Posts Tagged ‘African American history’

Membership in The Black Race

Monday, June 29th, 2015

To answer a callers question – we made an independent decision to give you an answer:

Question: Can you be a member of more than one “race” at a time? For example, can I be a member of the Black race and other races?

Answer: Yes. It is your decision.

Question: Do you have to be a citizen of the U. S. A. to become a member of the Black Race?

Answer: No, the Black Race has members spread around the globe.

Question: How do I join?

Answer: By sending an email with your request to bettina-network@comcast.net

Question: Now that I am a member of The Black Race can I solicit friends and relatives to join?

Answer: Of course. The more the merrier and the more effective we will be in this attempt to eliminate racism, sexism and all the rest.

MEMBERSHIP:

Trudi VanSlyck has become a member of the Black Race (Cambridge, MA)

The Rev. Dr. Robert A. Bennett, Jr. has become a member of the Black Race (Cambridge, MA)

Regina Downer has become a member of the Black Race (Weston, Vermont)

Marceline Donaldson has become a member of the Black Race (Cambridge, MA)

Prof. Dr. Hikmet Ucisik has become a member of the Black Race (Istanbul, Turkey)

Dr. Gino Cattani has become a member of the Black Race (Lucca, Italy)

Walter J. Foley has become a member of the Black Race (Norwood, MA)

Frances Maloney has become a member of the Black Race (Boston, MA)

Cheryl Nicholas has become a member of the Black Race (Randolph, MA)

Courtney Ratliff has become a member of the Black Race (Randolph, MA)

Jaimie Botero has become a member of the Black Race (Cambridge, MA)

Mike Johnson has become a member of the Black Race (Boston, MA)

Bruce Downer has become a member of the Black Race (Weston, Vermont)

Courtney Conway has become a member of the Black Race (Randolph, MA)

Nathaniel Conway has become a member of the Black Race (Randolph, MA)

Dr. Robert Perry has become a member of the Black Race (New Orleans, LA.)

Lani J. Stacks has become a member of the Black Race (Lemon Grove, CA)

Mr. Mark Roudané has become a member of the Black Race (St. Paul, MN)

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Send your event information to be included in Bettina Network’s Menu of Events to: bettina-network@comcast.net

This is a curated blog so you cannot write your responses at the end of each entry. TO RESPOND TO THIS BLOG email bettina-network@comcast.net or info@bettina-network.com

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, Bettina Homes, Rachel Dolezal, Racism, Sexism, The Black Race
Posted in Bed & Breakfast, Bettina Homes, Bettina Network Educational Institute, Bettina's Hall of Fame, Guest comments, Rachel Dolezal, racism, The Black Race, Ubuntu | No Comments »

Martin Luther King Day at Bettina’s

Tuesday, January 20th, 2015

Hate murdered a man, at 39 years of age, who preached love.

It has been amazing and humbling to watch the progress of the Martin Luther King holiday over the years. We watched from the beginning, when there was much conflict, confrontation, opposition, loud voices of angry protest at the very idea that such a man, with his history and achievements should be honored. We watched until today when the determination and love of those who were going to make sure Martin and the work of the Black Civil Rights movement was recognized. This 2015 year we celebrated and recognized a man and a movement with time out of school for our children, to the closing of banks, the post office and some of our corporations. To get even this far, has been a long, hard, painful, but very rewarding journey for many.

How do we treat greatness when discovered or suspected in African Americans?

We attended and participated in events which recognized Martin Luther King and the movement of which he was one of the leaders. The events, their venues, the people participating were a cross section – not only of America – but across parts of the world where the work of the Civil Rights Movement was remembered.

There was much “breakfast table talk” about the history which brought us to this day. We hope it continues throughout the year. I thought we would share some of that conversation with you:

“We had a fantastic breakfast – I would have to call it a ‘breakfast seminar.’ Only one person at the table had been through the Civil Rights Movement which created this holiday. The rest of us were either not yet born or were on the other side. I was one of those on the other side at the time because, to me, what was happening with the protests, the disruptions, the dogs, the hoses aimed at the hurting of even young children was something I couldn’t abide. I didn’t think there was anything wrong with life the way we were living it. My point of view was not that of those who were willing to die for their freedom and were looking to the future at their children’s future, but of someone whose life was being disrupted. Not seriously disrupted, but enough to be inconvenienced and I just wanted it to stop and things to go back to the way they were. I don’t know when God took hold of me to shake me up and to shake those attitudes out of my life, but somehow it happened and I am now a part of the Black Lives Matter demonstrations. My grey hair can be seen among all of those young people and I hope somehow, even though it is a very little and very late, my efforts will matter to those who come behind me.”

Are you listening out there in Simi Valley? How diverse is your neighborhood!

WOW!

“What a history lesson! I remember studying the Civil Rights Movement in school. We learned about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and what that time was all about, but I had never talked to someone who was a part of that history before. This was a very different perspective. I think of history as being about the study of dead people and past times. Here I was in the middle of a conversation with someone who lived that history and those past times are still with us today. I have never been a part of a demonstration of any kind. Never talked to anyone who had. Didn’t intend to talk to anyone who was a part of something like that and here I was in the middle of breakfast deep into a conversation that changed my life. Thank you to my breakfast companions for putting up with me. My responses must have been horrible to you, yet you were so kind – well almost kind, after you got over the shock of my being at the breakfast table. I don’t know what I expected, but certainly not what happened. I have never even thought twice about the Martin Luther King holiday. No different from all those other holidays I don’t celebrate. Maybe it is the newness of this one – with the pain still being felt by those who experienced the events which led up to this being important enough to remember once a year. This is, however, a holiday I am bringing back to my family to celebrate every year by learning something new about that time in history and by trying to be a little better about dealing with my prejudices which have caused so many people pain. But – is ‘celebrate’ really what I want to say. I almost feel as though we should all be in sack cloth and ashes for what we’ve done, but ‘celebrate’ is what I feel.”

A truth the world needs to hear! From the religious aristocrats to the homeless on our streets, none of us is immune from this need! To be accepted by proving that we can discriminate against our brothers and sisters just as good as the next person.

A truth the world needs to hear! From the world’s elite, the corporate billionaires, the religious aristocrats, the homeless on our streets, no one is immune from the need to be silent so we can be accepted. “I am sorry, but I can’t get involved. Only when my earthly masters signal their approval.”

“A small group of us (women all) get together every year on Martin Luther King day to try to continue to work through our conflicting thoughts about the Black Civil Rights Movement. It was a difficult time for us. Women – who were discriminated against, not only by the wider society, but also by the Black Civil Rights Movement. It was very male oriented and some, in the movement, felt embarrassed if women were perceived as being in any leadership position. We withdrew, but still supported what was happening with our money, by marching and by being a part of. At the same time, we gathered together to fight for the equality of women and here was an example where those discriminated against were discriminating against us. That is so the human condition! Flawed, full of sin, dragging our own history and almost blind to that of others. Our time together, each year, is to try to reconcile and acknowledge our being human and to root out our separateness to be able to embrace everyone and not feel victimized as we work with those also fighting for their freedom in a society which seems to need to have a group on top and a group less than and which needs to manage and continue their being on top by playing one ‘less than’ group against another.”

“I love Bettina’s. It is a safe place to be able to express whatever and you never know who is going to be at breakfast. May you all live long and prosper.”

Ed Note: We had a lot more expressions of breakfast at Bettina’s on Martin Luther King Day. We shared just a few. The places where people came from, knowing the history of King and the Movement amazed even us. We could put this all together in a book, but we will stop here. Hope this gives more meaning to your day and information to your life.

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, Bettina Homes, Bettina Network Information, breakfast table talk, Martin Luther King, Racism
Posted in African American history, Bed & Breakfast, Bettina Homes, Bettina Network Educational Institute, Bettina Network Foundation, Bettina's Hall of Fame, Breakfast Table Talk, Guest comments, Historical Support, Holiday Greeting, Jr., Uncategorized | No Comments »

The Rev. Dr. Lillian D. Anthony, my friend

Monday, December 1st, 2014

by: Marceline Donaldson, president

Bettina Network Foundation, inc.

There are some people one expects to go on forever, but none of us lives forever.

Lillian was a force of nature. Her strength came from the clear, truthful, fearless and love filled way she lived her life.

I have always called Lillian ‘my friend’, but as I look back over our lives I realize she was also one of my mentors from whom I learned a lot.

I met Lillian back in the l960’s in Minneapolis. She was challenging the City of Minneapolis about its lack of civil rights and was in the process of becoming the first head of one of the first city civil rights departments in the United States.

It was amazing for me – a young, southern, quiet, full of my early training. A person who wore gloves everyplace and usually with an umbrella at hand, who had been trained to always remember who she was and act accordingly – to meet this woman who always knew who she was and she was neither quiet nor southern.

I was just coming out of a not so great marriage and trying to stand on my own two feet for the first time in life. I’d found a beautiful house I loved and tried to buy, but the owner declared he would not sell to an African American. I was furious; was not going to take such; and wasn’t sure where to go or what to do when someone suggested I call Lillian Anthony – which I did.

Lillian responded immediately. She was head of the newly established Minneapolis Department of Civil Rights starting in l968 and had some power to address what happened to me.

We met and talked and hit it off right away. Lillian went off to address the problem and in a couple days called and we met again. She told me the problem was solved, the owner had no problem selling the house to an African American woman and she knew that for sure because she’d just bought it.

We started to laugh, almost uncontrollably. It was a joke that was funny far beneath what was on the surface and so off we went on a lifetime of what can only be described as a hilarious friendship full of one-upmanship’s. When we met at social, civic, or other events we would point and laugh uproariously because we knew we were the sharpest looking people in the room. I knew I looked better than Lillian and she knew she looked better than me.

We often went shopping together – to estate sales, of course – but we had to fight to buy what we wanted because we always saw the same item at the same time and it was a free-for-all as to who got to it first.

I was invited to a meeting in Chicago in the early 1970’s of 100 Black Women and so was Lillian, who was one of the coordinators of that event. Once there I met Elma Lewis – who had not yet become Miss. Lewis. There was a skit in the room with all of us gathered and a woman dressed as a waitress came in with her clothes askew looking very stressed and disheveled, crying out – ‘help me, they shot him’.

No one in the room moved, except me, who jumped up to run to this woman to help her in her obvious distress, while telling everyone else in the room how they should be helping also. Elma wanted to know “who is that woman”. Lillian, who was sitting next to Elma said – that’s just Marceline. She is always in the middle of everything saving the world . Elma called me over to sit next to her and she and Lillian laughed and carried on – at my expense.

Turns out, the waitress was a part of the skit to see who would respond and to then start a discussion on being involved. However, that didn’t work because Lillian, Elma and I couldn’t stop laughing and just having a great time out of all of this.

That was the start of a great trio of friends. We weren’t together a lot, but when we did get together it was always a good time.

Lillian designed the Afro-American Studies Department at the University of Minnesota, becoming its first chairperson. She did an amazing job of helping to found the Department and headed it in a way which helped develop the entire field. No, Skip Gates was not the first and neither was Harvard.

Lillian ran into trouble at the University as Black men challenged her position which they thought should belong to an African American man who they claimed should have better credentials than Lillians’. So Lillian resigned and went off to the University of Massachusetts to obtain a Doctorate in Education. In addition she also served on the faculties of the University of Nebraska, George Mason University and Towson University in Maryland.

Even before all of this, Lillian went to seminary at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary and received her Master of Religious Education in 1953 long before women were even beginning to see the possibility of a seminary education. Before that, Lillian received her undergraduate degree from Lincoln University in Jefferson City, MO.

After leaving seminary Lillian worked at Witherspoon Presbyterian Church as the director of religious education. A job most women found if they were lucky enough to finish their seminary education and find a job. The Church was way behind the society- still is today – in addressing the equality of men and women and Blacks, Hispanics and Native Americans.

Lillian also taught in Assuit, Egypt and was the North Central Area representative for the Commission on Ecumenical Mission and Relations of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Ordination was not possible then, even though God’s call to Lillian to the ordained ministry was strong, so she went instead into Religious Education. Lillian did not ignore this call to ordination into the Presbyterian ministry, which wasn’t realized until decades after she turned to listen to what God was calling her to do. What was clear in Lillian’s life was that God calls and man decides to ignore God’s way and pursue his own, blocking the path of women and minorities. It was clear looking at Lillian’s life, that it is dangerous for men to block God’s call, but they never seem to get that message because they are still today blocking as best they can – only today being joined by a few others who are not White European males!

Before I met Lillian, she had served the Federal Government from 1965-1968 as the district director for the Department of Labor establishing anti-poverty programs in Minnesota and Wisconsin.

When I moved to Massachusetts, Lillian was already there at the University of Massachsuetts working on a doctorate in Education. She insisted I join her because she felt I would need something to fall back on and with a doctorate I could teach in Academia someplace. I was not an academician, nor anything close and I decided that was not my path. She, Elma and I got together several times while Lillian was studying and both tried to push me into this doctorate business, but I resisted and took another path.

Several years after I moved to Massachusetts, Elma Lewis called to say she had heard from Lillian who was concerned about me because we hadn’t been in touch for quite some time and wanted Elma to make sure I was alright. They both knew my penchant for jumping into the fire and they both have had to pull me out several times. According to Elma, there were rumors and they were worried about me.

Elma called me to say John Ross was picking me up to bring me to her house for lunch, but before he did he was going to take me on a tour of Boston. I told Elma I already knew Boston, had been living here for a few years and that was great, but I preferred lunch times to tour times. Elma said nothing and John Ross picked me up and took me on a tour of Boston. Elma was now Miss Lewis and you did her bidding. John Ross asked all kinds of questions – how are you, what are you doing, are you alright financially, can we do anything for you, and on and on he went. I finally stopped him to ask why he was trying to get into my business. John Ross said he wasn’t he was just instructed by Elma to ask all of these questions because they needed to make sure I was alright and didn’t want me to say everything was fine – when we talked over lunch – and everything was not fine.

John Ross took me to Elma’s, where she was on the phone with Lillian and they both demanded I not stay out of touch for so long and whenever I had a problem of any kind they were just a phone call away.

That was a very emotional moment for me, but I knew that was how they both were and I must have had some kind of publicity or gossip which made them think they needed to circle the wagons.

Having had that kind of mentoring, I have tried to live up to their example and be there for others – although I have not been perfect following my mentors. I do fall away and still get busy with my own business and have missed many such opportunities presented to me by the universe.

One passion in Lillian’s life was ‘collecting’. It is a passion we both shared, but mine was about 18th century French furnishings, art objects, etc. Lillian’s was about collecting negative Black images throughout history. She had an amazing collection and her house – wherever it was – reflected this passion.

At one point in Louisville and again in St. Louis her home was a place classes of school children visited with their teachers to take the tour of Ms. Lillian’s home.

Oddly enough – or should I say expectedly enough – our two passions ran parallel because as Lillian became more knowledgeable about her area of collecting she ran across many objects which were from 18th century and beyond in the time frame of my collecting and items made by some of the same people and companies I loved. Lillian knew about and owned items made by the Dresden, Meissen and other factories of negative Black images and while artistically exquisite the subject matter made you wonder about this use of the artists talent. I remember when Lillian bought a beautiful piece of Dresden china which depicted a Black child being born out of an alligators egg and others pieces that went downhill from there.

My thoughts about negative Black images had to do with the Aunt Jemima dolls and the Uncle Tom depictions, but they went far beyond those simple objects into incredible works of art meant to support the racism against African Americans in as many and as subtle and not so subtle ways as possible.

Lillian brought a part of her collection to Boston for an exhibit along with a program speaking to this form of maintaining the structure of racism. It was well attended and the curiosity and amazement from those who had my early thoughts about this area was astounding.

Lillian was head of the Afro American studies department in Louisville, Kentucky and moved to Maryland to become a professor in the same area at Towson University.

Her life and career extended across the country and in several institutions. She left each one better for having served there.

Lillian’s last job before retiring was as the associate for equal employment opportunity/affirmative action in the human resources department in the Prebbyterian Church’s national office in Louisville, Kentucky.

Lillian was also able to function as an ordained minister before her death and her sermons were memorable, moving and caused you to rethink who you are and how you were responding to God’s call in your life.

Lillian was clearly one of God’s chosen and never forgot that she was called by God to spend her life ministering to God’s people and she did that with love, compassion, fearlessness, dignity and grace.

She received many awards and honorary recognitions like the Mary McLeod Bethune Award, presented by the Louisville National Council of Negro Women. She was also appointed to the President’s Disability Task Force.

What many people did not know was that Lillian lived with Lupus most of her adult life. How she did all of what she did and dealt with a very debilitating disease we will never know. Lillian was never a victim and nothing that happened to her turned her into a victim. She was always a child of God who she believed was the active force in her life and to whom she owed everything. She lived that life to the fullest – always.

Unfortunately for me, I did not stay as close to Lillian as a friend should and so my grief is not over the loss of a friend – who I know is celebrating with all of her friends right now having a joyous time – but over the loss of my opportunity and responsibility not to lose track of someone who I was close to and loved like a sister.

Through all of this I have learned that life and our society separates friends and families and thereby increases the burden on those we love and don’t keep up with because of our busyness trying to keep body and soul together.

Each time this happens I resolve to not let it happen ever again and then I hear of a close friend who has died and my guilt, regret and sense of great loss starts all over again.

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This is a curated blog so you cannot write your responses at the end of each entry. TO RESPOND TO THIS BLOG email bettina-network@comcast.net or info@bettina-network.com

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, Bettina Homes, Bettina Network Information, growing old, Lillian D. Anthony, Memorial
Posted in African American history, Bed & Breakfast, Bettina Homes, Bettina Network's Lifestyle Community, Bettina's Hall of Fame, Growing Old, Historical Support, Memorials, Preserving Family History and Stories | No Comments »

UBUNTU – I Am Because You Are

Tuesday, December 10th, 2013

“I am not a saint – unless you think of a saint as a sinner who keeps on trying.” – Mandela.

…………………………………….If only that described all of us!

The world is pouring out its grief, celebration, joy, gratitude, love for the life of Nelson Mandela.

………………………………………………………..Which has to make you think and ask – why?

What makes a human being rise to such a level that we are all grateful for his life on earth and come out to celebrate such an exceptional human being. Is it because so few such people have lived on this earth, especially when put in the context of the totality of those who have lived?

While most are celebrating such a great man – in Bettina homes we are asking why so few have risen to this height? Why so many human beings have been so absorbed with the mundanities of life that keep us busy and distracted so we can keep ourselves unaware of our irrevocable march towards death? Is it the self-absorption which some of our huge egos demand for their self-gratification? Is it the inconsistencies in values which we carry that keep us from living out our beliefs because we might get hurt – might miss a meal – might not accumulate as much wealth as possible? Or is it our contradictory ways of thinking and acting which we develop in our striving to create the structures which we think protect us and keep us secure, but which really oppress us?

How long, O Lord, do we have to wait for the many to live life the way Mandela lived his? Why does he have to be special? Why in our own small parts of the world we insist on living anti-ubuntu lives? Haven’t we experienced enough of the misery, poverty, pain, horrors that this causes? How long will we surround ourselves with “our own kind”? How long will we live blinded by the fact that we are all included in “our own kind.”

Whatever hurts me hurts thee! Whatever joys I experience grow exponentially when I share them with thee! My freedom totally depends upon your freedom.

One can hear why Mandela was great by just listening to the speeches honoring him. Some were clear, unobstructed by play acting, playing to the audience, playing to their own egos, unable to give a great speech honestly honoring Mandela’s life because they have allowed their minds to be clouded by their refusal to accept and act on their own values and take responsibility for their lives. Some were almost unintelligible and said more negatives about the person giving the speech than positives about the man the speech was supposed to be honoring. True Freedom eliminates that and you could tell whose lives were on track and whose were confused and muddled from listening to those speeches!

Mandela’s memorial services today gave us a stark opportunity to see and hear the differences as men and women gave their speeches of remembrance and the crowd reacted. Some people don’t have images, reflections, pretenses, – they have a rock solid faith, clear and authentic lives they are living and it is reflected in their very being, the words they use, their demeanor around others – especially their ability to be themselves when greeting strangers. Some people first promote their image and then everything else – lets not even begin to be who we really are, that must not show until we know the person better.

Why do so many of us want, protect and pass on to our children, as great gifts, the bondage in which we live? Why do we give up a beautiful life well lived for an existence that others have told us we must sacrifice ourselves to maintain? Why are we enslaved to sexual stereotypes – racial stereotypes – national stereotypes – religious stereotypes? We live out of them. We live for them and to promote them hoping that in exchange we will be able to live physically comfortable although seriously compromised lives.

FREEDOM will come to this earth when we celebrate lives like Mandela’s many times each day instead of once in a lifetime.

We set up ‘sins’ that we must stay away from and/or avoid the perception of our being involved with because that might handicap our future. We don’t set up, teach, preach, live authentic lives. The sins we set up and announce from our own mountain seem meant to deflect us and allow a few to claim perfection in their life’s story. Those are very far from the real sins of our lives – the inability to live authentically, the refusal to feel empathy for those on the street with no shelter from the cold, hunger, dangers of the street. Our refusal to stand on our own professed faith and most especially to give no room to others to stand on theirs – this seems to be the biggest sin of our creation. These are the commandments by which we live and demand that others of “our kind” also live. Our need to act to keep from feeling threatened by those we don’t understand; those in whom we see what we don’t like in ourselves – those we scape goat, and see reflected in our own mirror – we act against and break our own mirror.

As we look around at others it hurts the soul to see in them the rejection, mean spirit, and refusal to live truly free lives. After all, what does it matter in the end? We all die – and what a horrible death to leave this earth with unrequited dreams, longing, loves because you were trying for things that die with you for which there is no resurrection or redemption and which did nothing to make your life great. Worse, to die without ever having had dreams, great loves and without having left behind a legacy which helped change this earth for the better.

Isn’t it sad that we choose the fleeting fame and what we call ‘security’ instead of choosing to be about the business of living fully and making sure we are there to help others do the same?

There is no such thing in life as ‘security’, but we are willing to sacrifice much to attain the mirage.

Ecclesiastes comes to mind often – ‘vanity of vanities………’

Oh for a world full of people like Nelson Mandel!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.

Not only was Nelson Mandela clear as to who he was and whose he was, but he was a man who never met a stranger. He could reduce you to your real self in front of him in seconds or make it extremely difficult for you to maintain the pretense and image built up over years of living someone else’s imaginary life projected onto your own.

We pray that we all can move away from and cast out the garbage that collects as we live our lives striving for security; putting forth an image of someone we would like to be and who we would like those meeting us to think we are; cast out the values we collect to cover our insecurities and fears; cast out the mean spirit we take on because we need to feel better than other human beings who we describe and see clearly as those less than us helping us to be better than they are.

We pray that we have no more such outpourings as are happening this week for Nelson Mandela. Not because we don’t appreciate and value his life and work, but because we will be living in a world where there are so many like him that his life and how he lived it becomes normal and is common all around us. What a world that would be and what a wonderful place to live, love, work, and just be!

UBUNTU! A future and a word taken into the world’s vocabulary as one of its own no matter what the language. A word that describes – how we live – who we are!

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Want to join us? Have a home that you want to open to become one of Bettina Network’s Hedge Schools? Call us and lets talk – or email us.

Send your event information to be included in Bettina Network’s Menu of Events to: bettina-network@comcast.net

This is a curated blog so you cannot write your responses at the end of each entry. TO RESPOND TO THIS BLOG email bettina-network@comcast.net or info@bettina-network.com

TO LEARN MORE about Bettina Network, inc. try www.bettina-network.com

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1-800-347-9166 inside the U. S. or 617 497 9166 outside or inside the U. S.

Tags: African American history, Barack Obama, bed & breakfast, breakfast table talk, Making Connections, Nelson Mandela, politics, Ubuntu
Posted in African American history, Bettina's Hall of Fame, Breakfast Table Talk, Historical Support, Making Connections, Memorials, Nelson Mandela, politics, Ubuntu | Comments Off on UBUNTU – I Am Because You Are

Remembering Niko

Tuesday, October 22nd, 2013

…”There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you”…

—————————————Maya Angelou

photography by Dorothea Guild

A quote passed on to us by Dorothea Guild as she introduced the exhibit of Nicholas Michael Marinos’s art. Marinos was Dorothea’s family priest, long-term friend and soul-mate from years past. He was jazz artist, Greek Orthodox priest, one of the directors at Maliotis Center of Hellenic College in Brookline and at the end – visual artist working in oil, watercolors and more.

His art is on exhibit at the The Gallery of the Piano Craft Building at 791 Tremont Street, Boston, MA. 02118 through November 3, 2013.

The opening reception for the exhibit took place this past Saturday, October 19th. It was a beautiful success with good food, exceptional music and the introduction by Dorothea Gerros Guild of the art works of one of the two soulmates – one of the two people she cherishes in her life. The reception -intentionally or not – was about all the things needed to serve as an example for life, love, work, passion to all of us.

The first connection I found astounding was Jackie Cox-Crite’s presence as the guest curator. Jackie is the widow of Alan Rohan Crite.

The similarity of what Niko did to what Alan Crite did strikes you as you look at the art works. Crite worked from an African-American cultural aesthetic; Niko worked from a Greek Orthodox cultural aesthetic and you can see it in Niko’s works as strongly as you can see the Afro connection in Crite’s.

Jackie was not only the guest curator, but she was the caterer, promoter and all-around-into-every-part of this exhibit and its opening.

I remember Jackie as a very young person who was Alan Crite’s companion and caretaker. At the time, she was an artist in her own right. Her medium was soft sculpture. Her images and her work showed her innocence and intensity as she took a “woman’s medium” – a kind of quilting and used the medium to turn out beautiful works of art. She is not the first person to have done that, but at the time, I was particularly struck by the combination of her background, her images, her relationship with Alan Crite and how all of that showed in her art.

Mitch Weiss, photographer

The music at the reception was provided by Arni Cheatham, saxophonist, tenor, flutist, vocalist and very well known in the Boston jazz scene – who is also the soul-mate of Dorothea Guild. Arni is helping her in her quest for recognition for the works of Nicholas Marinos. That is most unusual in this society. Normally, we lock iron doors and gates against past close personal relationships when a new relationship starts and we strive to pretend that first, past relationship was somehow defective, not great and here is a list of all his/her faults.

Arni Cheatham provided a reason to attend for those who knew his music, but didn’t know Niko nor his art – and he and his group did not disappoint. Honored in Boston as a “Jazz Hero” by the Jazz Journalists Association and JazzBoston at – where else – but the South End jazz mecca Wally’s, Cheatham has a long line of acolades, performances, recordings and more. He currently can be heard at “Top of the Hub” with the Brian McCree Band during November, 2013.

…….and on to the artist.

Niko was born in 1928 and was a priest in the Greek Orthodox Church most of his adult life. He called himself an “Urban/Ethnic Neighborhood artist.” Born in Tarpon Springs, Florida, Marinos went through tragic losses as a child – starting with the loss of his father in a divers’ accident. He moved with his family to the Bronx; to the Greek Orthodox Seminary in Connecticut and on to serve a parish in Haverhill, MA. where he met Dorothea and her family and then on to Boston.

What went before in his life as jazz performer, priest, college professor, social activist and more all show up in his body of art works.

According to his own words, written in June, 1988, which reach us from 25 plus years ago——–

“Urban and ethnic neighborhoods hold a very special excitement for me. This ongoing fascination began when, as a child of the Depression of the 1930’s living in the tenements and growing up on the streets of the Bronx, Queens and mid-town Manhattan, I assimilated the cultural, racial and ethnic diversity of my environment. These became an indelible part of the fabric of my perception as a painter.

I was then, and am now, fascinated by the constantly evolving images which spread out before me as I chronicle, through color, the urban environment and its inhabitants in the various ethnic neighborhoods of this city, Boston. There is an ongoing dialogue between the indigenous environment and the changing demographics of the urban dwellers. It is this dialogue which always reaffirms the existence of the other that I attempt to record in a variety of perspectives through my art.

I am attempting to capture a moment in time and make it timeless. And if my art can convey to the viewer that which is familiar, very private, very personal, and, for each, a special remembrance of that place in another time, then I will have succeeded.

Thus far I have works of the North End, South End, Chinatown, Roxbury, Dorchester and downtown Boston including parts of the Back Bay. These paintings are, for me, a quiet celebration of life found in the urban and ethnic neighborhoods of Boston.”

The evening was an amalgam of Greek Orthodoxy – African American music – and a coming together of the two groups as if they were one because of the art of Nicholas Martinos and the spirits of Dorothea Guild and Arni Cheatham.

Dorothea was stunning in a black embroidered Greek silk blouse, skirt and shoes, all of which were her mothers. Clothes with a beauty almost unknown today. The image and the symbolism she portrayed in her look was that of a Greek Orthodox priest – it was difficult not to stare because of the richness of her appearance against the backdrop of the Greek Orthodoxy which comes through strongly in Niko’s art.

The community which Dorothea and Arni have gathered around them and who were there to see this exhibit and support their friend was a rare coming together on a very basic level of two communities which normally don’t seem to have many commonalities nor many comings together for any reason.

Maybe in all of this is hope for the rest of us. If we can imitate what is in their lives and values and incorporate a little of the processes which they used to cross many lines without providing the bridge. (That bridge which is usually a construct used for continued separation of the races.) Maybe we can all come together and begin to break down those barriers we have built to maintain unreal, unnatural and stilted separations even while we acknowledge and celebrate our original cultural identities.

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Tags: African American history, Arni Cheatham, art exhibit, bed & breakfast, Dorothea Guild, Greek Orthodox history, jazz, jazz heroes, Making Connections, Nicholas Michael Martinos, Piano Factory
Posted in African American history, Arni Cheatham, Art Exhibit, Dorothea Guild, Event Review, Greek Orthodox history, Historical Support, jazz heroes, Making Connections, Nicholas Michael Martinos, Piano Factory, Preserving Family History and Stories | Comments Off on Remembering Niko

The March on Washington

Wednesday, August 21st, 2013

This coming week we will remember one of the highlights of the Civil Rights Movement which changed so much in this country. It is such an emotional time that I have barely started to write this and the grief, tears and overwhelming feelings take over.

I was very young during the Civil Rights Movement – it took my life from the early 1950’s until today.

As I go back to remember all of those years – from my teenaged years on – several of Dr. King’s words come flooding back. The strongest in my memory is the quote “You will be judged not by the color of your skin but by the content of your character.” During my darkest days that will pop up in my mind as I experience the racism, sexism and now ageism of even my closest friends and sometimes, my family.

On Wednesday, August 28 at 3pm, the time and date of Dr. King’s “I Have A Dream” speech, houses of worship across the country will ring their bells in honor of the anniversary and will play hymns and spirituals. It should be an awesome moment! I want to be standing outside where I can hear all of them!

To contrast that to what was happening in the 1950’s and 1960’s is a stretch very few of us can make. People were being beaten, killed, maimed and the young were being denied freedom and equality. What young people had equal access to were the dogs, the hoses, the hostile and vicious law enforcement people who then worked hand and glove with the Ku Klux Klan.

Opportunities which these United States gave in its written documents were taken away at birth in the actual living out of life if you were the wrong race and sex. There has been no giving back. In fact, we still practice and allow others to practice the denial of the experiences of racism and sexism and we still strongly support the right of those engaging in such denial to be able to continue it. The denial that was so prevalent at the time is still hanging on with much tenacity and with no sign of the structure which accepts and promotes that denial being taken down. It is one thing to suffer the indignities and pain of racism and sexism; it is quite another to suffer those indignities and have those perpetrating them stand in front of you and deny their actions. —it has to do with the content of their character.

So many groups will be leading marches in Washington, D. C. from the Lincoln Memorial to the Martin Luther King Memorial. Around the country other groups will be leading marches to other places in their cities, towns, villages which have meaning in the context of this Movement.

Where will you be? What will you be doing? How will you contribute to the possibility that on August 29th you have helped to bring about some change which will make this a country more receptive to seeing everyone as equal?

The Bettina Network, inc. does its part – as a corporation – small though we may be – to help bring about moving us from a world of individuals, maybe even families, tribes, neighborhoods who see ourselves as better than those others out there – to a group of people who have an ethical commitment to dismantling the racism even further; to eliminating the sexism; to addressing the ageism and to reducing our thoughts about the culture within which we were raised away from a culture that is greater than, better than, more important than, to a culture which is different from but equal to all others. From that stance we are about giving, sharing, taking care of others as well as ourselves, and treating even the lowest and most tread upon of our brothers and sisters as equals and with respect.

The other quote from Dr. King which I hear often is “We must all learn to live together as brothers (and sisters) or we will all perish together as fools.”

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, Bettina Network Information, Civil Rights Movement, Jr., Making Connections, March on Washington, Martin Luther King, Memorial, New Orleans Creole, Racism, Sexism
Posted in An editorial just because, Bettina Network Info, Historical Support, Making Connections, Memorials, Preserving Family History and Stories | Comments Off on The March on Washington

A Bettina Guest Comments on Zimmerman-Martin

Wednesday, July 17th, 2013

You don’t have to copyright my comment! It is free to whoever wants to use it.

I’ve been a guest at Bettina homes for many years. My regret is that I was not at the home in Harvard Square to be a part of the discussions that I know took place over this trial and its verdict. They have some really unbelievable conversations – especially on race. So, I have to join the conversation via email. I understand,as a former guest in the network, my comments are accepted for Bettina Network’s Blog? If not, let me know. If yes, I will see it published – except, like most people, please don’t publish my name. I am not afraid of backing up my comments, I just don’t want anyone to pick up my name and start to harrass me.

My contribution to the conversation comes from listening to the juror. It was clear racism was deeply embedded in the jury deliberations. In the USA denial is the way racism continues and the way folks are able to go to Church on Sundays and feel good about themselves even when they have participated in some really low-down racism. They neither own up to nor are they even conscious of their sin. In this case, I think they were – the tears show some unconscious understanding of what they were doing. The juror saw Zimmerman very positively and could relate to him. Martin, however, in her comments, deserved what he got. How dare a Black man think he could question being stalked and treated in a demeaning way by someone like a Zimmerman. Afterall, Zimmerman was the neighborhood watch person – Martin was the hoodie wearing ‘punk’ – according to Zimmermans description. She said, she felt he was fully repentant and would be careful with his gun in the future. I wonder if that is true – or if he got the taste of celebrity from killing a Black man and will want more? So he becomes even more reckless and irresponsible with his gun. There are always two sides and her and the jury’s racism only allowed them to see the side which cast Zimmerman in a positive light and Martin as a stereotype. Her comments about Martin, as she quoted Zimmerman, were of a man looking in windows and clearly as someone who did not belong in the neighborhood because he was Black. Has anyone explained to her and the rest of the jury the definition of profiling? By the way, how could she quote Zimmerman who he did not testify at trial?

If you had any doubts that the Martin-Zimmerman decision was racist,or that the make-up of the jury was crucial to getting Zimmerman exonerated by the State of Florida, her comments erase those doubts.

I think this was a done deal before the trial – and I am not alone in that opinion. The Department of Justice was considering filing charges against Zimmerman because the State of Florida was refusing to do so (by dragging its feet). I think when they discovered the DOJ was coming, the State of Florida got its act together and started this trial, but did not intend for it to be a fair trial. A public show so DOJ didn’t come in to get a conviction after they covered for this neighborhood watch person for almost two months. To go forth with the kind of jury they picked – and to look at the history of convictions of Blacks in Florida and the refusal of the Florida prosecutors to charge some Blacks under the ‘Stand your Ground’ law – I don’t see how Trayvon Martin could get any kind of justice. It was a clear stacked deck before the case even started to be tried.

Thanks for the platform!

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, Bettina guest comments, breakfast table talk, Making Connections
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Please ask your readers to sign the petition

Monday, July 15th, 2013

Thank you for your writings about the Trayvon Martin – George Zimmerman encounter. It was special and I learned a lot. You said everything I wanted to say.

The NAACP has a petition on its web site which you can sign asking that the Department of Justice file a case against George Zimmerman, who violated Trayvon Martin’s right to life.

You can sign this petition at

www.naacp.org/page/s/doj-civil-rights-petition

you may have to go back to the site several times because it has been overloaded with people trying to sign the petition. Be persistent – don’t give up – keep going back to the site until you are able to sign the petition.

All of Us At Bettina’s

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, breakfast table talk, George Zimmerman, Making Connections, NAACP's DOJ Petition, Trayvon Martin
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Martin-Zimmerman and they Followed Historical Patterns

Sunday, July 14th, 2013

Don’t you know, just about every table talk conversation today is about the Zimmerman/Martin case and practically every sermon in many different denominations and religions includes some reference to it.

This is our contribution to the conversation:

1) George Zimmerman was not tried by a jury of his peers. Wasn’t it in the 1960’s and 1970’s that lawsuits abounded because Blacks were tried by all-White juries and those law suits proved that the results of such cases had nothing to do with justice and more to do with allowing the racism of the society penetrate and skewer Court decisions?

Lawsuit after Lawsuit proved that and change happened – until now!

How is it then, that a jury of five white women with white children and one minority woman who the press has never identified as to race – sometimes she was Black, sometimes she was Hispanic – is a jury of Zimmermans’ peers. This decision had nothing to do with justice and this jury did nothing except let the racism and sexism of this society enter the Court system through the front door with a special escort to make sure those twin isms knew where to go.

When one reflects on the fact that the children were White and the women were going to consider this case from the biased perspective not of – what if your child was Black and went to the local grocery store wearing a hoodie or just went to the grocery store in his neighborhood where there was an overzealous, out-of-control neighborhood watch person out there on the street; but what if your child was the White kid named some form of Zimmerman who had to go through a trial because he was doing what he claimed was his job and felt perfectly justified in shooting Trayvon Martin to death after the neighborhood watch person provoked the incident which allowed him to do this huge violence against another human being?

Zimmerman was not charged for 45 days after the fact. Who said “justice delayed……………” What happened in those 45 days? When someone confesses to shooting someone to death, there is an immediate arrest in this system because the evidence is subject to be skewered, disappear, witnesses tampered with and on and on and on.

2) George Zimmernan was a neighborhood watch person. There were many comments that he was a wannabe policeman, but those comments from the media seemed put out there only to cover the ugly facts of what happened. Why is a neighborhood watch person in the street in his car watching for ‘trouble’ with a gun? Was he trained in the use of a gun? Did he have to make regular trips to the shooting range to make sure he knew how to shoot a gun and his skills were up to where they should be? Was he ‘fit’ in the way police and other law enforcement officers have to be, in addition to keeping up their skills with their weapons? Had he been vetted psychologically to know he was able to be responsible with a gun in this neighborhood watch job? Was he encouraged to carry a gun by law enforcement? Why was he not immediately removed from this neighborhood watch duty when it was clear he was not sure of his own ability to fight off any possible attack on himself without the use of a gun? I didn’t hear any of these questions raised.

Zimmermans’ personality – character – ethics – kept him from following orders from those who knew better and advised him as to what to do. To ignore those orders, get out of his car to stalk a Black man in a ‘hoodie’ after telling the police who this Black man was using very negative racist and demeaning terms is a personality, character and ethics exposure. This could not have been the first time this side of Zimmerman was exposed to those who elected him or allowed him to be the neighborhood watch person. What was their motive to ignore these warning signs and allow him out with his gun.

Zimmerman is a man whose own defense witnesses said could not fight – he was too fat to defend himself in a fist fight on the street. He couldn’t punch, etc. He must have been very insecure being a neighborhood watch person – why else was carrying a gun? He knew his limits and he knew his temper – is that what made him so quick to pull the trigger? That is a very insecure person who is looking for trouble when he goes out on a job where he is supposed to be simply a neighborhood watch person observing the neighborhood for signs of trouble and if he saw possible problems, his ‘job’ was to alert the police.

With a gun, Zimmerman was not an ‘observer’ who would quickly alert the real police to trouble. He was someone who was armed and ready and willing to use his weapon at the least provocation. He has shown that is true by his actions against Trayvon Martin. Zimmerman was ready to use his weapon and to provoke an incident during which he could use his weapon – which he did. In the Mafia he would be a made man. In the gang world, he would be welcomed as a member, in the Florida police force ………………?

Has Zimmerman now overcome his half-breedness and is now welcomed into the arms of the majority group? Is this what it takes for a half-breed to become a full-fledged accepted White Person? Zimmerman didn’t make it by birth, but he has absolutely shown he is ready to take his place in a racist, sexist, classist system which is prone to violence against its minorities and is against giving its minorities justice in its court system. Review cases over the past years and see what you come up with! When the jury has spoken, justice has been served. No one commentating on this case has been willing to say other than the jury system has delivered justice. A jury system has delivered that kind of justice to a whole lot of Black folks over the generations – are we dissembling to take attention away from that fact? Are we throwing out a red herring to get folks to look in every place except at the truth?

3) We are all being told the jury has spoken and justice has been served because we are the best nation in the world and our justice system is the best there is!!!!!!! Tell that to the generations of African Americans who have been through our justice system and have seen results come through like Plessy vs Ferguson and a whole lot more. I could go on here and take time to list pages of such cases in which the same kind of justice we have just seen is traditional in this country when African Americans are involved.

When has this country’s justice system ever convicted a White man for the murder of a Black man? And clearly Zimmerman was White. His mother may have been hispanic or some other kind of minority, but his father was White and that is the determination in this country. He stands up as a White man and is respected as such.

4) This great system of justice will now reward Zimmerman and he is the man of the hour – he will shortly be the multi-millionaire of the hour as the offers pour in. I heard talk that his brother may even benefit since the media is talking up how ‘professional’, how ‘well spoken’ is his brother. All we could say is – how self-serving was his brother and how unbelievably horrible in the way he mocked what happened and put himself and his family on that top line where we are the best, most caring people in the world. A family that has produced a George Zimmerman has lots of problems the brother has not let slip out.

All on the back of Trayvon Martin. Trayvon Martin’s life was taken so this man can succeed. Zimmerman followed the book, written over the generations – the racist, ugly names; the provoked violence for which the Black is blamed, the holier than thou attitude at the end, that the Zimmerman family seems schooled in………………. This name calling and showing the spite and vicious racist attitude the Zimmermans have towards African Americans has been slathered over and will soon be buried deep under everything else. Just the fact that the arguments in court were around who was the aggressor says the red herring had already been thrown and Zimmerman was a free man. After Zimmerman started the fight – the court argument takes up at the point where they could picture Martin as the aggressor and all is well – the jury acquits and justice is served. For who? Certainly not for the African Americans in this country. This was a case about racial profiling which resulted in the death of an African American and the courts’ have said ‘ justice was served because the African American was the ‘aggressor’ – and now let the real aggressor go free.

5) The aggressor was clearly George Zimmerman. Trayvon Martin was going home from the store – he was not breaking into a neighborhood where he did not belong, he was going back to his father’s house. This 17 year old child, who had never been in trouble of any kind, had an exemplary record, was going home and was followed and threatened by one George Zimmerman who then shot and killed him and there was a question in the trial as to who was the aggressor! Well – who was the African-American! In this society, in its criminal justice system, there is no question that in that circumstance the Black man was the aggressor – let the facts be selectively chosen to prove this case – AND THEY WERE.

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, breakfast table talk, George Zimmerman, Making Connections, politics, Racism, Sexism, Trayvon Martin
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2013 The Jubilee Year

Friday, February 8th, 2013

We declare the year 2013 to be the Year of the Jubilee and a holy, joyous, history making, sin forgiving year!

By whose authority? – by our own. Isn’t that how such things happen!!!!

Generations from now, the historical cry will be reported and everyone will forget it was declared by one little person in a tiny corner of Massachusetts in danger of being crushed by Harvard University.

Why 2013? —————– Why not 2013!

The year Barack Hussein Obama was re-elected president of these United States. A man of African and Colonial American origins. He not only models what African Americans can accomplish, he also models that ‘half-breeds’ can be brilliant, successful, achieve beyond everyone’s expectations and really – how can you tell his racial background from just meeting him? Doesn’t his smile wipe all of your doubts away?

His election – his person – does not go through years of ancestors stolen from Africa and forcibly put into slavery. He comes from the combination of the Africans who escaped being brought over as slaves and the very middle-class White Americans who brought some of his family/tribe/countrymen over to do their work for them – for free. And, in spite of that ancestry he is just as nice and kind and smart and thoughtful and….as he can be. The progeny of the original enemies in these United States – the original American oppressed and oppressors – those who stole the freedom of generations of human beings so they wouldn’t have to do their own menial work and those who were stolen and lived for generations outside their own country, culture, language, until they no longer could recognize from whence they had come.

This Jubilee Year, which we are declaring, also comes 50 year after Martin Luther King, Jr. and the civil rights movement which broke out in this country and partially freed some of us from sitting behind signs on buses; drinking from water fountains which were never clean; going to the back door of restaurants and paying the same price for contaminated food handed to us out the back door which we then had to find a place to eat; travelling and wondering just where we were going to sleep the night because hotels, motels, inns, were not welcoming and did not allow Blacks to register; going to inferior segregated schools; not being allowed into institutions of higher learning except for those established ‘for colored patrons only’ and on and on and on.

We are a step beyond slavery, but still not free! A more qualified African American woman was passed over for Secretary of State in favor of a qualified, but less qualified White Male from a very Patrician American family – complete with trust fund, hundreds of millions of dollars and a phalanx of supporters in his chosen profession protecting him and making sure anyone threatening his path to his chosen goal was dutifully destroyed – or at the least – with reputation mangled.

With BHO’s election to the presidency we should proclaim this a great year of celebration. No, he is not perfect. No, I don’t agree with all of his stands on things. No, I suspect he has more than a little bit of sexism in his soul and it has popped out and will probably continue to do so. No to a lot about BHO, but YES, I will shout and loudly proclaim this celebration and the debt we owe him for stepping out and moving all of us out of a less equal time. If I knew about ram’s horns I would probably continuously bother all of my neighbors by playing several, all year.

This Jubilee Year, which we are proclaiming, is a year of unmitigated joy, but also a year of universal pardon for all of the sins of the past. It is time to put slavery, its manifestations in today’s society, its ruination of the lives of some of my and your ancestors (be they White, Black, Green, Pink, Brown or Purple) in the past and look to the future which this year proclaims possible. A future that is about all of us – that sees us working together to bring about a world free of the horribleness of the past.

In this Jubilee Year:

We need to call on our brothers and sisters to stop manufacturing foods and other processed goods which are harmful to us!

We need to call on our brothers and sisters to take global warming seriously and stop polluting the planet and to stop doing all the other things which are turning our living rooms into our toilets and our bodies into garbage disposals and composters at the expense of our health!

We need to call on our brothers and sisters to learn to settle their grievances without resorting to killing another human being – raping women and children – blowing up buildings out of their self-righteous hatred – playing games which hurt others, but relieves their own anxieties and covers from them the fact that they are mortal and one day will die.

We need to call on our brothers and sisters to take responsibility for each other. No one should sleep on the street or in other than a bed, have warm clothing, enough food to eat and be able to live without the fear of another human being. We are, afterall, more alike than different. We are our brothers and sisters keepers. We have heard those messages from childhood as have our parents, grandparents, great grandparents and much further back into history, heard them also, but we still have not put them into practice in our lives.

We need to call on our brothers and sisters to do at least one good deed each day for someone in need.

We need to dismantle our class structure which raises us up to believe some of us are better – as a part of a group – than others of us.

We need to dismantle what is left of racism.

We need to dismantle what is left of sexism.

We need to totally dismantle ageism.

And we need to do all of that and more before December 2013 so we can all end the year feeling great about ourselves and each other. So that no matter where we are in the world it is a safe place and if we need anything the people in that place will move to supply whatever ‘it’ is.

According to Leviticus 25:10 “Thou shalt sanctify the fiftieth year and shalt proclaim remission to all the inhabitants of thy land; for it is the year of the Jubilee.”

This needs to be a year of great goodness – great deeds – great acknowledgement of our common and shared humanity each one equal to the next, no one greater than another. We should work hard to keep this Jubilee Year and at the end, maybe we will have created habits which carry over into 2014.

50 years ago – at the beginning of this cycle of this Jubilee year –

John F. Kennedy and Medgar Evers were assassinated and W. E. B. DuBois dies!
Martin Luther King, Jr. writes his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail’ and later in the year gives his famous “I have a Dream Speech”, during the March on Washington.
Hoses and Police dogs turned on protestors and are nationally televised for the first time
Children’s crusade brings about a form of settlement – Birmingham juvenile court inundated with African-American children and teenagers arrested while protesting
16th Street Baptist Church bombed killing four young girls – out of which came Condoleeza Rice

and out of all of this and much more in the celebration year, the sabbatical year, has come Barack Husein Obama.

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Tags: 16th Street Baptist Church, African American history, Barack Obama, bed & breakfast, breakfast table talk, Children's crusade, Condoleeza Rice, I Have a Dream, John F. Kennedy, John Kerry, Jr., Jubilee Year, Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Making Connections, Martin Luther King, Medgar Evers, Racism, Secretary of State, Sexism, Susan Rice, W. E. B. duBois
Posted in Bettina's Hall of Fame, Breakfast Table Talk, Historical Support, Making Connections, Preserving Family History and Stories, Press Release from Bettina Network | Comments Off on 2013 The Jubilee Year

Was Susan Rice Used?

Friday, December 14th, 2012

RICE = ROGERS = GUINIER. What do they have in common besides all being African Americans!

Was yet another woman used? – misused? – abused? in this political process?

Looks to us as though Ms. Rice’s name was thrown out and then reeled in to get the deal President Obama wanted from Congress – and it looks as though not only was it a successful ploy, but he knows the political process very well and is not above playing the game. After all, he is now one of the big boys. I just hope he has not become one of the ‘good ole boys.’

Looks like something Bill Clinton did years ago when he was president and the woman used – abused – misused – was Lani Guinier . In 1993 Ms. Guinier was nominated by President Bill Clinton to be Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. Just like Ms. Rice, Ms. Guinier was eminently qualified – Radcliffe College, Yale Law School, Assistant to the then Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights – a really brilliant and accomplished Black Woman. One of the Clintons’ Yale Law School classmates.

Congress jumped all over Bill Clinton demanding her nomination be withdrawn and who was one of those who counseled him to withdraw the nomination? – none other than Ted Kennedy (genuflecting – of sainted memory), among others, including the Black Female who we will only identify with the nom de plume “turn coat” – “sell out without knowing how much you were selling out for”. So, of course, Ms. Guinier’s nomination was withdrawn. The Wall Street Journal called her one of “Clinton’s Quota Queens” (remember the title of Welfare Queen)?. The racism and sexism of that was overlooked and instead of articulating what this was about and going ahead to back-up and support his nominee, Clinton succumbed to the pressure, even though it looked as though Ms. Guinier would be confirmed. The loud, racist and sexist voices won the day.

The claim made to derail Ms. Guinier’s nomination – at the end of the day – turned out to be false, but the media proclaimed it loudly and kept the drum beat going so Ms. Guinier would be taken down – doesn’t that sound familiar? In small print after the fact, it was acknowledged that the loud drums beat out the wrong message. Now, isn’t that what they are doing to Ms. Rice? Even louder, because they have had more experience beating drums to drum out Black women!

And then there was Desiré Rogers. Another tremendous African American woman from New Orleans. I knew her parents and her grandparents. They were very substantial people and Ms. Rogers had a very solid and ethical upbringing.

Partially because of that New Orleans upbringing, -after what she went through in Washington, D. C. – Ms. Rogers was able to continue her life almost without missing a beat and moved right on up! And Condoleeza Rice – the horrible Republican who many can’t stand to even see or speak about – gets a standing ovation from any Republican group she appears in front of. Is that some kind of contrast? Takes me back to the days of Walter L. Cohen, African American who was head of the Louisiana Republican Party!

All three Black women were charged with things which were blown out of all proportion and all those charges and innuendos were kept going by the media who turned crap, half-truths and more into something which sounded real, substantial and reason for them to be not considered, re-considered, removed. Two were exonerated in the end when things quieted down and the racist sexist goals had been achieved. Ms. Rice will also be so exonerated. That will take awhile since we saw the news people this morning showing signs of relief that Ms. Rice would not be considered for Secretary of State. One news reporter woman let out an audible sound of relief. Although in Ms. Rice’s case it looks more like racism and sexism were used to reach a political goal and not a very big one, considering the price being paid by Susan Rice.

With Susan Rice,

Should be next Secretary of State

the forces of Congress came out once again to attempt to destroy an African American woman.- the Republican forces came out against her because the Democratic forces could not. They would have been accused of pushing for the appointment of a friend – which was, in fact what the Republicans were doing. What we have just witnessed on the political stage could be called “A Time of Surrogacy” with John McCain being the star of the play.

The good ole boys coming out to make sure one of their own got what he wanted. The price someone else paid for that is really irrelevant and not to be considered. That will just go down in the books as a debt to be repaid and they will look to John Kerry, at some point down the road, to repay the debt – and he will.

This time, it looks as though President Obama threw Ms. Rice to the Congressional Wolves so he could negotiate and get what he wanted from them if he withdrew her name from the short list and went back to John Kerry instead. The games boys will play.

Don’t you think it is time we elect men – or – a woman?

Was this the same John Kerry who was President Obama’s coach for that first memorable debate – which came close to blowing Obama’s chances for re-election and at the very least promoted Mitt Romney’s campaign to a higher level?

It seems to me Mitt Romney should be the one promoting John Kerry to higher responsibilities not President Obama – but then, we don’t know what goes on behind those closed political doors. And then I could be wrong – but have you read the Bettina Network’s Blog on “Rice and Kerry”?

And – in an aside, which probably had nothing to do with deals being made – Scot Brown, solely because of his ESP – and having nothing to do with games being played, started his campaign as early as December 4th. What did he know that the rest of us didn’t? He is getting ready to run for John Kerry’s seat. We think that seat should go to Martha Coakley – or – preferably to an African American woman as an appointment. If games are going to be played – set better ground rules fellows, this is a society full of diversity with a diversity mind set. To replace a White Man whose hands are unclean with another White Male whose … tsk tsk tsk!

Our breakfast table guests are seldom wrong. They seem to have that inside track which comes out over those really scrumptious breakfasts served in the bed & breakfast homes in the Bettina Network. Maybe its the coffee which brings out such great conversations. Check them out, especially if you have conversation to share!

If John Kerry has any sense of decency he will withdraw his name from consideration. It is the only decent and ethical thing he can do and it is the only way such games will begin to cease. But then, he has moved far away from the days in which his actions and youthful ideology first got him elected to Congress. How the mighty have fallen! Or – is it that power corrupts?

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Tags: African American history, Barack Obama, bed & breakfast, breakfast table talk, Desiré Rogers, John Kerry, Making Connections, Mitt Romney, New Orleans Creole, politics, Racism, Secretary of State, Sexism, Susan Rice
Posted in Bettina's Hall of Shame, Breakfast Table Talk, Guest comments, Historical Support, Making Connections | Comments Off on Was Susan Rice Used?

A Final Tribute

Thursday, February 16th, 2012

Ed. Note: Because we had so much response to the Bettina Network Blog on Whitney Houston and because we had questions we couldn’t properly answer and comments we didn’t want to put in the blog – there would have been many by now – mostly repetitive – we decided to reprint (with permission) – this article written by Marc Morial, who has written a fantastic column which covers it all and we commend this to you without reservations or further comments.

“The Incomparable Whitney Houston
To Be Equal #7

Syndicated Weekly Column by National Urban League President & CEO Marc H. Morial
“To me Whitney was THE VOICE. We got to hear a part of God every time she sang.” – Oprah Winfrey on the death of Whitney Houston

FEBRUARY 15, 2012 – Billie Holiday was 44. Judy Garland was 47. Dinah Washington was 39. Michael Jackson was 51. Jimi Hendrix was 28. Janis Joplin was 27. Amy Winehouse was 28. And Whitney Houston lived only 48 years on this earth. I was one of millions of people around the world who were stunned to learn of the untimely death of pop-music queen, Whitney Houston last Saturday. Like so many other entertainers who died too young, Whitney was blessed with a divine talent but also haunted by a heavy load of troubles.

Throughout much of the 1980’s and 90’s, Whitney Houston reigned as the undisputed queen of pop. With songs like “The Greatest Love of All,” and “I Will Always Love You,” she set a standard as an octave-shattering virtuoso who brought both elegance and a gospel-tinged intensity to her work in studio and on stage. That was surely a natural outgrowth of her church choir roots and being the daughter of classy gospel legend, Cissy Houston.

Whitney got her start singing in the junior choir of Newark, New Jersey’s New Hope Baptist Church, where her mother has served as Minister of Music for decades. Whitney also undoubtedly benefited from the influences of other great musical talents in her family. Dionne Warwick was her cousin. And Aretha Franklin was her Godmother. But, Whitney was a pure original.

In addition to setting the music world on fire and influencing such performers as Mariah Carey, Beyoncé and Jennifer Hudson, Whitney also excelled as an actress, and had starring roles in such movies as “The Bodyguard,” “Waiting to Exhale” and “The Preacher’s Wife.” Her final film, “Sparkle,” a remake of the 1976 movie about three sisters from Harlem who form a singing group, is set to be released in August.

It is a sad irony that Whitney Houston died on the eve of this year’s Grammy Awards. The winner of six Grammys herself, Whitney was preparing to attend a pre-Grammy party given by her mentor, the legendary music producer, Clive Davis. Her body was found Saturday afternoon in the bath tub of her room at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Los Angeles. As of this writing, the exact cause of her death is still unknown.

In her 2009 interview with Oprah Winfrey, Whitney revealed for the first time, some of the most intimate details about her troubled marriage to Bobby Brown, the deep feelings she had for her mother and her daughter, Bobbie Kristina, and her struggles with drugs. She candidly admitted to Oprah that at times “It was too much. So much to try to live up to, to try to be, and I wanted out.” Through it all, Whitney said she was constantly reading her bible and trying to get back to God. While we are all shocked and saddened by her death, I am hopeful that Whitney Houston’s life and incomparable musical gifts will inspire others to let nothing stand in the way of the full and healthy expression of their God-given talents. Our thoughts and prayers are with Cissy, Bobbie Kristina and the entire Houston family.”

And from the Bettina Network:
May the Lord Bless and Keep you Whitney,
May God’s face shine upon you and be gracious unto you;
May God lift up that exquisite, peaceful and loving countenance upon you and give you peace
Now and forever….Amen and Amen!

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Tags: African American history, bed & breakfast, breakfast table talk, Whitney Houston
Posted in Breakfast Table Talk, Memorials, Uncategorized | Comments Off on A Final Tribute

Alabama’s first licensed black female pilot dies at 90

Friday, December 30th, 2011

Published: Wednesday, October 26, 2011, 12:16 PM Updated: Wednesday, October 26, 2011, 12:35 PM

By The Associated Press

Mildred Carter, pictured here in 2003, shows her pilot’s

license from 1941. (The Birmingham News/ file photo)

TUSKEGEE, Alabama — Mildred Carter, who was Alabama’s first licensed black female pilot, has died. She was 90.

Funeral services for Carter will be held at 1 p.m. Friday at Tuskegee’s St. Andrews Episcopal Church with The Rev. Liston Garfield officiating. Burial will be at Greenwood Cemetery.

Her husband Herbert was a Tuskegee Airman.

In an interview with The Montgomery Advertiser he recalled how they had flown in a two-plane formation high over Alabama. He remembers how they laughed and exchanged silent “I love you” signals over their engine noise 3,000 feet above Lake Martin.

“We didn’t have radio contact, so we made up for it with hand signals and blew kisses at each other,” the retired Air Force lieutenant colonel said Tuesday. “It was a lot of fun.”

Herbert Carter, who compiled a distinguished flying record during World War II and, later, in peacetime, recalled those unauthorized rendezvous flights over the lake.

“I was a maintenance officer as well as a combat pilot and one of my jobs was to take planes up for a test flight after we worked on them,” he said. “That’s when we came up with the idea of flying over the lake. Nobody ever said anything to me about what we did.”

Both had to overcome racial prejudices and discriminatory practices when they learned to fly, but they persevered. As the years passed, they became the “first family” of the Tuskegee Airmen organization and represented the group at functions around the world.

She is survived by her husband, three children, a sister, five grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

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Tags: African American history, airline pilot, bed & breakfast, Episcopal Church, Mildred Carter, Rev. Liston Garfield, Tuskegee Airman
Posted in Making Connections, Memorials, Preserving Family History and Stories | Comments Off on Alabama’s first licensed black female pilot dies at 90

Posts Tagged ‘African American history’

Membership in The Black Race

Martin Luther King Day at Bettina’s

The Rev. Dr. Lillian D. Anthony, my friend

UBUNTU – I Am Because You Are

Remembering Niko

The March on Washington

A Bettina Guest Comments on Zimmerman-Martin

Please ask your readers to sign the petition

Martin-Zimmerman and they Followed Historical Patterns

2013 The Jubilee Year

Was Susan Rice Used?

A Final Tribute

Alabama’s first licensed black female pilot dies at 90

Published: Wednesday, October 26, 2011, 12:16 PM Updated: Wednesday, October 26, 2011, 12:35 PM

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