Wuddnya just know it?

NOW I know what should have been said, now that the opportunity's passed and the words and thoughts have come unstuck ... .

There's always been this mysterious amnesia about the war years. It came up again today. It's triggered by particular questions, questions that should be easily answered.

"Did you feel at one with the burst of patriotism that must have accompanied the homefront effort; the crushing speed and excitement of production?"

"No, I really can't recall that."

Then it came in a rush...the why of it all ...

African Americans have got to be some of the strongest people on the planet to have survived those years. We were being asked to work, fight, and possibly die for freedoms that would not be ours for another decade! How crazy-making that had to be. That -- for the most part -- we remained passive and more than that -- that we worked and fought and died despite the awfulness of national rejection.

If you've been reading this blog since the beginning you'll know that -- until the great migration to the West Coast changed the landscape for all time, my life had been relatively ordinary. My heroes were not black heroes. I was certainly familiar with Langston Hughes and Mary McLeod Bethune and Ralph Bunche, but I was far more familiar with Eleanor Roosevelt, Helen Keller, and Edna St. Vincent Millay. Our families, who'd settled in the west for more than fifty years before WWII were like any other immigrant families striving to live our version of the American Dream, the dream that would take us right up into the great middleclass if we played the game right. Small wonder that those years are clouded over for me, clouded by rampant confusion. It was quite suddenly necessary to redefine myself without reference to anything I'd lived before.

The part of me that moved out of that "American" side was stunned into silence (at least temporarily) while the Betty that was now lumped in with the thousands of folks (black and white) who'd dropped their hoes and picked up hardhats to save the world for democracy were strangers, indeed. They were still drinking from separate water fountains and riding in two ends of the same bus that was going in the same direction. The voting privilege had not yet been extended to many who were now being expected to get into uniform and protect the world from Facism! Confusion reigned!

African-Americans who'd moved up from the southern states to do the home front work were at the same time "moving to the front of the bus." Not so for us. We were discovering segregation of a kind we'd never known, and having our brains and emotions scrambled in the process. It should be no surprise that my memory has been dimmed over the years, in defense against the cruelty of the times.

Perhaps that's why I've never identified with the Rosie concept. She was an anomaly and symbolic of a time that produced some of the most painful growth of my life, and of the life of the nation.

I still find her little more than a paper doll. Rosie as a symbol just doesn't work for me.

Nonetheless, tomorrow at the dedication I'll catch the spirit and let go of the quiet anger that I've been carrying around all these years. Today I felt some of it drop away as I walked the memorial for those cameras. Watching myself being myself as if from some outside vantage point ... Not sure why that was, but I found myself looking back at that monument for a few minutes before starting the motor to drive back into the traffic of life ... and home again.

That 30 minute interview turned out be over two hours long.

It's now one o'clock and I just returned home.

There was a team of four, a cameraman, producer, a young woman whose role I never quite figured out, and a sound man. They'd borrowed the mayor's conference room for the shoot, and set up enough lights to raise my anxiety level to unknown heights! The interviewer, James, was easy to work with, however, and though it felt forced and a little clumsy, we managed to get through it without incident.

I was seated on a low-backed chair in front of a large poster of the traditional Norman Rockwell Rosie in bandana with muscles flexing. Since it was out of my line of vision, I wasn't intimidated by it. I'd really never identified with the image; a point made quite clear in the interview.

When it ended the producer asked if I would be willing to go with them to the memorial at Marina Bay park for some additional footage. We drove over in a few minutes and there I walked and paused and looked down and read plaques and scanned pictures until the crew was satisfied with what they had.

As I understand it, this is all a part of the MSNBC D-Day coverage that will be carried all this weekend. They will televise live from tomorrow's NPS Reception Center dedication after completing 3 more interviews with Rosies who will be attending. What was filmed today will be "looped" to run throughout the weekend but will have live pieces edited in as needed. That probably means that there will be more than one opportunity to regret a variety of things, "...why did I say that? That color green does terrible things to my complexion, why did I wear that top? My, how old I'm getting! Are those NEW wrinkles? And, why didn't I sit up straight? "Those rimless eyeglasses are not good. The black frame would have looked nicer. Yatatayatatayata!

Nice touch:

The sound man was African American. I'd assumed that they were all from the east coast. Wrong. He was obviously local. At the end of the interview, just as we were about to leave for the Rosie Memorial -- he (Vern) asked quietly and with a grin, "... aren't you Ms. Reid from Reid's Records?" Matters not who the world claims me to be, or how impressive the resume becomes -- the identity of note is as the proprietor of that little Berkeley store, and the years spent there. Having that reality check made the time spent later on camera at the park a piece of cake. Had he spoken up sooner, that earlier interview would have been a good deal more relaxed, I'm sure. It's been many years since I walked out from behind that counter for the last time and turned the business over to David. That it's still a time remembered by this man was comforting to me. And, he looked half my age, at that, so that life may by now have become the subject of myth in the hood? Makes me wonder how many other African Americans have created non-traditional institutions without realizing it? It might be an interesting project to begin to catalog some of that.

As I've often joked, "...didn't know that I'd live long enough to BE black history." But apparently I have.

Watch for me this weekend on your local MSNBC cable channel.

Now I need to alert my kids and grandkids to grandma's latest escapade so that they can set up their VCRs for taping. Would hate for them to have it flash by without warning...

It's 10:13 and I'm off to the interview in a few minutes ...

Think I've dressed properly for the occasion, but as is true of most women, I've been up since six trying on likely outfits hoping that what I've chosen won't be too young. That's a problem these days. I've remained pretty much the same size over many years and -- having lived past the age of acquisition -- have bought few clothes in recent years. Still wearing "petites," but am trying to be more careful about not wearing styles that are too young. Have to admit that "What Not To Wear" is having its effect on me. But where on earth do I find clothes designed for little old lady's whose weight stabilized 20 years ago? Don't think Armani or Donna Karan have given us much thought of late.

Tennyrate, I've settled on a conservative moss green sweater with silk vari-colored trousers and open sandals. Topped that with a beautiful ancient raw amber necklace that Bill brought back from Ladahk (on the border of Tibet) many years ago. It's stunning and will have its debut on national television sometime this weekend when the tape is shown on the news channel. It belongs in a museum, and someday that's where it will be.

Interesting how my mind is bringing up such trivia ... trying hard to not think about what I will say. There's no way to prepare for the interview -- except to stay relatively serene and let whatever truth is available to me rise to the surface. Tape is so much easier than being on live. If it's too awful, I can withhold release, hopefully. But that may not be true -- and probably isn't. Guess I'm looking for an exit strategy (to borrow a phrase from today's headlines.

That gives me something to dwell on besides myself and my appearance this morning ...

Watch for me sometime this weekend ...

Don't miss my lovely necklace!

Thoughts of the redevelopment project ...

dominate my memory bank right now. Can't seem to press them back into wherever they've been stored for all these years ...

I'm thinking of the excitement on the day when -- after seven years of organizing and debating before three successive city administrations -- the razing of the site began. There was the unmistakable sound of huge trucks on the move. We rushed to the front of the store to stare out of the windows at the sight of that hummongous claw machine chewing its way through that infamous house directly across the street. A crowd was beginning gather...

I thought of how many times I'd had people say to me, "...it will never happen. You'll never get it done. THEY'LL never allow it!" All the time I'd been plodding along identifying the steps and making the moves and drawing others along despite the protests. And here it was, HAPPENING before our eyes on this day.

Within only a few days the entire site had been neatly cleared and ground smoothed evenly. The homes behind, on Stanton Street, were now fully visible from the main street. This would take some getting used to. Q Martin's home had been chewed up in less time than it would take to tell it. I felt a deep sadness despite knowing that his family had been adequately compensated for the loss and would be eligible to relocate when the new homes were completed. We were dealing with a totally new landscape. It would take some getting used to.

In the days that followed something began to evolve that was completely unanticipated.

It was on a Saturday morning. I looked out and saw three kites flying high against the clouds. There was a family; mom and dad and several children having the time of their lives in this marvelous new play space with no obstructions in the way of pure delight! We'd never seen such innocent fun in this infamous former stretch of miserable crack houses (shooting galleries), and dens of inequity ever. It was like a lovely exorcism that announced silently and gracefully an end to evil. I cried as I watched. Traffic slowed and people stopped to smile at one another. With the utilities undergrounded not long before, there were no power poles or other obstructions to capture those beautiful kites!

A few days later there was the distinct aroma of smokey barbecue sauce and the smell of charcoal ablaze. When a customer motioned me to come outside for a look, we both laughed at the wonder of it all! There was a flatbed truck parked on the newly cleared site, with people gathering around. In a little while the blaring of a sound system ringing out the sounds of an electric guitar playing gutsy blues through loudspeakers, and the party was on! People were engaged in good fellowship for the entire afternoon, with great music and impromptu blues contests drawing everyone in from the streets. Spectators were few, everybody was a party guest! Neighbors went home to return with chairs and umbrellas and leftover potato salad from the fridge and red jello and pitchers of punch...it was pure umpromptu joy of a kind that embraced everyone within sight and sound of it.

I wasn't sure that I'd fully understood the language of the kites, except in the context of the exorcism theory, but the blues party was clearly a celebration of the triumph over misery and in anticipation of more good times ahead, though no one gave words to any of that. It was a 'feelin' thing. I locked the door and joined the party!

About four days out there was a new sound that drew me out to curbside. This time we watched in dismay as a huge truck from the City's Public Works Department noisily unloaded huge rolls of wire fencing material. My heart felt heavy for a loss I couldn't quite identify. In short order the new playground was fenced off from public use. There were no keys to the service gates mid-block -- except for city staff.

How do I respond to this? One call downtown was all it took to learn that this was something that the city must do in order to be protected from lawsuits. But of course I should have known that. It could not be left unguarded and free to community use for "insurance reasons." The reasonable logical part of me surely understood this to be an important consideration, but there was a deep sadness that fell on the neighborhood as the glow was diminished in the name of progress and safety and common sense.

Where oh where had these folks been when there was no safety to be had in my 500 feet, and when one quarter of the city's homocides had occurred in that block? Where were they when we'd witnessed four young men -- at different times -- shot dead within sight and sound of our store? Where were those "insurance considerations" when that stray bullet whizzed through our front window on a Saturday afternoon -- narrowly missing David's head as it embedded in the shelves above us? And where were they on all those times when young black sons and fathers were being hog-tied and carted off to serve time for questionable reasons, and while I watched in troubled silence?

Where was the logic?

What had been lost?

Where was the sense of it, and at what point do we balance risk against an exuberance that has been too long delayed?

Those answers are illusive. I've still not found them, though I've surely adjusted to the conundrum. Maybe I've also lowered my expectations over the years. I'm not as apt to recognize irony when I see it because I've now spent too much time among the "reasonable."



Meanwhile, MSNBC just called to announce that I'm to appear at the Old Ford Building for that interview tomorrow morning at eleven. Guess they've decided to go with this dissonant Rosie. I'm presuming that it will be a few sentences carved from a brief interview and that there will be other women of the period doing the traditional pieces about "The Good War."

I guess that I've yet to witness a "good" war.

I have, however, witnessed great moments in everyday life that may be cause enough to defend.

Let me know if you catch the coverage, will you?

Through conversations in my store ...

with customers who were coming now from far and wide (Monterey to Sacramento), it was becoming clear that we were all in this together and that my day-to-day progress was being shared. There was a lot of "we" in those conversations, and it felt good and right.

There were no longer any signs of graffiti, break-ins were now rare, and I was breathing more easily. Bill was beginning to relax and from time to time I'd hear him bragging to our friends about my exploits. Couldn't have managed without his strong support.

Mel had been settled in a senior housing unit nearby, and -- except for the need to pick up his groceries and take him for the occasional doctor's visits, we'd both adapted fairly well to his new life. My role as best friend eventually over-rode Betty as ex-wife. Both Bill and I felt comfortable with that. I generally tried to plan such errands when Bill was with his patients in our downstairs library. He still was in private practice though by that time was retired from the university.

My parents were requiring weekly visits. Dad was now totally blind, but still functioning surprising well. I remember watching him do little home repairs with as much confidence as he had when sighted. He knew that the distance between his fingertip and first crease (joint) was exactly one inch. He could therefore measure accurately anything that needed it, and complete the task with little difficulty. I watched him with such pride! I wondered whether he'd figured that out in anticipation of his blindness, but regrettably never thought to ask. There were some important lessons here in adapting to change with grace. I cannot recall him complaining at any point during those years. His pride and dignity held fast until death came at 94.

Dorian was at school in Santa Barbara and the boys were out living their lives in their own ways. Rick's alcoholism continued unabated and Bob's wanderlust was of concern at times. Life for us was extremely complex but manageable still with the constant need for re-appraisal for signs of stress.

Rick and two other helpers were holding the fort back in South Berkeley while I moved ever deeper into city politics and learning the ropes in a brand new field. This one would be essential to my ability to handle life as a small merchant in the inner city. This is where I would learn how political change is created and maintained. Reinventing myself as- and when-needed was becoming routine.

Bill was now deep into his Tibetan studies and spending more and more time at Padma Ling with his colleagues and on retreats at Odiyon, the Nyingma monastery, high above the Russian River two hours north. The home social gatherings were rare now. His two sisters had moved to the coast from the Midwest and needed to share his time and attention. Times were changing and our life together was reflecting that. We were clearly on different paths that were gradually moving apart, but with little trauma, and much mutual respect.

I was spending more time at city hall, now half-time at the store and half time staffing city councilman, Don Jelinek. This meant an entirely new field of learning and in a field that was as subjective as it was empowering. As a legislative aide I regularly attended weekly meetings of the city council, but in addition -- as the subject demanded -- many of the city's commissions and departments. I'd begun to do some speech-writing as well, but not for verbatim delivery as much as a way for Don and I to exchange ideas. He could often better frame his own arguments by knowing mine. That meant that we didn't need to agree, in fact, it was better when we didn't. As a practicing attorney he was used to being adversarial and I learned that my work was of more value when I could express my positions accurately and honestly. This better prepared him for the work that we did together; a very valuable way to move in the world of politics.

Since most city council seats are part time, it is the responsibility of the aides to bone up on the issues and help to prepare the packet for those weekly meetings. It means that one had to be a generalist with specialities in the areas that most interested your councilmember. It was fascinating work, and prepared me well for this past decade of serving the same function, primarily, for two members of the state assembly. The lessons of the past were easily refreshed and activated in this entirely new context.

One of the most valuable aspects of working with Don was the fact that he was Jewish, a New Yorker, had left his Wall Street office in the Sixties to join the Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi. He'd been one of the attorneys who formed Dr. King's defense team. He'd planned to spend six weeks in the deep south and stayed for three years, leaving only after Dr. King's assassination. He didn't return to the east coast, but came west instead.

Don was also the defense attorney for the Attica prisoners who were acquitted in the prison riots (in the eighties?). After coming west, he lived on Alcatraz Island for six months with the Native American tribes who claimed the site as their rightful heritage under long-neglected treaties. They were eventually ousted by the government. This idealist served two terms with the Berkeley city council and ran for mayor twice, but lost both times. It was a brutal struggle and most disillusioning. I cut my political teeth on those campaigns. And -- he lost to Shirley Dean, the same Ms. Dean who was defeated by Gus Newport in those early years of my return to South Berkeley. Ms. Dean and I go a long way back, as you can see. In the most recent election cycle in Berkeley, it was the husband of Assemblywoman Loni Hancock (my employer at the time), Tom Bates, who defeated Ms. Dean for the mayor's seat. The more things change ... .

Ms. Dean and I were to lock horns yet another time (during the 90s) over a small city-owned black theater, but that story is for another day. Suffices to say that she had both the power to frustrate my efforts and the willingness to use it. This time the mayor prevailed.

The Fourth of July in October ...

There were surely some frightening days to cope with. Like the day during the early years, before life had settled down into a day-to-day routine of ordinariness that still demanded a high degree of caution. I'd developed a highly sensitive hearing level. My ears amplified the street noises but often failed to filter out the cries of distressed children from the sounds of domestic violence somewhere out of sight but not out of hearing. This was before I'd become reasonably comfortable with the street corner cabals, and before I'd learned to read the danger signs with any accuracy -- the quickness of the lookouts -- the "runners" -- when something was "comin' down."

My problem tenant was still upstairs on the second floor and this was worrisome to me. Some of his staff had begun to report disturbing stories. I knew that he had downtown influence and that it would be difficult to deal with him without some element of threat.

On that morning in October I arrived to work to a scene that stopped my breathing for just an instant. On the Prince Street side of my building there was shattered glass everywhere! All of the display windows on the north side of the building had been blown out! At first sight I had the impression of there having been a fire.

My troubling tenant was standing at curbside -- his well-dressed long and lean body leaning against his car with a sinister grin on his face. He had been waiting for me, waiting to see my reaction to the mayhem. The corner was strangely empty of street dealers. There was an eerie silence with neighbors gathered in small groups -- staring.

As the story unraveled later, I learned that on the day before he'd hosted a meeting in his office at which the chief of police and several uniformed officers were present. That apparently signaled to the street that my second floor was being used for surveilance purposes. As a warning, barrel bombs had been taped to my windows during the night and detonated as a warning. My tenant appeared to have written the script, though proof was illusive.

Shortly thereafter I served notice of eviction for cause, but not before I'd experienced several weeks that seemed like a lifetime of living in fear. Bill was beginning to bring pressure to bear on me to give it up. Shut it down. He was increasingly concerned about my safety. He was probably justified, though in all honesty -- I always believed that eventually I would make it.

The fact that I immediately called in the glaziers to have the windows boarded up and went about the business of cleaning up the debris in plain view of everyone; that I didn't hide away in fear and trembling; may have saved the situation. Bravado thy name is Betty! When the plywood was temporarily in place I took to my "talking windows" and wrote a message in big bold black letters;


"How sad!
There is no insurance to cover this damage
...no money to pay for glass replacement.
However, while waiting to recover from this temporary setback
Reid's will do business as usual.
It would be helpful if you would not use this corner
for loitering so that our customers
will not be afraid to enter the store.
Then recovery can come more quickly.
Since I would prefer not to know your business,
conversations in my stairwell or front entry may
be unwise."

Thanks,

Betty Reid Soskin

It was clear that I was declaring turf and wouldn't be going anywhere. Come hell or high water, I planned to stand my ground and the street knew it. It was also clear that I really didn't want to know what they were doing and that I probably was not cooperating with the police, after all. They gave me the benefit of the doubt and I had no more problems. They honored my plea and left enough space around me and my building so that we became an island of sanity over time.

My customers continued to arrive in a steady stream, and the business grew with each day, though the nature of it was changing dramatically. Black gospel music was becoming more and more the centerpiece and Reid's was the location where the best could be found. And -- I was truly becoming far more comfortable as a business woman than I ever was at whatever it was that I'd become in the university community. This felt more like home for reasons I can't quite describe. Something deep inside me resonated to black life in ways that nothing else had. It still does.

Taking a stand on LL COOL J's album posed no threat to me. By the time that happened I was comfortable in my shoes. The Rappers either discounted me as being of no consequence, or, they respected my right to act on my own principles. I suspect it was the latter. If I wasn't comfortable with this genre, I (and possibly they) figured it had to be more generational than racial. I found little fascination with European music, either. Always figured that I just wasn't wired for Haydn and that Bach would sound a whole lot better with a good rhythm section with Mingus on bass, or a little Christian McBride, maybe (smile). Black gospel stood alone. Despite no history in the Black Church, Vanessa Bell Armstrong could bring a visceral reaction -- the late Thomas Whitfield might have been a fit musical companion to the great Duke Ellington. I recall writing an ad for a local paper in which I claimed ...

"Contemporary Black Gospel is Jazz Come Home!"

And it was and is.

RAP ALBUM TOO BAD TO BE COOL, SHOP OWNER SAYS

By Gerald Davis
The Oakland Tribune


LL Cool J's new, fast-selling rap album is simple titled, "Bad."

Bad as in cool, Bad as in hot. Bad enough to mock traditional sensibilities with the harsh realities of ghetto life. Bad as the cutting edge.

He's so bad, he raps on the X-rated LP about blowing people away with his .357 magnum; about a smelly prostitute who accepts food stamps; about what he likes his women to do.

Betty Reid Soskin, owner of Reid's Records on Sacramento Street in Berkeley, thinks the album is too bad to sell to children, so a sign in the window of her gospel-pop music store reads: "LL Cool J is not on sale here!"

Her protest is a relatively rare one in the black-oriented music industry, which has not been as affected by overt lyrical references to sex, violence, and suicide as have the white-dominated heavy metal markets.

In 1985, a group of congressional wives and the national PTA, Parent Teachers Association, pressured 22 recording companies, producing 80 percent of the records in the U.S., to include parental-guidance warnings about lyrics on album jackets.

Reid's solitary crusade began after she received three cartons of the LL Cool J album and listened to the lyrics. She said she had been signing up anxious and eager young customers -- all of them younger than age 14 -- on a waiting list before the recording hit the stores.

After hearing the words, she packed up her 30 albums and took them back to the distributor.

"Everyone looked at me like I was a lunatic," she laughed.

"Mine was just a single act. It was something I needed to do for my own conscience. The trouble is, most adults don't have the patience to listen to these records."

She says some parents have thanked her, and that one girl reported that her mother broke her record after hearing it.

Some young customers have returned to let her know that they'd bought the record elsewhere, although the imprinted parental warnings forbid sales to minors.

"...Calling all cars.
calling all cars.
Be on the lookout for a light-skinned brother
he's wearing a sweat suit, gold chain and sneakers...
he's armed.

That's the introduction to the album's lead song, "I'm Bad."

The song ends with master rapper LL Cool J himself cutting in on the mock police band with, "...Yo. This is LL Cool J, and you'll never catch me. I'm too bad!"

From there he raps out a sort of verbal collage of life as he sees it in New York City, a picture that is common to many youngsters living in the economically depressed areas of American cities.

His is a macho, competitive and potentially explosive world where everyone is out for the big bucks in a hurry. The cool women are loose, and the cool "dudes" pack guns.

He presents himself as a pseudo-outlaw super-disc jockey/dance/emcee/rapper. He issues tough-sounding challenges to anyone who would dispute his claim.


"I'm the hardest hard rocker
in the hard rock town
'cause I got a .357
and I break it on down ...
Three-fifty-seven at point-blank range
ain't nothin' strange
you're having a heart attack'
it's at your back!"


At Wauzi Records in Oakland's Eastmont Mall, manager Darrell McFadden said the album has been "the hottest thing going" since its release three weeks ago.

It's what the brothers can relate to," he said. If some people find the lyrics objectionable, McFadden says simply, "It's reality." "I wouldn't allow my kids (ages 8 and 3) to listen to it, there's a lot of bad words in it. But to each his own, you know."

McFadden and other local store managers say that they can barely keep the record on their shelves because sales are so brisk.

After its first sales week, "Bad" was ranked Number 51 on Billboard Magazine's chart of Top 100 albums. After its second week, it was ranked Number 13. The record trade publication, "The R&B Report," calls LL Cool J "one of the front-runners of the rap movement (drawing) listeners as a vanguard."

The rap music genre emerged in the post-disco era of the early 1980s with often-witty writing that challenged uninitiated ears to something new.

The early hit by Grand Master Flash and the Furious Five, "The Message," was an insightful tale about a young man about to snap from the pressures of his dead-end environment.

Some groups continue with social commentary. An album by Public Enemy calls for the return of the Black Panthers. Others have adopted more routine themes, usually bragging about how well they can rap, dance, or seduce women. "A lot of adults don't like rap," said Nelson George editor of black music at Billboard. "It's viewed in the same ways that people see heavy metal. "They (rap and heavy metal) appeal to the young with aggressive music. It's the nature of the way it sounds, and the attitudes, that adults don't like. "Cool J is one of the guys who emphasizes the machismo aspect. He's a clever lyricist, he really writes well. He personifies some of what people don't like about it and some of the best."

No other local record storers have returned the "Bad' album, said Elliott Blaine, founder of the record distributorship that first sold Reid Soskin the "Bad" album. "Unfortunately, a lot of records are being made today for adult ears," he said. "I've been in the record business for 41 years. I remember when you couldn't say "God" on a record. The whole world has changed, morally. "Betty's a wonderful person. I agree with her on a whole lot of things, but you've got to accept life the way it is."

"I make no pretentions about changing the world," Reid Soskin says. "Actually I'm happy to settle for a few blocks. I can only affect things immediately around me. "I'm simply not participating in something I feel so negatively about. Perhaps if enough Bettys do the same, we just might create the positive change that we'd all like to see."

(end of article)

The Birth of Reid's "Talking Windows"

In the middle eighties, I made my first discovery about the power of streetside communication. That's a term I coined to describe a technique that came into being quite by accident. It was another of those times when I attracted major press without intending to do so at all, like today with the Rosie exposure.

It was during the days when Sony introduced the walkman, and my youngest customers were proudly wearing them on their belts. Everyone sported headphones and vacant stares as they passed my shop on their way to and from school. Sony ushered in a problem that few beside record store owners were aware of. During the LP album era, youngsters would bring home their new purchases, put the disc on the record player and everyone in the house would hear and enjoy (or not) their newest album. With the walkman, kids would come into the store, select a cassette tape, walk out with the music blaring in their ears with parents being totally unaware of what was being listened to. I, alone, would know that much of it was ugly and often obscene material. In an odd way I was placed in the position of putting into the ears of children (secretly) what I would not have wanted my own to be exposed to in their formative years.

The walkman came into being about the time that rap music was becoming popular and this added an extra dimension. I started listening to my products and being horrified at much of what I heard. Made a decision that started my "talking windows" strategy.

When LL COOL J, a New York rap artist came out with a release called "Bad," I decided to act. I only intended to communicate with the children in the immediate neighborhood. I would explain to them why I would not be selling the new release that they'd been signing up for days to buy. Took a large poster, turned it around and wrote on the back -- posted it prominently in the window with an album cover of the artist;


LL COOL J is not on sale here.
Sorry, kids, but we have to draw the line somewhere.
This album contains not only explicit sexual lyrics, but advocates
violence as well.
We certainly need your business and support
but not at the cost of your values and moral development.
You are the future
You are the hope for positive change!

Betty Reid Soskin

(You'll notice that I didn't dumb down the words or the message.)

As the kids filed in to buy this latest monstrosity, I waved them along with, "you'll have to get this one from Leopolds up on Telegraph Avenue, kids. I'm sorry."

At some point on that first day a reporter passing by saw my homemade sign and stopped in to inquire. He took a picture of it (and with me standing beside it) and walked away grinning and shaking his head. The next day there on page three of the Oakland Tribune was a large photo and a major article about the evils of rap music. This is surely not what I had in mind. Nor was the unexpected response that followed. There were calls from local radio stations from talk show hosts. There were requests for interviews. There was one talk show host who made a visit to the store that very day for a live interview -- and happened to catch an interaction between me and a precocious 8 year-old wanting the tape and being refused.

The radio host:

"Do you agree that you're in violation of the First Amendment?"

Betty:

"No I do not. The artist has a right to create and record the material. The record company has exercised the right to produce the record for sale. I am simply opting out on my right to sell it. I'm not suggesting that people don't buy it -- am actually referring them on to where it is available. I'm simply not participating in the process -- that is MY right. Actually, everytime I visit my wholesaler and make the selection of just what I want on my shelves, I'm exercising that option. This is no different."


Over the next week there were letters from far and wide. They came from caring mothers giving thanks. There were several from San Quentin from prisoners who congratulated me on "helping to save kids." There were some that contained checks written in the amount of the cassette with notes saying, "...this is for the sales that you will miss for taking your stand. Keep it up!"


In the years that followed there were many occasions when my windows "talked" to the community. At election time I'd study the ballot measures for a couple of weeks prior, and on big rolls of newsprint would cover my display windows with my choices; a replica of the ballot. I would start -- not by telling folks how they should vote, but with how I planned to use the franchise. Big difference.

The California ballot was becoming more and more convoluted year by year, with initiatives written to be as confusing as possible (requiring a no vote when you wished a yes). The process was hard enough for me to wade through. I guessed that many simply gave up and sat out election day for fear of making wrong choices. This might increase the number going to the polls (I hoped). Along with my window ballot (always with my signature at the bottom), I placed on my counter a printed list of my rationale for each of my choices. Was always careful to leave at least one measure without an answer, ("...you're on your own on this one. I can't quite figure it out") just so I wouldn't be seen as a know-it-all. Would write the really critical ones in red ink to call attention to the weird ones that were written with the intent to confuse.

Again, I thought that I was talking directly to my neighbors and customers until local candidates began to show up for endorsements from time to time. It was common for people to begin to come in a couple of weeks before election time to ask if I'd gotten my ballot ready for posting yet, "how we gonna vote Ms. Reid?". During the last week before, it was not unusual to see people pull up in their cars and park in front of the store to sit marking their sample ballots. Even the drug dealers would sit on the curb doing the same. On the last couple of days people would come in to talk about the candidates and the measures and to argue good-naturedly with my choices. It was all that I'd hoped for.

I'd hoped that my talking windows idea would catch on with other small merchants in the neighborhood, in hope that folks would then have a choice of leadership. It never happened. I suspected that no one wanted to be seen as being on the wrong side of the results on the day after the election. I never cared. For me, the goal was to increase the numbers going to the polls. I believe that we did that.

Talking windows and a dynamic newsletter worked miracles in my determination to magnify my voice toward social change in my 500 foot realm of influence.

Maybe the reluctance I'm feeling to being singled out for national attention has to do with the role I'm being asked to play. I'm less important as a fraudulent Rosie than I am simply as a twist on the story and therefore newsworthy? The insatiable appetite for news bites cannot be satisfied without new angles being created hour after hour, day after day. Do I want to be one of them? A dissonant Rosie may fit in with the rest of the opposers, a kind of balance to the Norman Rockwell symbol of feminine derring-do. Maybe I'll just come off as an angry old woman trashing "The Good War."

During the 15 minute phone interview with the West County Times guy yesterday, I reminded him that the National Park Service is charged with telling the nation's history through structures. That's true. For the past couple of years, since the new park was created on the Richmond shoreline, a major search has been conducted by historians from the university and by hired consultants, locating the relevant structures still standing. There will be restoration of as many as are needed to tell the story. Impressive signage upon which the stories will be told will mark those portions of the Bay Trail that are incorporated into the park site. Have been working with the advisory group that is designing those pieces. They're impressive.

Since the NPS cannot own property, said properties will need to be funded by the city, foundations, corporations, or private individuals. There is Shipyard #3 (#2 having been razed long ago to make space for the Marina Bay housing development), the old Kaiser Medical Center, the original childcare center, a huge storage facility, and of course, the old Ford Plant that converted from assembling cars to tanks shipped to the Pacific theater. There were also the Whirly Cranes, and the docks and piers that still show signs of the period.

Among the structures earmarked for the park is the only war housing facility still standing. It is a modest cooperative that is still under the ownership of heirs of the original worker families and a few lucky folks who've been able to buy into it. As might be expected, it was built as an all-white settlement. That housing has been landmarked as historic. All housing where non-whites lived was torn down within weeks of war's end by the government. The Jim Crow union hall where I worked was on Barrett Avenue, and met the same fate as the war housing for black folk. If the homefront story is to be told through structures, one would never know that we were ever here or that we participated in that unprecedented effort that turned out a victory ship every five days.

It feels ironic to think that my first experience with the NPS was at a presentation given at the local library early in the process. There was a slideshow with discussion intended to involve the community in the process. I was there on a work asignment. At the time, I covered all of West County as field rep for Assemblywoman Aroner. (How roles had changed over the years.) There were no more than 3-4 other non-whites in the room, and no one was speaking up. I felt keenly uncomfortable without much sense of just why that was. Had pretty much dismissed all of my own WW2 experience, and didn't feel particularly like a Richmond resident, having moved here from Berkeley to work for Dion. I participated that evening as an outsider for the most part. At the time I had no idea where our union hall had been located, but it was the only war-related structure I could recall having seen. I'd not been within sight of the shipyards at any point, so the slideshow was new material for me.

When the formal presentation ended and the punch and cookie period not quite started, I remember saying out loud to no one in particular, "...I have such a love-hate relationship with Rosie!" Judy Hart, the newly-appointed chief of the new park project looked a little taken aback, but bravely asked what I meant. I then told the group of my role in the war and of how far from all of that I really felt -- that I could hardly recall the War. I'd obviously forgotten it all as soon as possible, and now it was coming back -- bringing all of the affect with it.

The feelings of being in Richmond had been always been marked by a sense of hostility and foreboding -- evil bubbling just beneath the surface. Going home to Berkeley was a welcome experience at the end of the working day. (I was remembering all that now.) For reasons I don't understand, that feeling persists to this day. People speak of it as "poor image," and there is a running theme that pervades all discussions about redevelopment and rehabilitation of this city. This aura gets blamed on crime stats and graffiti and poor lighting, but it's in this town's DNA carried over from an earlier time. It's what I'm so anxious to try to change with the help of others -- and through using the Arts & Culture as antidote. It can happen. Beauty can be just as contagious as blight. I know that. I've lived the truth of it.

I had the distinct feeling that this new Rosie The Riveter Memorial National Park was going to dredge up some troubling feelings, and that there needed to be some vehicle for sorting some of that out -- especially for the non-white people who had lived through the period. Was aware that a series of these meetings was being scheduled. But I wasn't sure that the NPS fully appreciated the full impact of the fact that -- in the postwar period -- there has been a resurgence of the KKK, and that cross-burnings had occurred a number of times before being brought under control. There is an historic photograph of the Klan marching in full regalia down Macdonald Avenue, the main street of Richmond. A street now abandoned as the town chose (unwisely I think) to grow from its outer edges, leaving the central core deserted for the most part.

Further irony is the fact that those historic structures are still around because Henry J. Kaiser, Corp., simply walked away when peace was declared, leaving the people it had brought here (over 109,000 of them) to abandonment. Those structures have stood unclaimed -- as were the human beings -- for all these years, leaving rust and blight everywhere. It took many years before the city began to reclaim itself and set down its roots. In many ways it is still little more than low- and middle-income housing, industrial sites all loosely threaded together by strip malls. After 50 years, it has not recovered completely, but is showing signs of progress with a boom in construction rising on the ashes of old brownfields left over from the war years.

The national park will give formal presence to the era and will mark the place where it all happened. That will be a good thing. More importantly, its affordability has created a city where many immigrants and refugees have continued to settle, making it one of the most racially diverse communities in the country. It's richness is in its people, surely not in its physical structures. The DotCom boom and bust left many handsome ghosts of luxurious office campuses (including Steve Jobs' now empty former Pixar Studios) dotting the landscape and looking like movie sets waiting for re-casting in order to come to life again.

There's a strange sense of the "almost" overlaying everything here. The national park will herald a new beginning, I believe, but only if we rebuild the human element of this area carefully and with sensitivity to what has gone before. We can only do that if we truly KNOW "what has gone before." Could that be the importance of my role in all of this? Enough reason to say yes to MSNBC?

There was a legacy of greatness in that the sense of accomplishment -- at having risen to the challenge of winning the war through round-the-clock extra-human efforts. Here were the beginnings of HMO's and universal 24-hour childcare. But the tragedy of the lives of black people who were left to manage in a strange place with little or no assistance has never been told. Their shipbuilding experience was not transferrable by design, so it was back to those "jobs nobody else wanted" (as we're told now about immigrant laborers from south of the border).

When the temporary war housing was torn down, these stalwarts dragged scrap wood from the deconstruction sites -- , piping, nails and screws into North Richmond and began to build lean-tos in order to go on living. Returning to the south was not an option. There was little work to be had, but they survived. Much of the area was marshland and given to flooding. Much of the land was agricultural previously owned by the interned Japanese and subject to being taken away at some point in the future.

There's a dramatic human story to be told. But, if it's to be told through structures, there may be only silence.

We can only learn from our history if we know it, right? That may be enough of a reason to do that interview. There are so few now left alive to tell the stories... .

Still mulling over that last post ...

Wondering why I've become increasingly uncomfortable with the amount of media attention I'm receiving these days. The oral histories I feel justified in doing since the life of any human being has value at least to their progeny. Knowing how much my father's videotapes mean to me provides some perspective on my own. Those several hours of Dad before the university audience provides immortality for him in a limited way. My own will do the same for my children. But those are done and in my possession. What is happening now seems quite different.

Maybe I'm feeling exploited for the sake of the Henry J. Kaiser image. And maybe that's not a bad thing. I'm not sure. I do know that at the recent opening of the Kaiser Exhibition at the Oakland Museum it felt strange to see my photo and sound bite (taken from the oral history) in a portion dedicated to the racial diversity he'd brought to the war effort. That felt disingenuous to me. There were photos of other blacks in that section of the exhibit. Segregated again? I wasn't sure. It did cause me to look around to see if there were any African-Americans displayed in any other section and (in all fairness) I did see one, but I can't remember the context. Maybe I was just looking for trouble where there was none. Maybe it's just the painful recollections of the period.

I have such mixed feelings about this very warped version of the American Dream. Each time I meet with the NPS people, what comes up for me is confused and disturbing. It could be that digging deep in these writings will serve to help clarify the period and lay some ghosts... .

I don't really see myself as particularly self-promoting,

but I'm beginning to feel cornered into seeming so. Not a terribly comfortable role.

Came home yesterday to a message on my answering machine from MS-NBC-TV in New York, wanting an interview. They appear to have been referred by the National Park Service people. The interview has to do with Memorial Day, remembrances of Rosie the Riveter and living again in the time of war, I guess. At any rate, I didn't return the call (not knowing quite what to do with it). This morning I woke to another call, Ms. Erin Anderson, from their booking office asking if I would be available some day this week for a studio (local) interview, and did I plan to be at the Rosie Reception Center grand opening next Saturday afternoon on the Richmond Marina? "We may be placing a news truck at the site, and if so, we can do it then."


I told her that I just might not be quite what they're looking for since I had spent the war in a Jim Crow union hall filing cards, and that would make me more of a "Rosie-May" than a genuine "Rosie With Helmet and Welding Torch". "If you want my unvarnished report on the times, you're on. If not, you need to find yourself a flag waver." She said that she'd get back to me, but that while this was not the story she'd expected to find, it might be an even more important one to tell. "I'd like to talk with my producer and get back to you."

Ten minutes after she hung up, at around 9:00 on a Sunday morning(!), comes a call from the West Contra Costa Times wanting to do ... you' guessed it. Told him that -- if he had any questions -- I'd answer them now. We talked for about 15 minutes.

I'm concerned about getting myself identified as something that I'm distinctly not. I refused to be photographed with Mrs. Lynne Cheney while she was here on her book tour, and refused to attend the White House Reception two weeks ago. Not sure why the NPS continues to send the media to me, unless they agree that a dissonant voice is one of legitimacy and should be heard. I won't be used to bolster the image of Henry J, Kaiser, who didn't give a damn about bringing all those southerners (white and black) and then abandoning them at war's end to fend for themselves. He was into building ships, and social engineering was far from his mind, no more than an unintended consequence. That was a period when the country was still segregated and he imported segregation to the west coast where it had not yet become overt but lay dormant still. what happened here in those years may have accelerated the Civil Rights Revolution a decade later.. Guess I'm still angry about that.

Guess the ball's in MS-NBC's court. Will keep you posted. I've got to be a very small blip on their radar, and someone more in keeping with the goals of this weekend celebration may be a far better choice.

Tonight we go before the city council ...

to introduce to the community (meetings are televised) the first blush of our proposal for the Convention Center. The week has been spent trying to reach as many local leaders as possible in the hope that the support that we'll need to garner is really there. It looks hopeful.

Jennifer is carrying the lion's share of the work at this point since this phase draws upon her expertise far more than mine. Makes for some guilt feelings, but I'm fairly sure that this will change as we approach the next phase of activity.

This brings to mind that I've lived a lifetime of working over my head, and stretching mightily. The surprise has always been that, in time, there comes a sense of the "it" (whatever "it" is needed) has always been there to be tapped into. But that means that the cost is high in terms of energy dissipated in the attempts, and with a high anxiety level to overcome.

During those earlier times when I was in learning mode on the fifth floor offices at the Berkeley city hall, it was necessary to sit in on Planning Commission meetings, Public Works, Packet Sessions in preparation for council meetings (in order to prep our members). I was often lost. Being surrounded by people whose education and careers had been devoted to the work at hand made it possible for me to "catch" by osmosis knowledge that I'd not been privileged to own, nor had I needed. My experience in Project Community and life with Bill had prepared me to do that effectively, but there were surely gaps in performance.


Case in point:

When we (South Berkeley Housing Development Corporation) were working so hard to make our project compliant with our determination that all employment opportunities were open to the neighborhood people, I'd proposed that all of the demolition be done by local people. Thought this was an inspired notion since anybody could do this, right? There was an entire block of structures to be torn down and lots of idle hands with empty pockets to do it. It would mean that some laborers would have wages because of our good works on their behalf.

On the morning of the demolition, I stood dumbfounded as we watched two giant-clawed wrecking machines spend all of a few hours noisily chewing up every building in that block! Three huge trucks were busily hauling away the debris. The only human beings working were those drivers and a couple of men spraying water to keep the dust down. The technology involved bore no relation to the picture in my mind of human beings pulling apart those houses board-by-board and brick-by-brick for days if not weeks. None of those sessions in those city boardrooms had hinted at the scene before me. My knowledge base was completely irrelevant to the job at hand. This was as often true as not, and that recollection has kept me properly humble over the years since.

We'd also been very careful -- when time came for choosing the contractor/developer -- that affirmative action specifications were strictly adhered to. We'd sent out a Request for Proposals and had spent many days and weeks carefully reading each one in order to assure that this mandate was honored. How disillusioning to discover after the fact that many of those contractors were not local, but were from cities miles away. The common practice was to create (on paper only) a profile of a multi-racial work force by paying non-whites for the use of their names and pictures on their proposals. In some cases the same names of black or brown sub-contractors appeared on several different proposals. A complete distortion of the intent of the mandate.

When the construction work started, the contractor chosen was from a city in the far north of the state and every workman on the job was white. The proposal had cleverly masked this fact. This, in a black community with high unemployment. Not even the laborers who cleaned the site and hauled away debris were black. There were no black sub-contractors.

The community began to grow resentful and I knew it. The day came when a group of men came to me with an request that I join them to walk the construction site. The carpentry had been pretty well completed by then and the painters were beginning to turn up. There were a number of black painters in the neighborhood, so this could get ugly.

We walked back to my store after our brief tour. I got out some old posters and wood for making picket signs, and the men and I returned to protest this development. I was picketing my own dream! Shut it down! It was a pittance, but we succeeded in getting two laborers on the job, but only two. They were still no painters; union problems, doncha know... .

Found myself sitting on my own rage that day, lest I encourage trashing of the project we'd worked so hard to bring into being. But I wondered how often that buried rage was seen as passivity by the outside world? My inside view of that world assured me that the more appropriate word would have been "control." Low expectations better describes what it was like. Low expectations that led to a collective feeling of unworthiness, a feeling that pervades the black community without ever being recognized for what it is.


It was harder and harder to return home each night and into a unknowing world of white liberals whose life experience simply could not have prepared them to see what I was walking into every day. The disconnect followed me from hill to flatlands and back again, with the chasm between threatening to engulf me in the process.

THE BERKELEY VOICE
September 28, 1983


OPINION/COMMENTARY
GUEST COLUMN

By Betty Reid Soskin

As a member of the Ad Hoc Committee formed to study the feasibility of changing the name of Grove Street to Martin Luther King Way, I've watched with growing concern the misinformation and distortions carried by the press. In the interest of clarification may I submit the following:

First to those who have responded to the issue with, "I'm certainly not opposed to honoring Dr. King in some way --a park, an as yet unnamed public building, any other street, etc.," I would say: Grove Street was not idly chosen. The City of Berkeley holds a position in the world community as an international city -- the site of one of the world's great universities. In this important little city, Grove is the oldest main street; has the greatest diversity of architectural styles; a healthy socio-economic balance; ethnic diversity, holds the city's governmental buildings -- the only high school, the adult education complex and a number of churches - truly a representative 'community' street with an interesting balance of residential, commercial and governmental structures.

To the woman who called to say, "Who are YOU to want to change the name of MY street to anything?" We are a committee of Berkeleyans who are of all races and religions, homemakers, students of both the high school and the university, clergy and laypersons, business and professional people, public servants, yes, and politicians. We are young and old, Flatlands and Hill, Town and Gown. We are even a few children. And we are of the belief that if several thousand other Berkeleyans will join with us and sign a petition to change the name of Grove, that we are prepared to request the city council to honor that wish by voting the change.

(Even while writing the paragraph above I was aware of the world in microcosm. Would that we were wise enough to deal with the age-old question of territoriality more creatively; the privilege of the many vs. the rights of the few.)

For those who have said to me, "Berkeley has done that already ...look at King Junior High and Malcolm X schools," may I say: As one of the senior members of the committee I, too, often feel that "we've done that already" as I recall the pain of the Civil Rights Movement of the Sixties. Look around you folks. It simply didn't STAY done. Under the present administration most of the gains of the period are already lost and more erosion can be expected in light of the greater defense commitments and an ever-growing military budget. Social change is now the charge of a new generation of young leaders, some of whom were barely out of the womb when Dr. King was challenging the conscience of the world.

To the man who called to say, "...this is an ABC plot to disrupt the Grove Street residents" may I say: The Committee is unaffiliated with any of the political organizations in the city. There simply is no device for discovering just which committee member belongs to which political group. I do know that -- as interested citizens, from time to time, we've been visited by the mayor (BCA) some council members (both ABC and BCA), our police chief, high school principal, at least one member of our school board among others. We've tried hard to not become politicized -- and except for questionable reporting, we've succeeded fairly well.

To those who approve the name change on the basis that, "...Those poor Black people don't ask for much and this would be a nice thing for US to do for THEM," may I say: Dr. King is far larger than Black. He is larger than 'American' -- of world stature. His Nobel Peace Prize attests to that most eloquently. He is a leader in the tradition of Lincoln, Jefferson, Henry David Thoreau and Ghandi. He was a continuing influence on men like the late President Anwar Sadat and Nelson Mandela. Behind the Iron Curtain,in Hungary, five Baptist churches are named in his memory. Streets and highways have been named for him in many countries and several American cities.

My personal reasons for participating in this project are simple. I fully approved the idea when first presented. Dr. King has been my personal hero for many reasons for many years, however, I would have settled for the process. How exciting to use it as a vehicle for bringing those powerful speeches out again -- whether or not the street actually got re-named. This was in the spring. In June my motivation was irrevokably altered.

I'd recently discovered while rummaging in the back of my store -- two 3-record boxed sets containing "The Wisdom of Dr. Martin Luther King" and "The Wisdom of Malcom X," the complete collected speeches of the two great leaders. I could hardly wait to present them as auction items for the KQED-TV (PBS) annual fund drive. They were beautifully packaged with lifelike portraits of each man depicted in full color on the covers. As I sat filling out the donor forms a mature (white) female volunteer sat studying the albums before her -- and -- after gently reminding me that the value of my gift had to exceed fifty dollars (I assured her that they were to be given in pairs, a $60 value), she continued to look dubious and asked, "is it good blues?" I felt a deep embarrassment for her that continued through the drive home.

Racism? Perhaps, but that's too easy. Ignorance? Certainly to some degree. Time? Yes. Time enough for the oily film of stereotypic memory to cloud over the identities of the two powerful leaders who'd shaken the rafters of the nation and the world in their time. Had they now morphed into the faces of Nat King Cole, Paul Robeson, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, or B.B. King, perhaps?


My day started much as yours with a shattering, "...the U.S navy today shelled the coastline of Lebanon..." The commentator briefly spoke of "stepped-up fighting between Iran and Iraq." My memory was jarred to recalling my city's role in the overthrow of the Shah -- Iranian students educated at Berkeley figuring heavily in the hostage drama. Found myself wondering if folks in other lands connected us with the birth of the atom bomb? With Edward Teller and David McMillan -- Lawrence Laboratories and Los Alamos?

Beginning to notice, again, a kind of numbness growing out of my inability to absorb the onslaught of yet another list of terrifying developments. Assassination in the Philipines -- a civilian 747 blasted out of the sky -- and that invisible part of myself that steps outside of my body for brief periods to watch all that "stuff go by" -- as if I'm not really involved at all. I believe Bill called it Samsara.

One quotation cuts through the numbness like a scalpel:

"Either we will learn to live together as brothers, or we will surely perish together as fools."

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

O that we could be reminded of that quotation each time we enter Grove street from any direction! To be reminded that we will surely perish even as 'brothers' if we continue to allow 'fools' to move us ever closer and ultimately beyond the edge of existence.



Spring, 2004:

Iraq again in the news with another Bush at the helm of the Ship of State... The more things change, the more they remain the same... .

Summer 1983 ... .

Early in my changing role from university administrative staff member to South Berkeley merchant, while still enjoying dual status in both worlds, I played an active role in the powerful leader Carol Sibley's political organization, ABC. Carol was very active in university issues and at a meeting asked if any among us would be willing to work with a campus African American student organization in an effort to re-name Grove Street -- a main artery connecting the cities of Oakland and Berkeley. If their work was successful, it was to become Martin Luther King Way. One other ABC member joined me in agreeing to take this on. This was precisely the kind of project that I needed for my own organizing purposes.

In one of those pillow talks with Bill, I'd clarified for myself (with his Plato-esque help, of course) that what was desperately needed was a plan with short term goals, something highly achievable. The problem of reclaiming our community would continue to be overwhelming without such a strategy. In my "500 ft." community there lacked any sense of empowerment. The percentage of unemployed was totally off the charts, something like 40% so most were living on welfare. The growing dependence upon the underground economy fueled by the drug trade and minor vice was even then, quite stunning. There was so little to build upon. Faith in the electoral process had eroded to the point of non-existence.

Our meetings with the Black Students Convocation began shortly thereafter, and my plan began to take shape. It would be important to my purposes to not have this change come as the result of an edict from the city council, but through a several month's petition drive so that people could buy in, individually, to the name change. It should take no more than 90 days, as I saw it, in order to meet my criteria for "short term." The students were in agreement. They were wonderful to work with, filled with idealism and enough memory of Dr. King and his work to give the honor substance.

In less than the three months allotted, we produced over 8,000 signatures, and no little controversy! There were those who were going to be clearly impacted by the name change, merchants who would now have to change all of their print materials. That was to be anticipated. The debate in the press was contentious and constant, but we made our arguments well and stood our ground. There were those who wanted to honor Dr. King, but "...why not some building?" The debate was activist Berkeley at its best.

On the shop counter I kept a clipboard with petitions attached (had delivered petitions to all of the merchants in our community). What I needed was for folks to make a demand of the city and have it positively responded to in a short time frame in order to prepare us for greater demands in the future. It worked magnificently, and eventually led to the redevelopment of the neighborhood.

One day a very drunk and dirty older man staggered into the store asking about the petitions. I handed him the clipboard and a pen and watched as he laboriously "drew" his name taking up at least three lines in the process. He then staggered out pleased with himself. Imagine my surprise when -- two days later this same man almost unrecognizably cleaned and starched and completely sober returned to the store. He asked if he could have the clipboard and some petitions. I gave him the supplies and watched him walk away to stand for the rest of the day, two blocks away, on the busy corner of Ashby Avenue and Sacramento Street aggressively collecting signatures from all who passed by or slowed to a stop at the signal light. Another small miracle. The power of Dr. King remained a potent element in the black community. One could only guess at what strengths his name would lend to our efforts at reclaiming this neighborhood. The strategy worked undeniably well.

Oddly enough, the organization (ABC - All Berkeley Coalition) began to lose its sense of purpose as it became clear that the petition drive just might be successful and that the name of Grove Street might actually be changed. The organization obviously had not believed in the possibility that we could actually pull this off. The pressure from the merchants and the more affluent upper Grove street residents were having an effect. I was ordered by the group to cease and desist any further activity on behalf of the university students and flatly refused to do so. Our friend, President Carol Sibley, actually rose to speak against the ordinance at the crowning council meeting and I was forced to defy her publicly. I wrote and delivered the justification paper and received a standing ovation before a crowd so large that it had to be moved that evening in a march through the streets from council chambers at city hall to a public building some six blocks away as ordered by the fire chief!

There hangs on my wall as I'm typing this entry -- an OpEd piece written for the local newspaper at the time. It was processed into permanent form, placed on a plaque and presented to me by the students when our work was done. If there's time later, I'll re-print it here. It tells the story well, I think. That issue, early on in the process moved me into the rival political group, BCA (Berkeley Citizens Action), the more liberal political organization in the city. Bill's university friends (and mine at the time) were far more conservative than life in the flatlands of Berkeley would allow me to be. The gap was growing wider, and I was being drawn deeper and deeper into black life -- both on and off campus -- and away from the Academy. In many ways I was desperately trying to remain on that bridge between, but losing ground with each day.

The attainment of short-term achievable goals served to set the pattern for the beginning of positive change in our community. No longer would I think in the general terms of replacing racial bigotry with true democracy -- instead I'd apply my logic in brief steps over brief periods and allow myself to be satisfied with incremental change. To do otherwise would be to become paralyzed in a hopeless struggle against the monster of continuing segregation patterns with no end in sight. I, too, needed short term achievable goals. Trusting that ABC's unquestionably strong political power was well-intentioned was a mistake in judgment. Their initial support of the students was in keeping with their mission statement. However, when student success loomed into sight, they caved in to the maintaining of the status quo, and abandoned their original admirable intent. A pattern to be witnessed and responded to repeatedly in the decades ahead.



Back to the Future:

In a way, there are whispers of those lessons learned back then in my recent walking away from a position as field representative for a member of the California State Assembly. Having developed highly sensitive BS indicators under tremendous pressures under real life circumstances, my response to hypocrisy is hair-triggered. I've as often as not acted impulsively at such times, though rarely have I regretted my actions. Intuition has proven to be the finest arrow in my quiver.

But there's my mortgage payment still waiting to be sent ... and the realization that in walking away with a mere three months to retirement was a high cost to pay for principle ... .

Why am I hesitating to liquidate my IRA? Is this not retirement, in a sense?

Attended a meeting this day for the Just Cause Initiative ...

being sponsored by a coalition of community groups that came into being about five years ago as Richmond Vision-2000. As field rep for State Assemblywoman Dion Aroner, I'd been a member of the original steering committee. Have continued to participate, but over the past several months -- since leaving my position as a member of her successor's staff -- have dropped away. It seemed important to give my successor (field rep) space to create her own identity in this important group. It was interesting to climb back into the saddle again. Felt the old excitement at being among creative dedicated thinkers. I'm always energized by activists, and these are the best.

While driving to the center of town I noticed a group of young Latino youth huddled together on a street corner and recalled the day when I lost the fear of youthful loiterers and reclaimed territory in South Berkeley.



Summer 1978-80:

It was a warm Saturday mid-morning. I was on the return trip from the bank where I'd gone to pick up change for the weekend. The distance is but a short ten blocks through a residential area and a drive past a school soon to be named named Malcolm X Elementary. As I was passing the school, a pack of about a dozen young black youth were suddenly thundering down upon me in the middle of the street -- on a collision course with my car! Some were bare to the waist, some wearing head rags. I caught it all as an impression since there was time for little else. Fully expecting a hail of bullets to spray my car in the next instant, I caught sight of an intersection just ahead and instinctively wheeled about crazily to get out of their way and my certain death! Just as I was screeching around the turn, out of the corner of my eye I caught the sight of a football streaking through the air and a hand reaching up to catch it! I stopped -- hitting the curb and some bushes clumsily and -- as I did so -- in a cold sweat heard myself laughing crazily! I'd bought it all. I'd been had by the media. These were kids, kids like my own. And this is what they were first of all. That they might also be gang members or drug dealers or anything else came second. I'd allowed my reality to be defined by images on television. This day I knew that the right to define reality was mine alone, and that it was within my power to do so. I, alone, would define my world.

Some weeks later, on a very hot summer day, I arrived from my daily visit to Music People in Emeryville where I'd done my wholesale buying for the weekend. I noticed the five or six dealers who'd taken up my corner and who occupied the bus bench that was so precariously sitting 18 inches from my 8' plate glass windows (this was before I was successful in getting it removed). I was tired and annoyed that I had to park illegally (no loading zone), carry the heavy cartons into the store in dribbles because I couldn't handle much weight. Because of their presence, it was necessary to lock my car with each trip and then repeat the process over and over again until all had been delivered inside. Energized by PMS(!) this was the day that I walked up to the gang, pointed to the corner across the street, and with hands on hips and honest outrage screamed, "y'all just get yourselves away from here. Now!!! This instant!" "This is MY corner!" To my utter surprise the obvious leader of the group dropped his head and said, "Yes Maam." And off they went, never to darken my corner again.

When I got inside, Rick, who'd watched the skirmish from just inside the store said, "Mom, how could you? Those kids are surely armed. That's crazy!" Then, with obvious admiration he added, "good show!" With mission accomplished and the memory of that football vignette, it occurred to me these youngsters (no longer thought of as drug dealers) knew how to handle cops and parole officers, but they didn't have a clue about what to do with an angry Momma! I'd declared turf and they could respect that. From that day forward, I took the time to greet them on the street and ask about those who might be missing from on any given day. Learned to not ask names, but to identify each in my own way, "...where's Red Pants today?" In this way we began to establish ties. They would talk with me easily about someone who may have been picked up by the police over the weekend, and I would send greetings. I learned much later that I, too, had a street name -- but I never learned what it was. That's probably just as well.

I can recall attending community meetings (regularly held when election time was nearing) where the police would invite discussions about the drug problems. One day I stood up and said, "...you know, those guys you know as the "Kingpin," or "Street Warriors" and "Perps" I know as "Mother Johnson's grandson" or "Ms. Jackson's son-in-law." I remember telling them that these were OUR children, and not some invading outside force, and that I couldn't understand why resources weren't being provided for them beside jail cells. I knew that a youngster I'd been watching grow up far too fast -- had been pushed out of the nest when his mother could no longer collect money for his support through welfare. This, in order to have enough resources to support his younger siblings. He was by then living in an old car out on the Berkeley Marina and selling drugs in order to survive. They lived next door to my store and were a part of my 500 ft. territory now, and mine to care about.

There was a bus stop directly across the broad street from our shop. As the days began to grow dark, I could see those young men move into position -- near the bus stop -- and watch over me and my store until it was time to close up. It was not out of the ordinary to have one or two cross over to walk me to my car. There was rarely if ever any sign of graffiti to be seen on my building and when there was, it was pretty clear that someone from outside the community was the culprit. I kept a gallon can of matching paint behind my counter and would immediately paint over any markings myself, within plain view of everyone on the street. On more than one occasion, some youngster would cross over -- take the brush from my hand and complete the job.

The day came some years later when two of these same young men were registering voters at a table in my stairwell. I'd asked them to do this and was amazed to see them arrived at ten o'clock on that morning dressed neatly in slacks, white shirts with ties, to man a registration table. Their respect for the process was touching. They remained in the stairwell for most of the morning, but eventually took to walking up and the down the streets in the latter part of the day. When they came to turn in their clipboards there were scarcely a dozen forms attached. I'd seen how easily they'd approached others, and had no idea of why this would be. There also were no cards for the two of them. The explanation was soon obvious. Neither could vote because they'd been disenfranchised by felony convictions involving drug violations. This was true of a high percentage of people in this community. A few ounces of crack cocaine could bring a felony conviction (the drug of choice for African Americans). A bagful of powdered coke has rarely if ever brought a felony conviction for a White user/abuser. Congress has failed in every attempt at equalizing justice on this issue, and the prisons are bursting with non-white offenders unlucky enough to be caught and convicted.

My naivete was embarrassing. It was a lesson learned that I've never forgotten. The Black Vote was disappearing through clever use of inequitable sentencing practices involving crack and powdered cocaine. That was at least 30 years ago. The corrections have never been made. I once asked online if anyone could tell me what percentage of non-whites in this country were no longer able to vote for these reasons. An answer came back from someone who'd been researching the problem. "The number is now equivalent to the population of Scotland." That was about ten years ago, long before the happenings that accompanied the Bush rise to power through manipulation of the Florida electoral process.

Stopped by the shop the other day, (son, David, is now sole proprietor). He told me that Charles, one of the street kids of those years, dropped by to say hello. He's since traveled to and lived in many places in the world and is a total success story in mainstream American. He's a business man with pride and stability. His family must still have a home in the Hood. Wish I'd had a chance to see him. Many of those kids are undoubtedly long since dead or incarcerated, but there are the Charles's who survived and were able to sustain enough of an existence to overcome and to become contributing members of society. Those survivors have great stories to tell.

Wish I knew some of their tales to share. Most such stories are now only available to us through the poetry of the times, but if you listen closely -- they're being clearly and dramatically sung and danced and rapped wherever young people congregate.

They're there to be witnessed, by those sensitive enough, open enough, and willing enough to hear ... .

Shades of the past ... .

Jennifer Ross and I met yesterday with two members of the Richmond city council. We made our presentation on the proposal we're honing for a hearing before that body in mid-June. The reviews were mixed, I think. They seemed to be persuaded by our enthusiasm, but underwhelmed by what they saw as our lack of awareness about the difficulties we would surely be facing in this financial and political climate.

To date we've met with the original city manager who has since retired in a surprise move (for health reasons). Since that time we've met with his replacement -- one of his assistant city managers who has since been replaced by another interim city manager who has already announced his intention of leaving in August. On Monday of this week we met with the man who was recently named as head of the Division of Parks and Recreation -- but who will replace the assistant-assistant interim city manager who is leaving to complete his doctorate after a trip to Paris in August! (Got all that?)

In addition, the present city council that has numbered 9 (by charter) will be reduced by 2 due to a sudden move caused by political pressure from the State to do so. That means that -- with 5 of the 9 up for re-election -- and the 5-7 other wannabees challenging them for the seats being vacated -- only three will be voted in. It will be a fiercely fought struggle for power in a city in complete chaos!

The city is facing a 35 million dollar budget deficit that has caused the lay-offs of 200 members of city staff. The climate is hostile and growing meaner by the day.

Into this miserable civic mess leaps Betty Soskin and Jennifer Ross of About Face Consulting, seeking to take over the management of the Civic Center Auditorium -- a facility that the redevelopment agency is looking at as a possible means for raising much-needed revenue. We're pushing arts & culture in a time when others are thinking World Wide Wrestling and indoor flea market - five days a week! This is literally what is being considered. You might call this pushing the river.


Back to 1978:

I'm situated in a crime-ridden poverty-stricken community with the powers that be telling me day after day that change would be impossible. "We cannot insure either your life or your property." And, "...we need neighborhoods like this so that when crimes happen in other parts of town, we know where to pick up the culprit." "Give up. Shut this down." And, from my friends on campus, "...how can you possibly expect to change what decades -- centuries -- has wrought?" From Bill, "Betty, significant social change is only measurable in decades; and sometimes centuries. Your idealistic attempts at chasing the sirens and trying to disarm the bad folks simply cannot happen on the timespan you've chosen for yourself." My response, "I know that social change takes decades to produce, but if you didn't have the Fannylou Hamers and the Rosa Parkses, and yes, the Betty Soskins out there -- in the short term -- chasing the sirens and disarming the bad guys -- there would be no social change for you social scientist types to measure!" As you can see, there are times when a mere doctorate is simply no match for ghetto logic (grin).

It took 7 years and pushing the project past the point of no return through 3 administrations, but in that 7th year it happened. On the 3000 block of Sacramento Street in South Berkeley, on the block that was the site of 1 quarter of the city's homicides in 1978, there now stands 41 units of attractive market rate housing and a community room for the tenants. The whore houses and "shooting galleries" are gone, but so is the Larks Club, Q Martin's barbershop, Jimmy Wiggins' dry cleaners, the pool hall and -- saddest of all -- the home that Q built years before with his own hands. All were bought out and all in the name of progress. Those who were property owners with legitimate claims were relocated and paid adequately for their homes. We discovered in the process that many of the homes and shanties on that block (on the residential side of Stanton Street) were occupied by squatters. The old house immediately across the street and that housed much of the illegal activity, had been long ago taken over by drug dealers who dared the rightful owners to try to collect rent. Those legal owners wanting to return were promised occupancy in the new homes, if they wished. In all, the city poured 8 and a half million dollars into that project, a signficant amount in terms of the times.

But that's how the story ended. The 7-year process leading to that end was anything if not problem-ridden. It wasn't a cake walk, but there were as many rewards as disasters, and many true friends made along the way. Many of those most heavily impacted by change were also those who participated in the achieving of it. This was the miracle that few suspected could be; the willingness of the few to sublimate their own needs to the welfare of the many. That is the soul of community, and being witness to this has served me well. In a place where need was so great and where there was so little to be shared, there exists nonetheless a quality of selflessness that cuts across everything. I'd seen little of this phenomenon either in suburban living or within the ivied walls of the university. Being a "Have not" breeds its own kind of awareness of the need to share. This was where I first began to understand that respect is learned through being respected, and rarely otherwise. I learned that love sanitizes the other side of the apple shared.

Once I laboriously learned what it was through my work at city hall, I was able to form and maintain a Housing Development Corporation through which the Byron Rumford Homes were created. The Corporation was made up of community people who learned the process right along with me, and together, we were able to bring that project into being -- from the clearing of the site, the choosing of the architect and developers, to the grand-opening a year later.


Back to 2004:

Yesterday we learned from the two council members we met with that the union's position was going to be a roadblock that we may not be able to overcome. After all, SIEU and 790 had just been severely pink-slipped and had taken a heavy hit with the workforce now having suffered two rounds in the layoffs over the past month -- with another coming soon.

Today we sat with our friends at the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts -- a 35 year-old institution that has seen recent 50% cuts in both its budget (down from an annual budget of 2 million to one) and a 50% cut in staff. It was all we could do to hold their attention as Jennifer slogged through our proposal. We were seeking their support in our effort to begin to bring together the arts elements now existing in the community -- under the roof of the convention center and its related facilities. The message seems to be "it can't be done." "The economic climate is too weak at this time."

I figure it's gonna take a bit more than my 500 ft. strategy to pull this off, maybe 650 ft. (given the gradual upgrade of my personal power over the years), but a look back at that other impossible dream gives me hope. Now I'm needing to give Jennifer a call and try to revive her spirits. after all, she didn't share the experience of the Byron Rumford Homes miracle. She isn't aware yet that "can't" is simply one more four letter word.

Oh to be fifty again!

For fear of leaving the impression ...

that I felt in any way capable of what I was embarking on, be it known that doubt plagued every step. I remember standing in the middle of that store on that first morning, quaking in fear and starting with each new street noise. Had no idea where this would take me or whether I was in any way up to the task -- but I did know that long years before -- in 1945 -- I'd stood behind the counter in a makeshift work space in a converted garage with a cigar box for my receipts and orange crates to hold the stock and that we'd survived. That was only some 100 feet away in the duplex next door. This building had been constructed in 1964 and was luxurious in comparison to those days. What could I do now with a real display cases for inventory, a commercial cash register that gave receipts and a custom-built counter to stand behind? In those days I'd served our customers through a window cut in the wall of the garage. This was a huge step up from the early days (1945). All that was missing was my youth and sense of daring. The neighborhood at that time was safe and the clientele easy to please. The prognosis should be far better under these circumstances, despite the awfulness that lay just outside the front door in the form of the drug trade. Others managed to cope with it; could I? Could I be tough enough?

After all, the people in this community lived on welfare for the most part and coped with uncertainty to a degree that I could only guess at. When night came, I climbed into my late model Toyota and headed back through the campus and into the hills to look down on the romantic lights of the city while eating quiche and sipping white wine! These families stayed behind in this fear and longing with the sounds of gunshots ringing throughout many a night. There was no respite for them. I was only a daytime warrior with a pass if I needed one. How well I could keep my eyes on the prize and tenaciously hold on to my purpose would determine whether I could make this work.


Among the social and political groups that I belonged to, was ABC (can't recall what those letters stand for). It suffices to say that there were two very active political groups in Berkeley at that time. Both would be considered liberal with one a bit farther Left than the other. I knew of no conversative activists within the city limits. ABC was the more conservative and was the one led by Ms. Carol Sibley, dear friend of Bill's and mine, and co-sponsor of the busing plan that brought school integration to Berkeley. Carol was a community leader by anyone's standards. Her co-sponsor on the busing plan was Bill's best friend from their days in Washington, Leonard Duhl, of the School of Public Health at the University.

During that time I was working hard to bring whatever influence I could from the Hills to the Flatlands and to the South Berkeley community where I now spent my days. It was to Carol that I turned for help with my growing conflict with the tenant from my second floor offices. I was more and more certain that he might be involved in less than legal activities. My fear of him was growing with each day. A female member of his staff had come downstairs to speak with me in private only that week, and confirmed my suspicions. I also knew of his strong city hall connections.

Carol listened intently and then said, "...I understand, Betty, I'll invite my friend Shirley to lunch with the two of us to talk about this -- before the week is over." Her friend was a member of the Berkeley City Council, and had recently announced her intention of running for mayor in the upcoming election. This should be most helpful.

As promised, within a few days the three of us met over a fine lunch in Carol's luxurious Japanese-style custom-designed home just north of the campus -- (dining on Imari, of course) -- and I told my tale of woe to her friend. She was silent for a moment and then said, "... Frank Davis is a leader in that community, and can deliver the vote down there. I see no reason to do anything to block his efforts." I was shocked! I'd been very candid in my plea to her. I was literally living in fear and desperately needed her help. She simply said "no." This man was her key to the black vote, or so she believed.

It was in the hours that followed that political Betty Reid Soskin was born. I drove back to South Berkeley, angry and hurt. I drove up and down Sacramento Street noticing the many Shirley Dean signs in the windows of every little business along the way. Drove back to downtown Berkeley to the headquarters of her rival in the mayor's race, Gus Newport, and picked up as many signs as I could carry. Returned to South Berkeley and started at one end of my six block small business community -- walked into each business, introduced myself to the proprietor, and asked permission to place a Newport sign in his/her window. Each in turn granted permission. I had soon covered the neighborhood with those signs certain that I'd done the job well. I was a woman on a mission.

The next morning as I was driving to work, it was clear that things had changed. Every single sign had been removed and in its place was a large Shirley Dean poster. Frank Davis had moved in and taken over. He'd staked his territory and I was no part of it. This was his declaration of turf.

When questioned (and I did walk the streets again, asking what had happened) there were signs of intimidation everywhere. People were apologetic, but clearly wanted no part of a fight over a political issues in which few felt they had any claim.

I returned to the Newport headquarters for more signs. Came back to my building with a newly purchased heavy duty stapling gun and plastered signs everywhere that I could reach -- in the windows, on the stairwell, across the front and on the sides of the building. I was a veritable Newport signboard! Mine was the only location in all of that community where Gus's signs were posted. Since this was a black community and Gus was African American while Ms. Dean was white, the undercurrent of intrigue was almost palpable. It was no accident that not one single sign was removed from my building during this battle of wits. The guys on the street were clearly watching over me. My tenant had to walk through that phalanx of Newport signs to reach his upstairs office. It was war!

A few weeks later when the elections were held, my candidate won with a strong majority, and the precinct where we had stood our ground gave him a great victory. It was also true that where I lived high in the hills, Dean signs were everywhere. The Newport signs on our home fence were rare in our neighborhood, so the huge victory citywide came as a surprise.

This was the beginning of my association with city hall. It was only a short time in Gus's term of office before the city received a HUD grant to do 61 units of scattered site low-income homes and I was named by the mayor to serve on the committee to select those sites. From that -- from my attorney, Don Jelinek, who was elected to the city council in the same election cycle -- I accepted a position as legislative aide, working part time at city hall. It was in that role that I began to learn how things get done in cities, for the purposes of designing my strategies for South Berkeley. I worked with him for two terms and accomplished a great deal with his help. This meant splitting my days between our store and city hall. I'd inherited two employees and the off-and-on-when-he-was-sober help from Rick, so it was possible to do both. The store was able to support only three small salaries, but since I wasn't dependent upon the shop for my support, it worked out reasonably well. It required an outside job to support my business. We'd never have made it without that effort. I also needed my outside social connections in order to do the job of community organizing that must be done if my agenda was to be carried out at all. I had a business to support and an environment to dramatically change -- if this was going to work. This I could not expect Bill to participate in.

The store was all there was left of the estate that Mel and I had intended to create for our children. He'd given 35 years of his life to the effort, and was no longer able to contribute. He'd actually lost most of it over time and I found it was up to me to try to reconstruct as much our family assets as was possible in the years I had left. This situation was a carryover from my first marriage. I was fortunate to have married someone who understood this driving need and who was willing to allow me the time to do that. To ask more of him would have been beyond reason. This responsibility was mine alone.

The demands placed upon our marriage began to threaten its stability. Bill made several trips to India that I was unable to join him in. He went as far as Ladahk, on the Tibetan border at one point - and I didn't. We had less and less to share as time wore on. There were events and journeys that drew him away that I either couldn't or wouldn't participate in with him. I suffered from emotional and physical fatigue much of the time and was distracted by a world that he neither understood nor wanted to share. He'd married me -- not my family or my former life. He had never been a father, so was barely able to connect with my sons except in a very formal manner. There was rarely need to since they were now off on their own. I missed them. Dorian was living at St. Vincents, a fine boarding school in Santa Barbara. I missed her. My parents were aging and I was their caretaker, their lifeline, as I was Mel's. I loved them all. The marriage was beginning to unravel -- but it would be years yet until the end would come. We worked valiantly to keep it alive. He became more and more deeply invested in Tibetan Buddhist studies as I became more and more African-American identified and absorbed in the business of creating social change.

Transitions are painful, but they're also the places where growth occurs and where life becomes more precious... .