Muncie Times, Muncie, Delaware County, 15 May 2008 — Page 32

Page 32 • The Muncie Times • May 15, 2008

News Briefs

continued from page 31 Deal Jr. has worked for the City’s Parks & Recreation Department for 22 years. He is currently a recreation specialist in charge of both Bass and Joseph C. Carter Park. “Ada Moore had an impact on me growing up on the park as well as professionally. I remember seeing her at Sunland Park when my parents would take me there when I was four years old. She worked at all the area parks in the city and brought a sense of professionalism wherever she went. Throughout my career in recreation, whether it was at Bass Park, Carter Park, or the Fort Lauderdale Swimming Hall of Fame, I knew I could perform my duties with the confidence and professionalism that I observed Mrs. Moore display. She taught me not to be afraid to share your knowledge in your profession.” Moore retired after working for Parks & Recreation in 1990. Being slowed somewhat as a result of experiencing a stroke in 1997, she is still active in her church’s youth group and also works with senior citizens. Moore helps out with mentoring young people who participate in the, “It’s OK to be Me” youth group at Harris Chapel United Methodist Church in Fort Lauderdale. She also heads up a senior citizen’s group called The Keenagers, a group of retirees who do a number of social activities which include field trips, visiting

nursing homes and hospitals, working on floats for the city’s annual Sistrunk Historical Festival, bowling, and celebrating holidays together. Although Moore has received numerous awards including “Women of the Year” by the Links and been recognized for outstanding achievement by national parks and recreation organizations, she said her biggest accomplishment has been being able to work with and help thousands of young people throughout the course of her career. “If there is one piece of advice I could give to young people it would be to listen to their elders, because they have more to offer them for the things that they may face now. The things that they may not think are not important to them now, will be important to their future.”

Black men in the news: a brief history of ‘trouble men’

MN.- Ten years ago, Bill Cosby’s son Ennis and Michael Jordan’s father both died. Entertainer M.C. Hammer filed bankruptcy, and Malcolm X’s grandson ignited a fatal fire. Les Brown divorced Gladys Knight, and the NBA’s Juwon Howard went into a treatment center. Actor Howard Rollins (age 46) died, and Yaphet Kotto chose to marry for the third time. Ten years ago in Current

Biography, actor Samuel L. Jackson claimed that his wife “always says to me that I have now grown into the man that she always knew I could be.” Jackson, bom 1949 in Washington, D.C., married actor La Tanya Richardson in 1980. “The makeover on environmentally induced selfhatred must be done from inside.” filmmaker Spike Lee said. “Nobody made Richard Pryor do what he did to himself, but him.” Richard Pryor told Charles Whitaker in a 1986 interview for Ebony, “It’s nobody’s fault.” In his book Vernon Can Read, attorney Vernon Jordan (bom 1935 in Atlanta) says organization and structure is his credo, while late attorney Johnnie Cochran’s advice was, “Handle the good days and the bad days with equal aplomb.” (Source: Emerge) As a Washington Post columnist, former Minneapolis Tribune columnist (and former Minneapolis Spokesman/St. Paul Recorder staffer), Carl T. Rowan criticized Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1967 for voicing his opposition to the Vietnam conflict. King dreamed of a day when “the lion shall lie down with the lamb and none shall be afraid.” Woody Allen countered that “The lion shall lie down with the lamb, but the lamb won’t get much sleep.” Bayard Rustin wrote about King’s death and the death of Malcolm X as well. Rustin not only met

Malcolm X, but also debated him. Rustin was a pacifist. His maternal grandmother raised him as both Quaker — pacifism is one of thentenets — and a civil rights activist. Rustin bought a ticket to ride the interstate to test the Supreme Court’s Morgan Decision banning Jim Crow seating. He was not only jailed for this, but also served hard labor on a chain gang. Asa Phillip Randolph appointed Rustin deputy of the August 28,1963, March on Washington; he was in charge of organizing the march, but was kept out of the spotlight: as a gay man, Rustin was perceived as a threat to the solidarity of the Civil Rights Movement. “In the late 1990s,” Ishmael Reed wrote, “some psychotic New Jersey police held a famous African American dancer to the ground until they saw that he was on the cover of that week’s Time magazine.” While being eyeballed for what seemed an inordinate amount of time by a White policeman on the street, Reed admits, “I was trying to reconstruct my whereabouts for the previous week. Just in case.” In Jasper County, northeast of Houston, Texas, on June 7, 1998, James Bryd Jr., was dragged behind a truck. His body was found decapitated. “The phenomenon of women is love,” A1 Green said. “Men are more into their careers, making money and achieving goals in their lives. But a woman

will turn down a career to say, T love you,’ and really mean it.” Green (bom 1946) has three daughters, Alva, Rubi, and Kara, from his six-year marriage (1977-83) to Shirley Ann Kyles, a gospel singer. (Source: Current Biography.) In 2008, NBAs Allan Iverson told USA Today, “I think the hardest thing in the world for a Black man to do is think when he’s mad.” Athlete Jesse Owens was bom in 1913 in Alabama, and of his time participating in the 1936 Olympics Games he said, “I came back to my native country and I couldn’t ride in the front of the bus. I had to go to the back door. I couldn’t live where I wanted. Now, what’s the difference” between that treatment and Hitler’s snub, he asked. Owens worked as a playground janitor; raced against cars, tmcks, motorcycles, horses and dogs; and toured with the Harlem Globetrotters. He acted as mediator to the 1968 Olympic dispute over the Black Power salute in Mexico City involving Tommie Smith and John Wesley Carlos; for this he was accused of being an Uncle Tom. He died of lung cancer in 1980. “I don’t want to hurt nobody. I just want to play baseball,” Henry (“Hank”) Aaron, bom 1934, said in 1954 of integrating the southern “Sally” leagues. He quotes “Dear N***er” letters to him in chapter 10 of I Had a Hammer. When continued on page 33