Our Time PressThe Local Paper with the Global View

       Returning to thrill New York audiences for the ninth year, Nativity: A Life Story brings a bevy of extraordinary performers to upper Broadway for what has become a holiday classic. The magnificent United Palace Theater, at 175th Street and Broadway, will host the musical for a three-week run: Thursday, December 4 at 8:00p.m., Friday, December 5 at 8:00p.m., Saturday, December 6 at 3:00p.m. and 8:00p.m., Friday, December 12 at 8:00p.m., Saturday, December 13 at 3:00p.m. and 8:00p.m., Friday, December 19 at 8:00p.m., and Saturday, December 20 at 3:00p.m. and 8:00p.m.
Inspired by Black Nativity, the Langston Hughes musical about the birth of Jesus, stage and screen veterans James Stovall (Sweet Charity, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat) and Hattie Winston (CBS’s Becker) wrote Nativity: A Life Story to tell the story of the Christ’s birth through Mary’s eyes.
With text, song and dance, Stovall and Winston’s production follows Mary from her childhood in Galilee to the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. A gifted array of entertainers brings the story to life, including vocal powerhouse Stephanie Mills, who provides the voice of Mary through song; gospel legend BeBe Winans as Joseph; R&B crooner Freddie Jackson in the role of a prophet; star of Harlem Song and Smokey Joe’s Caf‚, B.J. Crosby and the amazing Alyson Williams.
Nativity’s immense 125-member multiracial cast encompasses stage and screen veterans, a live sextet and three full choruses – The Broadway Inspirational Voices, The Christ United Church Youth-In-Action Chorus and The Ebony Ecumenical Ensemble. Stovall – who’s also helming the upcoming Bishop T.D. Jakes-produced musical Cover Girls — directs Nativity. Long-time composer, producer and Broadway stalwart Harold Wheeler heads up the team that puts together the show’s orchestrations and vocal arrangements.   
For eight years, Nativity has lifted holiday audiences with “rollicking”  gospel music performances.  But this unique interpretation of Christ’s birth doesn’t stop with gospel inflections. “When we were researching the art of Black Madonnas we came across a theory that proposed Mary was descended from Ethiopian Jews,” says Stovall, who directed the recent “Rites of Ancestral Return” events commemorating the reinternment of the African ancestors at the African Burial Ground Memorial Site.  “Working with the African aspect of the story really opened up the production. We were able to incorporate Ethiopian, Nigerian and Ghanaian music as well as gospel and spirituals. We even had a Nigerian songwriter, Olatunji, contribute ‘Betelehemu,’ which is sung in Yoruba.”
The producers are also excited about a tradition begun last year that captures the true spirit of the musical. “Our company, WWIN-ALL Publishing is working with an HIV/AIDS village in South Africa, The Sparrow’s Nest,” says Winston proudly. “Last year we sponsored an adoption for one of the children there, Godwin, a seven-year-old with tuberculosis who’d been abandoned. Godwin passed away several days ago, and we will commit to adopting a child every year in honor of his life.

The Billie Holiday Theatre is a gem in the Brooklyn community. Executive director/producer Marjorie Moon has provided audiences with plays that are interesting, funny, and thought-provoking for over two decades. That tradition is continuing with its latest offering, “Freeda Peoples.”
This entertaining play exposes what is really happening behind closed doors in a Black church in Harlem. Problems abound everywhere-from the pastor, to his deacons, to his church counselors. The people who are supposed to be the examples and lead the flock are exposed as not being perfect, but being human beings.
In this play the characters know the Bible and quote it often, but it is not done for spiritual enlightenment. They use the bible to make points in arguments.
The writer and director, Joyce Sylvester, gives audiences a show they can relate to and often laugh at. The characters reveal very personal and sometimes painful details about their lives. The information is helpful in assisting the audiences in understanding their behavior.
Rev. Scott (played by Jerome Preston Bates), Mrs. Reba Scott (played by Peggy Alston), Sister Ann (played by Marilyn Coleman); Deacon Beasley, her husband (played by C.R. Jarmon) , Deacon Lewis (played by Kim Sullivan), Elder Jones (played by William Williams) and Freeda Peoples (played by Jammie Patton) are characters that quickly capture the audience’s attention.
The cast delivers memorable performances. Bates is inspiring as Rev. Scott, who loves to quote Malcolm X and charge up the flock with his sermons. He also gives the character a very human side, as he portrays a husband who takes his wife for granted. When confronted, he is upset that she did not tell him how she was feeling all along. Alston is perfect as she captures and conveys the frustrations of a woman who wants to feel love and passion from her husband. Coleman is on-point as she talks the talk of a church sister ready to criticize instead of advise. Jarmon gives a touching performance as Beasley, a loving husband who is hurt, when after 45 years of marriage his wife questions his faithfulness. Williams is quick, funny and cold as Elder Jones, succeeding in disguising his character’s pain. Sullivan’s character does a 180- degree turn that I won’t talk about. He is brilliant as the Deacon who is loyal to the pastor. Patton delivers a wonderful performance as Peoples. She dresses one way, but shows that one should not judge people by their outer covering.
An engaging set by Patrice Andrew Davidson captures the audience’s attention. Costumes by Helen L. Simmons work well to depict these well-dressed,”religious” leaders. AVAN provides the lighting design and stage management.
“Freeda Peoples” will play through December 28. Go to see,  laugh and free your mind from judging others.

New York, NY-November 6, 2003 – Low wages, few basic employee benefits, as well as recent measures taken to close the city and state budget gaps, have compounded the struggle to make ends meet among low-income New Yorkers.  According to the second annual survey of New Yorkers conducted by the Community Service Society, nearly half of poor New Yorkers reported three or more serious economic hardships over the past year, such as falling behind on rent (27%) or inability to pay for needed medical attention (27%) or prescription drugs (32%).  Even full-time work did not protect people against hardships: 22% of full-time workers living below the federal poverty line fell behind on rent, 21% postponed needed medical care, and 27% were unable to fill prescriptions.
The survey, The Unheard Third: Bringing the Voices of Low-Income New Yorkers to the Policy Debate, conducted for CSS by Lake, Snell, Perry & Associates, provides an in-depth perspective on how theprolonged economic slump has affected New York City residents living below 200 percent of the federal poverty guidelines ($30,520 for a family of three). The survey polled a total of  753 low-income New York City residents and a comparison sample of  259 moderate and  higher  income New Yorkers.
David Jones, president of the CSS, said, “Despite recent reports of an expanding economy and increased consumer spending, our survey tells a very different story, one in which families are scraping by to survive despite full-time employment.”
The survey revealed that basic employer-based benefits that most middle-income workers take for granted are often nonexistent for low-wage workers – even among those holding full-time jobs.  Among poor full-time workers, 44% said they are not offered health insurance, 63% don’t have a single day of paid sick leave, and 64% don’t get a paid vacation.
“Even if our economy continues to rebound, I don’t see that it will change the plight of low-wage workers unless the government steps in to ensure that a hard day’s work reaps wages and benefits that will meet the basic needs of families,” stated Jones.  “These people need help.  It is not surprising that a majority of our respondents were unhappy with the way our city, state and federal governments were handling the current economic crisis.”
One positive finding in the survey is that the people in the category of near- poor, or those families earning between 100% and 200% of the poverty line, seem to have rebounded since 9/11, and are reporting fewer hardships compared to our 2002 survey.
“This suggests that government policies
 aimed at increasing the income of the poorest New Yorkers could make a significant difference in their standard of living.  In the survey, 70 percent of the low-income respondents said they were registered and are likely to vote.  “This is a large group of voters whose concerns are consistently ignored by most candidates for public office.  Those who speak to their issues may be able to energize this untapped constituency,” said Jones.
CSS recommends the following income-boosting strategies to help low-income people get ahead:
*   Increase the minimum wage
*   Establish a floor of basic employee benefits and paid family leave
*   Expand access to affordable housing for low-income New Yorkers through construction, incentives, rent assistance, and realistic welfare shelter allowances
*   Provide property tax relief to low-income New Yorkers
*   Fix welfare policies to promote education and training
*   Increase funding to improve New York City’s public schools so that graduates are well-prepared for jobs and higher education
*   Expand access to government programs such as the Earned Income Tax Credit, Food Stamps, Medicaid, and Unemployment Insurance benefits to help low-income families meet their basic needs
Telephone interviews were conducted between August 25 and September 9, 2003, with a total of 1,012 New York City residents age 18 or older, including 753 low-income residents and 259 higher-income residents.  The margin of error for the low-income component is +/-3.6 percentage points; for the higher income component +/- 6.2 percentage points.
Topline findings and a more detailed report can be found on the Community Service Society website at www.cssny.org <http://www.cssny.org/>

By Helen A. Tucker
      Charities and the Commons 18 (Sept. 21, 1907)
No one could look at the product of Negro brain and hand in the Negro Building at the Jamestown Exposition without realizing what a remarkable showing has been made after forty year’s effort, not only indicative of accomplishment, but full of promise. At one entrance to the Negro Building, by the side of the path, is a small, windowless log cabin, the slave home of 1860; on the other a pleasant wooden cottage, typical of many which are sheltering Negro families today. In Virginia alone, 47,000 homes are owned by Negroes.
The Negro Building is an attractive, well-proportioned, two-story structure, on classic lines, admirably adapted by its many windows to its purpose. It was designed by a young Negro architect of Washington, D. C., W. Sidney Pittman, a graduate of Tuskegee and Drexel Institutes, who has also designed some of the Tuskegee buildings. The contract for the building, together with the incidental contracts, were taken by Negro contractors. Colored mechanics and laborers did the actual work of construction. Even the timber was supplied by a Negro firm. All financial and business matters, including the collection and setting up of the exhibits, were in the hands of an executive committee consisting of three Negroes appointed by the United States Government to supervise the expenditure of the $100,000 congressional appropriation. The building, with the decorations and electric lights, cost about $50,000, and on the day of formal opening the chairman of the committee, Thos. J Calloway, was able to announce that with all expenses met and every debt paid they still had $30,000 left. This speaks well for Negro business ability.
In the early days of planning for the Negro exhibit, there was a feeling among some colored people that to have an exclusively Negro building at the exposition would be of  “Jim Crowism,” but the more thoughtful and discerning realized the truth that the credit for anything they might show in the general exhibits would be largely lost to them. As one of the Negro day speakers said, it would have been necessary to have some- one standing by each article to swear it was made by a Negro and ten more to swear they would believe the witness on oath.
Inside the Negro Building the contents of the building might be classified under the following heads: educational, agricultural, business enterprises, inventions, literary and artistic exhibits. In all, about 3,000 exhibitors are represented. As might be expected, since it is by education that the foundation for all further progress must be laid, a large number of schools, some one hundred and twenty-five, conducted by and for the race, have a prominent place.
These, including both public and private institutions, represent many states and kinds of training – one may turn from the work of a kindergarten in Topeka, Kansas, to that of a normal school in Lexington, Kentucky. From the nature of their work, the industrial schools can make the most striking showing, and there is plenty of evidence in the fine needlework done by the girls, and in the productions of embryo blacksmiths, wheelwrights and carpenters, that the training of the hand is not being neglected.
Hampton Institute has a particularly extensive, interesting and artistically arranged exhibit, illustrating what is done in the various departments of this great school, which is really an industrial village. Here, the furniture made by the students, the rugs woven by them, the handsome, substantial wagon, the well-made harness; the neat, attractive brick fireplace, are their own demonstrations of the value of industrial training and the power to do something well – and they speak also of the trained mind, lacking which such accurate and painstaking work would be impossible.
As a part of the exhibit of Fisk University, the jubilee singers give free concerts, morning and

afternoon, following a demonstration by Fisk students designed to set forth the value of college education. This demonstration usually takes the form of some experiment in chemistry, physics or other science, conducted as it would be by a teacher in the classroom. An  interesting part of this exhibit is a picture, painted in London in 1874, of the original jubilee singers who in seven years, having in the meantime sung in all the northern states and in many cities of Europe, brought back the $150,000 which helped make the present Fisk possible.
Howard University has a series of sociological charts prepared by the students under the direction of Prof. Kelly Miller which interpret census figures so as to bring out the facts in regard to the progress of the Negro race. These charts are explained by a student from the university, and should be of especial value and interest to Negro visitors. They deal with such subjects as: Negro population by states, Negro population by decades, counties in which Negroes are in a majority, Decline of Negro illiteracy, Number of Negro children attending school in each state.
Progress in agriculture is shown by samples of farm products, soil culture and improved machinery, with tables of statistics relative to the value and extent of Negro landowning. Negro farmers produce two-thirds of the cotton raised in the United States and one-fifth of the sweet potatoes.
Twenty thousand Negroes own and operate their own farms, aggregating twelve million acres. Among the samples of crops exhibited are corn, oats, cotton, large and perfect specimens of many kinds of vegetables and preserved fruit.
The business enterprises upon which Negroes have entered are of necessity represented largely by photographs. There are photographs of prosperous-looking stores,  office buildings,  banks and of many houses built by Negro realty companies.
A study of these indicates that Negroes are going into business, not only in the South where they have large numbers of their own people to supply,but in northern cities as well. The well-fitted shop of an electrician and locksmith in Chicago is said to be the only store of its kind in the United States controlled and operated by Negroes. A picture of an up-to-date department store, also in Chicago, hangs side by side with one in Baltimore. An enterprising shoemaker has set up his shop in the building and is busy making and repairing shoes. Another interesting corner is that filled by the exhibit of a shoe polish company  in New York City, where it occupies a five-story building and does an annual business of over $75,000. Capable demonstrators are ready to prove this polish the best made. Near one entrance is a model bank, open for business during banking hours. It is a branch of the bank in Richmond, Virginia, controlled by the United Order of True Reformers.
This, established in 1889, was the first bank in America chartered and managed by Negroes.
The large number of inventions, representing some five hundred of the five thousand patents said to have been issued to members of the colored race, their variety, and the real mechanical ability of which they are proof, give surprising evidence of the progress Negroes are making along this line. A case of interesting models was loaned by the Patent Department in Washington. Among some of the recent inventions is an automatic electric switch attachment for street cars, designed to be operated from the car by the motorman, an improved truck already in use in Chicago, a combined cotton planter and fertilizer, adjustable bed springs by which an  invalid’s bed may serve as a reclining chair, and an extension step ladder.
The literary exhibit consists of books written by Negroes, representing about eight hundred authors, and the 337 newspapers which they publish.
Nearby is a display of music, both vocal and instrumental. One is interested to discover we are indebted for so many of the recent popular songs to Negro composers. The historic tableaux, a series of fourteen  groups portraying different phases in the development of Negro life in America from 1619 to 1907, attract much attention. These were designed, made and set in place by Miss Meta Vaux Warrick, a young sculptor who has studied in Philadelphia and more recently in Paris. Beginning with the landing of twenty slaves at Jamestown they present such contrasting scenes as these: An escaping slave, a Negro defending his master’s home during the war, Negro soldiers, a Negro bank, the slaves learning to work in the cotton fields, an independent Negro farmer, the organization of the first Negro church in 1816, a modern Sunday scene, the first school house (a  rough log cabin), and a Negro college commencement.
 August 3 was Negro day at the exposition. A review of the Hampton Institute battalion by St. George Tucker, president of the exposition company, Booker T. Washington and Major Moton, commandant at Hampton, was followed by exercises at the Negro Building where Mr. Washington delivered an address to a large audience of his own people. He brought out the thought that the Negro race is at present passing through a formative period in its development and while in no sense minimizing the difficulties and drawbacks in the way of progress, he dwelt at length on the opportunities open, urged them to take advantage of these and throughout his speech kept dominant the practical, inspiring note so haracteristic of him.
The estimated attendance on Negro day was 10,000 Negroes and about 1,000 whites, very few of whom showed any interest in the exercises at the Negro Building. At police headquarters on the grounds, not one case of drunkenness was reported and not one of disorderly conduct during the day: a record of which the Negroes may well be proud. Nor does this stand alone. Last fall at the Georgia State Fair, the first of its kind held there, with an attendance of over 40,000, there was not one arrest for intoxication. The exhibit at the Jamestown exposition which does the most credit to the Negro race is not the fine building, nor yet the evidences of skill and industry so attractively arranged, but the interested and orderly gathering of people on Negro day, and the alert, courteous, intelligent men and women employed in various capacities throughout the building.

The injustices of the Jim Crow era of separate economic and social circles for whites and blacks, have been well-documented.  Signs such as “No Negroes allowed” and “Whites Only” are familiar symbols of a time when Black people were forced to trade among themselves, patronizing Black-owned stores and businesses.   Under such constraints, we made economic advances in the decades after slavery that are striking today.
One of the most important speeches in American history was made by Booker T. Washington, founder of Tuskeegee Institute, at the opening of the Cotton States and International Exposition, in Atlanta, Ga., on September 18, 1895.  Dubbed the “Atlanta Compromise”, Mr. Washington seemed to acquiesce to the injustices but his speech must be seen in the context of its time, when terrorists, who at the most visible, lynched an average of more than one hundred Black people per year from 1882-1901.  One hundred and thirty-four are known to have been lynched only a year before Mr. Washington spoke.
In that context, we can see that Mr. Washington had his work cut out for him as he spoke in the Negro Building at the Exposition.    He had his personal safety and that of his institution to think about.   He had Northern philanthropists Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller on his mind, men who were vital to Tuskeegee’s mission of educating a people.  And he had his fellow newly-freed people on his mind also, people who were recovering from the trauma of the slave experience while still under daily attack. 
Mr. Washington’s call for Black people to concentrate on industrial skills and education rather than social integration was resoundingly received by the first two constituencies, but many blacks, W.E.B DuBois being the most prominent, were not happy with the appearance of retreat from social progress.  But Mr. Washington’s approach was more of a strategic withdrawal than a retreat: time for the enemy to become civilized, time for people to be educated and strengthened.
The Jamestown Exposition of 1907, took place twelve years after Mr. Washington’s speech.  The following account, written at the time, is a window on the advances made by black people under severe circumstances and following Mr. Washington’s model. 
As we look around Brooklyn today, with “civil rights” laws giving full access to venues such as Marriott and the Waldorf, we have to ask, “How far have we come economically in the last ninety-six years and what would Mr. Washington think of our ‘progress’?”  DG

At about 1:45pm on Thursday, August 20th, we had just parked on St. Andrews Place, across from the park, when a police car raced onto the field and came to a halt in front of a man sitting on the player’s bench  behind the wire fencing.  The man was alone  facing the  sun and the windswept, deserted open field. 
Two officers with body armor and swaggering manners exited the police car with a third left inside. 
They approached the man who stood with the aid of a cane, and from the distance they appeared to check him out, and returned to the car.  Several minutes later, one of the officers gave the man something and the blue and white left in a TV wannabee screech of rubber. 
We went over to the gentleman, who was now gathering up his cane and plastic bag of worldly possessions and asked him what had happened. 
“Sir, I was sitting here with a bag of chips and a beer, sir, and they gave me a citation for opened alcohol in public. I have to go to court, sir.”   His name was Mike Latimer, a middle-aged man who spoke with the smiling resignation of a man who has come to expect the regular unfairness of life. 
He was recovering from an operation, and using the cane because his foot was in a cast.  Going to court would not be a small thing nor is the fine he’ll have to pay.  
Right then he was on his way to the hospital and as he left I asked him about the fresh-spilled coffee and the Dunkin Donuts cups that had been left where the patrol car was stopped.  “Was that there when they got here?”  “No sir, it was not.”
The City Administration has got to get its act straight on equal policing habits.  When white guys having wine in the park can be seen laughing and toasting on the cover of The New York Times, and one black man with a beer, the only soul  on a two-acre expanse, is reason for an armed response by three men in a car, then something is wrong and needs to be fixed.
Either stop writing tickets for open alcohol in public, or start writing them at the next concert in Central Park.   Enforce the law equally or not at all.