mmm
3A
NEWS / The Charlotte Post
Thursday, November 13, 1997
\Q(::
■Audience response brings halt to auction
j Continued from page 1A
j regular guest on Joyner’s show,
j gave the commentary, urging that
\ the documents be donated to a
:■ museum and attacking what he
*5aid was a double standard on the
Jpai^ of Christie’s. He said that
rwhifle it was the policy of
I Christie’s not to auction items
(related to the Holocaust, no such
[policy exists for items related to
[ASrtean American slavery.
{ .“You can’t profit on the pain and
[inisery of some and respect the
[history of others,” Smiley said in
[m interview 'IViesday after hear-
[ihg of the items’ withdrawal. “If
>you are not going to auction para-
[phemalia related to the
•Holocaust, then there has to be a
rrnoral consistency. When there is
[rio moral consistency, there must
tok moral outrage.”
I ^ pubUcist for Christie's, Vredy
3^>tsman, said while the house
iiaslauctioned some items related
lo t^e Holocaust in the past, it
lioei not sell items that “glorify
ilhejiolocaust.”
“We are, of course, sensitive to
people’s feelings - at least we try
to be,” Lytsman said. “It’s the
same thing in this case. People
told us their feelings, and then the
consignor [owner] withdrew the
lot.”
The statement issued by
Christie’s said: “It is the intention
of the consignor to donate this
property to a museum or histori
cal society that collects Afncan
American history.”
Christie’s would not disclose the
name of the owner or which
museum might get the docu
ments.
The controversy provided an
unusual example of the rest of the
country influencing New York’s
cultural world, rather than the
other way aroimd. Members of
New York’s African American arts
community had complained about
the sale to New York state Sen.
David A. Paterson (D), who spoke
out agairrst it on local and nation
al television news programs over
the weekend. Paterson said
Christie’s had a double standard
that assumes
Joyner
some sort of
“statute of limi-
tatiorrs on black
pain.”
But it was
only after
Tuesday’s calls
from hundreds
of Joyner’s lis
teners that the
items were
withdrawn.
Officials at
Christie’s said they had not even
heard of Joyner, whose show is
heard in most major cities but not
in New York, and were perplexed
at the reaction to a relatively
small sale that they had not pub-
hcized. Christie’s estimated the
total value of the slavery docu
ments at $2,400 to $3,700.
The Joyner show, which is based
in Dallas, is a mixture of music,
chat, commentary and humor
built aroimd Joyner, a ’liiskegee,
Ala., native with an easy laugh
and a wicked wit. It has come to
connect the national African
American community and attract
considerable attention.
President Clinton has called in
several times.
The show demonstrated its
muscle earlier this year when a
call-in and write-in campaign to
Fox television helped bring about
the reinstatement of “Living
Single,” the top-rated television
show among African Americans,
in the network’s fall lineup.
Lytsman said the outciy will
make the auction house more sen
sitive to how items related to slav-
eiy are handled in the future. “I’m
not the one who will say what our
policy will be, but we will discuss
the pros and cons of how to han
dle property like this.”
Smiley said he considered the
withdrawal, even of a few objects,
significant. ‘Tolitical victories for
black people these days are as fre
quent as sightings of Halley’s
comet,” he said. “These days, no
matter how small the victories
are, the/re major.”
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(704)563-8184 1401-C Eastway Dr.
tour touts black self-determination
!| By Herbert L. White
'I THE CHARLOTTE POST
)l
n
Tb enjoy true freedom, Afncan
Ij^ericans need to break current
Societal conceptions about blacks,
^ays a national author and lectur
er.
!' Malcolm Kelly, author of “The
Itjew African-American Man,”
iaid blacks, and men in particu
lar, should take it upon them
selves to determine their own
^vorth. He will be in Charlotte
[Jliesday for discussion and book
Signing at the Tuesday Morning
jBreakfast Forum at Renaissance
Hotel at 8 a.m. and 7 p.m. at
■heritage House Bookstore &
feallery 901 S. Kings Drive. On
!|Vednesday, Kelly will be at the
liVest Boulevard Branch Library,
$157 West Blvd. at 6:30 p.m. and
[Thursday at the Afro-American
ffiultural Center, 401 N. Myers
St., at 6 p.m. The tour winds up
Saturday at the African American
Cultural Expo at the Charlotte
Convention Center Nov. 22 at 3
p.m.
“It’s a book about the process
used to condition African
Americans and how we came to
consider ourselves victims,” he
said. “It’s a book about change
and expressing power.”
Kelly, who owned a personnel
and marketing company in the
San Francisco Bay Area, left the
business to become an author and
lecturer. Pursuit of the American
dream wasn’t the way he wanted
to spend the rest of his life, so he
wrote a self-help book to share his
philosophy on black determina
tion.
“I realized success as society
defined it, I was forced to accept
less than I was worthy of,” he
said. “I was always asking some
body else for something.”
Recent events in black America,
such as the Million Man March
and Million Woman March, indi
cates a new willingness among
African Americans to take respon
sibility for estabhshing new com
munity standards, Kelly said. As
a new century approaches, blacks
will become less concerned about
seeking white approval.
“This is not a message of the
future,” he said. It’s happening
right now. It’s a prelude to con
sciousness raising. They recog
nize that in order to get that
power, they have to do something
for themselves.
“The new African American
man is not about asking. He’s
about breaking the cycle we’ve
been in for hundreds of years.”
Although African Americans
debate issues ranging from
Afrocentric thought to affirmative
NAACP results are challenged
f^residential losers
question Skip
Alston’s win
I
Continued from page 1A
dacy on the back page. It was
unfair to the other candidates, the
complaint alleges.
! “We respectfrilly request a for-
fnal response in a timely fashion
In the interest of fairness and
Righteousness,” the complaint let
ter said.
I Normally, election complaints
are handled by the NAACP direc
tor of branches, who can recom
mend that the election be over
turned and a new one held.
However, even if the director
finds fault with the election, a rul
ing can state that the faults would
not have changed the outcome.
Appeals of the director’s ruling
can be taken to the NAACP
national board.
Alston received 188 votes on
Nov. 1. Smith received 68;
Gatewood, 41; and Belk, of
Charlotte, who endorsed Smith,
1.
Also elected were first vice pres
ident Valerie Woodard of
Charlotte, 194 votes; second vice
1
01ack paramedics changed lifesaving
XHE ASSOCIATED PRESS
I PITTSBURGH - Paramedic
Mitchell Brown can remember
the days when an ambulance
Aften doubled as a funeral hearse.
Until modem emergency medi-
I ine evolved in the late 1960s, an
i imbulance was just a vehicle that
larried people to a hospital. Its
crews provided minimal care en
loute, and the hospital was fre-
( uently just a stop on the way to
1 he funeral home.
As the first skilled paramedics
ii Pittsburgh, Brown and a few
(ther black men helped pioneer
jmbulance improvements that
\cere adopted elsewhere. They
(re among about 30 men being
Honored for their roles in a social
llrogram for unemployed minori
ties that became a medical model
f )r the nation.
After a 30th anniversary
I runion diimer on Friday, the
c riginal paramedics unveiled a
ibarker Saturday to honor the
first black-owned ambulance ser-
\(ce in the United States.
Based in Pittsburgh’s largely
l^ack Hill District, Freedom
liouse Ambulance Service began
iip 1967 as a federally funded pilot
jiroject to refine standards for
ti aining EMS technicians.
At the time, the city’s ambu
lances carried no fife support
equipment.
“If you got a gunshot in
Vietnam, you stood a better
30th anniversary
held in Pittsburgh
chance of surviving than if you
had a cardiac arrest in downtown
Pittsburgh,” said Brown, a former
Air Force medic. “The people who
responded didn’t have any train
ing. Once they got there, they did
n’t know what to do.”
Freedom House Enterprises, an
organization that had helped
build grocery stores and other
businesses in the Hill District,
also began seeking ways to
improve ambulance service.
With advice from Dr. Peter
Safar of UPMC Presbyterian hos
pital, Freedom House obtained
funding for its own ambulances
from the Ford Foundation and
other philanthropies, as well as
from the U.S. government.
Freedom House trained more
than 50 people to do on-the-spot
medical assessments, insert
intravenous lines and use defibril
lators to restart hearts.
The paramedic service hired
only from the ranks of the unem
ployed - a criterion of many fed
eral anti-poverty programs of the
1960s, said Phil Hallen, whose
Maurice Falk Medical Fund also
contributed money.
“It was the premiere training
program in the country,” Hallen
said. “These young black people
were at the top of the pyramid.”
action, Kelly says blacks are
becoming more willing to deter
mine their own future. 'Ib success
fully compete in America, blacks
will need to establish an identity
that sheds the victim label.
“The victim has been condi
tioned to think he is vrithout
power,” he said. ‘Whenever we
interact in American society, we
interact as victims. We have influ
ence to have others see our pUght,
but we lack power to change our
plight. You have to listen to your
self.”
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president Henry Pickett, 177
votes; third vice
president Mary
Peny, 164 votes
and fourth vice
president Fred
Yates, 148
votes.
Woodard,
Pickett and
Yates were
incumbents.
Belk z. Ann Hoyle
of Hickory was
re-elected treasurer, beating
Linda Crite Gaines of Charlotte
182-113. Sylvia Barnes was elect
ed secretary with 182 votes.
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1-888-376-POST
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During its eight years of opera
tions, the ambulance service
responded to 45,000 emergencies
in the downtown area.
“Here was a whole different phi
losophy of bringing care to the
patient, not patients to the care,”
Brown said. “And minorities were
doing it, and doing it well.”
John Moon, now the chief super
visor of Pittsburgh's Bureau of
EMS, was so impressed as a
youth living in the Hill District
that he became a paramedic.
“The glamour of the red light
and sirens started the ball
rolling,” he said. Moon completed
a paramedic training program
and joined Freedom House in
1973.
Among the service’s less tangi
ble benefits were pride and self
esteem for the community.
“I don’t think Ill ever forget the
way they made me feel. They all
just walked taU. You could tell
they were proud of themselves,”
said Lorraine Green, a longtime
supporter.
As grants and donations grew
scarce. Freedom House turned to
the city for help. The service
finally absorbed into a larger, i
wide paramedic system in 197^.“
“I took the last call,” Brown said
“It was an older lady who had bro
ken her leg. ... We took her to
Mercy Hospital. It was about
11:30 and we went out of business
at midnight. We went back and
signed off the air.”
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