On the night of March 4, the birthday of the city, Timuel Black and I walked into the Congress Room on the second floor of Roosevelt University expecting to see the place packed with college kids.
We were playing a small part in the six-month-long series of free public programs celebrating Harold Washington that began on Nov. 25, the 20th anniversary of Washington’s death, and ended on April 12, the 25th anniversary of his election as mayor of Chicago.
The evening was to consist of a conversation between Black, who might have known Washington as well as anyone, and me, who didn’t know him well at all. Roosevelt University is where Washington and Black attended college, first met one another and started sharing dreams of social equality and justice. The school’s motto is “Dedicated to the enlightenment of the human spirit.”
Black and I stared as we walked into an almost-empty room. “Do you think any more people will be coming?” he asked.
“Of course,” I told him. The Harold Washington Commemorative Year, the Illinois nonprofit corporation that created the programming series, had done a fine job of promoting its events. Ten more minutes passed. Fewer than a dozen more people came, among them Osgood, with camera. The crowd, so to speak, included photographer Marc PoKempner and journalist Salim Muwakkil, the team that helped create the magnificent book “Harold!: Photographs from the Harold Washington Years,” which was edited by Ron Dorfman and also includes the photos of Antonio Dickey.
So, we talked. I asked questions and Black provided answers, which engagingly took the form of long stories, crammed with humor, insight and detail, and not a whiff of self-importance. He talked of the weekly poker games with Washington and others so evocatively that I would have eagerly sat in, even if it meant losing every hand; and of early voter registration efforts and about the current presidential campaign.
He did not talk about his years as a social worker, high school and college teacher, union organizer and community political activist. He did not even mention his “Bridges of Memory” books, compelling oral histories of the African-American experience in Chicago.
“I have lived a lot of the city’s history,” said Black, a few steps away from his 90th birthday but frequently out and about in public forums.
History is, of course, available by many means. There are books, documentaries, Wikipedia. But history delivered firsthand is a rare commodity and it packs a punch that dazzles more than the flashiest Web site.
Sad that so few were interested in hearing about Washington from Black, a living link. We talked and then we left, walking through a lounging area littered with a few students who had missed the “show.”
One was working the buttons of his cell phone. Five were asleep.
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rkogan@tribune.com
