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F ebruary 5, 1997 • T he P o ru
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urt Flood was the Dred
Scott of baseball. He
went to court to assert
that he was a free man, and
ended up reforming an American
institution. He lost the court
case, but like Dred Scott he
ended up winning the principle,
and he blew open the door to a
new world.
Reverend Jesse Jackson helped
bury Curt Flood last week, with a
moving eulogy taken from Paul’s
words to Timothy about "fighting
the good fight, finishing the course,
keeping the faith.” (Reverend Jack-
son also notes that, perhaps surpris­
ingly to JaxFax readers, another stir
ring statement was delivered by con
servative columnist--and avid base­
ball fan--George Will. Don Fehr,
head of the player-, union, was also
there to honor Flood's memory.)
Curt Flood was a Cardinal for 12
years. He was team captain for the
last 3 years, a 3-time Major League
Al 1-Star, earned 7 Gold Glove awards
for fielding excellence, batted .300
or better in 6 seasons with a high of
i 1
p e
P O S T M A S T E R : Send A ddress C h an g es T o : P o rtla n d O b s e rv e r,
Civil Rights Journal
In memoriam of Ennis and
the other young brothers
by
B ernice P owell J ackson
very
is a precious
jewel to his or her par-
ents. Every child is on
loan from God. Every parent
wants to protect his or her child
from the harsh realities of life.
But parents of African-Ameri­
can sons carry a special kind of
burden.
It’s the burden of knowing that
the leading cause of death for their
sons is homicide. It’s the burden of
knowing that no matter how hard
you try, no matter how much mon­
ey you earn, no matter how good a
parent you are, there are no guaran­
tees that your child will die of nat­
ural causes.
Bill and Camille Cosby knew all
of that before that fateful day when
their son was murdered. As activ­
ists. as educators and as African-
American parents, they knew all of
that. Now they are living that real­
ity, along with thousands of other
black parents across the nation.
I never met Ennis Cosby, but
from what I have learned about him
since his murder, I know his death
is a tragedy not only for the Cosby
family and his friends, but for all
young black children, for the A fri­
can-American community and for
this nation.
For here was a young man of
privilege whose parents had taught
him that what was important in life
w asn’t fame or money, but service
and people.
Here was a young man who,
having experienced what it was
like to have a learning disability
himself, committed himself to help­
ing those with learning disorders
SUBSCRIBE TO
but without his fam ily’s resources.
Here was a young man who already
had been a role model for young
black children and had a plan in
mind for how he could help chil­
dren in the future.
We as a community, we as a
nation are poorer because of Ennis
C osby’s needless death. We as a
community and a nation are poorer
because of the deaths of the thou­
sands of other young black men,
many of whom also has a plan for
themselves and for their futures.
Young black men who were strug­
gling against the odds, but who
were in the wrong place at the
wrong time. Or young black men
who were positive members of their
communities, their churches and
schools, but walked the dangerous
streets. Or young black men who
had been lost to the streets, but who
could have been entrepreneurs or
community leaders, if only they
had the right opportunities or the
right guidance. Thousands of young
black men dead before their time.
We all join the Cosby family in
mourning the death of this extraor­
dinary young man. We join those
unnamed other fathers and m oth­
ers, sisters and brothers who have
suffered this tragedy.
But when the tears end, when
the prayers subside, when the out­
cry is over, what will this nation do
to end the availability of guns to the
public? How many have to be m ur­
dered before we realize that we all
lose with each one of these mur­
ders? And will young African-
American men stop being our hu­
man endangered species in my life­
time? In yours?
2 L lje J p o rtk tn h (J f)b s rrD e r
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After The Flood
.335 in 1967, had a lifetime average
of .293, had a perfect fielding per­
centage in 1966. and held the Major
League record for most consecutive
errorless games (226).
Curt Flood helped lead St. Louis
to three World Series and two world
championships in 5 years (1964,
1967 & 1968).
More important, he changed the
nature of professional sports, with
his one-man challenge to baseball.
More than perhaps any other single
individual-player, manager, owner,
of com m issioner-C urt Flood re­
formed the institution of baseball, by
r s p
e
fighting for his freedom. If there is
any meaning to the Hall of Fame at
all. Curt Flood deserves to be in­
ducted.
Curt Flood gave up a $ 100,000
contract (big money in 1969!), and
effectively ended his career, by chal­
lenging baseball's right to own his
skills, staling: "I do not feel that I am
a piece of property to be bought and
sold irrespective of my wishes..." He
challenged the system as a form of
economic servitude and a violation
of antitrust laws; and while lie lost in
court, he paved the way for free
agency.
c
t i v
e
s
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C O A 1L 11 T I O N
Curt Flood was an activist who
could also play with the best. He
deserves Io be honored for the base­
ball reforms he forced. We suggest
the following:
( 1) that the Major League players
union give out an annual "Curt Flood
A w ard,” for the ballplayer who
shows the courage and hum anitar­
ian spirit to stand up for justice in the
Hood tradition;
(2) that the St. Louis Cardinals
erect a statue at the stadium honor­
ing Flood, as thy have done for Stan
Musial; (while they’re at it , they
should consider ones for Bob Gibson
and Ozzie Smith, too!);
(3) that the baseball writers elect
Curt Flood to the Hall of Fame, as an
All-Star player more important to
today’s game than any other single
individual.
C urt Flood took the freedom
movement into baseball, and W hite,
B lack, and L a tin o b a llp la y e rs
benefitted greatly, especially eco­
nomically. We honor his memory.
We ask today's players and Major
League Baseball to do the same.
fact, things are look-
ing better all the time,
both home and abroad.
A good sign indeed, and espe­
cially apropos since this is Black
History Month-certainty a time
for a rejuvenation of spirit and
commitment for us all.
I’m sure that some will say that it
is time you moved from the ‘gloom-
and-doom ’ posture; but then I’m
quite sure that the many appreciate
realistic examinations of our social
and economic situations. Especially
the case when past experience indi­
cates that naivete and/or unfounded
expectations have seriously impeded
progress. People still comment on
my inversion ol an old expressio»,
“looking at the rose through w orlds,,
colored glasses.” Hey, that will help
you survive.
Saturday, I was feeling up after a
call from a black structural engineer
in Pennsylvania. A fter five minutes
of kind of effusive congratulations
on having written "Black Inventors
of America”, he said it was so diffi­
cult for him and associated young
engineers (both black and white) to
understand how black leadership
could have failed to see what a criti­
cal and valuable motivational tool
this could have been these past de­
cades. My book was written in 1969,
almost 30 years ago.
BY
l ’ l« ) l I ESSOR
M c K innley
H ik i
Well, I’m certainly glad to find
that others, obviously quite knowl­
edgeable in such matters, have the
same perspective that I have enter­
tained have for millenniums dem ­
onstrated a documented expertise
and mastery o f technology, unparal­
leled and deliberately ignored) from
Pyramid to the Third Rail and the
so-called Westing’house Air Brake
and from the Nilometer and the de­
liberately misnamed Fibonacci Se­
ries and Mercator Map Projections
to the Refrigerated Box Car and the
miracle of Skyscraper Plumbing and
Heating (Crosthwaite Patens).
Surely this hour-long conversa­
tion was the most gratifying and
reassuring that I have enjoyed in
many a year (other engineers came
on the line). What a surge of re­
newed energy and motivation of my
own. I was delighted and humbled
that John Henri Clarke, the dean of
black historians had not too long
ago announced that my book still
was “the best in its field”, incorpo­
rating the holistic approach -- in­
ventors whose genius incorporated
a humanistic regard for the safety
and comfort of their fellow creature.
Well, what can I say but para­
phrase the statement of Isaac New­
ton, the man who took a good hard
look at The Great Pyramid in Africa
(three decades of study) and then
announced his magnum opus, ‘the
theory of Universal Gravitation: “I
have stood on the shoulders of the
great ones who came before me”
( “ Isaac N ew ton: H is to ria n ” ,
Manual).
The eastern group of engineers
really got excited when I turned
them onto the simply astounding
recitations of black technological
genius to be found in the U.S. C on­
gressional Record of a hundred years
ago (Steam Locomotives, logging
machinery-textile and farm machin­
ery, etc.). And the incredible docu­
mentation to be found in the Vatican
Library, the Louvre Museum in Paris,
The U n iv e rsitie s of H alle and
Wittenberg in Germany and my other
long-term correspondents at the
University ofCam bridge in England
(where Isaac Newton preached).
“Why weren’t we told this? Not even
by black educators?
Thats right, “preached.” I bet they
didn’t tell you that in school. He
waxed eloquent after years of study­
ing African religion, history, math­
ematics and astronomy. Left lots of
written material, too. Two of the
engineers are coming out next month
and I’ve arranged for their lodging
at the guest house maintained for
overseas customers by one of the
electronic plants m anaged by a
former student. They also wanted to
know if I could give presentations at
their alma maters, asking, “what
better way to reclaim a disaffected
black youth in an age of technol­
ogy?”
That could be a problem in that I
quite traveling a while back because
of inner-ear problems - pressurized
cabins. ‘If’ that still proves to be the
case, modern telecommunications
offers a solution. Some readers may
remember that several years ago I
did a talk radio show on Black In­
ventors; aired in Houston, Texas but
originating in my Alberta street of­
fice.
Infants’ Deaths, Race and Poverty
by
B ernice P owell J ackson
ometimes it's hard to
prove that racism and
poverty are the causes
of certain effect.
Deciphering that cause and effect
relationship is a very complicated
and sophisticated task which people
of color are required to do constantly
in this world and are often chal­
lenged about. Sometimes that deci­
phering requires intuition and other
unmeasurable skills, but sometimes
hard facts can be considered.
Take for instance the cases of the
infants with bleeding lungs which
confronted a doctor in Cleveland,
w here I live. W hen Dr. D orr
Dearborn of the Rainbow Babies
and Childrens Hospital treated four
infants with bleeding lungs in a
single day in 1994, he began to
wonder what was going on. Unex­
plained lung bleeding norm ally
strikes only one in a million infants,
but 30 cases were seen in Cleveland
in the last four years.
Doctors found, after a two year
study done by the Centers for Dis
ease Control (CDC), that these cases
were due to a black mold which
grows in water dam aged homes.
Most of the cases in Cleveland were
in low-income neighborhoods with
older, wooden houses, many of which
were not kept in good repair by their
landlords.
Then there was the disturbing fact
that the illness, which claimed the
livesof nine Cleveland infants, seemed
to strike African American boys dis­
proportionately The Centers for Dis­
ease Control is still not clear why that
is the case or if race is shielding other
socioeconomic factors.
It is not yet clear how race or
economic status play into these mys­
terious cases of infants with bleeding
lungs, but somehow they are a part of
the picture. But investigatorsdoknow
that poor infants, especially African
American boys in water-damaged
homes, seem to be st risk.
In a recent New York limes ar­
ticle, Dr. Ruth Etzel of the national
Center for Environmental Health,
said the illness, “Is frightening as
can be,” adding, “You have a previ­
ously healthy baby who basically
gets sick before your eyes.” Infants
can have unexplained nosebleeds or
begin to cough or vomit the blood
which has been filling their lungs.
Sometimes the symptoms are more
subtle with a child simply crying,
coughing or turning pale.
Doctors have know for many years
that poor children and children of
color are more likely to be threat­
ened with life and death illnesses.
For instance, while lead poisoning
rates of children in the Untied States
have decreased significantly with
the use of lead-free gasoline, there
are still considerable “pockets of
poising” in minority and low in­
come, urban communities.
There seems to be a direct corre­
lation between race, income and lead
poisoning in children. For instance,
in Chicago, 38% o f children in 1993
were lead poisoned and 78% were
African American and 22% were
Latino, while only 2% were white.
To Rod With Love
le tte r to the Editor:
This is a true story about a very
brave American in Russia who is in
very grave danger.
Rod Stinson moved his family to
Koctpoma, Russia, over three years
ago to spread the gospel of Jesus
Christ. He pioneered a little church
they called “Homefire," Domashni
Ochak in Russian
They call Homefire Rod’s “busi­
ness,’ because Christians there are
still persecuted.
Rod was arrested and threatened
with four years in prison but a good
lawyer got him out o f it This was for
buying the flat (apartment) he wanted
to use for the church This is, also,
their home.
Rod’s wife’s parents were a great
source of their income but when she
left Rod and Russia, so did their
financial support.
Trusting God for provisions Rod
stayed with his little church. Now he
has a new Russian wife, a baby and
another on the way.
Endless Russian winters are frig­
idly unforgiving however and al­
ready, foodjs scarce and expensive.
T here’s very little food in the stores
because Russia is crippled by poli­
tics and storms, so food is very scarce.
Rod is struggling to feed his own
family and others but they are all on
the verge of starvation
He is trying to be every where for
everyone at once but he is weaken­
Setter Cd 'die CS-ïïitor
Send your letters to the Editor to:
Editor, PO Box 3137, Portland, OR 97208
ing too. Their need is so overwhelm­
ing. it hurts. Some people need anti­
biotics to get up out of bed and some
just need food.
The desperation is worsening
daily as they grow weaker.
We are, therefore, appealing to
Oregonians to join us in the "To Rod
With Love,” drive to ensure their
survival through this long Russian
winter. Perhaps your family or orga­
nization will “adopt,” Rod’s family
and “Flock,” in this “9 1 1 Russian
Rescue. “Please share what you can !
They need financial support, food,
baby food, medications, warm win­
ter clothing, boots, soap toothpaste,
prayer and anything you send, even
some leftover Christmas candy.
It cost $1.00 to mail a letter to
Russia with a money order enclosed
- even $5.00 will help!
Please send all donations to Rus­
sia yourself at Russia; Koctpoma
156000; Y. CobetckaiaG . 17 KB. 3;
Domashni Ochak; Rod Stinson
*Note: their city o f Koctpomais
written as Kostroma in english (to
help the postal clerk.) Also, the
address looks backwards to us but
th a t’s how they write it...
If you have sent a donation or
even a letter to Rod, please let us
know so we can keep you current on
their news. God bless you!
Susan Stevenson and Bonnie
Toussau; 377 W 8th St. #202, Eu­
gene OR 97401 (541) 302-6857.
In Appreciation
The family of Eddie “Terry” Overton would like to think all of our
friends for their expressions of sympathy and support shown through their
kindness, which will always be remembered. —Lyda M. Overton