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APRIL 22, 1998
Page A4
(Elfe Jlortlanb ©bseruer
Editorial Articles Do Not Necessarily
Reflect Or Represent The Views O f
(Eljc |Jnvtlanb (©bseruer
p e r s
Attention ReadersI
Please take a minute to send us your comments. W e’ re always trying to give you
a better paper and we can’ t do it w ithout your help. T ell us what you like and
what needs im provem ent., any suggestions are welcomed and appreciated. W e
take criticism well! G et your powerful pens out N O W and address your letters
to: Editor, Reader Response, P.O . B o x 3137, Portland, O R 97208.
W e all knew, o f course, that a sig­
nificant effort to improve the future o f
our youth can never be concluded, it
should only gain mom entum as m ore
relevant information is incorporated
into the structure. “Grow it” as they
say in that new exotic use o f English
grammar.
N extjust guess where a number ofthe
youth and parents o f our Neighborhood
Science Clubs are going for their vaca­
tions this summer? It ain’t “Disneyland”,
life has taken a serious and rewarding
twist After almost twenty year ofeffort, I
have gotten through to a number o f the
brethren - thanks to the hard work and
perseverance o f some of my former stu­
dents. Remember that in some cases I’m
in touch with three generations o f some
families in the community.
D ifferent groups will be visiting
historic sites related to many key black
inventors, birthplaces, m useum s and
contem porary industrial applications
o f their innovations. For instance, in
the case o f Lewis Howard Latim er
w hose invention o f the first practical
filament for the incandescent light -
m aking Thom as E dison’s light bulb
practical (No. 247,097, Sept. 13,1881)
- T he kids wi 11 visit the black inventors
house in Queens, N ew York. The
G eneral Electric Foundation contrib­
(U S r S 9 59-680) E stab lish ed in 1970
M ark W ashington
Publisher & Editor
Distsribution Manager
G ary A nn T aylor
Larry J. Jackson, Sr.
Business Manager
Director o f Operation
T ony W ashington
Iesha W illiam s, Elana K estrel
Assistant Editor
Graphic Design
Contributing Writers:
P rofessor M cK inley Burt,
L ee Perlm an,
N eil H eilpem
Joy R am os
4747 NE Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.,
Portland, Oregon 97211
503-288-0033 • Fax 503-288-0015
Email: Pdxobserv@aol.com
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R E S E R V E D , R E P R O D U C T IO N IN W H O L E O R IN PA R T W IT H ­
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1885, and T h e N ational A dvertising R epresentative A m algam ated
P ublishers, Inc, N ew Y ork, N Y , and T he W est C oast Black Publishers
A ssociation • S erving Portland and V ancouver.
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e
c
t i v
e
s
Identity And Motivation IV, Conclusion
'QH|C ^ n rtla tth (©bseruer
C harles W ashington
p
uted $25,000 to save it in A ugust
1988.
It will imm ediately occur to a n u m -
ber o f readers that the group will be in
proxim ity to the New Y ork City Sub­
way, w hose very basic concept was
predicated upon the scores o f patented
inventions o f a great African A m eri­
can electrical
engineer. The
m ost obvious
o f his seminal
contributions
to
subw ay
tr a n s it s y s ­
tem s w as, o f
course, those
that did aw ay
w ith the n e­
cessity for an “overhead trolley”; see
N os. 385,034; 6 7 8,086; 395,533;
463,020; 509,065; 569,443; 667,110;
G ranville T. Woods.
A nd there will be visited Black
Inventor M useum s in Atlanta, Detroit
and St. Louis; different groups som e 1
am advisor to. Interestingly 1 have
alw ays had great difficulty with cura­
tors o fth e “T hom as Edison M useum ”
near Detroit in even getting an adm is­
sion that Lewis H oward Latim er ever
existed - let alone that he w as a hon­
ored m em b ero fth e“Edison Pioneers”.
N ow
B y H ugh B. P rice
P resident
N ational U rban L eague
Martin Luther King Jr. is thirty
years gone, taken by an assassin’s
bullet that w as m eant to slay the
Dream as well as the Dreamer.
But in fact K ing’s presence is
even m ore powerfully with us now-
-despite the efforts o f tricksters to
take a snippet o f this speech or that
sermon as support fortheir benighted
^ o r t l a n b Q fr b a e r u e r
The Portland Observer can be sent directly to your home for only $60.00
per year. Please fill out, enclose check or money order, and mail to:
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Zip-C ode:
Fortunately for the historical record.
T he New York City Library has pic­
tures o f all the "Pioneers” (including
Edison) paying their respects at his
funeral . Sic T ransit Gloria, “how fleet­
ing is fam e.”
A nother point o f interest is that all
o fth o se taking the New Y ork trip have
read m y tw o-part
article appearing in
ih e Portland O b ­
server at the end o f
1996 a n d c o n -
cludedJan. 1,1997,
“ Harlem, the V il­
la g e L ig h t R a il
Built.” A ctuallythe
line w as an over­
built disaster, but a
black real estate broker converted a
developm ent fiasco into a cultural Re­
naissance. Here at home, weconstantly
im press upon the kids the econom ic
payoffs o f inventions and the sw eep­
ing cultural and social changes brought
about. “You could be left out!”
Interested readers m ay obtain a rel­
evant U.S. G overnm ent publication,
“General Information on Patents” from
the local Federal Bookstore, 1405 S. W.
First Street, Portland O R 97201. The
Price is $3.95 and provides m uch valu­
able inform ation for w hich those tele­
vision hustlers charge hundreds to a
thousanddollars. Dorothy Williamson,
the local in v en to ro fth e“PaintC addy”
started this correct way as I advised
my students at PSU.
Later this year there will be more on
Neighborhood ScienceClubsand media
introduction when they are well on foot.
I would like to mention though that many
o f those successful modes from ‘yester­
year’ are working even better today;
‘communication’ isevery thing, thecross-
fertilization o f ideas. And once again,
former students o f mine are meeting the
challenge to get black kids prepared for
year 2( XX) technology. W here in many
cases they would be left out or put on the
slow track.
A num ber have pen pals in other
cities, kids/clubs with like interests in
science and technology. Parents have
given them models they first saw here.
I’ve told how my m other had m e to
write G erm any for model plane plans
when I couldn’t find that type here
(“d o n ’t whine. Junior, you know how
to read and write” ). And I’ve told how
w e high school kids had the ’ initiative’
to earn and pool our m oney to contract
moonlit excursion trips on the Streckfus
Steam er Line. Hundreds o f kids, big
paddle wheel steam ers like the Casino
boat on T.V ., hit by barges.
I s t h ie T i m e
efforts to re-assign A frican A m eri­
cans to second-class status in A m eri­
can society.
It is ever m ore pow erfully with us
because the advice and moral counsel
he provided are as needed now as they
were at that m om ent in 1963 when, in
his “I H ave A D ream ” speech at the
March on W ashington, he reminded
A m ericaoP'the fierce urgency ofNow .
“This is no tim e to engage in the
luxury o f cooling o ff or to take the
tranquilizing drug o f G radualism ,” he
proclaim ed then. “N ow is the tim e to
m ake real the prom ises o f D em oc­
racy.”
M artin Luther King w as “an A m eri­
can leader o f conscience and hum an­
ity,” as Julian Bond, chairm an o f the
National Association forthe Advance­
ment ofC olored People, said w hen we
(along with the Reverend Jesse Jack-
son and R epresentative J.C. W atts [R-
O kla.]) appeared together April 5 on
the NBC News program, “Meet The
Press.”
So, even as w e celebrate the fact
that m illions o f African Americans
have m oved into the middle class,
and thus, com e into full earthly pos­
session o f their ow n destinies—com e
closer, if you will, to the Promised
Land that King spoke o f on the last
night ofhis life -w e know that Martin
Luther King is still calling us to ac­
tion.
Support to r a career
with no boundaries.
T hank Y ou F or R eading T he P ortland O bserver
Oregon Coalition To Abolish
The Death Penalty
You have the education, the drive
Message From The Chair
A t th e A n n u a l M e e t i n g o f
th e O re g o n C o a litio n T o
A b o l i s h T h e D e a th P e n a l t y in
J a n u a r y , w e m a r k e d th e 1 0 th
A n n iv e r s a ry o f th e C o a litio n .
A r e v ie w o f 1998 in d ic a te d
th e h a rd w o rk o f m a n y m e m ­
b e rs o n th e w ritte n a n d o ra l
a p p e a ls a n d v ig il fo r H a rry
C h a rle s M o o re , on O re g o n
le g is la tio n , on c o rre s p o n ­
d e n c e w ith in m a te s , a n d on
e d u c a tio n th r o u g h ta b lin g ,
n e w s le tte r , m a g a z in e an d
n e w sp a p e r a rtic le s an d s p e a k ­
in g . M itig a tio n S p e c i a li s t
P a m e la R o g e rs o f B e n d s p o k e
a t th e A n n u a l M e e t i n g a b o u t
C o a l i t i o n m e m b e r s k e e p i n g in
c o n ta c t w ith in d iv id u a ls on
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d r e s s e d th e i s s u e o f “ d e a t h -
q u a lifie d j u r o r s .”
O n ly p o t e n t i a l j u r o r s w h o
f e e l t h e y in s o m e i n s t a n c e
c o u ld s u p p o r t th e d e a th p e n ­
a l t y a r e a l l o w e d to s e r v e in
a g g ra v a te d m u rd e r tr ia ls ,
m a k in g j u r i e s u n b a la n c e d to ­
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W h e n c a l l e d to s e r v e o n a
ju r y , o n e m u st c o n s id e r c a r e ­
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s e a t i n g th e j u r y .
P o s i t i v e m o v e m e n t is h a p ­
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tio n a l le v e ls fo r th o s e o f us
w h o o p p o s e c a p ita l p u n is h ­
m e n t. O r e g o n ’s C a p ita l D e ­
I
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e x e c u tio n o f K a rla F a y e
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0991 U 5 Wf SI COPIMUNHAtlONS