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ee out of all thr i
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What a great time in hi tory t be African. The cotlective graduation
of education' tin t tuden - the muiti-cultural collc e and high
school eniorcl e of 1 3-
represen our very b t na­
tionally and wo-ldwid .
Along with the thousands
of tudent also receivm
graduate d re • It IS af to
say' that when it rom to
intellectual and academic de­
velopment, the contemporary
African world commuruty no
longer tak a b ck at to
nyone.
Be It the 'Umted State s,
Canada. MeXICO, Puerto
Rico, Martinique. France, Sweden. Rus ia, India Tazrnarua, Tanzania,
Azarua or any oth r pls e on the planet, people of -African descent
continue to po Ilion thcrru elve lo� elve for the twenty irst century.
Be It the Claremont Coil t the University 0 . Chrca 0, ew York
Uruv rsny, Saint Au usnn ' Colleg . B nnett Colle , Br n Univcr­
ity, Virgirua W tern Community Colle e. Austin East High Scho lor
Ox ord Urnve iry, the for I WIth you - and you are the force.
.6 •
KEITH
HILTON
HIGHER
EDUCATION
IIlLT ; HI ;UER ED now alute ho you' you
pursu the puons of Immediate career gratification and/or advanced .
tudy. What a great time 10 hi tory to be Afncan.
Commen ement means a new beginning. Commencement i also
tha time wh n \ e reload the movement. Thi year' commencement
cercrnorue: \ 'Ill pcrhap have a pecial mearung for many tudents of
, Af an descent, pr vided tha you are culturally linked we hope
that y( u arc to the greater Afncan community.
However, mce January, we have 10 t several gian ; Chancellor
William (rustonan), Thurg od Marshall (Suprem Court J tice),
Thomas Dorsey (g pel m IC 'compos er), Wilmer. Am (publi her),
Re inald Lewi (entrepreneur, Arthur h (a rivi t and athl te) •
DIZZY Gillespie (jazz rnusi Ian). Manan Andc n (opera In er • Carl
Ston (political joumah t). Oltver Tambi (ANC leader). And to many
of you tuden • ther I er known Ian and laved on have also
phy really p' ed,
Their u e and ailur have erved window to look through
Just your pnn raduau ns arc. erving the arne purpo e for count­
le numb 0 people wh you may never know or meet. It goes almo t
without ayin that th many pecial people who are till around you
n d to thanked Inc rely for In WIth you throu h much.
o I THE. .. that we onnnue '0 return to 10 our annual
commen ement m . a e I . on ot eing "culturally rounded (and
also culturally rai d)" 0 that you rna some day"ri e and Oy . All the
education and degre 10 th world are meaningl I you d n't
trengthen or marntain e enual cultural connectio .
Tht d not mean that you have t prove that you are "Bla k.er han
Black", nor do it mean makm the tatern nt "I now who I am.
Anyon can that I am BI k."
And nor d It mean that being ucce ful a bUSIO person,
engi ncer math tea .h r or attorney means that you will have to downplay
your cultural trengths. Take it from Keith O. Hilton, a pretty ood
educator, journalist, counselor and co ultant "What a great time 10
hi tory to Afncan."
HILTO. : .HIGHER EDUCATIO is on oing and certainl not
limited to ci sro In tud '. L ('5 tal (909) 99-06 O.
HA�RIS'
or
By JAftES E. ALSBROO
If ever a Blac man had good
. reason to regret being born too soon.
that man i the ensational and pio­
neering asketball tar Don
Bar dale. who died at 69, on Mon­
day larch 8 at his home in Oak­
land, California
B rn in. 1923, Barksdale w at
hi t from 1943 to 1953. Hi total
aiinual alary was 2, - really
"hi money" at that Orne - and
omewhat higher than that of fu
white p including "Big George"
. ikan, Dolph Schayes, Bob Co y.
and Harry Gallatin.
Barksdale was quic mooth and
graceful He commanded big mon
because everal nationally known
ket all clubs, including the Har­
lem Globetrotters were rompeting
. for tu ervices.·
But Barksdale missed the really
br m ney of today because of two
facto : first, mainstream America.
and especially the South bad not ac­
cep d imegrated prof ional bas­
ketball before the 1954 Supreme
Court Decision; and econd, sports
-television with sa Hit had not de-
v loped I nt the billion-dollar na­
tional craze that I t IS today.
Suburban by I tion, m n . ty
and t geted clientele, n i r
Denny' or Sboney' ve 0 in
inn r-city . In order to be -d'
ed" by Denny' or Sboney',
BI have to 0 to ubwbia to g
their feelin burt.
And go to wb'
ag IDS to be
drov
T ence of leadership, and
good ense on our part, to ard build­
ing up our own communiti bas
caused too many of om people to
have 0 to the outskirts of town for
and to be -dissed."
REED
THE UlT � tbat Denny'
bad discouraged Bl patronage
and required BI to pay for tbeir
m in advance. The company till
BED
Kenny Wasbington, the baseball and
football star, am Woodrow Strode,
championship trac and field athlete .
As time for the 1948 Olympics.
approached Bardsdale was urged to
compete for a position on the U.S.
team. His experience a tarter on
the UCLA cage quintet had been so
good am his ability as a basketeer
was so widely known that the pre­
dominantly Southern white team
violated its traditional oppo ilion to
Blae and invited him to play with
them.
At the 1948 Olympics in London,
England, Bar dale became the fi t
Black to win a Gold Medal as a mem­
ber of a champiorship U.S. b ket­
ball team. But Ba dale achieved
olherdistinctions. Among them were
his being first Blac man to be a tar
in an Amateur Athletic' Union
(AAU) basketban team, and first to
play In an interraci official colle­
gia game in Oklahoma and other
SOuthern tat .
HE 28 years old in
1951, be joined the old Baltimore
Bullets and became th third BlaC
player in the anonal B k.etball
Lea e. The first two were Chuc
Co per who igned ith the 80 ton
Cel ncs and Earl Lloyd who igned
With the Weshington, D.C. profes-
ronal team. .
He played ou tanding b ketball
wi th the Bulle for two years and •
(hen went to the Bo ton Celti in
1953.
Bar dale was the first Bla k to
P lay an AlJ-S tar Eas t- W t game in
January 1953 wh n the West team
won 79-75, d pite Bar dale' n-
ational performance.
Bar d eta high tandard of
pro� ional hievement and per-
a
sona! conduct for those Bla leaders
whO foUo ed him -l:. high quality
I' e Elgin Baylor, Oscar Robin­
son, Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Jab­
bar, Julius Erving and many others.
If the peak of hi career had oc­
curred within.the last ten years Don
Bar dale would have been paid mil­
lions of dollars, (or his professional
talent was in the same category wi th
1 t of today' NBA performers uch
as Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson,
and other uperstars.
TID F MED TIll.. E of
yes teryear was a good role model. He
neither moked nor drank.
He ettled in OaJdand, California
aod reared a family, caring for his
urviving wife and two sons. He was
a good peaker wi th a good person­
ali ty ard worked as a television show
ho l He owned a beer distributorship
in Oakland and friends say was a
model citizen.
The world needs more men like
him.
READERS WRITE
I
o
I
or
ac
Last Th day, I received th Michigan Citizen With the poem "Let
U Stop Thi Mad " on page lOA (April 18-241). Thank you for
publi hing it. I am saddened that the thi poem which I wrote in 1
for the children in Detroit, who had een killed by handguns I till
applicable and relevant in 1993.
Thi poem has become an important piece of wnting which I mcor­
porate in all of my p entations and lectur in an Antionio and around
the country. The li t of names of tho e children killed and kilhn each
other is as long the h t of Detroit ard other cit! in tlu country.
There' n que tion t proliferation of guns 10 the country m t
top!
Equally important we m t understand the oth r Ide of this' ue.
We have become a ciety unable to deal withouran erma non-violent
way.
Our children need to e taught. need 0 unde tand an er i an
emotion and can be lthily e pr ed 10 non-violent way allowin
for othe to respond ith equally appropnate behavior,
Congratulations at your dauntl forts in add ing th prohfera-
tion UrIS in thi country, AU of to eth r we can ave th
lives of our ctuldren,
(
•
Trlnld d S nehez, Jr.
Poet·S n Antonio, T x