By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN – When Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland announced in early July that the city would offer $50,000 in tax free grants to the 14 surviving 1968 sanitation strikers, a wave of excitement washed over Baxter Leach. “I feel great about it,” said Leach, who never imagined that he would be compensated nearly 50 years after the sanitation workers opted to participate in Social Security rather than a pension plan offered by the city at that time. “We’re proposing a new retirement plan, an additional retirement plan for all sanitation employees,” said Strickland, making his remarks at…
Author: Wiley Henry
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN – The Southern Christian Leadership Conference survived decades of internal discord and instability after its founding in 1957, when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., SCLC’s first president, began leading the organization through the tumultuous civil rights movement. Dr. Charles Steele Jr., SCLC’s current president and CEO, is leading the organization through global discord and instability, and evokes the organization’s creed to “Redeem the Soul of America.” Steele will be in Memphis July 20-23 when SCLC convenes its 59th convention at the historic Peabody Hotel. The theme: “The Hour is Now to: Believe, Empower, Act.” The…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN – Tupac Shakur (or 2Pac), a West Coast rapper and actor, was gunned down on Sept. 7, 1996, in a drive-by shooting at an intersection in Las Vegas, Nevada. His fans still mourn his death. The Notorious B.I.G. (or Biggie Smalls), an East Coast rapper, was killed in a drive-by shooting by an unknown assailant on March 9, 1997, in Los Angeles, Calif. His fans still mourn him too. Aiesha Overton, a visual artist known as Naima Peace, was a little girl when both rappers died in the middle of an East Coast and West…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN — What Mamon Wilson has been able to accomplish with homeopathic medicine is beyond comprehension – particularly since he’s not a medical doctor or the conferee of a medical degree from a prestigious medical school. What he is credentialed in is treating patients stricken with catastrophic diseases with holistic, natural and plant-based medicines derived from nature’s botanical garden: seeds, berries, roots, leaves, flowers, fruits, herbs, etc. “I never had any schooling. [But] I’ve trained a lot of doctors and medical missionaries,” said Wilson, one of three facilitators focusing on the theme “Better Health & Body,”…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN – If it had not been for sheer will power and the determination to finish what she had started 30 years ago, Shalonda Patryce Jackson wouldn’t have been ready to walk across the commencement stage to receive the Bachelor of Science in Education. But she was more than ready for that crowning achievement on the morning of May 13, when The LeMoyne-Owen College kicked off its 147th Commencement ceremony at Mt. Vernon Baptist Church-Westwood in Memphis. Donning cap, gown, tassel and the purple and gold stole, Jackson remembered how far she’d come to this point…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN – The Memphis Juneteenth Urban Music Festival is celebrating 25 years of fun-filled, musical merriment Friday through Sunday, June 16-18, on the grounds of the historic Robert R. Church Park on “World-Famous” Beale Street. Juneteenth, the longest-running cultural festival in Memphis, is the go-to place for eclectic music. This year, the legendary Barkays is partnering with Juneteenth on June 16 for a night of live, funk and soul music at the Cannon Center for the Performing Arts. ConFunkShun, another local legendary group, will join the Barkays in concert. The doors will open at 8 p.m.…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN – Several police officers from the Memphis Police Department’s Cordova/Appling Farms precinct pulled their cruisers up to the home of Martha Washington-Smith and made a beeline to the front door. The intermittent show of force on May 13 may have drawn gawks and curious stares, and no doubt triggered the gossip mill, but a sign in Washington-Smith’s yard explained the officers’ presence – COP STOP. COP STOP is the brainchild of Bob and Joanna McNeil-Young, a Germantown couple who started feeding police officers in 2015 to show their support for the arduous job they do…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN – Several students with varied challenges and one adult assembled around the dinning room table at Dr. Theresa M. Okwumabua’s home in Midtown on May 5 to discuss last-minute details for an upcoming awards banquet. They also went through a dry run to mitigate any problems when they recount how they beat the odds to make life better for themselves and others. “As you share your stories, some young person can say, ‘If they can do it, I can do it, too,’” said Okwumabua, encouraging each honoree receiving this year’s Memphis “Beat the Odds” Award…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN — Going to jail is not at all pomp and circumstance. But for a family of courageous sisters, it was a “badge of honor” to be carted off to jail 17 times during the turbulent civil rights movement. On March 25, more than 50 years later, a historical marker was unveiled honoring Ernestine Lee Henning, Sandra Faye Lee Swift, Brenda Lee Turner, Elaine Lee Turner, the late Joan Lee Nelson, Peggy Jayne Lee and Susan Carlotta Lee. “This is living history,” said Jimmy Ogle, county historian for the Shelby County Historical Commission, which preserves, educates…
By Wiley Henry MEMPHIS, TN — Death could be described as the final chapter in the life of the decedent. But not for the late Staff Sgt. Donnie Dixon, who lives on posthumously in an intriguing book written by his widow, L. Latrese Dixon. “From Tragedy to Triumph: The Life of a Widow” is the recounting of an enduring love story told by Dixon, who was shattered after the Army sent her husband home from Iraq in a flag-draped coffin. “The life I once had, I had no more,” Dixon writes. “Donnie’s unit was set to return home by October…