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Page 2...The Portland Observer...Deeember 4,1991
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Duckworth ¡Describe Him In One Word
Nostalgia: Don’t Leave Home Without It, I
BY BILL BARBER
A college psychology professor
once asked each of the students in his
class to describe their entire personal­
ity in one word. At first, his request
seemed more trivial than serious. Ac­
tually, it turned out to be a lot more
difficult for most students than they
originally thought. The first impulse is
to say something trite or flippant. Take
a minute to think of how you would
describe yourself in one word.
When Kevin Duckworth was asked
to decribe himself, he chose the word
“ Misunderstood.” It seemed like an
intriguing choice of words. To try to
get an understanding of Duckworth,
you have to go back to the early years.
Back to the South Side of Chicago.
Duckworth will tell you, Dolton Illi­
nois is the kind of place where “ No­
body gives you anything...You have to
work it out on your own.”
Being 6"4” in the eight grade, and
the tallest of four kids means you usu­
ally don’t have to deal with hand-me-
downs. “ I grew four inches over the
summer and entered (Thornridge) high
school at 6'8” . Duck said. After being
cut as a freshman, Kevin played on the
varsity basketball team as a sopho­
more. After a toe operation in his
junior year, he averaged 20 points a
game as a senior at Thornridge. The
high school teams always had winning
seasons, but a winning team had to be
built at Eastern Illinois University. Rick
Samuels, who is still the head basket­
ball coach for the EIU Panthers, re­
cruited Duckworth for over a year. ‘ ‘In
my junior year I received letters from
every major college I had ever heard
of.” explained Duckworth. He wanted
to make clear to kids going through the
recruiting process that “ it is a different
story from getting letters and coaches
actually coming to watch you practice.
I always let the colleges go through my
high school coach, because I always
felt he had the better judgement. When
somebody like Georgetown would write
me a letter my high school coach would
break it down to me that it doesn’t al­
ways mean that they are interested in
me as a person; they may be just trying
to fill a position.” Eastern Illinois
came to watch Duckworth practice and
play the game. “ They were interested
in seeing that I got an education and
also offered tutoring if it was needed to
get the best education I could while I
was trying to fulfill my basketball goals.
That personal interest Coach Samuels
took in Duck paid off. Kevin, who was
recruited by every major college in the
country, visitedonlyoneschool. When
you ask if he ever regretted not going to
a bigger school, you have to realize,
Kevin is one of those lucky people who
can say “ I don’t regret anything in my
life. I went to a smaller school because
it was close to home. I didn’t really like
being around a lot of people.”
Kevin Duckworth would be de­
scribed by some as a private man off
the court. He is single, but he doesn’t
Kevin Duckworth
live alone. Even when he comes home
late from “ work,” Mercedes, Benz
and Porsche (a German Shepherd and
two Rottweilers) are there to welcome
him home. Not everybody knows Duck
is a skilled woodcrafter. Among other
things, he has designed his own furni­
ture. The lifelong fisherman offered
three pieces of good-natured advice on
salmon fishing: “ The first thing you
have to understand is that you might
have to leave without a fish, second is
to use the proper reel, and third is to
take along somebody who knows what
they’re doing.” Duckworth will freely
admit he didn’t know anything about
Portland when he was traded from San
Antonio in exchange for Walter Berry
on December 18,1986, Until that time
he was content to fish for catfish and
bass. When he found out about the
Columbia River Sturgeon, he finally
had the opportunity to fish for some­
thing a little more his size. In fact, he
has caught sturgeon twice his size. That
must make fora tall (but true) fish story
back in Illinois.
Back in Illinois, Duckworth is also
known for giving something back to
the game, by hosting his “ Big Man’s
Basketball Camp” at EIU, where he
was All-Conference MVP. In fact,
when he went back for the homecom­
ing football game this last fall the school
honored him at halftime by retiring his
number. “ I’m young right now,” Duck­
worth observed, “ but I am looking for­
ward to the retirement of it. People
always think this is sc much glamore
and it’s so terrific. It is the most stress­
ful thing I have ever seen in my life.
When I retire I’d like to finish up my
last 20 hours in Industrial Technology
JJnrilitttir (©hserber
(USPS 959-680)
OREGON'S OLDEST AFRICAN AMERICAN PUBLICATION
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Contributing Writers
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photo by Veronica Green
and get a degree.”
After basketball season in his sen­
ior year. Duck made the decision to
drop his classes and go to several camps
in pursuit of an NBA career. “ I wasn’t
going to be drafted” he said, “ I had to
go out and prove myself. I was invited
to Portsmouth, Va. I did well there and
they invited me to Hawaii. When I did
well there too, they invited me to the
Chicago Pre-draft. So then I was drafted.”
In the 1987-88 season when Duck­
worth was picked as the NBA’s Most
Improved Player his shooting percent­
age was .496. Back then, coach Mike
Schuler fed the ball inside a lot more. In
the last few games, Duck has been hit­
ting .500! (3 for 6 against Washington
& 6 for 12 against Chicago) The total
points might not be there, but with the
team shooting percentage way under
50%, Duck is starting to look pretty
good. Most of the fans who watch the
game closely have seen the Duck stop
two defenders as a Blazer thunders
through the paint to deliver a killer
dunk. Micheál Jordon has embarrassed
every Center in the league coming right
down the middle for his patented dunk
shot. He only did it to Duckworth once
lastFridday! That shows respect.
Duckworth makes it clear he has a
modest understanding of what it means
to be a public figure in the NBA “ If I
had a hero, I’d rather talk to them one on
one than ask for an autograph. It’s more
significant than an autograph if you can
learn about them as a person.” That’s
not hard to understand. Kevin Duck­
worth, like so many of the Blazers, is a
good basketbal 1 player and a good man.
Duck, you’re going to have to find a
new word.
!
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IT he P ortland O bserver
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Tony Washington
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fill out ,
his Rod and Gun Club where I was
occasionally allowed to dispatch those
pie plate targets used in skeet and trap
shooting. He belonged to a number of
such organizations of black profession­
als such that one got an idea of ‘ ‘accept­
able” careers and “ advancing the race.”
Most of these people were lawyers,
doctors, teachers, and upper echelon
postal employees -- and graduates of
traditional Black Colleges. The pull-
man porters and recaps had their own
organizations as did the waiters and
bartenders. But all were extremely
community conscious, promoting chari­
ties and forming investment groups that
financed businesses and built housing.
In the ethnically divided neighbor­
hood only the children “ mixed” (de­
spite segregated schools) and among
the adults there were no social exchanges
or visits. We kids played together and
sang together and fought together. The
big event every evening just before dark
was to run to meet the lamp lighter who
made his rounds to light the gas street
lamps. He must have seemed like the
Pied Piper ofH am elin with the scores
of kids following him from block to
block. Then it was back to the house to
do homework or just read. There was no
television, o f course, but there was ra­
dio with “ The Shadow-Buck Rogers-
Jack Armstrong-The Whistler.”
All kids had their magazine sub­
scriptions in this neighborhood, from
“ Boy’s Life” to “ Popular Mechan­
ics,” and for 3 cents a day you could
RENT A BOOK at the comer drug­
store. When I got to kindergarten I
could read the comic strips to the other
kids-now that’s a Head Start! It all
came to a crashing hall at age 12 and
that is where we will pick up “ Nostal­
gia” next week (the memories just as
fond-K ids are resilient).
Portland Observer encourages our readers to write
letters to the editor in response to any articles
we publish.
eight Northeast Portland neigh­
borhoods are being targeted in
$25.00
PER YEAR.
Chuck Washington
Sales & Promotions
tion.”
Now, for the “ pleasant memories”
which lasted until age 12 when the
whole structure fell apart. My grandfa­
ther, a railway mail clerk, headed the
household, domiciled in the right neigh­
borhood on the west side of the city, an
island surrounded by whites (Irish, Jews,
Italians and Germans) -- and a few
black professionals. My mother and aunt
were teachers, but my mother had to
switch to a job at the Federal Reserve
Bank when she married - the St. Louis
School System, like others in the middle
south, had the rule that married women
could not teach at elementary schools
(?). The family was rounded out by two
old maid cousins of my grandfather
who monitored yours truly, did the
cooking and laundry and kept track of
the household accounts.
I Suppose one could say that in a
sense they were servants, but grandpa
took care of them very well with cash
monthly stipends, clothing allowances
and yearly paid vacation trips to Seattle
where they had relatives. As you might
gather from my writings, there is no
way you can overestimate the value of
having an older generation in the same
household with children. It is a social
matrix that provides moral direction,
social graces, discipline and a sense of
self, and of belonging to a group in
which one has a place ( and they READ
and TALK to you from day one). This is
why when I evaluate or propose educa­
tion programs, I insist that they are
simply not going to work at the level we
wish until a similar structure is built in
if there is no functioning family.
My father had been given his walk­
ing papers when I was age 2, so my
grandfather took over this role; from
fishing trips and conversation-filled walks
in the park to going along with him to
Homeowners and renters in
j CAN BE SENT DIRECTLY TO
| YOUR HOME ONLY
lean best describe “ nostalgia” as
a wistful urge to return to the good old
days. Some would say it is a blatant
effort to recall all the pleasant memo­
ries and tune out all the bad ones. In any
case, it is the holiday season and like
many of us, I reminisce. Also, this may
satisfy some readers who write, “ you
cover a lot of subjects — What is your
background?”
While I’m indulging in this exer­
cise in fond recall, it would be well to
organize my thoughts into three sepa­
rate presentations (articles) that repre­
sent that number of distinct phases of
the formative years (to age 21). Though
done in broad brush-strokes, I think the
accounts may be useful for they reflect
the different social and economic divi­
sions in the black experience - as
compartmentalized in the old days as
now; the difference being that then
there was an overriding hope, belief
and drive at every level to attain equal­
ity in the American system (to be
achieved, primarily, by educational and
an appeal to the goodwill and fairness
of the general population). What can I
say?
Taking this first phase of our ac­
count to age 12, it is seen that the social
and economic structure of what we
term a typical “ Middle Class Black
Family” has not changed at all since
the date of my birth in 1922. How
“ middle class” was it? My birth cer­
tificate reads “ Race of father, WHITE-
- Race of mother WHITE” ! In later
years, my inquiry of the St. Louis
“ Barnes Children’s Hospital” -- the
place to be bom in St. Louis - elicited
the reply, “ We had very few Negroes
admitted at the time, mostly from the
professional class. What probably hap­
pened is that office staff completed the
paper work within a justifiable assump­
in Sabin, King and Vernon neigh­
borhoods; Monday, November
L
F -j
18 in Piedmont and Woodlawn
neighborhoods; and Monday,
tenants. The program is offered in
many Portland neighbortxxxis and
November 25 in the Concordia
provides plumbing, wiring, heat­
ing, roof and weatherization re­
neighborhood.
Low-income homeowners
who quali fy for the Home Repair
Loan program receive assistance
to fix plumbing, wiring, heating,
pairs. For more information about
qualifying for a rental property
loan, contact PDC at 823-3269.
The Home Repair Loan pro­
roof and/or security problems in gram is funded through a federal
their home. Loan rates vary from Community Development Block
0%, 3% and 6%. For more infor­ Grant (CDBG) administered by
mation about qualifying for a the Bureau o f Community Devel­
home repair loan, contact PD C ’s opment. It is available only in
Neighborhood Housing Preser­ neighborhoods designated in need
vation office at 823-3400.
Owners of rental properties
according to federal standards.
The IRL program is funded by a
may qualify for the Investor Re­ combination of CDBG funds and
habilitation Loan (IRL) Program private funds from area banks.
that provides below m arket-in­ Both repair loan programs are
terest rate loans for single and available on a first-come, first-
multi-family uniLs for low-income served basis year round.
"Reinvestments in the Community" is a weekly column appearing
in API publications through out the USA
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