The 2013 Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast
US Bank
Oregon State University
Oregon Lottery
Metro Purchasing
ALL PHOTOS ON THIS PAGE ARE BY THE SKANNER STAFF
United Way
Howard & Wright Construction
Red Cross
City of Portland Purchasing
Providence Health & Services
See more photos on page 6, 7 and 8
Liveblog: The Skanner News Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast 2013
Elected officials and corporate leaders hobnob with everyday people in honoring King
By Helen Silvis
Of The Skanner News
January 21, 2013
8 a.m. Guests are gathering in the lobby outside the
Grand Ballroom.
8:37: Event Emcee Bobbie Dore Foster, Editor of The
Skanner News Group welcomes the guests and introduces
the head table.
“Thank you all for being here this morning to celebrate
America’s greatest civil rights leader. You all are a reflec-
tion of Dr. King’s “beloved community” and we are
grateful that you choose to begin this special holiday in
his honor by being here this morning.
At this moment President Barack Obama is taking the
oath of office with his hand on the bibles of Abraham Lin-
coln and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (CHEERS)
“Dr. King was a warrior for justice and peace fot all
people. And he was especially concerned about the poor,
those who struggle for their daily bread, shelter and cloth-
ing…. Those who are homeless or hopeless. They were
always in the forefront of Dr. King’s consciousness.
Many of you have already read our special MLK edition,
which is devoted exclusively to this issue. And we will
address the needs of poor and unemployed people later in
this program…”
8:40 Mother Lorene Wilder leads the assembled com-
pany in Lift Ev’ry Voice, the Black national anthem.
8:42 Bobbie Foster introduces guests at head table:
Dr Jean Pollard, co-pastor Emanuel Church of God in
Christ; Larry Miller, President Brand Jordan, NIKE; Dan
Floyd, VP Marketing and Development Hood to Coast
Relay; Ron Person, VP Retail Operations Safeway; Bob-
bie Dore Foster, Executive Editor The Skanner News
Group; Dr. Irma McClaurin, Author, poet and anthropol-
ogist; Amanda Fritz, Portland City Commissioner; Doug
Tweedy, CEO Pacific NW Council of Carpenters; Frank
Taylor, Director of Operations Portland Prime Restaurant;
and Patrick Quinton, Executive Director of Portland
Development Corporation.
8:44 Video greeting from Mayor Charlie Hales who is
at President Obama’s inauguration in Washington DC.
8:46 Invocation from Dr. Fuller.
8:50 Breakfast is served. Video shows scholarship
recipients.
8:55 Frank Taylor of Portland Prime speaks to invite
people to his new restaurant, Quartet, opening in Febru-
ary. Card on table have 20 percent discount.
9:00 Scrambled eggs, potatoes, bacon for the meat
eaters, and croissants. Yum.
9:16 Emcee Bobbie Foster introduces keynote speaker
Dr. Irma McClaurin. She grew up in Chicago and is
known as “someone who gets things done”
9:17 a.m. Dr. McClaurin:
“He presented America a vision of hope. He gave us a
dream on that fateful day in 1963; he gave us a dream in
which he articulated his belief in a racial equality and
social justice. In his own words:“ I have a dream. It is a
dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a
dream that one day out in the red hills of Georgia the sons
of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will
be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.”
This man, this prophetic and visionary man, born also
reminded us of the broken promises woven into the fab-
ric of America’s past and present, & scattered throughout
its history. Dr. King reminded us on that momentous
occasion on August 28, 1963, that those to whom we refer
as the “Founding Fathers” of this Republic, crafted a doc-
ument—their own Emancipatory document—the
Declaration of Independence, in which they mapped out
the premises and propositions that were the prerequisites
to forming a new nation of greatness and a new vision of
citizenship founded in freedom.”
“The crafters of these visionary documents, these men,
did not say. And so, through omission, they wove into the
credo of this country a trap door. A door of contradiction
through which they could EXCLUDE those whom they
deemed unworthy of citizenship—those people who were
Black and slaves, those people who were white and
women, those people who were Black, and slaves, and
women.
We have spent decades, fought a Civil Wars, lived
See LIVE on page 6
January 23, 2013 The Portland Skanner Page 5