Milestones and passings in the last 12 months.

Long Island

LI Life

Black History Month

Dedicating a piece of artwork Monday at <a href="/topics/Nassau_Community_College">Nassau Community College</a> to kick off Black History Month, history buffs and civic leaders called for more understanding between <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a>'s African-Americans and Hispanics. 
"We're two communities of color, so there's a natural affinity," said Angelo J. Rivera, a community activist who has worked in <a href="/topics/Hempstead%2C_NY">Hempstead</a> and Harlem. But, he admitted, "We may not always understand each other."
Rivera spoke while greeting friends arriving at the dedication of a 6-foot-long brass sculpture chronicling the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott.
Rivera was joined at the upbeat ceremony by African-American and white scholars, who spoke of the exhortations of the Rev. <a href="/topics/Martin_Luther_King%2C_Jr.">Martin Luther King Jr</a>. for all people to work together.
"This is a dream come true," Marion Fleming, an English instructor at <a href="/topics/Nassau_County%2C_NY">Nassau</a>, said of the artwork.
The story of the sculpture started seven years ago, when Fleming attended a performance Rivera had arranged to teach Hispanics about black history. She was so impressed that she offered to help in future projects overseen by Rivera, who works with former inmates and others as they look for training and jobs.
Eventually, the pair and others commissioned the artwork from James Counts Sr., a postal worker who lived in <a href="/topics/Roosevelt%2C_NY">Roosevelt</a> and spent his free time sculpting. He died in 2005, four months after his work was unveiled at the college. It sat in a storage room until it was recently given a permanent place on a brightly lighted wall. 
Rivera said he tells young Hispanics that African-Americans were trailblazers in civil rights, and all minorities benefit from turning points such as the Montgomery bus boycott. He and others reminded students in the audience Monday that the boycott started in 1955, when <a href="/topics/Rosa_Parks">Rosa Parks</a> refused to give her seat to a white man. Lasting 13 months, it became a model of nonviolent resistance.
"We always worked toward the equality we deserved," said Hempstead Town Councilwoman Dorothy Goosby, who grew up in the South and traveled to Montgomery to participate in the boycott at the time.
She acknowledged that she's witnessed tensions between blacks and Hispanics on Long Island, in places including Hempstead, as the two groups vie for jobs and housing. "We need to learn that we've got to live together," she said.

Nassau

LISTAT02

At statue dedication, a call for racial cooperation

Could-be <a href="/topics/U.S._Senate">U.S. Senate</a> candidate <a href="/topics/Harold_Ford%2C_Jr.">Harold Ford</a> Jr. made his first political trip to <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a> Monday, where his most important meeting didn't result in a new fan. 
<a href="/topics/Suffolk_County%2C_NY">Suffolk</a> Democratic chairman Richard Schaffer said Ford, the former <a href="/topics/Tennessee">Tennessee</a> congressman who is weighing a Democratic primary challenge to Sen. <a href="/topics/Kirsten_Gillibrand">Kirsten Gillibrand</a> (D-N.Y.), said "nothing new" in their 15-minute chat in Schaffer's <a href="/topics/West_Babylon%2C_NY">West Babylon</a> office. 
Schaffer, who in December endorsed Gillibrand's election bid, said he stands by the state's junior senator. "Nothing that was said today changes my mind on that," he said. 
VIDEO: <a href="http://www.newsday.com/long-island/video-former-rep-ford-visits-westbury-h-s-1.1736516">Click here to watch Ford speak to students at Westbury High School</a> 
Ford's visit with Schaffer followed a closed-door breakfast meeting arranged by <a href="/topics/Nassau_County%2C_NY">Nassau</a> Legis. Robert Troiano (D-<a href="/topics/Westbury%2C_NY">Westbury</a>) at the Chateau Briand in <a href="/topics/Carle_Place%2C_NY">Carle Place</a> with about 40 black and Latino leaders with stops in <a href="/topics/Westbury%2C_NY">Westbury</a> and <a href="/topics/Great_Neck%2C_NY">Great Neck</a>. 
Ex-<a href="/topics/Nassau_County%2C_NY">Nassau</a> Legis. David Mejias (D-<a href="/topics/Farmingdale%2C_NY">Farmingdale</a>) said Ford was impressive. "I think everybody there was charmed by him," he said. 
Assemb. <a href="/topics/Philip_Ramos">Philip Ramos</a>, (D-<a href="/topics/Brentwood%2C_NY">Brentwood</a>) said he too was "appreciative" that Ford met with black and Hispanic officials. Ramos on Saturday hosted a similar meeting with Gillibrand at his <a href="/topics/Bay_Shore%2C_NY">Bay Shore</a> office. 
Later, at Westbury High School, Ford, the son of former Rep. <a href="/topics/Harold_Ford%2C_Jr.">Harold Ford</a> Sr., told about 100 students at a Black History Month event to "work hard and never let people tell you that you can't realize a dream." 
From the high school, Ford went to the <a href="/topics/Great_Neck%2C_NY">Great Neck</a> Senior Center, where <a href="/topics/North_Hempstead%2C_NY">North Hempstead</a> town officials announced broadening a senior project to include half-price medical visit taxi rides. "This is a great example of government reaching out and partnering with the private sector to make government work better," Ford said. 
Ford moved to <a href="/topics/Manhattan">Manhattan</a> in 2007 after losing a heated and expensive 2006 <a href="/topics/U.S._Senate">U.S. Senate</a> race in <a href="/topics/Tennessee">Tennessee</a>. He began an ad hoc tour of the state two weeks ago, meeting with political leaders as he considers a statewide run. 
Since he emerged as a possible challenger to Gillibrand last month, Ford has been dogged by questions about whether he received a taxpayer-funded bonus while working as an executive at <a href="/topics/Merrill_Lynch">Merrill Lynch</a> and <a href="/topics/Bank_of_America">Bank of America</a>. He declined Monday to say if he received a bonus. 
"I can say that I fulfilled the contract and was paid per the terms of the contract," he said after meeting with Schaffer. "There was a contract that was a part of it, and I received what was laid out in the contract."

Politics

POFORD02

Could-be Senate candidate Ford meets with LI pols

Disappointment first hit <a href="/topics/Monte_Irvin">Monte Irvin</a> hard when he was a Depression-era teenager and a life-threatening strep infection stole his dream of playing college football for <a href="/topics/Michigan">Michigan</a>. He got through it with chest surgery, his mother's home cooking and the firm belief that bitterness is no balm for life's unfairness. 
He wasn't bitter when he was one of the best baseball players in the world but missed his prime because blacks weren't allowed to play in the major leagues. He didn't gripe when three years of <a href="/topics/World_War_II">World War II</a> in the Army possibly cost him a chance to be the one to break baseball's racial barrier. And he is not complaining now, 60 years after his belated first full season with the Giants. 
"Being bitter doesn't prove anything," Irvin said. "If you're bitter, the other person wins. If you just go on, you're on top. I think that's why I've lasted so long." 
Irvin's 91st birthday will be Feb. 25, during Black History Month. It will be an occasion to celebrate a Hall of Famer who made history - Irvin was among the major leagues' African-American pioneers when he debuted July 8, 1949 - and witnessed it. Irvin and <a href="/topics/Hank_Thompson">Hank Thompson</a> broke the color line for the <a href="/topics/New_York_Giants">New York Giants</a> on that July 8 day, fittingly at Brooklyn's Ebbets Field, where <a href="/topics/Jackie_Robinson">Jackie Robinson</a> was playing second base. 
Irvin was in front of his TV last July, watching President <a href="/topics/Barack_Obama">Barack Obama</a>'s lefthanded pitch at the All-Star Game. "I was delighted," Irvin said. "He was young enough to go out there and do a good job." 
Speaking on the phone the other night from <a href="/topics/Houston">Houston</a>, where he lives near his daughter and her family, Irvin sounded like an ambassador for baseball and life itself. 
"You just feel good about yourself when you're with Monte," said Art Berke, chief operating officer of the <a href="/topics/Yogi_Berra">Yogi Berra</a> Museum, who is a friend of Irvin and a former colleague in the baseball commissioner's office. 
The former <a href="/topics/Newark">Newark</a> <a href="/topics/Philadelphia_Eagles">Eagles</a> outfielder was genuinely joyful at a Negro Leagues reunion last fall in <a href="/topics/Atlantic_City">Atlantic City</a>. 
"There are not too many of us left, so whenever we get together, that is a precious moment," Irvin said this past week. "We talk about how much progress has been made and how little we made. I signed for $100 a month in 1938. I'm grateful for everything I've had, but I'm sorry that some of those great players never made more than $200 a month." 
Not much saddens Irvin, but he does regret that most of America never even caught a glimpse of Leon Day and <a href="/topics/Ray_Dandridge">Ray Dandridge</a> and others. 
"They were extra-special. They were naturals," he said. "We were young and healthy and baseball was king, and we wanted to play the sport of kings. Those were good times. We didn't have very much but we enjoyed playing, and we were hopeful that things might change later on." 
He remembers how the winds had changed by the time he returned from his Army tours in England, France and <a href="/topics/Belgium">Belgium</a>: "People were saying, 'They could fight for our country; they should be able to play ball for our country.' " 
Maybe his name could have been as famous as Robinson's. Irvin was approached by <a href="/topics/Branch_Rickey">Branch Rickey</a> (president and general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers) about joining the Dodgers around the same time he approached Robinson ("I think he spoke to Jackie first,'' Irvin said), but he admitted to Rickey that after having missed three seasons, he wasn't ready. "I was getting over the war nerves," Irvin said. 
He did deem himself ready in 1949, but Rickey and the <a href="/topics/Philadelphia_Eagles">Eagles</a> couldn't agree on a fee, so Irvin signed with the Giants. A year later, he was a starting outfielder. A year after that, he was mentoring <a href="/topics/Willie_Mays">Willie Mays</a>. "He was country. I put a little city in him," said Irvin, who grew up in Orange, N.J., after his family moved from Haleburg, Ala. 
Yet Irvin was more than Mays' tutor, more than the co-host of a 1960s show between games of <a href="/topics/New_York_Mets">Mets</a> doubleheaders. Montford Merrill Irvin was a towering talent on the field. 
He was Mr. October before anyone came up with the nickname - batting .462 in the 1946 Negro Leagues <a href="/topics/World_Series">World Series</a> and .458 in the 1951 major-league <a href="/topics/World_Series">World Series</a>, with a steal of home. He set up the Miracle of Coogan's Bluff in 1951 by leading the <a href="/topics/National_League">National League</a> in runs batted in with 121. He was an All-Star and a career .293 hitter in the majors, even though he did not get that career going until he was 31. 
You just didn't hear it from him. "He is the most modest guy I've ever met," Berke said, adding that Irvin does know who he is and what he has done. 
Said Berke: "Once I heard him say he wanted to play football for <a href="/topics/Michigan">Michigan</a>. I said, 'You could have been Tommy Harmon's blocking back!' He just looked at me and said, 'Tommy Harmon would have been my blocking back.' "

Sports

Baseball

SPMONTE31

Irvin, about to turn 91, too big a man to be bitter

MONTE IRVIN

When Garfield Langhorn, 20, joined the small, select band of <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a>ers who had been awarded the Medal of Honor - the nation's highest military award - everyone in Riverhead knew his name.
But, that was in 1969, during the <a href="/topics/Vietnam_War">war in Vietnam</a>. Now, his mother, Mary J. Langhorn, said, some people in the community don't know who he was anymore, or even what that 40-year old war was all about.
They will soon get a reminder.
Congressman <a href="/topics/Tim_Bishop">Tim Bishop</a> (D-<a href="/topics/Southampton%2C_NY">Southampton</a>) has introduced a bill to name the new Riverhead post office building for Langhorn, who died in <a href="/topics/Vietnam">Vietnam</a> after throwing himself on a hand grenade to save the lives of several already-wounded soldiers.
In a talk to the NAACP convention in <a href="/topics/Colorado">Colorado</a>, President <a href="/topics/Ronald_Reagan">Ronald Reagan</a> in June 1981 said Langhorn's last whispered words were "you have to care."
There is a small bust of Langhorn in front of Riverhead Town Hall, and each year his mother takes part in the <a href="/topics/Memorial_Day">Memorial Day</a> observance at Long Island National Cemetery at <a href="/topics/Calverton%2C_NY">Calverton</a>. There is also a memorial garden at his old school.
But, she said Wednesday, the memory of her son has faded from the community.
"Very few people know Garfield as a little boy," she said. "He used to walk the halls at church as an usher. They have an [annual] essay contest in his name at the Pulaski Street school . . . that was our high school when he graduated."
She noted that her son already has a building named for him, at Fort Campbell, Ky., the home of his former Army unit, the 7th squadron of the 17th Air Cavalry. "People in other states talk about Garfield," his mother said. "A few people around here do, too. Sooner or later, they will all find out about him."

LILANG21

Lawmaker wants Riverhead post office named for honored vet

Lillian Beatrice Scott, a passionate civil rights activist and a matriarch to her community, Amityville, died Oct. 28 of complications from liver cancer. She was 93. 
A champion of the young and the poor, Scott became an integral part of the Central <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a> branch of the NAACP when she moved to Amityville in 1951. She fought segregation of local elementary schools and picketed businesses as she called on them to admit black clients. But those who knew her work say her crowning achievement was working on the hard-fought campaign to clean up a notorious, drug-infested corner in <a href="/topics/North_Amityville%2C_NY">North Amityville</a>. 
"She was a warrior for civil rights and human rights," said Myrna Taylor of Amityville, a former NAACP chapter president. 
Scott was born in <a href="/topics/Baltimore">Baltimore</a> in 1916. When she was 16 her mother died, and her father died eight months later, leaving Scott to raise her three younger siblings, according to family members. 
She worked as a domestic worker and later a riveter for the former Glenn L. Martin Aircraft Co. 
She married Harry Pendleton in the 1940s, and the couple had two children, said her daughter, Lillian Joan Miller, 74, of Amityville. 
The couple divorced, and in 1948 Scott moved to <a href="/topics/Jamaica%2C_NY">Jamaica</a>, <a href="/topics/Queens%2C_NY">Queens</a>, and shortly thereafter married <a href="/topics/George_Scott">George Scott</a>. The family moved to Amityville three years later. 
By day Scott worked as a nurse, first at Brunswick Hospital and then at Pilgrim State Hospital, where she remained for 30 years, according to family members. She later worked for then-<a href="/topics/Suffolk_County%2C_NY">Suffolk</a> County Executive Patrick Halpin doing constituent services, and as a receptionist for the <a href="/topics/Babylon%2C_NY">Babylon</a> Industrial Development Agency, family members said. 
In her free time Scott poured her energy into community activism and the <a href="/topics/Hollywood">Hollywood</a> Baptist Church in Amityville. "She was one of the pillars of the congregation," said Bishop Andy C. Lewter. 
She was known as "Mama Lillian" to many in the community, always there for the young and the old, said Gwendolyn Brown, president of the Central <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a> NAACP. "She was part of the old group that was out here," said Brown. 
Relatives said Scott was a masterful cook who could recite poems by heart, a woman who didn't mince words but was always there with a helping hand or an encouraging word. "She a no-nonsense, vibrant, loving, compassionate woman," said her grandson, Donald Pendleton Jr., 57, of <a href="/topics/Staten_Island%2C_NY">Staten Island</a>. 
Besides her daughter and grandson, Scott leaves a son, Donald Pendleton of <a href="/topics/Atlanta">Atlanta</a>; three other grandchildren, 15 great-grandchildren and six great-great-grandchildren. A funeral was held Saturday at <a href="/topics/Hollywood">Hollywood</a> Baptist Church, followed by a burial at Pinelawn Memorial Cemetery in <a href="/topics/Farmingdale%2C_NY">Farmingdale</a>.

Suffolk

LISCOT10

Amityville activist 'Mama Lillian' Scott dies at 93

Lillian B. Scott

His is an unlikely love story with his community that began 40 years ago. 
Robert Paul Jeffries, who died last week at age 63, had wanted to use his Navy firefighting training to volunteer in his hometown of Quogue after returning from service in <a href="/topics/Vietnam">Vietnam</a>. But he would have to fight a more powerful enemy than fire to get there.
He was the first black firefighter in the village's volunteer department, a position he earned only after filing a complaint against it in 1969. In 1979, he would become its chief.
Jeffries was born in <a href="/topics/Brooklyn_Bridge%2C_NY">Brooklyn</a> in 1946. His father was a soldier who had stopped over in <a href="/topics/New_York%2C_NY">New York</a> while serving in <a href="/topics/World_War_II">World War II</a>. His mother abandoned him as an infant, and he went to an orphanage, he would later tell his son.
Jeffries was adopted by Christine and Gerard Jeffries, who lived in Quogue, said his son, William Paul Kersnowski.
Jeffries attended <a href="/topics/Westhampton_Beach%2C_NY">Westhampton Beach</a> High School, where he played varsity football, according to his son. But Jeffries often got into trouble. Years later, he would acknowledge that he was repeatedly called on the carpet for "fooling around in class and arguing with teachers."
He also would say that he was asked to leave the school at 16.
By then, the nation was at <a href="/topics/Vietnam_War">war in Vietnam</a>, and Jeffries later enlisted in the Navy. He served four years. It was a decision that changed his life, his son said.
"He became a man in the Navy," Kersnowski said. "He matured. He told me that he loved the camaraderie, loved being of service. I think that when he came home, he went to the fire department looking for that camaraderie, that opportunity to do service."
And so it was that Jeffries, 23, applied to join the Quogue fire department. It was June 1969. "I learned how to fight fires [aboard ships] in the service and I wanted to keep my hand in," he said at the time.
Jeffries said he had no trouble getting four department members to sponsor him. He said he passed the physical, sent in the required fee. On Aug. 4, however, he received a letter saying that his application had been voted upon and rejected.
"I wanted to know why," Jeffries said. And because the department would give him no reason, he filed a complaint with the state Division of Human Rights.
During a 1970 hearing, a department official said Jeffries wasn't denied admission because of racial bias, but because of his reputation as a high school troublemaker. In a decision released a few months later, the state determined that Jeffries was denied admission because of racial bias. The state ordered that he be admitted to the fire department and that the department make sweeping changes in its membership process.
"I think the order is just," Jeffries told a reporter at the time. "I live in Quogue. . . . I feel it is my duty to give to the community as much as I can."
He joined the department in 1971. Eight years later, Jeffries was elected chief. He served a second two-year term in 1996. And continued to volunteer until he died, of complications from a heart ailment, on Oct. 22 at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City.
Jeffries, who worked at <a href="/topics/Brookhaven%2C_NY">Brookhaven</a> National Laboratory and had a lawn care service, was well-known throughout the community.
"He loved his church . . . ," said the Rev. John D. Greene, pastor of St. Paul AME Zion Church in Quogue. "He worshiped the fire department. When the alarm went off, he would run out of the church. He had a tough time getting in, but once he was there, he devoted himself to it for 45 years."
Thursday, the firehouse bore the black bunting of mourning.
After his service, his body will take a last ride on the department's antique fire truck. "My father loved the department and he loved Quogue," Kersnowski said.

Columnists

Joye Brown

LIJOY30

Quogue FD mourns volunteer who broke color barrier

Robert Paul Jeffries

The last time Sgt. Archie Ortega saw his close friend Lance Cpl. Leopold Damas, the young Floral Park Marine talked of the future and spoke of buying his mother a house. 
Damas, 26, was a rifleman with the 2nd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force at <a href="/topics/Camp_Lejeune">Camp Lejeune</a> in <a href="/topics/North_Carolina">North Carolina</a>. He died Aug. 17, military officials said, during a struggle with militants in <a href="/topics/Afghanistan">Afghanistan</a>'s southern <a href="/topics/Helmand_Province">Helmand province</a>. 
He had also served two tours in <a href="/topics/Iraq">Iraq</a> before volunteering to go to <a href="/topics/Afghanistan">Afghanistan</a>, said Ortega, 25, of <a href="/topics/Elmhurst%2C_NY">Elmhurst</a>, a best friend from high school who attended a wake, held Friday in <a href="/topics/Queens_Village%2C_NY">Queens Village</a>. 
Ortega, currently stationed in <a href="/topics/Jacksonville">Jacksonville</a>, N.C., said he last saw Damas in May, before the Marine headed for <a href="/topics/Afghanistan">Afghanistan</a>. "He wanted to buy his mother a house in <a href="/topics/North_Carolina">North Carolina</a>," Ortega said, adding Damas also mentioned upgrading his car. 
"I just want people to know that he fought and died for this country and don't forget about him and don't forget the men and women who serve this country," Ortega said. 
Damas was remembered at the wake as a brave young man who spoke his mind and who was not afraid. 
"He's a hero because he died for this country," said Dong Ky, 25, of Elmhurst, another of Damas' friends from high school. "We wouldn't enjoy the freedom we have if it weren't for him." 
Also in attendance were members from several <a href="/topics/US_Marine_Corps">Marine Corps</a> leagues, including some from <a href="/topics/Westchester">Westchester</a> and <a href="/topics/Port_Washington%2C_NY">Port Washington</a>. 
Dom Longobardi, 69, of Floral Park, a member of the Western <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a> Detachment Marine Corps League, noted the recent spike in U.S. deaths in Afghanistan. "We're bringing the battle to the enemy, we're going to take some casualties," said the former Marine. 
A funeral service for Damas is 11 a.m. Saturday at Saints Joachim &amp; Anne <a href="/topics/Roman_Catholic_Church">Roman Catholic Church</a> in <a href="/topics/Middle_Village">Queens Village</a>, <a href="/topics/Queens%2C_NY">Queens</a>.

LIMARI29

Floral Park Marine remembered as a 'hero'

Leopold F. Damas

After decades of civil rights activism on <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a>, Wyatt Burghardt Turner swore that nothing would keep him from seeing the <a href="/topics/Obama_Inauguration">inauguration</a> of President Barack <a href="/topics/Barack_Obama">Obama</a>. 
He missed by just 10 days. 
Turner, 93, a retired <a href="/topics/Stony_Brook_University">Stony Brook University</a> history professor and founding president of the <a href="/topics/Brookhaven%2C_NY">Brookhaven</a> NAACP, died Jan. 11 in his home in Riderwood Village, a <a href="/topics/Maryland">Maryland</a> retirement community. He had been diagnosed with a rare, virulent form of cancer, just days after the election. 
"He actively worked on the campaign," said his son, Mitchell, who lives in <a href="/topics/Tampa">Tampa</a>, Fla. "He made phone calls, he went door-to-door, he was a poll watcher. He was overjoyed when Obama won. He really wanted to see [the inauguration], he just didn't quite make it." 
Turner's activism was a birthright, his son said, noting that his grandfather was an accountant for the NAACP from its inception. Turner's middle name, Burghardt, was given to him in honor of civil rights leader and author W.E.B DuBois, who had been a family friend. 
Born in <a href="/topics/Jamaica%2C_NY">Jamaica</a>, <a href="/topics/Queens%2C_NY">Queens</a>, Turner finished high school in <a href="/topics/Kentucky">Kentucky</a>, while tending to his ailing grandmother. He earned a bachelor's degree in history and sociology at Kentucky State College. 
Back in <a href="/topics/New_York%2C_NY">New York</a>, Turner started a milk delivery route in his old neighborhood to pay for graduate school at <a href="/topics/Columbia_University">Columbia University</a>. One day, he spied the pretty daughter of a family on his route, who also was a Columbia student. 
"It's true, he was the milkman," said his wife of 66 years, Joyce. "He may have been coming around, collecting when I met him. I thought he was kind of interesting." 
After they married, Turner shipped out to Italy to serve in the Army during <a href="/topics/World_War_II">World War II</a>. 
When he returned, Turner earned his master's degree in history at Columbia and moved his growing family to <a href="/topics/Patchogue%2C_NY">Patchogue</a>. He loved the classroom, but couldn't find a district that would hire a black teacher, so he became a claims examiner for the <a href="/topics/Social_Security_Administration">Social Security Administration</a>. 
In 1947, his family said, he became the first black teacher in <a href="/topics/Bay_Shore%2C_NY">Bay Shore</a>. After stints at Patchogue High School and <a href="/topics/Southampton%2C_NY">Southampton</a> College, Turner joined the history department at <a href="/topics/Stony_Brook%2C_NY">Stony Brook</a> in 1968. 
His tenure at Stony Brook was marked by community and civil rights activism, both on and off-campus. He helped found the Brookhaven branch of the NAACP and served as its president. He also served as chairman of the <a href="/topics/Suffolk_County%2C_NY">Suffolk</a> County Human Rights Commission and its Economic Opportunity Council. His wife, a school administrator in <a href="/topics/Brentwood%2C_NY">Brentwood</a>, often joined him in his work. 
Turner fought housing discrimination and organized marches in solidarity with those in Selma, Ala. He introduced Stony Brook's first courses on African-American history and Native American history. 
"He was known as the go-to guy in a lot of situations," Mitchell Turner said. 
In 1988, 10 years after he retired from Stony Brook, the school named a fellowship program for minority graduate students after him. 
The Turners retired to <a href="/topics/Tucson">Tucson</a>, Ariz., in the early 1990s, where he continued to be involved in many causes, including the Unitarian Universalist Church and tutoring programs for children. They moved to Maryland in 2006. 
Besides his wife and eldest son, Turner is survived by another son, Richard, of Rockville, Md., a daughter, Dr. Sylvia Turner of <a href="/topics/Dallas">Dallas</a>; two brothers, Marion of Wilson, N.C., and Frost of Jamaica, Queens; and five grandchildren. 
The family requests donations in lieu of flowers to The Turner Family Memorial Garden Corp., c/o Edna Turner, 5445 NE 1st Lane, Ocala, FL, 34475; or Stony Brook Foundation-Turner Support Fund, c/o Stony Brook Foundation, Stony Brook University, NY, 11794.

News

ny-liturn236009117jan23

Wyatt B. Turner, longtime civil rights activist, dies

George Boykin of <a href="/topics/East_Moriches">East Moriches</a>, who worked at The Health Sciences Center at <a href="/topics/Stony_Brook_University">Stony Brook University</a> for more than 35 years, has died of complications brought on by heart disease, cancer and diabetes. He was 78. 
As chief morphologist, Boykin, who died Feb. 19, operated Stony Brook's Anatomy Lab, where he oversaw the dissection of corpses donated to the university for medical research. Although family members admitted that the job was morbid, they said that Boykin's personality did not reflect the somber nature of his profession. 
"You would never know that he worked with cadavers," said wife Hilde Boykin, 80. 
"He was the most cheerful person you would ever want to meet," added son-in-law Stephen Priory, 60, of Glenwood Landing. 
Boykin's daughter, Tracey Boykin-Priory, 48, of Glenwood Landing, said that her father "really understood the living quite a bit." 
Boykin-Priory, a physical therapist at The Stern Family Center for Extended Care &amp; Rehabilitation in Manhasset, studied in her father's anatomy lab while attending Stony Brook University. However, she was given no special treatment. "He was very low-key in that sense," she said. "We believe in working for things." 
Boykin graduated from the <a href="/topics/New_York">New York</a> Academy of Embalming, his family said. He went on to serve in the Army, where he was a sergeant first class in the Korean War. Boykin, who was black, met his future wife, who was white, while stationed in <a href="/topics/Hamburg">Hamburg</a>, Germany. The two married in 1953, when interracial marriages were uncommon. 
"People were spitting at us at that time," Hilde Boykin said. "We had each other, and that's the most important thing." 
At Stony Brook, Boykin was a civil rights activist and was involved in a program that supports African-American, Latino, Native American and Asian students. "He did whatever he could to take people under his wing," said Boykin-Priory. Boykin was also involved in Stony Brook's Black Faculty and Staff Association, and was vice president of the Brookhaven NAACP. 
Before coming to Stony Brook in 1972, Boykin was a mortuary attendant at the New York City medical examiner's office, supervisor of the mortuary at the <a href="/topics/Manhattan">Manhattan</a> veterans hospital, and pathology assistant at the Suffolk County medical examiner's office. 
Family members said hospitals across <a href="/topics/Long_Island">Long Island</a> sought Boykin's assistance. "He had mentored many doctors over the years," Stephen Priory said. 
His daughter said that he initially wanted to be a funeral director, but at the time there were few African-Americans in that field. "He was dedicated to changing that," said Boykin-Priory, although he ultimately decided to go in a different direction. 
In addition to his wife and daughter, Boykin is survived by two grandchildren, who knew him as Opa. 
A funeral was held at the Bethel A.M.E. church in Setauket on Feb. 24, with burial at Calverton National Cemetery.

ny-liboyk086063200mar09

George Boykin, retired Stony Brook staffer, dies

Black History Month prompts reflection for Bernard Tomlin, the SUNY-Old Westbury men's basketball coach. He gives his players a lesson in history, some of it very personal.
 "Athletics today is not the way it has always been," said Tomlin, 56. "I grew up in a time when a lot of my friends went to predominantly black schools. That was their best option."
 In many cases, the only option.
 Tomlin tried bucking that trend, going from Malverne High School to the University of <a href="/topics/Utah">Utah</a> in <a href="/topics/Salt_Lake_City">Salt Lake City</a> in the early 1970s. He was the only African-American member of the freshman team.
 "When we went on the road to certain schools, you would hear things," Tomlin said. He need not elaborate. He later transferred to Hofstra.
 Tomlin has set up workshops in which his players learn about not only their heritage - and ordeal - in athletics but in this country's civil rights movement.
 In years past, although black and white athletes had the same aspirations - playing college basketball - few blacks had the same opportunity.
 "I wasn't aware of the struggle they went through," junior forward Hakiem George said. "Growing up as a kid playing basketball, I was just having fun. You have to give thanks, you have no choice. It was like a civil rights movement for basketball. There were times when we couldn't use the same bathroom or water fountain. People have to think and know what it was like then and now. To think you had to look at a sign to drink water or use the bathroom."
 George watched the movie "Glory Road," which chronicled the 1965-66 <a href="/topics/Texas">Texas</a> Western University team. That's the team that included numerous black players struggling for acceptance in an area of the country that was largely segregated - and a team that started five black players and upset all-white <a href="/topics/Kentucky">Kentucky</a> to win the national championship.
 "It showed what people went through just to be on the court," George said. "I don't know too many athletes now that would put their life on the line to play the sport. It showed how much athletes before us went through just to show their talent."
 Junior guard Dwayne Messam said: "Some people take it for granted. Some people don't know what happened back in the day. One black person on a team. Sometimes they couldn't get anything to eat because they were black. He'd sit at the counter and ask for something to eat, but nobody would serve them."
 Tomlin's lessons are open to the entire athletic department, and the workshops and movies are attended by all races.
 "It gives you the opportunity to learn about what individuals from other cultures went through," said women's basketball player Carlie Moore, who is white. "I really don't see a difference [in the races]. Then again, I don't look for a difference."
 Women's basketball star Pamela Robinson believes the message needs to resonate beyond this month, saying, "It should be incorporated throughout the year because it is part of American history."
 Tomlin said the election of <a href="/topics/Barack_Obama">Barack Obama</a> as the nation's first African-American president has made Black History Month all the more significant.
 "It was like a team at the bottom that finally put it all together and wins the championship," he said. "It gives us all hope."

Basketball

ny-sphist156036957feb15

Old Westbury's Tomlin sharing black history

As they mounted the stage at the Cradle of Aviation 
Museum in <a href="/topics/Garden_City">Garden City</a> yesterday - two active-duty generals, one retired general 
and a pioneering <a href="/topics/World_War_II">World War II</a> aviator - an evolution of African-American 
struggle, and progress, was made plain. 
Before an audience of about 200 <a href="/topics/Westbury%2C_NY">Westbury</a> and <a href="/topics/Uniondale%2C_NY">Uniondale</a> high school students 
at the museum's Black History Month program, William Wheeler, 85, of <a href="/topics/Hempstead">Hempstead</a> 
- one of the four luminaries - related his experience as a member of the famed 
Tuskegee Airmen. The all-black aviator group's successful exploits during 
World War II helped influence President <a href="/topics/Harry_S._Truman">Harry S. Truman</a> to end segregation in 
the military. 
Responding to a question from moderator <a href="/topics/Lester_Holt">Lester Holt</a>, of the "Today" show's 
weekend edition, Wheeler said he wasn't thinking about making history. 
"We were fighting for equality," Wheeler said. 
Other panelists were Maj. Gen. Darren W. McDew, a command pilot who is now 
director of public affairs for the Air Force at the Pentagon; Brig. Gen. 
Allyson R. Solomon, whose duties include commanding the <a href="/topics/Maryland">Maryland</a> Air National 
Guard; and Maj. Gen. Joseph McNeil of <a href="/topics/Hempstead%2C_NY">Hempstead</a>, who is retired from the Air 
Force Reserve, and during active duty in the 1960s was a master navigator. 
Wheeler, in an interview, recalled Truman's executive order 9981 to 
integrate the military. "1948," Solomon added, citing the year of Truman's 
edict. "We all know that number," McDew said. 
In interviews and in their talks, McDew and Solomon, both 48, noted the 
doors that were opened by the likes of Wheeler and McNeil. 
Noting he didn't have to go through the struggles the Tuskegee Airmen did, 
McDew said, "I wouldn't be standing here today, having gone through pilot 
training and now wearing general stars, without their work." 
Solomon noted there are fewer limitations based on race and gender today. 
"But we still have a ways to go. Many of us feel you can't just be average, but 
better than average in order to be competitive." 
McNeil, 66, of Hempstead, who is also retired from the Federal Aviation 
Administration, is in the history books for being one of four college students 
who staged the first sit-in of a "whites-only" lunch counter at a Woolworth's 
in <a href="/topics/Greensboro">Greensboro</a>, N.C., in 1960, sparking a nationwide protest that ended the 
practice. 
Responding to a student who asked how he was able to "maintain your cool" 
in the face of such discrimination, McNeil said, "The whole effort was about 
bringing about human dignity and respect. While it was tough, it was important 
we stay nonviolent." 
After hearing their stories, <a href="/topics/Michael_Barrett">Michael Barrett</a>, 18, a senior at Westbury High 
School said, "We really don't have much to complain about, our generation. 
"The doors are wide open and it's time for us to step up to the plate."

LIHIST13

When equality first took wing

She grew up in segregated <a href="/topics/Tennessee">Tennessee</a>, was split from her parents when <a href="/topics/The_Great_Depression">the Great Depression</a> forced her family to move to seek work, married a fiery civil rights activist and shielded her children from the threat of violence his activism brought their family growing up on Long Island. 
Jane Dwin Reed, who was married for 58 years to civil rights pioneer Dr. Eugene Reed, died of cancer Dec. 17 at her Amityville home. She was 87. A memorial service is scheduled for 2 p.m. Sunday at Slinger-Hasgill Funeral Home, 155 Sunrise Hwy., Amityville. 
The activities of her husband, who during the 1950s and 1960s battled housing segregation here and faced shotgun-toting opponents during trips to <a href="/topics/Mississippi">Mississippi</a> to participate in civil rights actions there, made the Reed family a target of racial threats from fellow Long Islanders. 
Crosses were burned on the Amityville lawn of her husband's dental practice. His leadership in the NAACP, which he criticized for not being radical enough, brought threatening phone calls from anonymous individuals uttering racial slurs. 
Her children said Reed, who was a stay-at-home mom, was quietly reassuring. "She was very frightened because she grew up in the South and knew how mean racists could be," said her youngest child, Dorothy Reed of Amityville. "But she battled for us." 
A petite, soft-spoken woman who grew roses, Reed was born in Morristown, Tenn. Her mother commuted by horseback to teach at a segregated one-room schoolhouse; her father worked as a restaurateur and a barber. 
When economic collapse forced her parents to find work in the homes of wealthy families in Hartford, Conn., Reed stayed with friends and relatives living there, often seeing her parents only on Sundays. 
But she excelled in school, where she also played tennis and violin before graduating from high school in 1940, and enrolling at <a href="/topics/Howard_University">Howard University</a> in Washington, D.C. She met Eugene Reed, a student from Glen Cove, and the two were married in 1944. After living briefly in <a href="/topics/Munich">Munich</a>, Germany, where Eugene Reed served as an Army dentist, the family moved to Amityville. 
In addition to her daughter, she is survived by daughter Tobi Connors, of Oakland, <a href="/topics/California">Calif</a>., and son Eugene Reed Jr., of Washington, D.C. Her husband died in 2002. 
She had a private burial Dec. 23 at her husband's plot at Calverton National Cemetery, in Calverton.

Obituaries

LIREED09

Jane Dwin Reed, 87, widow of civil rights activist, dies

liREED

In a Long Island community where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once visited to promote school integration, the number of black teachers in the Malverne school district is little changed from a generation ago, despite ongoing efforts to further integrate the predominantly white faculty.
That and other lingering racial inequities - housing segregation, economically depressed neighborhoods and frequently strained relations with the police - are sobering to area members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, who are preparing to celebrate the 100th birthday of the nation's oldest civil rights organization.
"The fact that America has a black president does not mean America's racial issues are all solved," said Bea Bayley, president of the NAACP's Lakeview branch.
NAACP delegates from around the country - excited by the scheduled appearance next Thursday of President <a href="/topics/Barack_Obama">Barack Obama</a> - are expected to flock to the <a href="/topics/New_York">New York</a> Hilton in <a href="/topics/Manhattan">Manhattan</a> beginning Monday for the organization's four-day centennial convention.
They will represent an organization that has helped bring about dramatic change in American society - including the near elimination of lynching, the end of legal segregation in public schools and the U.S. military, and voting rights laws that made possible Obama's election.
But the NAACP is also trying to fend off the perception that it is an aging organization fighting for equalities that have already been won.
Leroy Gadsden, president of the <a href="/topics/Jamaica">Jamaica</a>, <a href="/topics/Queens">Queens</a>, branch of the NAACP, said the fatal police shooting of an unarmed man, <a href="/topics/Sean_Bell">Sean Bell</a>, 23, in 2006 demonstrated the ongoing need for organized advocacy in the black community.
After Bell's death, Gadsden worked with police to calm community tensions, but criticized prosecutors for failing to convict any of the officers.
"We still don't have equal protection under the law, and I think the Sean Bell trial demonstrated that," Gadsden said.
 
Visit by King in 1965
King visited the Malverne school district in 1965, two years after the state ordered the district to comply with the Supreme Court's decade-old ruling on school segregation.
Since then, the local NAACP has lobbied almost continually for greater black representation among teachers and administrators. In the Malverne district, three of every five students are black.
The district has 11 black teachers divided among its four school buildings, according to the NAACP, compared to nine black teachers in 1975. Last year, the Malverne school board hired a black principal and assistant principal at the high school.
Newsday was unable to reach school superintendent James Hunderfund.
Sherwyn Besson, a Malverne High School teacher who lives in the community, says the regular presence of NAACP representatives at school board meetings helps ensure that the black community's concerns about test scores, disciplinary measures, teacher hiring and other matters are heard.
"Their presence alone sends a message to the board that they won't go unchallenged," Besson said. 
NAACP branches on Long Island have helped identify black applicants for positions in school systems, county governments and local police departments.
 
Work with police department
Last year, the Islip Town NAACP worked with the <a href="/topics/Suffolk">Suffolk</a> County Police Department to successfully boost the number of African-Americans taking the police exam. 
Islip NAACP president Rev. Roderick Pearson, 47, said he urged the collaboration because about 2.3 percent of the department's officers are black, and only two blacks hold the position of detective sergeant.
He said the presence of black officers in the department is important to building trust with black communities. 
"Especially for people who need assistance and don't know where to turn, there is a real relevance for the NAACP," Pearson said.
Suffolk Executive <a href="/topics/Steve_Levy">Steve Levy</a> said a joint effort between the NAACP and the Suffolk police department led to a doubling of the number of minority applicants who scored in the highest category on the most recent police recruitment examination. Levy also said the number of civilian complaints against Suffolk police fell by 50 percent since the NAACP helped design a sensitivity training program implemented in 2005.
"We work pretty closely with the NAACP, and have seen the results," Levy said.

LINAAC12

NAACP's influence felt on Long Island

May Brown, 82, held fast to seven "Welcome Home" balloons. 
Her grandson Marine Cpl. Lamarr Jackson was coming home. 
He had jarred her awake more than once, calling briefly, sweetly, from somewhere in <a href="/topics/Afghanistan">Afghanistan</a> to tell her he was all right. 
Late Wednesday afternoon, Jackson, 25, of Central <a href="/topics/Islip%2C_NY">Islip</a>, stepped through a security checkpoint and into the lobby of <a href="/topics/Long_Island%2C_NY">Long Island</a> MacArthur Airport. Flanked by his parents and siblings, who had met him at the gate, he was beaming as he bent and squeezed his grandmother hard and long. Her eyes filled with tears. 
"You're taller!" she said. 
Members of the airport staff - colleagues of Jackson's father, <a href="/topics/John_Jackson">John Jackson</a>, who works for the <a href="/topics/Transportation_Security_Administration">Transportation Security Administration</a> - clapped and cheered. Then the ceremonies began. 
With Cpl. Jackson's arrival, the Town of <a href="/topics/Islip%2C_NY">Islip</a> launched its Hometown Heroes Welcome program, greeting service members who fly home to MacArthur. 
<a href="/topics/Jerry_Ferrara">Jerry Ferrara</a>, 67, a Navy veteran, blew a call on his boatswain pipe. "Welcome home, U.S. <a href="/topics/US_Marine_Corps">Marine Corps</a>!" he shouted. 
Standing in two lines, some 50 veterans, civilians and TSA employees saluted. Jackson walked between the rows, accepting hugs, handshakes and thanks. At the end, friends and relatives reached out to grab him, squealing and laughing. 
Islip Councilman Gene Parrington, a <a href="/topics/Vietnam">Vietnam</a> veteran, gave Jackson a framed town citation and a backpack intended to contain local coupons and references for veteran support services. But because his <a href="/topics/Southwest_Airlines">Southwest Airlines</a> flight arrived early, the inaugural backpack had not been fully assembled. 
Jackson said that in his year in <a href="/topics/Afghanistan">Afghanistan</a> he survived a close call with a roadside bomb. 
"It's been a difficult year for me," he said. "I'm just glad to be home. I wasn't expecting all of this." 
And there was more. 
Members of the Patriot Guard Riders, a motorcycle group that honors military service members and veterans, handed him a helmet, goggles, gloves and a leather jacket, which he donned over his fatigues. His sister, Tiffany, 21, giggled as Parrington helped cover his nose and mouth with a bandanna. 
"I know he loves this," she said. "He deserves it." 
He hopped on the back of a bike and the Patriot Guard Riders rumbled off, carrying him home.

LIHOME26

Hero's welcome for Marine at MacArthur Airport

liHOME26

Black History Month 2010

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