went live on January 15, King’s birthday, four days before the national holiday honoring him.
“It’s a speech of importance that deserves to be released on a day of importance,” said Derek Bolin, a 2013 UCLA graduate who found the recording while working as a contract archivist. Over the years, King’s visit to UCLA became a proud part of campus lore. The spot where the civil rights leader stood to deliver his speech, at the base of Janss Steps, is now marked with a plaque and is a stopping point on some campus tours.
The speech, recorded originally on 7-inch, reel- to-reel tapes, will become part of the UCLA Communication Studies Speech Archive, an online collection of more than 400 speeches delivered on campus by politicians, activists, entertainment personalities and other newsmakers primarily during the 1960s and ’70s. Like King, the speakers were brought to campus by UCLA’s now-defunct Associated Students Speakers Program. With donations from alumni, the department began last year to digitize the speeches and upload them to YouTube. So far, more than 180,000 listeners have tapped into the online archive.
Archivist Derek Bolin (left) and Tim Groeling, chair of the UCLA Department of Communication Studies
The timing of the speech is significant. King delivered it on April 27, 1965, one month and two days after the triumphant march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, that is depicted so movingly in the new biopic “Selma.” The film’s director, Ava Marie DuVernay, attended UCLA in the early 1990s as an undergraduate English major, according to registrar records.
The march and protests leading up to it paved the way for passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The federal legislation that prohibits racial discrimination in voting was signed into law four months after King’s UCLA visit, said Paul Von Blum, a senior lecturer in the department and in African American studies, who participated in the civil rights movement as a young man.
“It’s tremendously important,” Von Blum said of the speech. “It shows that Dr. King recognized that American universities were crucial in the movement for social justice. Students, especially at elite universities, were kind of the foot soldiers of the movement.”
The audio recording would have been completely forgotten had Bolin not noticed King’s name on a list of campus speakers. Tapes of the speech weren’t in the two cabinets that stored the recordings of the 365-plus speeches he had already processed. So he scoured the storage room where tape reels had languished for decades. Eventually, he found a cabinet that had been hidden from view by shelving, old beta players and other out-of-date audiovisual equipment.
It’s a royal return for the King of Pop to the Billboard Hot 100 and Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs charts. Michael Jackson‘s “Love Never Felt So Good” with Justin Timberlake makes splashy debuts at No. 20 on the Hot 100 and No. 6 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. The track (heard below) is the first single from Jackson’s posthumous album “Xscape,” due tomorrow (May 13).
“Good” sold 80,000 downloads in the week ending May 4, according to Nielsen SoundScan, after only three full days on-sale. The song went on-sale in the evening of May 1, after it premiered on the iHeartRadio Music Awards the same night. It’s available as both a duet and as a solo track from Jackson, although sales of the Timberlake version drive 80 percent of its combined sales.
Powered by hourly play across a multitude of Clear Channel-owned radio stations on May 2, “Love” debuts at No. 38 on the Radio Songs chart. It bows with 34 million in audience for the week ending May 6, from 358 stations, according to Nielsen BDS. “Love” is Jackson’s biggest Radio Songs hit since “Butterflies” peaked at No. 14 in early 2002.
The debut for “Good” is handsome not just because of its sales and airplay figures, but also thanks to its streaming numbers. The tune collected 1.9 million U.S. streams in the week ending May 4, according to BDS. It arrives at No. 41 on Streaming Songs. Bringing Michael Jackson Back: The Inside Story of ‘Xscape’ (Cover Story)
“Good” arrives as Jackson’s 49th Hot 100 hit (not counting his entries as part of the Jackson 5). He nets his highest Hot 100 rank since “Butterflies” reached No. 14 (Jan. 26, 2002). He also ties for his third-highest debut: “You Are Not Alone,” his 13th and last No. 1, launched at the summit (Sept. 2, 1995), almost three months after “Scream,” with Janet Jackson, started at its No. 5 peak. “Good” matches the bow of his classic “Thriller,” which began at No. 20 on Feb. 11, 1984 and rose to its No. 4 highpoint three weeks later.
“Good” becomes Jackson’s 33rd top 20 Hot 100 hit, tying him with Rihanna for the seventh-best sum in the chart’s 55-year history. (Jackson was born the same month as the Hot 100: August 29, 1958, or 25 days after the chart’s inception.) Elvis Presley leads with 48 top 20 hits, followed by Madonna (44), the Beatles (42), Elton John (40), Lil Wayne (39) and Stevie Wonder (36).
On Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, “Good” is likewise Jackson’s highest-charting entry since “Butterflies,” which reached No. 2 on the ranking. He lands his 33rd Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs top 10. (James Brown boasts the most top 10s all-time, 60, followed by Louis Jordan, with 54, and Aretha Franklin, with 52.)
Timberlake, meanwhile, tallies his 21st Hot 100 top 20 and 10th such hit on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. article by Keith Caufield & Gary Trust via billboard.com
MONTGOMERY, AL – MAY 1956: Civil rights leader Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. relaxes at home in May 1956 in Montgomery, Alabama. (Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
PHOENIX (AP) — Mary Scanlon had no idea a $3 purchase from a Goodwill store in Phoenix would turn out to be a rare link to the civil rights movement’s most revered leader. Last April, Scanlon was at the thrift store when she spotted a pile of 35 vintage reel-to-reel tapes, including one labeled with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s name. Despite the moldy and torn packaging, she snapped up all of them. “I didn’t really necessarily have any expectation that this tape would be rare,” Scanlon said.
Arizona State University archivists have found that tape is the only known recording of speeches the slain civil rights leader gave at ASU and at a Phoenix church in June 1964. The hour-long audio has since been digitized and is now available for listening on ASU’s website through June 30.
The tape illustrates that King had been eager to visit supporters in Arizona, a state that would draw criticism more than 20 years later for rescinding the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. Scanlon, who donated all the tapes to the school, said the find is one of the high points of her life. “To have anything about myself connected in any way to Martin Luther King, what more could a person ask for? I’m so proud,” Scanlon said.
Rob Spindler, a university archivist and curator, said it’s miraculous that the audio was still intact. When he first spoke with Scanlon, he immediately warned her not to try and play the tape. “When the material is that old, sometimes you only get one shot to preserve it,” Spindler said.
The tapes were taken from the Ragsdale Mortuary, which was owned by Lincoln Ragsdale, a civil rights leader in Phoenix who died in 1995, Goodwill employees said. Spindler sent the tapes to a company in Kentucky to copy them to a digital format. On May 17, Spindler, Scanlon, a university librarian and two ASU professors who have researched King gathered to listen to the recording for the first time. Hearing King’s voice brought most of them to tears.
“It answers a question we’ve had for decades,” said Spindler, who believes it was King’s first public appearance in Arizona. “What did Martin Luther King say to us that night and how did he arrive here in Phoenix? Now we have a much better idea of those things.”
Arizona was the last stop on a West Coast tour King had been doing, Spindler said. The university and the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People worked to get the preacher to come. About 8,000 people attended the June 3 speech at Goodwin Stadium that started about 8 p.m. In his remarks, King focused on the Civil Rights Act, which at the time was stuck in a filibuster in the U.S. Senate.
“Keeping Up Mess” by Tracy Andrews (Source: blackartdepot.com) Marketplace.org recently posted a podcast about African-American hair salons and the entrepreneurial environment that exists within and around them. Check it out below: [soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/102465676″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /] article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson
