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Black History

Special Salute to Orators of Our Time

 

Richard Green, Photo: B Green

When we think of great orators, the names of Frederick Douglass, The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X easily come to mind. Although their messages of justice and freedom ring in harmony still, the mic is live and has not been dropped by their Brooklyn-based heirs.

We heard two of them – community advocate Richard Green of the Crown Heights Youth Collective and historian/activist Graham Weatherspoon, former detective and recent broadcast commentator at The Cooperative Culture Collective’s Juneteenth 19th Celebration on Juneteenth in Ft. Greene, June 15. The event, themed “Celebrating Our Story and Pouring into Our Future,” featured the two leaders’ rousing keynotes: Green on the historical significance of the annual June observance to Central Brooklyn, and Weatherspoon on “When We Were Kings.”

May 16, in Montgomery, Alabama, the voice of village griot Rev. Taharka Robinson resounded throughout the sanctuary of the Dexter Avenue Historic Martin Luther King Jr. Baptist Church and brought to life a movement in his total recall of details of its history.

Here at Our Time Press, we are rediscovering our own voice in the form of echoes from the past: forgotten, now found, stories that reflect our journey.  

Rev. Taharka Robinson, Photo: B Green

This week, we pulled publisher David Greaves’ interview with Green out of the files to share on Page 2.  Next week, we feature the messages of Weatherspoon and Rev. Robinson.  

(Bernice Green)

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