Jordan gets own magazine
Michael Jordan join? Oprah Winfrey
as one of the few black celebrities with a
self-named magazine.
Next month. Hearst Magazines will
begin to publish "Jordan," a lifestyle
magazine based around the NBA super
star. The publication, sponsored by Nike,
is targeting young men between 16 and
21.
Hearst, which did not say how much
it paid Nike to publish "Jordan," will ini
tially publish 300,000 copies rwi cc a year
this year and four timdl next year. Under the agreement, Nike
will send the magazino?n a mailing list it owns.
Jordan
Former Atlanta mayor joining
Pittsburgh-based Edwards Broadcasting
ATLANTA - Foster Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell is join
ing Edwards Broadcaping, a black-owned company based in
Pittsburgh. <
Campbell will remain in Atlanta and
will serve Edwards as vice president of
corporate communications and legal
affairs, he said last Thursday in Washing
ton.
"I'm a young guy - I'm 48 - and I've
loved broadcasting, and it givej, me a
chance in particular for enhancing the
opportunities for minorities," said Camp
bell, who was replaced by Shirley
Franklin on Monday.
The company is trying to buy as many
broadcast stations across the country as
passible and also is promoting an entertainment-onented televi
sion program that it produces.
TTie president and CEO, Campbell friend Eddie Edwards, is
head of the Black Broadcaster Alliance, a national organization
that supports minority media ownership.
4- . *
Campbell
Clemson focuses on luring blacks
CLEMSON, S.C. - Clemson University is looking to
make the school more inviting to minority students with Pres
ident Jim Barker's push to increase black enrollment above 11
percent within five years.
Ideas range from enhanced cultural support such as a black
student union; creative strategies for recruitment and market
ing; ways to change attitudes about diversity; and ways to bet
ter include blacks in the community.
Black enrollment at Clemson has fluctuated between 7
percent and 8 percent in recent years, and 3 percent of the fac
ulty is black. The population of the state is almost 30 percent
black.
Clemson competes with other colleges for the small pool
of qualified minority applicants, said Byron Wiley, director of
the university's Office of Access and Equity.
The university already invites more than 100 minority stu
dents each summer to spend two weeks dissecting questions
and learning the tricks of the S.A.T. college entrance exam.
The school also leads a collaboration with three historically
black colleges to recruit black men who want to become ele
mentary school teachers.
Other proposals include expanding the PEER program,
which matches black freshmen in the engineering college with
upperclassmen to help them overcome a feeling of isolation
on the primarily white campus, to all five of the university's
colleges.
The PEER program, created in 1987, has put Clemson
among the top 10 schools nationally in degrees awarded to
black engineers.
Wiley also said the school needs to improve its financial
aid packages and make programs more appealing to minority
students. For example, the university doesn't have a major in
African-American studies, he said.
Barker said he will approve no new academic programs
unless faculty can convince him the proposals will attract
some black students, and the university budget includes
$500,000 that can be used to fund diversity programs.
BET, Air Jamaica to sponsor jazz
and blues festival in Kingston
KINGSTON, Jamaica - Air Jamaica and Black Enter
tainment Television will sponsor a jazz and blues festival
next month in Jamaica, as the island hopes to attract visitors
to revive its tourism sector.
American pop singers Babyface
and Carl Thomas, gospel singer Yolan
da Adams and blues artist Bobby Blue
Bland are among the headliners for the
Feb. 8-10 show in the northern resort
town of Montego Bay.
. BET plans to televise some of the
performances and has been promoting
the concert, said Cybelle Brown, net
work senior vice president of market
ing, but she did not give more details.
Brown and Air Jamaica marketing
manager Allen Chastenet announced
the festival at a news conference Tuesday night.
Josef Forstmayr, president of the Jamaica Hotel and
Tourist Association, said Wednesday the festival is welcome
news for the ailing tourism sector. Tourism has dropped
since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States,
although some hotels have reported some improvement in
bookings in recent weeks.
-From Staff and Wire Reports
Adams
The Chronicle (USPS 067-910) was established by
Ernest H. Pitt and Ndubisi Egemonye in 1974 and is
published every Thursday by Winston-Salem Chronicle
Publishing Co., Inc., 617 N. Liberty Street, Winston
Salem, NC 27101. Periodicals postage paid at Win
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POSTMASTER: Send address changes to:
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Winston-Salem, NC 27102-1636
INDEX
OPINION A6 ?
SPORTS B1
RELIGION B5
CLASSIFIEDS B9
HEALTH C3
ENTERTAINMENT C7
CALENDAR C9
"Roots' and Branches
25 years after TV
miniseries, Alex Haley's
search inspires ancestry
industry, writers
BY TODD STEVEN BURROUGHS
mmpa rORRESPONDENT
WASHINGTON - Twenty
five years ago this month. Alex
Haley's best-selling book
"Roots" was broadcast as a tele
vision miniseries.
Today, the impact of both the
historical novel and TV product
is still being felt.
They "allowed other people
to think that their own families
had some dignity and some
worth and that they were worth
telling," said A'Ulia Perry Bun
dles, a friend of Haley who
authored a book on her great
great-grandmother, black entre
preneur Madame C J. Walker.
So Bundles and other curi
ous people around the world,
spurred by Haley and his exam
ple began to tell their stones.
And the result is the worldwide
popularity of genealogy, the
research of one s ancestors.
"You never see an article
now that mentions genealogy
where Alex's name is not men
tioned as the person who really
spurred an interest in family his
tory among African Americans
and European Americans and all
Americans," Bundles said.
She said that best-selling
authors - such as Frank
McCourt, author of "Angela .s
Ashes," his memoirs of growing
up dirt-poor in Ireland - are fol
lowing in Haley's wake.
Lisa Drew, who edited
"Roots" for Doubleday, said
hundreds heeded Haley's public
call for people to document their
own family histories.
"1 knew a lot of people who
took that seriously, who actually
were, when they went home for
a holiday, taking a tape recorder
to recotd the great-aunt or the
so-and-so," she recalled.
? "Roots" had transformed
Haley, who died in 1992 at the
age of 70, from a prominent
freelance magazine writer and
author into a revered American
cultural figure. Haley, who co
wrote "The Autobiography of
Malcolm X." died knowing he
had written two of the most pop
ular books in black America.
The story Haley told of his
ancestors, one that began with a
proud African named Kunta
Kinte being sold into slavery
and brought to America, became
the symbolic history of black
America, instantly absorbed into
the nation's consciousness
through the power of network
television.
That transformation brought
together others who continue to
work to document the history of
African Americans, said Barbara
Dodson Walker, president of the
Afro-American Historical and
Genealogical Society.
The group was formed in
1977 in Washington, D.C., by
Walker's late husband, pioneer
ing genealogist James Dent
Walker, and several other schol
ars who were part of Haley's
Kinte Foundation.
Haley's success in finding
his forebears inspired untold
numbers to pack other libraries.
In the five years after the
book was published, book pub
lishers received a barrage of
books from would-be authors
who researched and wrote histo
ries of their families, said book
editor Lisa Drew. But history
didn't repeat itself.
"The reason that 'Roots' is
so important (is that) through the
microcosm of one man's person
al family story, (it) represented a
whole race in this country, the
representation of which had
never been done before in litera
ture," she said.
"This was American history
served up to every American, of
every age, of every race,"
explained Drew, now a vice
president at Scribner's and pub
lisher of her own imprint.
"It was a segment of our
country's history that was miss
ing. That cannot be said of any
old group," she argued. "'Roots'
was so much more than one
man's family, no matter how
important his family was."
Although Haley inspired a
generation of amateur genealo
gists. questions and discrepan
cies about facts in "Roots" con
tinue to prick at his legacy. The
author, responding to initial crit
icism of the book, dubbed his
work "faction" - a combination
of fact and fiction."
Walker accepts Haley's defi
nition. "'Roots' is an historical
novel. He didn't say it was his
family's genealogy....He based
"Roots' on his oral history and
his research," she said.
Bundles, a former television
news producer who is director of
talent development for ABC
News in Washington, said she
could never join Haley's chorus
of critics. She also said Haley
was a storyteller, not a historian.
However, she said she can't
defend anyone's sloppiness.
u
The attacks Haley received
in life affil in death on the accu
racy of his reporting were things
she kept in mind while writing
"On Her Own Ground," hdr
biography of Madame C.J.
Walker, she admitted.
"If somebody finds holes ip
what you're doing, it diminishes
what you do," she said. "That's
why in my book, I was very
meticulous, because I knew hav
ing the example of Alex - haw
ing him attacked on something
that was worthy of praise - J
think you owe it to yourself and
you owe it to other people to be
as accurate as you can."
Haley's only son, Wi1liatt>
Alexander Haley, is also writing
books. One of them is on his
interest in psycho-genealogy, thfc
study of family traits and behav
iors. It's the focus of the Alex
Haley Center in Annapolis, Md,\
which he runs with a colleague;
"I think most people don s
know who he was," said Haley.
"They projected him as thf
grandfather of all of us."
"Roots " will air on the Halt
mark Channel Jan. 20 - 25 and a
special anniversary show will
air on NBC tomorrow night. '
KRT Ima?
Author Alex Haley; left, and actor LeVar Burton were part of the most-honored miniseries
"Roots" when it aired 25 years ago.
Homes 1 year and
older need to be
checked for termites
"A flea circus is a
good act but it takes
termites to bring a
home down."
Cali
Triad Pest Control
1535 S. Martin Luther King Drive
Winston-Salem, NC
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Winston-Salem/Forsyth Housing-Consortium
Consolidated Housing And
v Community Development Plan
Public Hearing
Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Housing Consortium will hold a
public hearing to obtain views on Community Development and
housing needs for the program year beginning July I, 2002 and
ending June 30, 2003. Staff will also provide a performance
assessment of the current program year through December 31,
2001. Representatives from neighborhood organizations, city
wide groups and any other interested individuals are invited to
attend.
? ?
DATE: Thursday, January 24, 2002
TIME: 7:00 PM
PLACE: Planning Board Conference Room
City Hall South
100 East 1st St., 2nd Floor
All requests for appropriate and necessary auxiliary aids and serv -
ices or more information should be dir&ed to Ms. Joy Knopf1*!
727-8597. Persons requiring TDD service may call 727-8319.
The City of Winston-Salem does not discriminate on the basis of
race, sex, color, age, national origin, religion, or disability in its
employment opportunities, programs, service, or activities.
The Chronicle: January 17, 2002
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