PITTBIRD PUBLIC DEFENDER...GET OFF "DONOR" DEATH ROW...A CALL FOR JUSTICE...412-471-1024...ZAPPALA's GENOCIDE OF POOR FOR ORGANS...LE-JIT FISHING KITE BELLEVUE 15202...Text 412-313-3080...PITTSBURGH JITNEY FOR LIFE...412-471-1024...PUBLIC DEFENDER... PUBLIC DEFENDER ON "DONOR" DEATH ROW... National Association for the Advancement of Colored People hides MASS GENOCIDE FOR ORGANS...MURDER FOR ORGANS UP ROCKEFELLER'S ASS...THE KITE RUNNER From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search Page semi-protected National Association for the Advancement of Colored People aacplogo.png Abbreviation NAACP Formation February 12, 1909 Purpose "To ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination." Headquarters Baltimore, Maryland Membership 300,000[1] Chairwoman Roslyn Brock President/CEO Cornell William Brooks Budget $27,624,433[2] Website naacp.org African American topics History[show] Culture[show] Religion[show] Political movements[show] Civic / economic groups[show] Sports[show] Ethnic subdivisions[show] Languages[show] Diaspora[show] Lists[show] Category: African American Portal icon African American portal v · t · e The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is an African-American civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909.[3] Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination".[4] Its name, retained in accordance with tradition, uses the once common term colored people. The NAACP bestows the annual Image Awards for achievement in the arts and entertainment, and the annual Spingarn Medals for outstanding positive achievement of any kind, on deserving black Americans. It has its headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland.[5] Contents [hide] 1 Organization 2 Predecessor: The Niagara Movement 3 History 3.1 Formation 3.2 Anti-lynching campaigns 3.3 Jim Crow and disfranchisement 3.4 Legal Defense Fund 3.5 Desegregation 3.6 The 1990s 3.7 Lee Alcorn controversy 3.8 George W. Bush 3.9 Tax exempt status 3.10 LGBT rights 4 Current activities 4.1 Youth 4.1.1 Youth & College Division 4.1.2 ACT-SO program 5 Criticism 6 See also 7 References 8 Further reading 9 External links 9.1 Archives Organization The NAACP's headquarters is in Baltimore, with additional regional offices in California, New York, Michigan, Colorado, Georgia, Texas and Maryland.[6] Each regional office is responsible for coordinating the efforts of state conferences in the states included in that region. Local, youth, and college chapters organize activities for individual members. In the U.S., the NAACP is administered by a 64-member board, led by a chairperson. The board elects one person as the president and one as chief executive officer for the organization; Benjamin Jealous is its most recent (and youngest) President, selected to replace Bruce S. Gordon, who resigned in March 2007. Civil Rights Movement activist and former Georgia State Senator Julian Bond was chairman until replaced in February 2010 by health-care administrator Roslyn Brock.[7] Departments within the NAACP govern areas of action. Local chapters are supported by the 'Branch and Field Services' department and the 'Youth and College' department. The 'Legal' department focuses on court cases of broad application to minorities, such as systematic discrimination in employment, government, or education. The Washington, D.C., bureau is responsible for lobbying the U.S. government, and the Education Department works to improve public education at the local, state and federal levels. The goal of the Health Division is to advance health care for minorities through public policy initiatives and education. As of 2007, the NAACP had approximately 425,000 paying and non-paying members.[8] In 2011, the NAACP teamed up with the digital repository ProQuest to digitize and host the NAACP's archives, which includes over 2 million pages of "internal memos, legal briefings and direct action summaries from national, legal and branch offices throughout the country — charts NAACP's work and delivers a first-hand view into crucial issues: lynching, school desegregation, and discrimination in the military, the criminal justice system, employment, and housing, among others."[9] Modules are being added on a continual basis, with the NAACP Papers: Special Subjects being released in March 2014.[10] Predecessor: The Niagara Movement In 1905, a group of thirty-two prominent African-American leaders met to discuss the challenges facing people of color and possible strategies and solutions. They were particularly concerned by the Southern states' disfranchisement of blacks starting with Mississippi's passage of a new constitution in 1890. Through the early 1900s, legislatures dominated by white Democrats ratified new constitutions and laws creating barriers to voter registration and more complex election rules. Black voter registration and turnout dropped markedly in the South as a result. Men who had been voting for thirty years in the South were told they did not "qualify" to register. Because hotels in the U.S. were segregated, the men convened in Canada at the Erie Beach Hotel[11] on the Canadian side of the Niagara River in Fort Erie, Ontario. As a result, the group came to be known as the Niagara Movement. A year later, three whites joined the group: journalist William E. Walling, social worker Mary White Ovington, and social worker Henry Moskowitz, then Associate Leader of the New York Society for Ethical Culture. They met in 1906 at Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, and in 1907 in Boston, Massachusetts.[12] The fledgling group struggled for a time with limited resources and internal conflict, and disbanded in 1910.[13] Seven of the members of the Niagara Movement joined the Board of Directors of the NAACP, founded in 1909.[12] Although both organizations shared membership and overlapped for a time, the Niagara Movement was a separate organization. Historically it is considered to have had a more radical platform than the NAACP. The Niagara Movement was formed exclusively by African Americans. The meeting that inspired the NAACP included three European Americans. History Crystal Clear app kedit.svg This section may need to be rewritten entirely to comply with Wikipedia's quality standards. You can help. The discussion page may contain suggestions. (January 2012) See also: African-American–Jewish relations ormation Founders of the NAACP: Moorfield Storey, Mary White Ovington and W.E.B. Du Bois. The Race Riot of 1908 in Abraham Lincoln's hometown of Springfield, Illinois, had highlighted the urgent need for an effective civil rights organization in the U.S. This event is often cited as the catalyst for the formation of the NAACP. Mary White Ovington, journalist William English Walling and Henry Moskowitz met in New York City in January 1909 and the NAACP was born.[14] Solicitations for support went out to more than 60 prominent Americans, and a meeting date was set for February 12, 1909. This was intended to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the birth of President Abraham Lincoln, who emancipated enslaved African Americans. While the meeting did not take place until three months later, this date is often cited as the founding date of the organization. The NAACP was founded on February 12, 1909, by a diverse group composed of W. E. B. Du Bois, Ida B. Wells, Archibald Grimké, Henry Moskowitz, Mary White Ovington, Oswald Garrison Villard, William English Walling (the last son of a former slave-holding family),[14][15] Florence Kelley, a social reformer and friend of Du Bois,[16] and Charles Edward Russell, a renowned muckraker and close friend of Walling who helped plan the NAACP and served as acting chairman of the National Negro Committee (1909), a forerunner to the NAACP.[17] On May 30, 1909, the Niagara Movement conference took place at New York City's Henry Street Settlement House, from which an organization of more than 40 individuals emerged, calling itself the National Negro Committee. Du Bois played a key role in organizing the event and presided over the proceedings. Also in attendance was African-American journalist and anti-lynching crusader Ida B. Wells-Barnett. At its second conference on May 30, 1910, members chose as the organization's name the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and elected its first officers, who were:[18] National President, Moorfield Storey, Boston Chairman of the Executive Committee, William English Walling Treasurer, John E. Milholland (a Lincoln Republican and Presbyterian from New York City and Lewis, NY) Disbursing Treasurer, Oswald Garrison Villard Executive Secretary, Frances Blascoer Director of Publicity and Research, Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois. The NAACP was incorporated a year later in 1911. The association's charter delineated its mission: To promote equality of rights and to eradicate caste or race prejudice among the citizens of the United States; to advance the interest of colored citizens; to secure for them impartial suffrage; and to increase their opportunities for securing justice in the courts, education for the children, employment according to their ability and complete equality before law. The conference resulted in a more influential and diverse organization, where the leadership was predominantly white and heavily Jewish American. In fact, at its founding, the NAACP had only one African American on its executive board, Du Bois himself. It did not elect a black president until 1975, although executive directors had been African-American. The Jewish community contributed greatly to the NAACP's founding and continued financing. Jewish historian Howard Sachar writes in his book A History of Jews in America of how, "In 1914, Professor Emeritus Joel Spingarn of Columbia University became chairman of the NAACP and recruited for its board such Jewish leaders as Jacob Schiff, Jacob Billikopf, and Rabbi Stephen Wise."[19] Early Jewish-American co-founders included Julius Rosenwald, Lillian Wald, Rabbi Emil G. Hirsch and Wise. According to Pbs.org "Over the years Jews have also expressed empathy (capability to share and understand another's emotion and feelings) with the plight of Blacks. In the early 20th century, Jewish newspapers drew parallels between the Black movement out of the South and the Jews' escape from Egypt, pointing out that both Blacks and Jews lived in ghettos, and calling anti-Black riots in the South "pogroms". Stressing the similarities rather than the differences between the Jewish and Black experience in America, Jewish leaders emphasized the idea that both groups would benefit the more America moved toward a society of merit, free of religious, ethnic and racial restrictions."[20] Pbs.org further states, "The American Jewish Committee, the American Jewish Congress, and the Anti-Defamation League were central to the campaign against racial prejudice. Jews made substantial financial contributions to many civil rights organizations, including the NAACP, the Urban League, the Congress of Racial Equality, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. About 50 percent of the civil rights attorneys in the South during the 1960s were Jews, as were over 50 percent of the Whites who went to Mississippi in 1964 to challenge Jim Crow Laws."[20] As a member of the Princeton chapter of the NAACP, Albert Einstein corresponded with Du Bois, and in 1946 Einstein called racism "America's worst disease".[21][22] Du Bois continued to play a pivotal role in the organization and served as editor of the association's magazine, The Crisis, which had a circulation of more than 30,000. Moorfield Storey, who was white, was the president of the NAACP from its founding to 1915. Storey was a long-time classical liberal and Grover Cleveland Democrat who advocated laissez-faire free markets, the gold standard, and anti-imperialism. Storey consistently and aggressively championed civil rights, not only for blacks but also for Native Americans and immigrants (he opposed immigration restrictions). Anti-lynching campaigns Wiki letter w.svg This section is empty. You can help by adding to it. (February 2014) Jim Crow and disfranchisement An African American drinks out of a segregated water cooler designated for "colored" patrons in 1939 at a streetcar terminal in Oklahoma City. In its early years, the NAACP concentrated on using the courts to overturn the Jim Crow statutes that legalized racial segregation. In 1913, the NAACP organized opposition to President Woodrow Wilson's introduction of racial segregation into federal government policy, offices, and hiring. By 1914, the group had 6,000 members and 50 branches. It was influential in winning the right of African Americans to serve as officers in World War I. Six hundred African-American officers were commissioned and 700,000 men registered for the draft. The following year, the NAACP organized a nationwide protest, with marches in numerous cities, against D. W. Griffith's silent movie Birth of a Nation, a film that glamorized the Ku Klux Klan. As a result, several cities refused to allow the film to open. The NAACP began to lead lawsuits targeting disfranchisement and racial segregation early in its history. It played a significant part in the challenge of Guinn v. United States (1915) to Oklahoma's discriminatory grandfather clause that disfranchised most black citizens while exempting many whites from certain voter registration requirements. It persuaded the Supreme Court of the United States to rule in Buchanan v. Warley in 1917 that state and local governments cannot officially segregate African Americans into separate residential districts. The Court's opinion reflected the jurisprudence of property rights and freedom of contract as embodied in the earlier precedent it established in Lochner v. New York. In 1916, when the NAACP was just seven years old, chairman Joel Spingarn invited James Weldon Johnson to serve as field secretary. Johnson was a former U.S. consul to Venezuela and a noted scholar and columnist. Within four years, Johnson was instrumental in increasing the NAACP's membership from 9,000 to almost 90,000. In 1920, Johnson was elected head of the organization. Over the next ten years, the NAACP escalated its lobbying and litigation efforts, becoming internationally known for its advocacy of equal rights and equal protection for the "American Negro". The NAACP devoted much of its energy during the interwar years to fighting the lynching of blacks throughout the United States by working for legislation, lobbying and educating the public. The organization sent its field secretary Walter F. White to Phillips County, Arkansas, in October 1919, to investigate the Elaine Race Riot. More than 200 black tenant farmers were killed by roving white vigilantes and federal troops after a deputy sheriff's attack on a union meeting of sharecroppers left one white man dead. White published his report on the riot in the Chicago Daily News.[23] The NAACP organized the appeals for twelve black men sentenced to death a month later based on the fact that testimony used in their convictions was obtained by beatings and electric shocks. It gained a groundbreaking Supreme Court decision in Moore v. Dempsey 261 U.S. 86 (1923) that significantly expanded the Federal courts' oversight of the states' criminal justice systems in the years to come. White investigated eight race riots and 41 lynchings for the NAACP and directed its study Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States.[24] NAACP leaders Henry L. Moon, Roy Wilkins, Herbert Hill, and Thurgood Marshall in 1956. The NAACP also spent more than a decade seeking federal legislation against lynching, but Southern white Democrats voted as a block against it or used the filibuster in the Senate to block passage. Because of disfranchisement, there were no black representatives from the South in Congress. The NAACP regularly displayed a black flag stating "A Man Was Lynched Yesterday" from the window of its offices in New York to mark each lynching. In alliance with the American Federation of Labor, the NAACP led the successful fight to prevent the nomination of John Johnston Parker to the Supreme Court, based on his support for denying the vote to blacks and his anti-labor rulings. It organized support for the Scottsboro Boys. The NAACP lost most of the internecine battles with the Communist Party and International Labor Defense over the control of those cases and the strategy to be pursued in that case. The organization also brought litigation to challenge the "white primary" system in the South. Southern states had created white-only primaries as another way of barring blacks from the political process. Since southern states were dominated by the Democrats, the primaries were the only competitive contests. In 1944 in Smith v. Allwright, the Supreme Court ruled against the white primary. Although states had to retract legislation related to the white primaries, the legislatures soon came up with new methods to limit the franchise for blacks. =Legal Defense Fund The board of directors of the NAACP created the Legal Defense Fund in 1939 specifically for tax purposes. It functioned as the NAACP legal department. Intimidated by the Department of the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service, the Legal and Educational Defense Fund, Inc., became a separate legal entity in 1957, although it was clear that it was to operate in accordance with NAACP policy. After 1961 serious disputes emerged between the two organizations, creating considerable confusion in the eyes and minds of the public.[25] Desegregation Question book-new.svg This section does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2011) NAACP representatives E. Franklin Jackson and Stephen Gill Spottswood meeting with president Kennedy at the White House in 1961 With the rise of private corporate litigators like the NAACP to bear the expense, civil suits became the pattern in modern civil rights litigation. The NAACP's Legal department, headed by Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall, undertook a campaign spanning several decades to bring about the reversal of the "separate but equal" doctrine announced by the Supreme Court's decision in Plessy v. Ferguson. The NAACP's Baltimore chapter, under president Lillie Mae Carroll Jackson, challenged segregation in Maryland state professional schools by supporting the 1935 Murray v. Pearson case argued by Marshall. Houston's victory in Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada (1938) led to the formation of the NAACP Legal Defense fund in 1940. Locals viewing the bomb-damaged home of Arthur Shores, NAACP attorney, Birmingham, Alabama, on September 5, 1963. The bomb exploded on September 4th, the previous day, injuring Shores' wife. The campaign for desegregation culminated in a unanimous 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education that held state-sponsored segregation of elementary schools was unconstitutional. Bolstered by that victory, the NAACP pushed for full desegregation throughout the South. Starting on December 5, 1955, NAACP activists, including Edgar Nixon, its local president, and Rosa Parks, who had served as the chapter's Secretary, helped organize a bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama. This was designed to protest segregation on the city's buses, two-thirds of whose riders were black. The boycott lasted 381 days. The State of Alabama responded by effectively barring the NAACP from operating within its borders because of its refusal to divulge a list of its members. The NAACP feared members could be fired or face violent retaliation for their activities. Although the Supreme Court eventually overturned the state's action in NAACP v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449 (1958), the NAACP lost its leadership role in the Civil Rights Movement while it was barred from Alabama. New organizations such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) rose up with different approaches to activism. These newer groups relied on direct action and mass mobilization to advance the rights of African Americans, rather than litigation and legislation. Roy Wilkins, NAACP's executive director, clashed repeatedly with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and other civil rights leaders over questions of strategy and leadership within the movement. The NAACP continued to use the Supreme Court's decision in Brown to press for desegregation of schools and public facilities throughout the country. Daisy Bates, president of its Arkansas state chapter, spearheaded the campaign by the Little Rock Nine to integrate the public schools in Little Rock, Arkansas. By the mid-1960s, the NAACP had regained some of its preeminence in the Civil Rights Movement by pressing for civil rights legislation. The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom took place on August 28, 1963. That fall President John F. Kennedy sent a civil rights bill to Congress before he was assassinated. President Lyndon B. Johnson worked hard to persuade Congress to pass a civil rights bill aimed at ending racial discrimination in employment, education and public accommodations, and succeeded in gaining passage in July 1964. He followed that with passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which provided for protection of the franchise, with a role for federal oversight and administrators in places where voter turnout was historically low. After Kivie Kaplan died in 1975, scientist W. Montague Cobb became President of the NAACP and served until 1982. Benjamin Hooks, a lawyer and clergyman, was elected as the NAACP's executive director in 1977, after the retirement of Roy Wilkins. The 1990s In the 1990s, the NAACP ran into debt. The dismissal of two leading officials further added to the picture of an organization in deep crisis. In 1993 the NAACP's Board of Directors narrowly selected Reverend Benjamin Chavis over Reverend Jesse Jackson to fill the position of Executive Director. A controversial figure, Chavis was ousted eighteen months later by the same board that had hired him. They accused him of using NAACP funds for an out-of-court settlement in a sexual harassment lawsuit.[26] Following the dismissal of Chavis, Myrlie Evers-Williams narrowly defeated NAACP chairperson William Gibson for president in 1995, after Gibson was accused of overspending and mismanagement of the organization's funds. In 1996 Congressman Kweisi Mfume, a Democratic Congressman from Maryland and former head of the Congressional Black Caucus, was named the organization's president. Three years later strained finances forced the organization to drastically cut its staff, from 250 in 1992 to just fifty. In the second half of the 1990s, the organization restored its finances, permitting the NAACP National Voter Fund to launch a major get-out-the-vote offensive in the 2000 U.S. presidential elections. 10.5 million African Americans cast their ballots in the election. This was one million more than four years before,[26] and the NAACP's effort was credited by observers as playing a significant role in Democrat Al Gore's winning several states where the election was close, such as Pennsylvania and Michigan.[26] Lee Alcorn controversy During the 2000 Presidential election, Lee Alcorn, president of the Dallas NAACP branch, criticized Al Gore's selection of Senator Joe Lieberman for his Vice-Presidential candidate because Lieberman was Jewish. On a gospel talk radio show on station KHVN, Alcorn stated, "If we get a Jew person, then what I'm wondering is, I mean, what is this movement for, you know? Does it have anything to do with the failed peace talks?" ... "So I think we need to be very suspicious of any kind of partnerships between the Jews at that kind of level because we know that their interest primarily has to do with money and these kind of things."[27] NAACP President Kweisi Mfume immediately suspended Alcorn and condemned his remarks. Mfume stated, "I strongly condemn those remarks. I find them to be repulsive, anti-Semitic, anti-NAACP and anti-American. Mr. Alcorn does not speak for the NAACP, its board, its staff or its membership. We are proud of our long-standing relationship with the Jewish community and I personally will not tolerate statements that run counter to the history and beliefs of the NAACP in that regard."[27] Alcorn, who had been suspended three times in the previous five years for misconduct, subsequently resigned from the NAACP and started his own organization called the Coalition for the Advancement of Civil Rights. Alcorn criticized the NAACP, saying, "I can't support the leadership of the NAACP. Large amounts of money are being given to them by large corporations that I have a problem with."[27] Alcorn also said, "I cannot be bought. For this reason I gladly offer my resignation and my membership to the NAACP because I cannot work under these constraints."[28] Alcorn's remarks were also condemned by the Reverend Jesse Jackson, Jewish groups and George W. Bush's rival Republican presidential campaign. Jackson said he strongly supported Lieberman's addition to the Democratic ticket, saying, "When we live our faith, we live under the law. He [Lieberman] is a firewall of exemplary behavior."[27] Al Sharpton, another prominent African-American leader, said, "The appointment of Mr. Lieberman was to be welcomed as a positive step."[29] The leaders of the American Jewish Congress praised the NAACP for its quick response, stating that: "It will take more than one bigot like Alcorn to shake the sense of fellowship of American Jews with the NAACP and black America... Our common concerns are too urgent, our history too long, our connection too sturdy, to let anything like this disturb our relationship."[30] George W. Bush Louisiana NAACP leads Jena 6 March. In 2004, President George W. Bush (president from 2001–2009) declined an invitation to speak to its national convention.[31] The White House originally said the president had a schedule conflict with the NAACP convention,[32] slated for July 10–15, 2004. On July 10, 2004, however, Bush's spokesperson said that Bush had declined the invitation to speak to the NAACP because of harsh statements about him by its leaders.[32] In an interview, Bush said, "I would describe my relationship with the current leadership as basically nonexistent. You've heard the rhetoric and the names they've called me."[32] Bush also mentioned his admiration for some members of the NAACP and said he would seek to work with them "in other ways."[32] On July 20, 2006, Bush addressed the NAACP national convention. He made a bid for increasing support by African Americans for Republicans, in the midst of a midterm election.[33][34] Tax exempt status The Internal Revenue Service informed the NAACP in October 2004 that it was investigating its tax-exempt status based on Julian Bond's speech at its 2004 Convention in which he criticized President George W. Bush as well as other political figures.[35][36] In general, the US Internal Revenue Code prohibits organizations granted tax-exempt status from "directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office."[37] The NAACP denounced the investigation as retaliation for its success in increasing the number of African Americans who vote.[35][38] In August 2006, the IRS investigation concluded with the agency's finding "that the remarks did not violate the group's tax-exempt status."[39] LGBT rights As the American LGBT rights movement gained steam after the Stonewall riots of 1969, the NAACP became increasingly affected by the movement to suppress or deny rights to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Bond, while chairman of the NAACP, became an outspoken supporter of the rights of gays and lesbians, publicly stating his support for same-sex marriage. Most notably he boycotted the 2004 funeral services for Coretta Scott King on the grounds that the King children had chosen an anti-gay megachurch. This was in contradiction to their mother's longstanding support for the rights of gay and lesbian people.[40] In a 2005 speech in Richmond, Virginia, Bond stated: African Americans... were the only Americans who were enslaved for two centuries, but we were far from the only Americans suffering discrimination then and now.... Sexual disposition parallels race. I was born this way. I have no choice. I wouldn't change it if I could. Sexuality is unchangeable.[41] In a 2007 speech on the Martin Luther King Day Celebration at Clayton State University in Morrow, GA, Bond said, "If you don't like gay marriage, don't get gay married." His positions have pitted elements of the NAACP against religious groups in the Civil Rights Movement who oppose gay marriage mostly within the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) who was blamed partly for the success of the 2008 gay marriage ban amendment in California.[citation needed] The NAACP became increasingly vocal in opposition against state-level constitutional amendments to ban same-sex marriage and other rights, with state NAACP leaders such as William J. Barber, II of North Carolina participating actively against (the ultimately-successful) North Carolina Amendment 1 in 2012. On May 19, 2012, the NAACP's board of directors formally endorsed same-sex marriage as a civil right, voting 62-2 for the policy in a Miami, Florida quarterly meeting.[42][43] Benjamin Jealous, the organization's president, said of the decision, "Civil marriage is a civil right and a matter of civil law.... The NAACP's support for marriage equality is deeply rooted in the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution and equal protection of all people." Possibly significant in the NAACP's vote was its concern with the HIV/AIDS crisis in the black community; while AIDS support organizations recommend that people live a monogamous lifestyle, the government did not recognize same-sex relationships.[44] As a result of the endorsement of same-sex marriage, Rev. Keith Ratliff Sr. of Des Moines, Iowa resigned from the NAACP board.[45] Current activities Benjamin Jealous, president of the NAACP from 2008 to 2013. Youth This aspect of the NAACP came into existence in 1936 and now is made of over 600 groups and totaling over 30,000 individuals. The NAACP Youth & College Division is a branch of the NAACP in which youth are actively involved. The Youth Council is composed of hundreds of state, county, high school and college operations where youth (and college students) volunteer to share their voices or opinions with their peers and address issues that are local and national. Sometimes volunteer work expands to a more international scale. Committing to the Youth Council may reward young people with travel opportunities or scholarships. In 2003, NAACP President and CEO, Kweisi Mfume, appointed Brandon Neal, the National Youth and College Division Director.[46] Currently, Stefanie L. Brown serves as the NAACP's National Youth & College Division Director. A graduate and former Student Government President at Howard University, Stefanie previously served as the National Youth Council Coordinator of the NAACP. Youth & College Division "The mission of the NAACP Youth & College Division shall be to inform youth of the problems affecting African Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities; to advance the economic, education, social and political status of African Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities and their harmonious cooperation with other peoples; to stimulate an appreciation of the African Diaspora and other people of color's contribution to civilization; and to develop an intelligent, militant effective youth leadership." ACT-SO program Since 1978 the NAACP has sponsored the Afro-Academic, Cultural, Technological and Scientific Olympics (ACT-SO) program for high school youth around the United States. The program is designed to recognize and award African American youth who demonstrate accomplishment in academics, technology, and the arts. Local chapters sponsor competitions in various categories of achievement for young people in grades 9–12. Winners of the local competitions are eligible to proceed to the national event at a convention held each summer at locations around the United States. Winners at the national competition receive national recognition along with cash awards and various prizes.[47] Criticism Main article: Resignation of Shirley Sherrod When right-wing media maven Andrew Breitbart publicized a maliciously edited video of a speech at a NAACP-sponsored Georgia event by USDA worker Shirley Sherrod, the mainstream press recycled his libel without properly vetting it, and the organization itself piled on without properly checking what had happened.[48] NAACP president and CEO has since apologized. See also Portal icon African American portal Association for the Study of African American Life and History Black Rock Coalition The Crisis NAACP Image Awards NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund NAACP Theatre Awards Niagara Movement Racial integration Resignation of Shirley Sherrod Spingarn Medal References 1.Jump up ^ naacp.org, 4 August 2011, "NAACP Passes Resolution Supporting Strong Clean Air Act". Accessed 8 December 2011. 2.Jump up ^ Charitynavigator.org 3.Jump up ^ Kwame Anthony Appiah, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., eds. Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience, in articles "Civil Rights Movement" by Patricia Sullivan (pp 441-455) and "National Association for the Advancement of Colored People" by Kate Tuttle (pp 1,388-1,391). ISBN 0-465-00071-1. 4.Jump up ^ "NAACP - Our Mission". Retrieved 2008-09-05.[dead link] 5.Jump up ^ "Contact Us". National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Retrieved November 17, 2009.[dead link] 6.Jump up ^ NAACP, "Youth and College - Advisor's Manual", p 9. 7.Jump up ^ Ian Urbina, "Health Executive Named Chairwoman of N.A.A.C.P.", The New York Times, February 21, 2010, p. 4. 8.Jump up ^ Texeira, Erin (March 5, 2007). "NAACP president to step down, cites discord with board". USA Today. Associated Press. Retrieved 2007-03-04. 9.Jump up ^ Dempsey, Beth. "NAACP Archives Go Digital". ProQuest. Retrieved 31 March 2014. 10.Jump up ^ "History Vault: 2014 Releases". March 27, 2014. Retrieved 31 March 2014. 11.Jump up ^ "Niagara Movement First Annual Meeting". Retrieved 2012-11-27. 12.^ Jump up to: a b "The story of the Niagara Movement and the N.A.A.C.P.". 13.Jump up ^ "Niagara Movement". W.E.B. DuBois Papers, Special Collections and University Archives W.E.B Du Bois Library, UMass, Amherst, MA. 14.^ Jump up to: a b "NAACP Timeline". National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. 15.Jump up ^ Simkin, John. "William English Walling biography". Spartacus Educational. 16.Jump up ^ Kathryn Kish Sklar, "Florence Kelley", in Rima Lunin Schultz and Adele Hast (eds), Women Building Chicago, 1790-1990: A Biographical Dictionary, Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2001, p. 463. 17.Jump up ^ Library of Congress. "NAACP Founder Charles Edward Russell". Library of Congress. 18.Jump up ^ "NAACP - How NAACP Began". 19.Jump up ^ Howard Sachar. "Working to Extend America's Freedoms: Jewish involvement in the Civil Rights movement". Excerpt from A History of Jews in America, published by Vintage Books. MyJewishLearning.com. Retrieved 2009-02-04. 20.^ Jump up to: a b PBS.org 21.Jump up ^ Fred Jerome, Rodger Taylor (2006), Einstein on Race and Racism, Rutgers University Press, 2006. 22.Jump up ^ Warren Washington (2007), Odyssey in Climate Modeling, Global Warming, and Advising Five Presidents. 23.Jump up ^ Kenneth Robert Janken, Walter White: Mr. NAACP, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2006, p.49 24.Jump up ^ Kenneth Robert Janken, Walter White: Mr. NAACP, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2006, p.2 and 42 25.Jump up ^ Benjamin L. Hooks, "Birth and Separation of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund," Crisis 1979 86(6): 218-220. 0011-1422 26.^ Jump up to: a b c Marable, Manning (August 2002). "The NAACP's 93rd Convention: An Assessment (archived copy)" (PDF). Along the Color Line. Archived from the original on 2007-01-06. 27.^ Jump up to: a b c d "NAACP Leader Quits Under Fire". CBS News. August 9, 2000. 28.Jump up ^ "Bush campaign denounces Dallas NAACP comments on Lieberman". CNN. August 9, 2000. 29.Jump up ^ Duncan Campbell (August 10, 2000). "Black leader suspended for anti-semitic Lieberman slur". London: The Guardian. 30.Jump up ^ AJCongress on Statement by NAACP Chapter Director on Lieberman, American Jewish Congress (AJC), August 9, 2000. 31.Jump up ^ "Editorial: No mutual respect: Mr. Bush unwisely forgoes NAACP meeting". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. 2004-07-17. 32.^ Jump up to: a b c d Allen, Mike (2004-07-10). "Bush Criticizes NAACP's Leadership". The Washington Post. p. A05. 33.Jump up ^ "President Bush addresses the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's (NAACP) national convention" (video). FORA.tv. 2006-07-20. 34.Jump up ^ Bush invokes civil rights in NAACP speech, Associated Press (reprinted by MSNBC.com), July 20, 2006. (retrieved on October 14, 2008). 35.^ Jump up to: a b Janofsky, Michael (2004-10-29). "Citing July Speech, I.R.S. Decides to Review N.A.A.C.P.". The New York Times. 36.Jump up ^ "NAACP chairman calls for Bush's ouster". CNN. 2004-07-13. 37.Jump up ^ "Election Year Activities and the Prohibition on Political Campaign Intervention for Section 501(c)(3) Organizations". Internal Revenue Service. February 2006. 38.Jump up ^ Anderson, Makebra M (2005-02-08). "NAACP says IRS has no "Legitimate" Claim". National Newspaper Publishers Association (Amsterdam News). 39.Jump up ^ Fears, Darryl (2006-09-01). "IRS Ends 2-Year Probe Of NAACP's Tax Status". The Washington Post. 40.Jump up ^ Black Voices Q&A 09/25/06 http://www.blackvoices.com/black_news/canvas_directory_headlines_features/_a/bv-qanda-with-julian-bond/20060908115409990002 41.Jump up ^ "NAACP chair says 'gay rights are civil rights'". Washington Blade. 2004-04-08. Archived from the original on March 21, 2006. Retrieved 2009-09-24. 42.Jump up ^ Michael Barbaro (May 19, 2012). "N.A.A.C.P. Endorses Same-Sex Marriage". The Caucus/The New York Times. 43.Jump up ^ "NAACP Passes Resolution in Support of Marriage Equality". NAACP. May 19, 2012. 44.Jump up ^ Castellanos, Dalina (May 19, 2012). "NAACP endorses same-sex marriage, says it's a civil right". Los Angeles Times. 45.Jump up ^ After NAACP's Gay Marriage Stance, Discord And Discussion. NPR (2012-06-08). Retrieved on 2014-05-24. 46.Jump up ^ Jet Magazine, April 2003 47.Jump up ^ "NAACP Proudly Announces 30th Anniversary ACT-SO Medalists". National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Retrieved 2009-01-31. 48.Jump up ^ Rich, Frank (May 28, 2012). "Post-Racial Farce". New York. Further reading Alexander, Shawn Leigh. An Army of Lions: The Civil Rights Struggle Before the NAACP. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012. Bynum, Thomas L. NAACP: Youth and the Fight for Black Freedom, 1936-1965. Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press, 2013. Dalfiume, Richard. "The Forgotten Years of the Negro Revolution," Journal of American History 55 (June 1969): 99-100. fulltext in JSTOR Fleming, Cynthia Griggs. In the Shadow of Selma: The Continuing Struggle for Civil Rights in the Rural South. Rowman and Littlefield, 2004. Goings, Kenneth W. The NAACP Comes of Age: The Defeat of Judge John J. Parker. (1990). Hughes, Langston. Fight for Freedom: The Story of the NAACP. (1962) Janken, Kenneth Robert. White: The Biography of Walter White, Mr. NAACP. New York: The New Press, 2003. Jonas, Gilbert S. Freedom's Sword: The NAACP and the Struggle against Racism in America, 1909-1969. (Routledge, 2005). Lewis, David Levering. W.E.B. DuBois. In Two Volumes. (1994, 2001). Mosnier, L. Joseph. Crafting Law in the Second Reconstruction: Julius Chambers, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and Title VII. University of North Carolina, 2005. Ross, Barbara Joyce. J. E. Spingarn and the Rise of the NAACP, 1911-1939. (1972) Sartain, Lee. Borders of Equality: The NAACP and the Baltimore Civil Rights Struggle, 1914-1970. Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi, 2013. St. James, Warren D. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People: A Case Study in Pressure Groups. (1958) Schneider, Mark Robert. We Return Fighting: The Civil Rights Movement in the Jazz Age. (2001) Sullivan, Patricia. Lift Every Voice: The NAACP and the Making of the Civil Rights Movement. New York: The New Press, 2010. Topping, Simon; "'Supporting Our Friends and Defeating Our Enemies': Militancy and Nonpartisanship in the NAACP, 1936-1948," Journal of African American History, Vol. 89, 2004 in JSTOR Verney, Kevern and Lee Sartain, eds. Long Is the Way and Hard: One Hundred Years of the NAACP. (2009), 16 new essays by scholars Zangrando, Robert. The NAACP Crusade Against Lynching, 1909-1950. (1980) External links Wikimedia Commons has media related to NAACP. Wikisource has original text related to this article: Barack Obama's Remarks at NAACP centennial Official website Events on the NAACP timeline (1939 - Present), naacp.org Civil Rights Greensboro: National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Civil Rights Movement Veterans, crmvet.org Youth College Mission, naacp.org Article and Video, The NAACP 100 Years On, governingdynamo.com Annual ACT-SO Contest, naacp-Los Angeles.org Official site of the Brooklyn, New York Branch, brooklynnaacp.org NAACP in Georgia, georgiaencyclopedia.org The Wichita NAACP Blog, wichitanaacpblog.com George W. Bush addresses NAACP national convention for the first time July 20, 2006 (Video) President Obama NAACP Speech: "Your Destiny Is In Your Hands ... No Excuses" - video by The Huffington Post NAACP Turns 100: The History and Future of the Nation's Oldest and Largest Civil Rights Organization, democracywow.org video FBI file on the NAACP Archives Niagara Movement Du Bois Papers, Special Collections and University Archives, Umass Amherst National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Region 1 Photograph Collection, ca. 1940-1982 at The Bancroft Library National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Region I, Records, 1942-1986 (bulk 1945-1977) at The Bancroft Library National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Vancouver Branch records. 1914-1967. 2.10 cubic feet (5 boxes). At the Labor Archives of Washington, University of Washington Libraries Special Collections NAACP Convention in Atlanta, Civil Rights Digital Library. Categories: National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Nonpartisan organizations in the United States Organizations based in Baltimore, Maryland 1909 establishments in the United States Organizations established in 1909 Address: 2203 Wylie Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15219 Phone:(412) 471-1024</p> _________________________________________ Biography of the Most Reverend David A. Zubik, DD Bishop David A. Zubik was born September 4, 1949, in Sewickley, Pennsylvania, to Stanley and the late Susan (Raskosky) Zubik. He attended Saint Stanislaus Elementary School and Saint Veronica High School, both in Ambridge, before entering Saint Paul Seminary in Pittsburgh. He received an undergraduate degree at Duquesne University in 1971 and went on to study at Saint Mary Seminary and University in Baltimore, Maryland, where he earned a degree in theology in 1975. Zubik was ordained a priest on May 3, 1975, by Bishop Vincent M. Leonard at Saint Paul Cathedral in Pittsburgh. Bishop Zubik served as Parochial Vicar of Sacred Heart Parish, Shadyside, until 1980. He was then assigned as Vice Principal of Quigley Catholic High School in Baden as well as Chaplain to the Sisters of Saint Joseph Motherhouse and Chaplain to the students at Mount Gallitzin Academy. At the same time, he began graduate studies at Duquesne University where he earned a master’s degree in education administration in 1982. He served in the role of adjunct spiritual director at Saint Paul Seminary from 1984 through 1991 and associate spiritual director at Saint Vincent Seminary, Latrobe, from 1989 through 1996. In 1987, Bishop Zubik was appointed Administrative Secretary to then-Pittsburgh Bishop Anthony J. Bevilacqua. In 1988, he was appointed Administrative Secretary and Master of Ceremonies to then-Pittsburgh Bishop Donald W. Wuerl (now Cardinal Archbishop of Washington, DC), where he served until 1991, when he began his service as Director of Clergy Personnel. In 1995, he was named Associate General Secretary and Chancellor of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, and on January 1, 1996, became Vicar General and General Secretary—a position in which he served until his appointment to the Diocese of Green Bay. Bishop Zubik was consecrated a bishop on April 6, 1997, at Saint Paul Cathedral and was appointed auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Pittsburgh. On October 10, 2003, the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, named the Most Reverend David A. Zubik as the Eleventh Bishop of the Diocese of Green Bay. Bishop Zubik was installed as Bishop on December 12, 2003. On July 18, 2007, he was named by Pope Benedict XVI as the Twelfth Bishop of Pittsburgh. He was installed at Saint Paul Cathedral in Pittsburgh on September 28, 2007. Bishop Zubik currently serves on the following committees: •USCCB Catholic Communications Campaign Subcommittee •USCCB Protection of Children and Young People Committee •Catholic-Jewish Dialogue of the USCCB •Board of Trustees, Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington, DC •Chairman, Pilgrimage Committee •Board of Trustees, The Papal Foundation •Board of Trustees, Saint Mary’s Seminary and University, Baltimore, MD •Board of Regents, Saint Vincent Seminary, Latrobe, PA •Chairman, Committee on Priestly Formation •Episcopal Advisory Board, Catholic Athletes for Christ •Episcopal Advisory Board, Catholic Education Foundation •Episcopal Advisory Board, Catholic Leadership Institute •Board of Directors, Sister Thea Bowman Foundation •Advisory Board, Angels’ Place •Board of Directors, Building United of Southwest Pennsylvania •Vice Chair, Council, Christian Associates of Southwest Pennsylvania •Advisory Board, National Catholic Center for Holocaust Education, Seton Hill University, Greensburg, PA •Cabinet, Southwestern Pennsylvania Food Security Partnership •Board of Directors, United Way of Greater Pittsburgh •Board of Directors, Urban League of Pittsburgh In addition, Bishop Zubik serves as … •Episcopal Liaison, Catholic Charities USA •Episcopal Moderator, Catholic Purchasing Services •Episcopal Chair, Ladies of Charity of the USA •Episcopal Liaison, National Association of Church Personnel Administrators _______________________________________________________________________ August Wilson From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search This article is about the late-20th-century writer. For the late-19th-century writer August J. Evans Wilson, see Augusta Jane Evans. For the United States Navy sailor, see August Wilson (Medal of Honor). August Wilson August wilson.jpg Born Frederick August Kittel April 27, 1945 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA Died October 2, 2005 (aged 60) Seattle, Washington, USA Occupation Author, playwright Nationality United States Spouse Constanza Romero (1994–2005) Judy Oliver (1981–1990) Brenda Burton (1969–1972) Information Magnum opus The Pittsburgh Cycle Awards Pulitzer Prize for Drama (1987, 1990) August Wilson (April 27, 1945 – October 2, 2005) was an American playwright whose work included a series of ten plays, The Pittsburgh Cycle, for which he received two Pulitzer Prizes for Drama. Each is set in a different decade, depicting the comic and tragic aspects of the African-American experience in the 20th century. Contents [hide] 1 Life 1.1 Childhood 1.2 Career 2 Work 2.1 The Pittsburgh Cycle 3 Personal life 4 Legacy 5 Honors and awards 6 Plays 7 See also 8 References 9 External links Life[edit] Childhood[edit] Wilson's maternal grandmother walked from North Carolina to Pennsylvania in search of a better life. Wilson was born Frederick August Kittel, Jr. in the Hill District of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the fourth of six children, to Sudeten-German immigrant baker/pastry cook, Frederick August Kittel, Sr. and Daisy Wilson, an African-American cleaning woman, from North Carolina.[1] Wilson's mother raised the children alone until he was five in a two-room apartment above a grocery store at 1727 Bedford Avenue; his father was mostly absent from his childhood. Wilson would go on to write under his mother's surname. The economically depressed neighborhood in which he was raised was inhabited predominantly by black Americans, and Jewish and Italian immigrants. Wilson's mother divorced and married David Bedford in the 1950s and the family moved from the Hill District to the then predominantly white working-class neighborhood of Hazelwood, where they encountered racial hostility; bricks were thrown through a window at their new home. They were soon forced out of their house and on to their next home.[2] In 1959 Wilson was the only African-American student at the Central Catholic High School, where he was soon driven away by threats and abuse.[1]He then attended Connelley Vocational High School, but found the curriculum unchallenging. He dropped out of Gladstone High School in the 10th grade in 1960 after his teacher accused him of plagiarizing a 20-page paper he wrote on Napoleon I of France. Wilson hid his decision from his mother because he did not want to disappoint her. At the age of 16, he began working menial jobs and that allowed him to meet a wide variety of people, on some of whom he later based his characters, such as Sam in The Janitor (1985). Wilson made such extensive use of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh to educate himself that it later awarded him a degree, the only such one it has bestowed. Wilson, who had learned to read at the age of four, began reading black writers at the library when he was aged 12 and spent the remainder of his teen years educating himself through the books of Ralph Ellison, Richard Wright, Langston Hughes, Arna Bontemps, and others.[2] Career[edit] By then, Wilson knew that he wanted to be a writer, but this created tension with his mother, who wanted him to become a lawyer. She forced him to leave the family home and he enlisted in the United States Army for a three-year stint in 1962, but left after one year and went back to working various odd jobs as a porter, short-order cook, gardener, and dishwasher. Frederick August Kittel, Jr. changed his name to August Wilson to honor his mother after his father's death in 1965. That same year he discovered the blues as sung by Bessie Smith, and he bought a stolen typewriter for $10, which he would often pawn when money was tight.[3] At 20 he decided he was a poet and submitted his poetry to such magazines as Harper's.[1] He began to write in bars, the local cigar store and cafes, longhand on table napkins and on yellow notepads, absorbing the voices and characters around him. He liked to write on cafe napkins because, he said, it freed him up and made him less self-conscious as a writer. He would then gather the notes and type them up at home.[1] Gifted with a talent for catching dialect and accents, Wilson had an "astonishing memory," which he put to full use during his career. He slowly learned not to censor the language he heard when incorporating it into his work.[3] Wilson's childhood home at 1727 Bedford Avenue in Pittsburgh Malcolm X's voice would influence his life and work (such as The Ground on Which I Stand, 1996). Both the Nation of Islam and the Black Power spoke to him regarding self-sufficiency, self-defense and self-determination, and he appreciated the origin myths that Elijah Muhammad supported. In 1969 Wilson married Brenda Burton, a Muslim, and Wilson converted to Islam in order to sustain the marriage. He and Brenda had one daughter, Sakina Ansari-Wilson, and divorced in 1972.[2] In 1968, he co-founded the Black Horizon Theater in the Hill District of Pittsburgh along with his friend Rob Penny.[1] Wilson's first play, Recycling, was performed for audiences in small theaters, schools and public housing community centers for 50 cents a ticket. Among these early efforts was Jitney, which he revised more than two decades later as part of his 10-play cycle on 20th-century Pittsburgh.[2] He had no directing experience.[1] He recalled: "Someone had looked around and said, 'Who’s going to be the director?' I said, 'I will.' I said that because I knew my way around the library. So I went to look for a book on how to direct a play. I found one called The Fundamentals of Play Directing and checked it out."[3] In 1976 Vernell Lillie, who had founded the Kuntu Repertory Theatre at the University of Pittsburgh two years earlier, directed Wilson's The Homecoming. That same year Wilson saw Sizwe Banzi is Dead at the Pittsburgh Public Theater, his first professional play. Wilson, Penny, and poet Maisha Baton also started the Kuntu Writers Workshop to bring African-American writers together and to assist them in publication and production. Both organizations are still active. In 1978 Wilson moved to Saint Paul, Minnesota, at the suggestion of his friend director Claude Purdy, who helped him secure a job writing educational scripts for the Science Museum of Minnesota.[1] In 1980 he received a fellowship for The Playwrights' Center in Minneapolis. He quit the Museum in 1981, but continued writing plays. For three years, he was a part-time cook for the Little Brothers of the Poor. Wilson had a long association with the Penumbra Theatre Company of St Paul, which gave the premieres of some Wilson plays. Fullerton Street which has been unproduced and unpublished, was written in 1980. It follows the Joe Louis/Billy Conn fight in 1940 and the loss of values attendant on the Great Migration to the urban North.[2] In 1987, Saint Paul's mayor George Latimer named May 27 "August Wilson Day." He was honored because he was the only person to both come from Minnesota and win a Pulitzer Prize.[2] In 1990 Wilson left St Paul after getting divorced and moved to Seattle. There he would develop a relationship with Seattle Repertory Theatre, which would become the only theater in the country to produce all of the works in his ten-play cycle and his one-man show How I Learned What I Learned.[2] Although he was a writer dedicated to writing for theater, a Hollywood studio proposed filming Wilson's play Fences. He insisted that a black director be hired for the film, saying: "I declined a white director not on the basis of race but on the basis of culture. White directors are not qualified for the job. The job requires someone who shares the specifics of the culture of black Americans." The film was never made. Wilson received many honorary degrees, including an honorary Doctor of Humanities from the University of Pittsburgh, where he served as a member of the University's Board of Trustees from 1992 until 1995.[4] Work[edit] Wilson's best known plays are Fences (1985) (which won a Pulitzer Prize and a Tony Award), The Piano Lesson (1990) (a Pulitzer Prize and the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award), Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, and Joe Turner's Come and Gone. Wilson stated that he was most influenced by "the four Bs": blues music, the Argentine novelist and poet Jorge Luis Borges, the playwright Amiri Baraka and the painter Romare Bearden.[1] He went on to add writers Ed Bullins and James Baldwin to the list. He noted: "From Borges, those wonderful gaucho stories from which I learned that you can be specific as to a time and place and culture and still have the work resonate with the universal themes of love, honor, duty, betrayal, etc. From Amiri Baraka, I learned that all art is political, although I don't write political plays. From Romare Bearden I learned that the fullness and richness of everyday life can be rendered without compromise or sentimentality."[1] He valued Bullins and Baldwin for their honest representations of everyday life.[3] Like Bearden, Wilson worked with collage techniques in writing: "I try to make my plays the equal of his canvases. In creating plays I often use the image of a stewing pot in which I toss various things that I’m going to make use of—a black cat, a garden, a bicycle, a man with a scar on his face, a pregnant woman, a man with a gun." On the meaning of his work Wilson stated "I once wrote this short story called 'The Best Blues Singer in the World,' and it went like this— “The streets that Balboa walked were his own private ocean, and Balboa was drowning.” End of story. That says it all. Nothing else to say. I’ve been rewriting that same story over and over again. All my plays are rewriting that same story."[3] The Pittsburgh Cycle[edit] Wilson's "Pittsburgh Cycle," also often referred to as his "Century Cycle," consists of ten plays—nine of which are set in Pittsburgh's Hill District, an African-American neighborhood that takes on a mythic literary significance like Thomas Hardy's Wessex, William Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha County, or Irish playwright Brian Friel's Ballybeg. The plays are each set in a different decade and aim to sketch the Black experience in the 20th century and "raise consciousness through theater” and echo "the poetry in the everyday language of black America".[3] He was fascinated by the power of theater as a medium where a community at large could come together to bear witness to events and currents unfolding.[3] Wilson noted: "I think my plays offer (white Americans) a different way to look at black Americans," he told The Paris Review. "For instance, in 'Fences' they see a garbageman, a person they don't really look at, although they see a garbageman every day. By looking at Troy's life, white people find out that the content of this black garbageman's life is affected by the same things - love, honor, beauty, betrayal, duty. Recognizing that these things are as much part of his life as theirs can affect how they think about and deal with black people in their lives."[1] Although the plays of the cycle are not strictly connected to the degree of a serial story, some characters appear (at various ages) in more than one of the cycle's plays. Children of characters in earlier plays may appear in later plays. The character most frequently mentioned in the cycle is Aunt Ester, a "washer of souls". She is reported to be 285 years old in Gem of the Ocean, which takes place in her home at 1839 Wylie Avenue, and 322 in Two Trains Running. She dies in 1985, during the events of King Hedley II. Much of the action of Radio Golf revolves around the plan to demolish and redevelop that house, some years after her death. The plays often include an apparently mentally impaired oracular character (different in each play)—for example, Hedley Sr. in Seven Guitars, Gabriel in Fences or Hambone in Two Trains Running. Title Decade Premiere[5] Opened on Broadway[5] Awards[6][7][8][9] Notes[10] Gem of the Ocean 1900s 2003 Goodman (Chicago) 2004 Walter Kerr - - Joe Turner's Come and Gone 1910's 1986 Yale Rep (New Haven, CT) 1988 Ethel Barrymore New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award Presented in 1984 as a staged reading at The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Ma Rainey's Black Bottom 1920s 1984 Yale Rep (New Haven, CT) 1984 Cort Theatre New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award Presented in 1982 as a staged reading at The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Only play of the cycle not set in Pittsburgh. It is set in Chicago. The Piano Lesson 1930s 1987 Yale Rep (New Haven, CT) 1990 Walter Kerr Pulitzer Prize Drama Desk Award New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award Presented in 1987 as a staged reading at The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Seven Guitars 1940s 1995 Goodman (Chicago) 1996 Walter Kerr New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award Presented in 1994 as a staged reading at The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Fences 1950s 1985 Yale Rep (New Haven, CT) 1987 46th Street Theatre Pulitzer Prize Tony Award Drama Desk Award Presented in 1983 as a staged reading at The Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Two Trains Running 1960s 1990 Yale Rep (New Haven, CT) 1992 Walter Kerr - - Jitney 1970s 1982 Allegheny Repertory Theatre (Pittsburgh) - - After an extensive re-write it premiered for a second time at the Pittsburgh Public Theater in 1996. Opened off-Broadway at the Second Stage Theatre in 2000. Has never been performed on Broadway.[11] King Hedley II 1980s 1999 Pittsburgh Public (Pittsburgh) 2001 Virginia Theatre - - Radio Golf 1990s 2005 Yale Rep (New Haven, CT) 2007 Cort Theatre New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award Wilson passed away between the premier and the Broadway opening. Chicago’s Goodman Theatre was the first theater in the world to produce the entire 10-play cycle, spanning from 1986 to 2007. Two of the Goodman’s productions—Seven Guitars and Gem of the Ocean—were world premieres.[12] Israel Hicks produced the entire 10-play cycle from 1990 to 2009 at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts.[13] Geva Theatre Center produced all 10 plays in decade order from 2007 to 2011 as "August Wilson's American Century." The Huntington Theatre Company of Boston has produced all 10 plays, finishing in 2012. During Wilson's life he worked closely with The Huntington to produce the later plays. Pittsburgh Public Theater was the first theater company in Pittsburgh to produce the entire Century Cycle, including the world premiere of King Hedley II to open the O'Reilly Theater in Downtown Pittsburgh.[14] Personal life[edit] Wilson was married three times. His first marriage was to Brenda Burton from 1969 to 1972. They had one daughter, Sakina Ansari, born 1970. In 1981 he was married to Judy Oliver, a social worker, and divorced in 1990. He married again in 1994 and was survived by his third wife, costume designer, Constanza Romero, whom he met on the set of "The Piano Lesson". Together they had a daughter, Azula Carmen Wilson.[1] Wilson was also survived by siblings Freda Ellis, Linda Jean Kittel, Donna Conley, Barbara Jean Wilson, Edwin Kittel and Richard Kittel. Wilson reported that he had been diagnosed with liver cancer in June 2005 and been given three to five months to live. He died on October 2, 2005, at Swedish Medical Center in Seattle, and was interred at Greenwood Cemetery, Pittsburgh, on October 8, 2005, aged 60. Legacy[edit] The August Wilson Theatre, New York City The childhood home of Wilson and his six siblings, at 1727 Bedford Avenue in Pittsburgh was declared a historic landmark by the State of Pennsylvania on May 30, 2007.[15] On February 26, 2008, Pittsburgh City Council placed the house on the List of City of Pittsburgh historic designations. On April 30, 2013, the August Wilson House was added to the National Register of Historic Places.[16] In Pittsburgh, there is an August Wilson Center for African American Culture. On October 16, 2005, fourteen days after Wilson's death, the Virginia Theatre in New York City's Broadway Theater District was renamed the August Wilson Theatre. It is the first Broadway theatre to bear the name of an African-American.[17] Honors and awards[edit] 1987: Pulitzer Prize for Drama - Fences 1987: Tony Award for Best Play – Fences 1987: Outer Critics Circle Award - Fences 1987: Artist of the Year by Chicago Tribune 1988: Literary Lion Award from the New York Public Library 1988: New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play – Joe Turner's Come and Gone 1990: Governor's Awards for Excellence in the Arts and Distinguished Pennsylvania Artists 1990: Drama Desk Award for Outstanding New Play – The Piano Lesson 1990: Drama Desk Award for Outstanding New Play – The Piano Lesson 1990: New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play – The Piano Lesson 1990: Pulitzer Prize for Drama – The Piano Lesson 1991: Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame award 1992: American Theatre Critics' Association Award – Two Trains Running 1992: New York Drama Critics Circle Citation for Best American Play – Two Trains Running 1992: Clarence Muse Award 1996: New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play – Seven Guitars 1999: National Humanities Medal 2000: New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play – Jitney 2000: Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Play – Jitney 2002: Olivier Award for Best new Play – Jitney 2004: The 10th Annual Heinz Award in Arts and Humanities[19] 2004: The U.S. Comedy Arts Festival Freedom of Speech Award 2005: Make Shift Award at the U.S. Confederation of Play Writers 2006: American Theatre Hall of Fame.[20] Plays[edit] Recycle, 1973 (produced in Pittsburgh) Fullerton Street, 1980 Black Bart and the Sacred Hills, 1977 (produced St. Paul, 1981) Jitney (1982) Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (1984) The Homecoming, 1989 Fences (1987) - Pulitzer Prize[21] Joe Turner's Come and Gone (1984) The Coldest Day of the Year, 1989 The Piano Lesson (1990) - Pulitzer Prize[21] Two Trains Running (1991) Seven Guitars (1995) King Hedley II (1999) How I Learned What I Learned (2002–03, Seattle) Gem of the Ocean (2003) Radio Golf (2005) See also[edit] Portal icon Biography portal References[edit] 1.^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g h i j k "August Wilson, Theater's Poet of Black America, Is Dead at 60", The New York Times, October 3, 2005. 2.^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g Little, Johnathan (2000). Twentieth-Century American Dramatists: Second Series. Detroit, Michigan: Gale. ISBN 978-0-7876-3137-6. 3.^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g Bonnie Lyons, George Plimpton (Winter 1999). "August Wilson, The Art of Theater No. 14". The Paris Review. 4.Jump up ^ Bruce Steele (October 10, 2005). "Remembering August Wilson 1945-2005". The Pitt Chronicle (The University of Pittsburgh). Archived from the original on September 30, 2009. Retrieved October 1, 2008. 5.^ Jump up to: a b The August Wilson Century Cycle.Theatre Communications Group. Retrieved October 7, 2014. 6.Jump up ^ Drama. Pulitzer Prize. Retrieved October 7, 2014. 7.Jump up ^ Past Awards. New York Drama Critics' Circle. Retrieved October 7, 2014. 8.Jump up ^ Tony Award: Play. Internet Broadway Database. Retrieved October 7, 2014. 9.Jump up ^ Drama Desk Award for Play. Internet Broadway Database.Retrieved October 7, 2014. 10.Jump up ^ National Playwrights Conference. Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Retrieved October 7, 2014. 11.Jump up ^ Christopher Rawson (June 25, 2000). "Stage Reviews: Wilson's 'Jitney,' 'King Hedley II' have become clearer, tighter since leaving Pittsburgh". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Retrieved October 7, 2014. 12.Jump up ^ Houlihan, Mary (January 8, 2014). "Court Theatre stages August Wilson’s ‘Seven Guitars’". Chicago Sun-Times. 13.Jump up ^ Weber, Bruce. "Israel Hicks, Director of August Wilson’s Cycle, Dies at 66", The New York Times, July 7, 2010. Accessed July 8, 2010. 14.Jump up ^ http://www.pghcitypaper.com/pittsburgh/the-final-installment-of-august-wilsons-epic-pittsburgh-cycle-premieres-at-the-public/Content?oid=1340845 15.Jump up ^ Associated Press (May 31, 2007). "State Memorializes August Wilson's Childhood Home". Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Retrieved October 3, 2008. 16.Jump up ^ NPS.gov 17.Jump up ^ Jesse McKinley (September 2, 2005). "Theater Is to Be Renamed for a Dying Playwright". The New York Times. Retrieved December 21, 2008. 18.Jump up ^ Kathy Mulady (June 12, 2007). "Visions For a New Seattle Center Being Made Public". The Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved October 5, 2008. 19.Jump up ^ The Heinz Awards, August Wilson profile 20.Jump up ^ "Theater Hall of Fame honors August Wilson, seven others". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Retrieved February 12, 2014. 21.^ Jump up to: a b The Pulitzer Prizes | Drama External links[edit] Wikimedia Commons has media related to August Wilson. August Wilson Theatre Broadway August Wilson Center for African American Culture Berkeley Rep profile of Wilson and works Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article August Wilson at the Internet Movie Database InterviewsAugust Wilson on Blackness, Bill Moyers, A World of Ideas, October 20, 1988. Bonnie Lyons, George Plimpton (Winter 1999). "August Wilson, The Art of Theater No. 14". The Paris Review. NPR Intersections: August Wilson, Writing to the Blues, March 1, 2004, audio interview (6 mins). Interview with Wilson, Believer Journal, November 2004. Putting Up Fences, article with video, BU Today, September 17, 2009. Obituaries"Theater Is to Be Renamed for a Dying Playwright", New York Times, September 2, 2005. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette obituary, October 3, 2005 "August Wilson, Theater's Poet of Black America, Is Dead at 60", The New York Times, October 3, 2005. Margaret Busby, "August Wilson - Distinguished black American playwright who reclaimed the stories of his people" (obituary), The Guardian, October 4, 2005. Pulitzer Prize for Drama (1976–2000) Michael Bennett, Nicholas Dante, James Kirkwood, Jr., Marvin Hamlisch and Edward Kleban (1976) · Michael Cristofer (1977) · Donald L. Coburn (1978) · Sam Shepard (1979) · Lanford Wilson (1980) · Beth Henley (1981) · Charles Fuller (1982) · Marsha Norman (1983) · David Mamet (1984) · James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim (1985) · August Wilson (1987) · Alfred Uhry (1988) · Wendy Wasserstein (1989) · August Wilson (1990) · Neil Simon (1991) · Robert Schenkkan (1992) · Tony Kushner (1993) · Edward Albee (1994) · Horton Foote (1995) · Jonathan Larson (1996) · Paula Vogel (1998) · Margaret Edson (1999) · Donald Margulies (2000) Complete list · (1918–1925) · (1926–1950) · (1951–1975) · (1976–2000) · (2001–2025) Authority control WorldCat · VIAF: 100245761 · LCCN: n84182196 · ISNI: 0000 0001 2096 7292 · GND: 119248662 · SUDOC: 031933750 · BNF: cb12305789p (data) Categories: 1945 births 2005 deaths African-American dramatists and playwrights American dramatists and playwrights American people of German descent Cancer deaths in Washington (state) Deaths from liver cancer Guggenheim Fellows Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters National Humanities Medal recipients People from Saint Paul, Minnesota Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners Tony Award winners Writers from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania American Theater Hall of Fame inductees ____________________________________________________________________________________

A LE-JIT CALL FOR JUSTICE...text 412-313-3080

HIGHWAY TO HELL

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