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Holding on to The Best Part of Bedford Stuyvesant — Its History, Humanity and "Hands"

Editor, Our Time Press
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 Brenda & Wilbert Fryson of Chauncey Street –

We bought our house on Chauncey Street in 1974.  A relative of a close friend lived on the block, and he made it possible for us to meet the owners, who were moving away.  We wanted our daughter,  Kenya,  to grow up in a caring and nurturing environment, and we chose Bedford-Stuyvesant for that reason.  Despite the relentless negative press, we knew that there were thoughtful neighbors, strong block associations, good schools, historic churches, active civic associations, and some of the most beautiful homes and apartment buildings to be found anywhere.

The house was a three family dwelling, and much of the detail was already gone.  It was a perfect palate for us to experiment with contemporary interior design. With guidance from architect, David Danois, we set about the first major renovation, which involved opening the second floor to the roof; moving a staircase; building a raised platform, constructing a loft bed, and creating a ground-floor rental unit.   The house is relatively small, and we had to find ways to take advantage of every inch.  Wilbert (“Fry”) did much of the work after the large projects were finished.  Perhaps the most compelling part of this phase in our lives was the help that we received from friends like Bernard Cooley, who helped with the dirty work of demolition and clean-out.  George Glee, Jr., Bernard McDonald, Clarence Jones, and Reginald Shell were among that group, and the Brownstoners of Bedford-Stuyvesant, a volunteer civic association,  was literally birthed in our backyard  after one of those work sessions. During that time,  we would work on each other’s houses, and then break for meetings that were held in the midst of busy toddlers, plaster dust and peeling paint.  You see, it was about making a contribution to this wonderful community, even more than it was about renovating a house.  We were fortunate  to have great activist role models to follow… Dr. Vernal Cave, Lucille Rose,  Montier Eason, Alma Carroll, Hattie Carthan, Joan Maynard, and Ruby Brent Ford (who was a guiding light in helping us organize the Brownstoners). Bed-Stuy Restoration Corp. was in its infancy, and was a visible and vital force in community development – rebuilding neighborhood pride at every level.  Those lessons of “giving back” still remain the bedrock of the work of the Brownstoners – thirty-two years later!  It was just the best time to live and grow with Bedford-Stuyvesant.  The best part … the great friendships that grew out of this love of community, and  which remain until this day.

Since those early days, we have done two more fairly large projects on our home…each one reflecting another stage in our lives. After Kenya left for graduate school, we opened her room to the adjoining bathroom and dressing room to create a comfortable suite.  The loft bed, with its own set of stairs, was replaced with a floor-to-ceiling glass wall that now encloses  a cozy bedroom.  On the parlor floor, a new breakfast room is now our favorite spot for morning coffee, Fry’s crossword puzzles, and quiet dinners. Custom cherry cabinets, silestone counters,  and stainless steel appliances were part of a kitchen makeover.  Now, in our retirement  years, we have updated the ground floor bathroom in Fry’s “man cave”, with a chair-height toilet and  a walk-in shower, complete with grab bars.  This entire floor can be converted into living space for the two of us when those flights of stairs become too much.

Needless to say, just about every room on the public floors in our home  has played host to one meeting or another.  Many times, in the hurried pace of my community work, Fry will cook a great meal, or give up his den for a “skull session” with this group or that.  We are blessed to have both of our mothers still alive, and in their 90’s.  As caregivers, we are learning that the love and support that we received throughout our lives, must be just as lovingly returned.  We have so many friends who are experiencing the same situations, and we share resources and strategies. . We gloat over our three year old grandchild; we travel, and we try to take care of our health.   We have our favorite eateries right here in the nabe…Sugarhill, Royal Rib House, and the new Mix-up Restaurant.  We try to make time to catch the excitement at Jazz 966 as much as we can.  This is Bed-Stuy, and we love it!

The house is here, but so is Chauncey Street.  We enjoy “stoop-sitting”, and watching  over  the children as they come and go, just as our neighbors did for Kenya. We can smile about Kenya and Donine Carrington, who grew up on this block, and who are still good buddies to this day…one in Maryland…one in Georgia.  They are just two of the many stories of our children, public school products all, who have gone on to make good lives for themselves.   

Sometimes we look at the huge article from the New York Times, dated 1988, which hangs on one of our walls, and I chuckle. There are pictures of our families and homes and, of course, the expected   tale of gentrification.   Yes, we were “discovered”;  we were declared “safe”, and folks moved to Bedford-Stuyvesant.  Two decades later, we have been “discovered”,  once again. I am hopeful that the strands of this community’s  history; its struggles and triumphs, and the tenaciousness of its people in renewal and revival will not be lost in these cycles of “discovery”.

When Fry and I moved to Bedford-Stuyvesant, shops were owned by folks who lived in the neighborhood; property was obtained and passed down to the children; there was an unmistakable pride in who we were as an African-American community, and our churches, tenants’ groups in our public housing developments,  block associations, and civic groups were all tuned into the needs of every resident. Undergirding those precepts was an understanding that forces of destruction (infiltration of guns and drugs, unemployment, ineffective schools, health disparities, decaying housing, and unscrupulous developers) had to be dealt with in the most aggressive ways, and people took the time and energy to fight for Bedford-Stuyvesant.  Those times have come again, and the advantages and pitfalls should not be surprising.  However, I fear that the extraordinarily high  level of energy and commitment to continued revitalization – block association by block association, and neighbor by neighbor –  that has been the cornerstone of our survival, is being lost in a new paradigm which subtly diminishes our values  and  rich culture;  dismisses our institutions (public schools, community-based organizations, and civic groups), and marginalizes those residents who are determined to remain, amid rising housing costs. We need all of the new ideas, new drive, and hard work if we are to continue as one of the brightest jewels in this city’s crown of great, historic communities. 

We helped to build NYC, and these next generations of hands are needed to sustain and enrich Bedford-Stuyvesant.  We must heed the simple and powerful message left by the many awesome men and women who guided Bedford-Stuyvesant’s renascence … everybody can and must contribute something.

By Brenda Fryson

Fedrecia M. Hartley, Bedford-Stuyvesant's Artful Home

Editor, Our Time Press
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 Bedford-Stuyvesant’s Artful Home: When Fedrecia Hartley purchased her property several years ago she fulfilled three dreams: brownstone ownership in her Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood; the establishment of a home for exhibiting artists’ works, including her own; and creation of creative art opportunities for community building and empowerment.

 

Hartley is the Director of Zion Gallery and President and Co-founder of the Bedford-Stuyvesant Artists’ Association (BeSAA).

 

Hartley obtained her house in 1996, and opened her Zion Gallery in 2005. In this space, residents right here in the community can view art within the framework of a setting that is similar to their own, then acquire these works for their own homes.  “It gives collectors a chance to see how the artwork will work in their houses,” says Ms. Hartley.

 

But the Hartley MacDonough Street homestead is more than a venue to display and sell artworks by famous local artists who live in the neighborhood.  Ms. Hartley also hosts workshops for young students – preschool to high school; creates holiday-oriented celebrations, including last year’s Art and Vine mini-fest; presides over meetings for BeSAA, and blueprints major community events, like the recent Bed-Stuy Alive! festival of last October.

 

In the ground-floor entry hallway, she established the Small Works Gallery – a dedicated space for originals and prints that are 12 inches-by-12 inches or smaller.  “As pieces are sold, more are added,” she says.   Among the offerings are jewelry, handmade hats and small artworks. 

 

A door on the right leads to the main room of the gallery – which has been home to works by such artists as Otto Neals, Gerald Jones, Olivia Cousins, Annette E. Brown, Halima Cassells, Ramona Candy, Pamela D. Jones, Rita D. Strickland and Maxine Townsend-Broderick.

 

Ms. Hartley’s major exhibitions have included: Honoring Men with artists Corey Lightfoot, Stephan L. Davis, Cornell Jones and Trevor Brown; Freedom’s Journey: Passageways Along the Underground Railroad  featuring the photographs of Cousins, and an exhibition of the art of the Long Island Black Artists Association , among others.

 

“Zion Gallery functions to collect, preserve, study, document, interpret and exhibit community artists and beyond,” she informs visitors to her blogspot. “While these goals are common to many galleries, Zion Gallery distinguishes itself by emphasizing art’s historical, cultural and social contexts through experimentation and interpretation in workshops, art classes, special events and presentations.”

 

Fedrecia’s bold signature works, a mixed-media series entitled Urban Flowers, is easily distinguishable.  She describes her art as “capturing the everyday beauty and strength that can be found blooming in corners of the vast urban landscape of New York.”  This is an appropriate description of the home and gallery – a treasure in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Zion Gallery, located at 152 MacDonough Street, Brooklyn, is opened Saturdays and Sundays, 12 noon to 6pm (by appointment; telephone number is below). 

 

On Saturday, November 21 during the smART Brooklyn Gallery Art Hop, an initiative of Borough President Marty Markowitz  (www.visitbrooklyn.org), Ms. Hartley is helming curatorial duties at two galleries: Zion on MacDonough Street and George Washington Carver Gallery at the Magnolia Tree Earth Center, 677 Lafayette Avenue, between Tompkins and Marcy Avenues.  Both Zion Gallery in Stuyvesant Heights and Carver Gallery in North Bedford-Stuyvesant will be two of the 69 exhibiting galleries.  BeSAA is presenting the Fulton Art Fair artists at MTEC’s Carver Gallery in an exhibition entitled “TREASURES” featuring the works of Brent Bailer, Denzil Belisle, Bob Carter, Olivia Cousins, Bob Daniels, Diane Grazette-Collins, Rudolph Greenaway, Ruben Holder, Gerald Jones, Edward Martin, Dinga McCannon, James Mingo and Emmett Wigglesworth.

 

“Zion Gallery’s outreach Bedford-Stuyvesant’s “urban landscape” is a realization of the community involvement aspect of Ms. Hartley’s early dreams.  “In extending Zion’s and BeSAA’s missions to all parts of  Bedford-Stuyvesant, we are recognizing our community as a home for artists and a builder of artists,” she says.

 

For more information about Zion Gallery, BeSAA and Ms. Hartley’s other projects, at home and beyond, visit: www.ziongallery.blogspot.com and www.besaa.org.  718-919-8014

 

Aging in Our Time / Who Are the Caregivers?

Editor, Our Time Press
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Photo courtesy of the Alzheimer's Association. by: Rowena Groves Rye

Students of the Bible interpret the phrase “brother’s keeper” in relation to a lesson in caring … or being responsible … for others.  By this interpretation “others” refers to everyone, related by blood or not. 

  Offspring of America’s big birth boom following World War II, however, are focusing closer to home; more than 20% of them, according to statistics, are taking care of those who first took care of them. 

 So with the aging population, an entire world has come alive around Elder Care as Caregiving and caregivers come out of the closet.   Old myopic views of “dementia” and “Alzheimer’s” are fading in the glare of research’s great light – a research that is still bringing gray matters out of the shadows. Also, Caregivers and the Caregiven are living longer.

 In “Caregiving:  The Spiritual Journey of Love, Loss and Renewal,” two-time Pulitzer nominee Beth Witrogen McLeod offers heart and soul to statistics.   She writes: I was drifting along in my tidy little life, as … immortal as the next fortysomething.  Suddenly… everything that had been familiar vanished.” 

 As caregivers work to fulfill the needs of loved ones, many reveal they also are peering into mortality’s eye and seeing their own.  Is it a guilty hope that one day someone may do the same for them?  Ms. Witrogen writes, “(Caregivers go lengths to) travel in health care systems trying to control long-term-care costs while living in a society that idolizes youth and independence rather than wisdom and community.” 

 Following is an excerpt from Ms. Witrogen’s work.  Perhaps not so fitting a metaphor – but one just the same, is how we rescued “Caregiving”: we found it last week atop a pile of used books at a local flea market. Our Time Press publishers are grateful: the book is enhancing our caregiving.       

                                                                                  Bernice Elizabeth Green

 

Who Are the Caregivers?

(Excerpted from: Caregiving: The Spiritual Journey of Love, Loss and Renewal –

{(c)2009 Beth Witrogen McLeod. All Rights Reserved.

 Reprinted with Permission. John Wiley & Sons Publishing})

 

 My parents left a double-edged legacy: awareness of both the sorrow and the generosity of the human heart.  Nowhere perhaps is this paradox more widely played out than on the daily stage of family caregiving, where the unsuspecting can find themselves on a chaotic journey in which the only certainty is the demise of their loved one.  These caregivers are on a path seemingly without end, subjected to the stresses and the guilt of watching another’s pain without being able to erase it, of witnessing a loved one’s dying without being able to prevent it. They quietly sacrifice personal agendas to look after those in need, when sandwiched between child care and jobs and usually without advance planning. They live a world apart from everyday reality and wonder if they will ever be normal again. They have one goal: to maintain the dignity and the well-being of their loved one until the end.  The burden is great, the information insufficient, the doubt overpowering.  Yet, these loyal souls – many of whom do not recognize themselves as caregivers-work largely without professional help, feeling they can and must do everything alone.  There is no question about taking on this role: they do so compelled not only by the dictates of society, but also by the mandates of the heart.

 They bathe, feed, dress, shop for, listen to, and transport frail parents, spouses, children, friends, relatives, neighbors and even strangers.  Night and day they torment over how to keep loved ones out of nursing homes, how to give adequate medical attention and make life-and death-decisions when they have not been trained to do so,  Often in poor health or over age sixty-five themselves, they worry about safeguarding an obstinate relative’s finances or moving him or her to a more secure home.

 They are the parents who lovingly tend to disabled children.  They are the grandparents raising grandkids because their own children are incarcerated, divorced or on drugs.  They are the well spouses who grieve while their mates still live but have forgotten all the love that ever passed between them.  They are the adult children who have discovered an entirely new and unanticipated midlife crisis: caring for an aging parent.  They are mostly women.

 In individual way, they blaze their own trails and build support networks.  Each caregiver must deal with challenges like handling complex medical and legal documents, finding appropriate housing or care facilities, modifying a home for safety, moving a loved one cross-country, massaging a child forever confined to bed, or changing the diaper on a modest and humiliated parent.  Loved ones who have been independent now fear becoming burdensome; family patterns ware turned upside down and futures are forever altered. Usually these tasks are carried out with courage and persistence against frustrating odds.   Shorn of energy but loyal and loving to the end, family caregivers more than measure up to the demands: they are stalwarts who persevere against great obstacles. 

Caregiving is as much if not more, about the emotional impact as it is the physical.  Long after proper housing or medical care has been arranged, greater personal issues remain: how do we keep our hearts open in hell? And why should we try?  This is the inner journey of caregiving: this is the promise of renewal.

 Although family caregiving has always existed across all cultural and economic settings, some elements are unique to this era: an increasingly aged and disabled population that will be filled by the massive baby boom generation (who has ) entered midlife, the lack of adequate and coordinated systems to finance and support long-term care of the chronically ill and disabled, and a renaissance in spiritual seeking and exploration of end-of-life issues.

 In North America, the number of family caregivers has exploded by 300 percent in only nine years (Note to readers: Witrogen’s book was published in 1999.), reaching into a quarter of all households.

 Doomsayers would preach that the world has been overtaken by rage, greed, and resignation. I believe that if you look into the private rooms of caregiving families, you will find the true nature of things as they are, beneath the veneer of social conditioning and confusion, stereotype and illusion.  There you will find great kindness and devotion, a trust of life that surpasses doubt or pain.  There you will find the highest expression of who we are.

 If we close our hearts to suffering, we cannot open them to love.  Every benevolent act counts.  By surviving difficulties and holding on to goodness, caregivers inspire others to summon the power of the spirit.  Humanity can evolve from its violence and recklessness into an enlightened age of caring when the lessons of loss are honored, exemplified by modern-day heroes who fulfill the old mandate: to give. Author contact: info@witrogen.com.

 

BROOKLYN RETIREES FIND SUCCESS IN EMBRACING LIFELONG PASSION: UPSTATE HERB FARMING

Bernice Elizabeth Green
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He was a successful university dean; she was a prominent health professional. They both were entrenched in the comfort zone of a Crown Heights brownstone they loved. 

Their labor of love is the Wellington Herb & Spice Farm “which sits atop a hillside” offering “breathtaking” views of the Catskills’ Schoharie Valley.   Annually they have offered visitors from around New York State and beyond a place to visit their “landscaped gardens” and “pristine grounds,” fish in their ponds and shop at their 4,000-sq. ft. country store for garden products, antiques, collectibles, herb and spice products, and jewelry.   They also have herb classes, tours for all ages, a wonderful high-end art gallery and Carolyn’s great teas and homebaked goods.

 They are farmers now, but they also are part of a new generation of older Americans who are opting to fulfill their passions in “encore careers.”

 

When we asked them if they had considered setting up a bed-&-breakfast to complement the hugely profitable and well-trafficked business, Carol answered with a question: “Why?”  The Wellingtons are where they want to be in life, doing what they want to do, living their lives far away from the maddening world albeit in the midst of the bucolic wilds.

For baby boomers who want more to do than what they are doing, and have the means to do it, the Wellingtons offer six points to consider before realigning those dreams to match star positioning:

• Define your life goals

• Be clear on your life priorities

• Know as much as you can about your career interest

• Create a personal road map

• Identify ways to work through the challenges and it’s never too late until it’s too late.

 

·         Gardens are not made by singing, “Oh how beautiful” and sitting in the shade.

 

– Bernice Elizabeth Green

 

Publisher’s Note: The following story was written by an African-American artist whose work was presented as part of an African-American exhibit, “Black Dimension in Art”, presented during 2008 in the Wellington’s Art Gallery facility which stands adjacent to the shop.

Couple Keeps Vanishing African-American Farming Traditions

Strong, Profitable and Green in Upstate New York

 

Farming, once a proud tradition in the African-American community, is rapidly disappearing or gone altogether in the United States.  However, the spirit limps along, buoyed by the tireless efforts of the older generation, who through community gardening try persistently to keep a grand tradition alive.

 

Recently, quite by accident, I encountered an African-American who is bucking the trend and succeeding in spreading the joy of farming/gardening to small groups of African-Americans who periodically visit his farm.

 

Dr. Frederick Wellington, an American of Caribbean descent, arrived in the U.S. in 1961 from the island of Grenada to pursue a course of study in veterinary medicine.  He discovered only weeks before he began his studies that even with long hours of employment and his savings that he would not be able to afford the programs required.  So with half of a soccer scholarship to Long Island University, he elected an alternative career path, hoping that he and his passion would be reunited at some point in the future.

 

He earned instead a Baccalaureate degree in Psychology, and Master’s & Doctorate degrees in Education.  Along the way, he became a college dean and an Associate in Higher Education with the New York State Education Department with responsibility for the review of undergraduate and graduate degree programs.  In 1998 and 1999, he played a significant role in the review of the new, higher teacher-education standards, and shepherded the entry of the fledgling and innovative “Teach for America” program into the state.

 

Now retired, Dr. Wellington with his Georgia-born wife, Carolyn, live on a 45-acre farm in the fertile Schoharie Valley region between the Catskill and Adirondack Mountains, after having restored the land from its former abandoned state.

 

Eighteen of those acres are now certified for organic production.  Wellington’s Herbs and Spices, a business which the Wellingtons operate on the farm, sits on top of a hillside that overlooks this beautiful valley aptly dubbed the “Breadbasket of the Revolution” for the role it played in providing sustenance to the stalwart continental soldiers.

 

Dr. Wellington, now 70 years young, works as hard as a much younger man.  He is motivated largely by his desire to see African-American and Caribbean communities consume more fruits and vegetables, and to choose whenever possible those that have been produced organically.  Whenever he speaks to groups who visit the farm, his message is simple – “If your fruits and vegetables are not protected by a thick skin (i.e., banana) that could be removed, or by a shell, let your food choices be organic.”  He especially recommends organic collard, mustard & turnip greens, lettuce, arugula, kale, thyme, mints, beets, scallions, basil and string beans.  He also urges that people with the following conditions make organic choices:

·       Pregnancy

·       Parents of children 5 or younger

·       Living with a compromised immune system

·       Senior citizen

·       Suffering from a chronic disease/allergies

·       Have a family history of cancer

 

WHS is considered a very small producer in the grand scheme of New York State farming.  Almost 100% of their crops are grown organically.  When for reasons of climate or other influences they cannot grow an organic product, they exercise an unwavering vigilance in the selection of a produce source before they offer that product to their customers.

 

The largest crops grown by the Wellingtons are collards, hot peppers, basil, string beans, rosemary, mints, oregano, lemon-verbena, thyme, cherry tomatoes and leaf lettuce, but thyme is numero uno!  During my visit to the farm, more than five thousand plants were being transplanted that day by a team of students from the neighboring SUNY Cobleskill College.

 

“Why so much thyme” I asked, “and who buys it all?”  “Well”, he responded, “many local restaurants are looking for fresh local herbs and spices and as a matter of fact some chefs do come here and pick it themselves.  As for capacity, we can produce less than one percent of the thyme consumed in New York State.  Nevertheless, we try to produce even that small quantity because of the growing interest in organic foods.  Most consumers don’t know that fresh green produce entering the U.S. is routinely fumigated to protect the U.S. Agricultural Industry from exposure to insects that may have hitched a ride from their country of origin.  It is for the informed that we produce what we do to give them an option in the marketplace.”

 

“Food selection can no longer be a casual decision. Safety, security and combating chronic diseases such as hypertension and diabetes have become an important part of the equation.”

 

Wellington’s Herbs and Spices also sells a large variety of imported teas and herbal tea blends.  For more information about the complete inventory of merchandise and service, visit their Web site: www.wellingtonsherbsandspices.com, now being redesigned to accommodate online shopping.  E-mail: ginger@midtel.net, or telephone: 518-295-7366.

But when they decided to retire, Carolyn and Frederick Wellington didn’t hang it up. They went to work, joining nearly 9 million Americans between the ages of 45 and 70 who have reentered the workforce in recent years.  But this second time around, they are in careers that are more personally meaningful and have social and far-ranging community impact.  

 

 

 

Pooling Talents and Aging in Style

Bernice Elizabeth Green
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Pooling Talents and Growing with Style: (Left to right) Darlene Slater, Richard L. Akers, and Carolyn Pratt, all retirees, are not geezers or codgers; they are managing the aging process, and having fun.  That’s the reason yesterday morning at the Bedford-Stuyvesant YMCA they were looking for a term to replace “Splashers.”  Richie, a septuagenarian volunteer swim instructor, and his lovely wife of 47 years, Laurie (not pictured), are early morning regulars at the Y, which offers an assortment of programs for older adults from swimming and health and fitness (sit-fit), to service-learning, trips and social clubs.  Darlene says, “Splashers are the adults who come in and splash in the water.”  The Bedford Y boasts swimmers and aqua joggers, ranging in age, from over 50 to 100 – who work out from 3 – 4 times per week.  Of note: Those who come in to splash, don’t stay splashers for very long. “I learned to swim here at the Y, earlier this year, and swam in the ocean waters of Cozumel, last month,” says Darlene who’s in her early 50’s. At YMCAs, older adults have a chance to keep active “and grow in spirit, mind and body,” says Darlene.  Akers adds, “I get the most fun out of taking people with limited and no aquatic experience and assisting them to become swimmers. We have members of a certain age who started from nowhere and now compete in the Empire games in Cortland, New York.”

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