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A Family Thing, Bryant-Fisher Family Reunion
Family. Can't live with them, can't live without them. For the Bryant-Fisher extended family, who call home base Omaha, Neb. but have members scattered all over the nation, they keep things tight with a annual family reunion. Big deal, right? Well, before you dismiss their get-together as routine, consider that this is a really big family, as in more than 2,200 direct descendants of family reunion founder Emma Early Bryant Fisher, by last count. Their Second Sunday in August reunion usually draws 500 or more folks, and for those milestone years it sees 700, 800, or more. Eight generations worth come from near far. Then consider they've been doing this for 94 consecutive years.
A Family Thing, Bryant-Fisher Family Reunion
©by Leo Adam Biga
As published in The Reader (www.thereader.com)
With the "hot ghetto mess" of Native Omaha Days over, another traditional African-American summer gathering, the Bryant-Fisher Family Reunion, begins.
The biennial Native Omaha Days began in 1977. But it's a newbie compared to the historic annual reunion that dates to 1917, when Emma Early Bryant Fisher inaugurated the event with a family picnic at Mandan Park near her South Omaha home. The picnic was held there for 30 years.
Sunday's picnic at Levi Carter Park will mark its 94th consecutive year.
The Days and the reunion coincide only every other year. Just as NOD winds down, the reunion gears up, though there's an extra week between them this time. NOD officially runs a week. The reunion, three days.
NOD boasts signature events attracting sizable crowds. The Bryant-Fisher reunion has one main event – the sprawling, all-day August 14 picnic. The picnic moved to Carter Lake in the early 1990s.
The picnic draws the biggest family throng.
"They're going to be at the park. If they don't do anything else for the whole weekend or the whole year, that Sunday they will be at the park," says family historian Arlett Brooks. "You cook your food and you pitch your tent, and you may be there for an hour or you may be there for five hours, but you go."
This mega extended family, whose population rivals that of many Nebraska towns, takes over a few acres at Carter Lake.
The Bryants and Fishers exert a considerable presence wherever they encamp. They comprise what's believed to be the largest African-American family around, extending over 12 branches. They're so large they conduct their own census. At last count they numbered more than 2,200 direct descendants.
If this year is like others, 500 to 800 souls will gather Sunday.
"People just don't realize the magnitude of it until they get there," says Brooks, whose sister Cheryl Secret and mother Patricia Moss are family stalwarts.
The enormity of the history and scope is a point of family pride.
"I think it's associated with pride, it's associated with tradition, respect for our elders. By continuing this we're respecting our great-grandmother," says Secret.
For milestone reunions like the 90th in 2007, when upwards of 1,000 or more gathered, the family throws its own Saturday parade on North 24th Street.
In this frantic age, the reunion expresses solidarity and consistency. The family likes to say no matter where you are in the world, you know the reunion will be held on the second Sunday in August ,come hell or high water. Neither storms nor floods will deter it.
"Nothing has ever stopped it," says Secret. "You don't even look at the weather, you just go."
"We've been rained on a lot of times, but not rained out," says Moss, who by her reckoning hasn't missed a reunion during her 85 years.
Having something to count on helps this enormous family remain tight.
"It's wonderful to have that bond, to have something that brings us together as opposed to separating us," says Paul Bryant. "We need more things like that in society – showing love as opposed to hate or indifference."
"We may not see each other every day, but if you need us we're there. That's how we are," says Juanita Sutton.
Meeting and greeting at the picnic is an invitation for young and old to share where they fit on the vast family tree. "If someone says, 'How are you related?' it's an honor to be able to go down the line as to how you belong in the family," says Secret.
Arlett's daughter, Makida Brooks, says, "It means a whole lot, just knowing I can go anywhere and not be alone. I can go anywhere by myself and be pretty sure I'm going to be in the same area as one of my relatives, so I'm going to be okay, wherever I go."
On their Dozens of Cousins Facebook page, Makida says, "We send messages, 'Do we have any cousins in Alabama? In Buffalo, New York.? In L.A.? Most places we do. On Facebook I have 500-600 friends and 90 percent of them are my relatives. I don't accept you if I don't know you, so you have to be related to me."
Moss, whose grandmother was reunion founder Emma Early, does old school social networking at the picnic, where she seeks her closest cousins.
"When I could walk I used to walk from one end of Carter Lake all the way to the other to make sure I saw every one of my cousins, especially my first cousins," says Moss, who as an elder now has relatives come and wait on her.
When she was still spry, her daughters shadowed her as she made the rounds. It ignited their interest in family lore.
"We got to visit and develop relationships with all 12 families because we were with her," says Brooks.
Patricia's daughters cherish their mother's and other elders' tales.
"She loves telling us stories," says Secret. "She'll tell stories about racial things that happened in South Omaha, where they kind of pushed the blacks out, and how her father's family stayed put. Her uncle sat on the porch with a shotgun and said, 'I'm not going anywhere.' They stood their ground.
"When we're like this, just sitting around, all you gotta do is just give her a little hint of what direction you want to go, and she'll just start sharing stories."
As if on cue, Patricia recalls how long-ago customs were enforced at the picnic.
"I remember when we were kids my grandmother had all of the cousins sit at one table. The sisters (daughters, daughters-in-law) had to wait on everybody before they could eat. My grandmother would sit down with the men and she'd have her dinner and she'd make sure all the kids had theirs, and then the sisters could sit down and eat."
Where a pavilion or large tent once accommodated the picnic, she says, "It's got so big, now each family's got their own tent."
The Bryant-Fisher thing turns Carter Lake into a multi-colored tent city. Black folks of every shade and hue mingle. Eight generations worth. Some sport Bryant-Fisher T-shirts, complete with the family crest. Some "wear" the logo as body art. Jazz, blues and R&B mix with hip-hop.
One could mistake it all for Native Omaha Days. But don't confuse the two. The family is protective of what they have and don't like sharing the spotlight.
The reunion's longevity and large turnout regularly attract media notice, even gaining Guinness Book of World Records mention. During election cycles the picnic's known to bring out politicians in search of votes.
Party crashers are not unheard of.
"Oh, yeah, but they're kind of welcome, as long as they're not bringing trouble," says Mary Alice Bryant. "To me, what's great, with all the violence in Omaha, we've never had one incident, not one."
Rev. Doyle Bryant, pastor at Shiloh Baptist Church, says his family's commitment to staying connected, and the reunion's high profile, explain why it's endured and why it's coveted by outsiders.
"This family reunion is nationally known, that has a lot to do it. When you get that type of notoriety you don't want it to die out. We have people coming from all over the country to participate."
"I know some families struggle to keep the family together, but I grew up with us always having it. It's just expected," says Arlett Brooks. "I think a lot of people admire that we could have kept it going that long."
"There's not too many that have gone on this many years," says Marcelyn Frezell. "I think it has encouraged other families to have family reunions."
But there are posers, too.
"We've got a whole lot of wannabes," says Patricia Moss.
With a family this size, it's impossible to know everyone.
"I think it's intimidating, especially for the people who come from out of town maybe only every five years," says Secret. "You walk through the park and you know all these people are your relatives, but you just don't have a clue who they all are.
"I think the more we go down in generations the less connection they seem to have with each other. That's something we talk about, we really need to work on – the young people getting to know each other to maintain the closeness and bonds with one another."
And the lineage beat goes on.
There have been countless occasions when two young people who are sweet on each other find out they're cousins.
"I had six children and every last one of my kids, every last one of 'em, brought somebody home as their girlfriend or their boyfriend," says Moss. "When I got through questioning them, they were cousins. And we all live right here in Omaha. That's what I couldn't understand – how they don't know each other."
Arlett and Cheryl had it happen to them, as did most of their cousins.
"I went all the way through high school with a guy and one year I seen him at the family picnic. He said, 'This is my family,' and I'm like, 'Well, where have you been all of these years?' Sometimes, they've been there and you've been there, you just haven't seen each other," says Arlett.
Someone she works with turned out to be a cousin. "We're very close now."
Cheryl began a family genealogy book 16 years ago. Arlett's revised it every five years. The family consults it when there's a question.
"I took the initiative to research and find out all of the generations underneath my mother's generation," says Secret. "If someone can't go down that line and tell me who their grandmother was or who their great-grandmother was, then you know they're a wannabe or they married in or they're somebody's friend."
Not that friends aren't welcome, they are. "I have two girlfriends I've been knowing all my life, and they don't miss it," says Mary Alice Bryant.
Coming on the heels of Native Omaha Days, it makes for two weeks of black pride heritage celebrations.
Folks catch up with family and friends, revisit old haunts and make the rounds. The Days is a succession of reunions, picnics, barbecues and block parties. There's music, dancing, card playing. Church. A parade down North 30th. A communal picnic at Elmwood Park. A Blue Monday at local watering holes to tie one on before parting-is-such-sweet-sorrow goodbyes.
The Bryants-Fishers turn out in force at The Days. A family matriarch, Bettie McDonald, co-founded the event and its sponsoring Native Omahans Club. Not surprisingly, the itinerary is patterned after that of the Bryant-Fisher bash.
Though the Dozens of Cousins picnic has changed, one thing that hasn't is the dawn fish-fry breakfast, followed by a church service. Other activities include a talent contest, volleyball, foot races, fishing. Pokeno, gin and dominos are the favored card games.
There's a formal dinner dance Friday night at the Lake Point Center, a Family Fun Day Saturday at Fun-Plex and various odds and ends.
When the family has a parade, Bryant-Fisher floats and drill teams pass by the Native Omahans Club on North 24th. The building doubles as the family clubhouse for Dozens of Cousins meetings and fish-fry dinners.
Just as The Days ends on a blue note, some relatives will ring out the reunion on Monday at the club or a bar – tilting back a few to bid each other farewell, till next year.
For Paul Bryant, the reunion's been a given his whole life, and with it the realization his family is far from ordinary.
"Some of my earliest childhood memories are at family picnics at Mandan Park," he says, "and of some of the same things still going on today. The dance contest, the races. We used to almost always go down to the bottom of the hill to play football.
"The little kids would watch the older kids. 'Oh,he plays for Central! He's my cousin?' Then you become older and you become the one the little guys are watching. Then you get older still and admire someone like my cousin Galen Gullie, who made us all proud playing ball for Bryan (High). In my day, I was kind of doing that."
Bryant sees the reunion as continuity. An each-one-to-teach-one opportunity for older generations to impart the family heritage and tradition.
"I always knew we have a big family," says Bryant. "When I was 8 or 10 they'd hold a program with a dinner and the mayor or someone would speak. I was like, 'Wow, there's something special here.' Politicians come to the picnic and press the flesh. I mean, there's a lot of people there and a lot of them have done some things in the community.
"As a kid, you'd see that, you'd hear that, and you knew your family had something special. And you were proud to be inheriting all that legacy."
Paul Bryant
He enjoys discovering some notable is a relative. He's a notable himself. He excelled in sports in high school and college, then embarked on a fast-track corporate career before assuming leadership of the Nebraska Urban League. He found a new mission as executive director of the Wesley House, where he formed an excellence academy. Today, he's a presenter at schools with his purpose-driven leadership program.
Bryant, his wife Robin and their three kids are widely recognized for their community service. He says high achievers in the family, whether the late coach-educator Charles Bryant or current young hoops star Galen Gullie or the family's bona fide celebrity, actress Gabrielle Union, serve to inspire.
Union gets back for The Days some years and for the reunion others. Her appearances, lately with NBA squeeze Dwyane Wade, cause a sensation in the black community every bit as electric as the buzz Lady Gaga generates among her Little Monster fans.
The family is unapologetically possessive in claiming "Gabby" as their own. Paul Bryant's as starstruck as the rest, but he'd rather his kids view their elders as role models and their family history as cool.
"My son can tell you, 'My dad's Paul Bryant, whose dad was Doyle Bryant, whose dad was Marcy Bryant, whose dad was Thurston Bryant, who's the son of Emma Early, who's the daughter of Wesley Early, who's the son of a plantation owner.
"For me, it's important to pass that down. I want every one of my kids to know their lineage as far back as we can trace it. I think that's part of what this whole Bryant-Fisher thing is. If you don't know, if it's just going to the picnic Sunday and you don't feel connected with something bigger, you miss out, you've got nothing to pass on."
Makida Brooks values the experiences her elders share. "Just knowing what they had to go through and what they had to do makes me appreciate what I have now. I understand I don't have nearly the struggles they had."
Ninety-four years since it's start, the reunion appears set for the future.
"I'm not expecting anything different than what has happened in the past," says Arlett Brooks. "People will step up and make sure it continues, just like I have for my generation, and I'm sure my daughters will for their generation. It's just expected."
"I think it's embedded in so many of us we couldn't stop this thing if we wanted," says Cheryl Secret. "I think in each tribe there are children who will make this thing happen, no matter what.
"It will go on I think for generations."
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Overarching Plan for North Omaha Development Now in Place, Disinvested Community Hopeful Long Promised Change Follows
North Omaha Village Revitalization Plan and Empowerment Network leaders after 7-0 City Council vote approving plan
Here's a cover story I did for The Reader (www.thereader.com) about a plan and a vision that may at last signal the start of significant turnaround for long stagnated North Omaha. To be more precise – Northeast Omaha, where the predominantly African-American community is located and has awaited meaningful change for going on half-a-century. If it doesn't happen now, then when?
Overarching Plan for North Omaha Development Now in Place, Disinvested Community Hopeful Long Promised Change Follows
©by Leo Adam Biga
As published in The Reader (www.thereader.com)
Recent adoption of the North Omaha Village Revitalization Plan into the city master plan gives direction and impetus to energizing a stagnated, disinvested area never fully recovered from decades-ago civil disturbance and urban renewal.
Unanimous approval by the Omaha Planning Board and City Council sends a strong signal to public-private funders and developers the plan provides an officially endorsed blueprint for action. What happens next to realize its 30-year vision is up to stakeholders, entrepreneurs, elected officials, movers and shakers.
The Empowerment Network initiated plan, which drew input from residents, business concerns, philanthropists, planning consultants and others, envisions $1.43 billion in redevelopment along key corridors. The initiative puts the Northside in the crosshairs of major transformation as never before.
Some plan contributors and likely implementers recently spoke with The Reader about what this means for a section of the city that's long awaited significant change.
"One reason it's important is to show the people who participated, who live in the community, that we're serious about a North Omaha that is a strong component of the overall city, one that shares in the successes and in the future of the whole city," says Omaha Planning Director Rick Cunningham.
"It's important because as the Planning Department this gives us then our marching orders. This is what we then work with with developers to compare their ideas and plans against. It gives people a clear understanding of what the vision is and where they can best take their dollars and invest them."
Omaha Economic Development Corporation president Michael Maroney sees the plan as "absolutely essential" for addressing some sobering realities.
"I've been working in this community for over 40 years and over that period of time I've heard over and over again from the political leadership of this city, from the corporate-business community, why can't North Omaha leadership get together and speak with a single voice in terms of what the needs are.
"And this whole effort going back five years in the creation of the Empowerment Network was really in part a response to that, because we recognized we had to start doing things differently."
The need for a new approach became painfully obvious, he says, in the wake of a 2005 study. It showed that in every quality of life measure constituting a healthy community blacks "were either no better off or worse off compared to the majority community" than they were in 1977, he says.
"That basically said all the good work all of us thought we were doing wasn't making a difference, not in the overall scheme of things. Something was missing."
The community action coalition African American Empowerment Network was born.
"We sat around a table and said we've got to start working together, we've got to start collaborating, we've got to start connecting with each other, and bring all our combined talents together," says Maroney. "That led to this village revitalization visioning we did."
To those who might regard the resulting plan's price tag as excessive, he says, "We cannot be afraid of reality. Now we're not saying we're going to go out and get a $1.43 billion commitment tomorrow. It's a 30 year process, and it's not going to come from any one entity or one source or one area. Government has a role in this, the private sector has a role in this, there's going to be a lot of bank financing in this thing."
"When $3 billion has been spent in downtown and midtown, what's a billion dollars for North Omaha to make it a strong resource, a strong player, a big part of the tapestry for a sustainable Omaha?" asks Cunningham.
It's no exaggeration to say the plan is a put-up or shut-up moment in Omaha history.
Maroney says, "For decades the greater community has said come together and the support will be there. Well, we've done that now, and I have to say we've had good vibes all along the way from those various entities. But the proof is going to be in the pudding. We now have a very solid process we've gone through that creates a long term vision for the community. We've done this in a collaborative way that engaged the city and the business and philanthropic community. Now the question becomes, Will you step up to the plate? We've got this down, we've got it in phases, we've got even the first couple projects identified. So we're moving to that next level and we'll see if what has been suggested and indicated for years will actually happen."
Michael Maroney
Empowerment Network president Willie Barney says the plan's "going to take focus and commitment from the community itself," adding, "New businesses and venues will only be sustainable to the level they're supported by the people who live here."
For the area to thrive, says Maroney, "it's more than just brick and mortar because we know if people don't feel safe and secure, I don't care how nice we make it, they're not going to be there, they're not going to come."
Observers agree infrastructure needs like the sewer-separation project must proceed to lay the way for large scale development.
Seventy Five North Revitalization Corp. executive director Othello Meadows says whatever happens next, the Network deserves credit for making North O a priority.
"I'm encouraged by what the Empowerment Network is doing," he says. "They've been consistent, they haven't let the momentum fizzle out. They've been diligent. They've put together a really comprehensive plan. Anybody can quibble with aspects of it, but the fact they've put this together is a major accomplishment.
"They've kept the conversation going long enough to get the attention of the right people and it's moved to a very concrete step being part of the master plan."
He's confident North O has the players it needs to drive the plan to fruition.
"I think there's far more executors than they're used to be. There's more people who are used to being held accountable, to executing and getting things done and who are much less interested in talking about it and much more interested in doing it. That's the single biggest component of what will make North Omaha successful."
Another aspect of economic development the plan implicitly addresses is improving work skill readiness and creating more living wage to career job pathways.
"Omaha has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the nation, yet we still have in North Omaha a very high unemployment rate," says Barney. "We have not really bridged that gap yet. We really haven't come to grips with job creation and development. I think more so now than ever the business community is alongside us in looking at how to solve this. There are training programs through the Urban League, Heartland Workforce Solutions, Metro Community College that I think will do a more effective job of getting people ready."
The Chamber of Commerce's Workforce Solutions partners with local employers, Metro and Goodwill Industries to train skill deficient workers for entry level professional jobs. Meadows, who headed the Omaha Workforce Collaborative, says too many North Omaha residents still have "the steepest of hills to climb" to become proficient.
North Omaha is a much studied, social serviced area suffering disproportionately from poverty, unemployment, underemployment, educational-skill gaps and health problems. As Omaha as a whole has prospered, North O's languished, cut off from the mainstream of commerce and affluence that ranks the city among the nation's best places to live. For half a century its predominantly black population has seen their community cast as a crime-ridden danger zone and charitable mission district.
Branded as an undesirable place to live or do business in, major investment has bypassed it. Thus, it lacks goods and services, its population is down, its housing stock deteriorated, its vacant, condemned properties number in the thousands. Added to this is a sparse entrepreneurial class and scarcity of entertainment options-attractions.
Planning Director Cunningham says though efforts have "stabilized what was a declining part of town, it doesn't mean there isn't a lot of work to do," adding. "To say we've stabilized is not great, but it does give us a platform upon which to move forward."
"If North Omaha is to be a sustainable community, and that means it really takes care of itself and it doesn't need to be a welfare community, we have to have a different mind set," says Maroney. "That does not mean we forsake those in need, but we have to create the atmosphere by which we not only bring back people with higher incomes but we elevate those people within upward. We must create a community that is generating resources that turn around in the community by creating jobs, creating opportunity."
"The whole idea is to make North Omaha a neighborhood of choice," says Cunningham. "That not only people who live there now stay, because they can afford to stay, because of new jobs and opportunities, but people who moved away are invited-enticed to move back and people looking for a new place to raise their families move there."
He says the plan mitigates against gentrification pricing out residents.
"The concept is to not have just one type of housing but a full range of housing types and income levels. I think that's all through the plan."
Facilitating mixed income housing projects is what Seventy Five North plans doing. The new nonprofit, in partnership with Purpose Building Communities, is quietly acquiring properties to infuse new life into neighborhoods.
Prospect Hill has recently seen the addition of new "green" homes to its stock of older homes courtesy of a collaborative venture between OEDC, Alliance Building Communities, Holy Name Housing, Wells Fargo Bank and Family Housing Advisory Services. More partnerships like this are needed, says OEDC's Maroney.
Cunningham says if North Omaha is to be a prime development landscape the same way other parts of the city are, "we need to identify innovative and new ways we can invest. So we're looking at the economic development tools we have to make it just as easy to develop and reinvest there. We've got to do that. We've got to utilize the resources of this city." He says, "A plan like this is a catalyst that begins people thinking about, What if? Why not? and people are doing that already. There are partners (emerging) out there the public doesn't know about at this point."
Othello Meadows feels a serious attitude change is necessary.
"One of the things I see a lot is almost this antithetical attitude to people coming into North Omaha to make money,," he says, "as if it's almost a bad or exploitive thing, and I don't understand that. The only way North Omaha grows in a sustainable way is if somebody sees an opportunity to go in there and make some money. That's how North Omaha gets tied to the rest of the economic prosperity the city has enjoyed."
Othello Meadows
Nurturing more entrepreneurs, says Maroney, "is absolutely key. It's an area we're working on. It needs a lot of help. A lot of it is access to credit and capital. A lot of its entrepreneurial development training. That's critical because as we develop all this brick and mortar we need to have people ready to move in and create businesses and jobs and hopefully make a lot of money."
The city and Chamber are actively recruiting black businesses outside Nebraska to open operations in North Omaha. Consultant Jim Beatty heads an Atlanta initiative that's imported one business thus far, All(n)1 Security. He says aggressive, wide net efforts like these are needed to market the revitalization plan to entrepreneurs, philanthropists and developers. "I think we need to present North Omaha as an opportunity for investment, and we need to tell that story, not only locally but nationally," says Beatty, who chairs the Black History Museum board.
The Chamber's Ed Cochran, who heads the North Omaha Development Project, says, "There are several ways to grow business in a community. One is to grow it organically
through inspiring entrepreneurs with brand new businesses. Another is to strengthen and grow existing businesses. A third is to import businesses from other locations." He says North Omaha needs all these approaches.
For too long, says Meadows, the Northside has been treated as a charity case.
"I feel like there's almost a patriarchal type relationship that always leaves North Omaha in a secondary position. At this point North Omaha doesn't have the capital, in a lot of ways it doesn't have the personnel, kind of by way of brain drain, to transition itself organically without outside resources. At this point it needs help from philanthropy and individuals whose hearts are in the right place, who simply want to do the right thing.
"I think the compassion that exists in this city is rare, especially in the philanthropic community, but I think we have to have a little bit more analytical, clinical approach."
While the adjacent downtown, riverfront and mid-town have bloomed, North O's seen piecemeal, stop-gap change, with pockets of redevelopment surrounded by neglect.
"Historically what we've done, and I've been a part of that, is have a scattered gun approach toward development," Maroney says. "A lot of good things have been done, but they've been done in isolation. We need to better coordinate and understand how these things relate to each other, and then how you build on top of those. We're now trying to take a more deliberative and directed approach toward development."
Backers of the revitalization plan see it as a guide and stimulus to making North O a destination to live, work and recreate in. Among the early focal points is developing 24th and Lake into a heavily trafficked, tourist-friendly arts-culture district.
"In North Omaha one of the real epicenters is 24th and Lake, where you have a really nice combination of history and communal feeling," says Meadows. "It's one of the hubs of the community. I think you could make a tremendous splash by focusing on that area. You can't find somebody who grew up in North Omaha that hasn't spent a lot of time in that area, whether they got their cut there or they went to church there. So to me it makes sense to start with an area that touches so much of North Omaha.
"If I were a developer I'd start right there. It's close enough to downtown to draw from a lot of different nodes, which is important."
Anticipated commercial development would build on existing anchors in strategic areas:
24th and Lake (Bryant Center, Jewell Building, Omaha Star, Family Housing Advisory Services, Blue Lion Centre, Loves Jazz & Arts Center, Omaha Business & Technology Center, Great Plains Black History Museum)
30th and Lake (Salem Baptist Church, Salem Village, Miami Heights, Urban League, Charles Drew Health Center)
Adams Park and the Malcolm X Memorial Foundation
Refinements to 16th and Cuming and the 24th and 30th St. corridors are meant to spur a "seamless transition" from north downtown to North Omaha. Cunningham says "development there would integrate with the downtown and begin to bring the flow of people, goods, enterprise and economic development over into and overlapping with what has been historically the North Side."
He adds, "We're working now with 24th Street and an existing building there housing an historic business to revamp their footprint so that it says this is a front door rather than a back door. We're also working with Creighton (University) and their plans for 24th and Cuming. That's an entry portal for them too. They're a partner in this and they have a vision for what's happening there, really from 30th to 16th Streets, in creating a Cuming that is not a barrier, not a border, but a strong component of activity."
Asked if it's vital the first projects find success, Cunningham says. "Absolutely, because that builds momentum. We have to have successes early because it will be easier for the next developer to come in." Sources indicate government funded projects are likely to launch first to "prime the pump" for private investment to follow.
Sustainability will be critical.
"Each one of those projects, particularly ones in the initial stages, have to be able to stand on their own in the event nothing else happens so that 20 years from now that project will still be there, will still be functioning," says Maroney. "Not only do we look at what is it going to cost to create that project, but what is it going to take to sustain it over time. We nee to make sure thats built in also."
Meadows says, "The same kind of rigor, due diligence and economic models that went into determining the feasibility of midtown and downtown development projects needs to take place with each North Omaha project" to ensure their sustainability.
More than anything, Meadows just wants to see change.
"When my friends come to visit from out of town there's very little positive to show them on the Northside, very little you can point out and say, 'Wow!' So I'm glad we potentially have some things to be proud about in our neighborhood, in my community.
"I think North Omaha is really poised. I think residents are getting ready to see actual movement, they're getting ready to drive down certain streets and see real development, real improvement. I can't remember when that's happened here."
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Omowale Akintunde's In-Your-Face Race Film for the New Millennium, 'Wigger,' Introduces America to a New Cinema Voice
Over the past 20 years I have had the opportunity of stumbling upon some filmmakers from my native Nebraska whose work has inspired me and many others. I first became aware of Alexander Payne back when I was programming art films in the late 1980s-early 1990s. This was before he'd directed his first feature. I read something about him somewhere and I ended up booking his UCLA thesis film, The Passion of Martin, for screenings by the nonprofit New Cinema Cooperative. Hardly anyone came, but his work was unusually mature for someone just out of college. That lead to my interviewing him in the afterglow of his feature debut, Citizen Ruth, and his making Election. I've gone on to interview him dozens of times and to write extensively about his work. I even spent a week on the set of Sideways. I almost made it to Hawaii for a couple days on the set of his film, The Descendants. I may be spending weeks on the set of his next film, Nebraska. It's been an interesting ride to chart the career of someone who has become one of the world's preeminent filmmakers.
More recently, I was fortunate enough to get in on the evolving young career of Nik Fackler, whose feature debut, Lovely, Still, shows him to be an artist of great promise.
More recently still I discovered Charles Fairbanks, a true original whose short works, including Irma and Wrestling with My Father, defy easy categorization. He is someone who will be heard from in a major way one day.
In between Fackler and Fairbanks I was introduced to Omowale Akintunde, an academic and artist whose short film Wigger became the basis for his feature of the same name. Akintunde and Wigger are the subjects of the following story, which appears in The Reader (www.thereader.com). The small indie film, made entirely in Omaha, is getting some theater exposure around the country.
This blog contains numerous stories about these filmmakers and others I've had the pleasure to interview and profile.
Omowale Akintunde's In-Your-Face Race Film for the New Millennium, 'Wigger,' Introduces America to a New Cinema Voice
©by Leo Adam Biga
As published in The Reader (www.thereader.com)
Make no mistake about it, filmmaker Omowale Akintunde intends for his 2010 racially-charged Omaha-made feature, Wigger, to provoke a strong response.
After premiering here last year, and in limited theatrical release around the country, the dynamic looking and sounding film returns for a 7 p.m., July 28 red carpet screening at the Twin Creek Cinema. It's back just in time for Native Omaha Days (July 27-August 1), the biennial African-American heritage celebration.
The film, definitively set in North Omaha, plays off a young white man, Brandon (David Oakes), so enamored with African-American culture he's adopted its trappings. He pursues a R & B career amid skeptics, users and haters. His interracial relationships, both platonic and romantic, are tinged with undercurrents.
"He feels he has transcended whiteness," says Akintunde, chair of the University of Nebraska at Omaha Department of Black Studies. "On the other hand, his father is a very overt racist who calls people nigger, talks about fags and Jews. He's very open about his biases. So Brandon sees himself as disconnected from his father."
Brandon's best friend, Antoine, is black. As pressures build, the two have a falling out, each accusing the other of racism, unintentionally setting in motion a tragedy.
"There's just some things you learn in a black household you don't get in a white household, and vice versa," says Eric Harvey, who plays Antoine and co-produced the film, "so that line between them keeps them from being as close as they really want to be. They're both in denial of self-conscious racism.
"It's not a bad thing, it's a reality. We do things without thinking about it. Seriously, it's been embedded for so long it's just the norm."
This is the prism through which Akintunde, who produced, wrote and directed the film, examines polarizing attitudes. Nearly everyone in the film exhibits some prejudice or engages in some profiling. Race and privilege cards abound.
"I thought this story…was the perfect premise to get into some real deep stuff," says Akintunde. "It's about these two characters with this improbable dream. This white boy who loves black culture and wants to be accepted comes from a background that says, why would you want to be like THEM? And then them telling him you're not one of US. And how does one make that fit?"
The film suggests a post-racial world is a fallacy short of some deep reckoning or ongoing discussion. It's message is that not confronting or deconstructing our racial hangups has real consequences. Akintunde can spout rhetoric with the best, but his film never devolves into preaching.
He does something else in offering a raw, authentic slice of black inner city life here with glimpses of Native Omaha Days, the club scene, neighborhoods, church. He avoids the misrepresentations of another urban drama set here, Belly (1998).
"This is the first film that really deals with North Omaha and attempts to make icons of the things that have become emblematic of it," says Akintunde. "I really did want to show this city and that community some big love. It was very intentional I made the location a character in this film."
Rare for any small independent, even more so for a locally produced one, Wigger is managing theatrical bookings at commercial houses, albeit mostly one-night engagements, coast to coast. In classic roadshow fashion, the filmmaker is brokering screenings through his own Akintunde Productions. He pitches exhibitors and when he sells a theater or chain on the flick he often appears, film in hand, to help promote it. He often does a post-show Q & A.
Meshach Taylor
In May the film got national mention when co-star Meshach Taylor plugged it on The Wendy Williams Show.
The success is the latest affirmation for Akintunde, who has a solid reputation as a serious artist and scholar. His 2009 nonfiction film, An Inaugural Ride to Freedom, which charts the bus trek a group of Omahans made to the Obama presidential inauguration, won a regional Emmy as Best Cultural Documentary.
The Alabama native has heeded his creative and academic sides for as long as he can remember. "I always wanted to be a university professor and I always wanted to make films," he says. "I wanted to make films because there are so many people who will never attend a university, who will never be involved in a high level ivory tower discussion, and movies reach everybody. What I always wanted to do is to meld those two worlds — to use film to teach academics."
In a career that's seen him widely published on issues like white privilege and diversity, he's penned academic texts, short stories, a novel and a children's book. He says he always conceives his stories cinematically. Well into his professional career though, the cinephile still hadn't realized his dream of filmmaking.
"It was one of those things you always wanted to do but everyone discouraged you from because they felt you needed a real job," he says. "No one ever thought that was a credible goal. I finally reached a point where I realized credibility was determined by me, and if I had a passion for filmmaking I needed to do what…makes me happy. That was one of the missing things in my life."
During a sabbatical he attended the New York Film Academy's Conservatory Filmmaking Program. His thesis project was a short version of Wigger. Another of his shorts, Mama 'n 'Em, was selected for the Hollywood Black Film Festival.
An expanded Wigger script became his feature debut. He and producer Michael Murphy financed the film themselves. Akintunde imported principal cast and crew from outside Nebraska, including film-television actors Meshach Taylor (who was in the short) and Anna Maria Horsford, cinematographer Jean-Paul Bonneau and composers Andre Mieux and Chris Julian.
"I didn't follow any of the traditional methodologies in terms of even making Wigger, much less how I promote it and get it out there."
David Oakes
Kim de Patri (Kim Patrick), who plays Antoine's girlfriend Shondra, says the script's unvarnished truth grabbed her.
"It said every single thing most people think (about race) but would never actually say. It was the way it was said and the voice it was speaking from, these characters. It was so real and so honest and it came from a very genuine place."
Taylor, a big advocate of Akintunde's, says he likes how the film "challenges people's concepts of what racism really is" by dealing with "the reality of institutionalization racism," adding, "It's not an overt thing, it's really built into the system." He says he and Akiintunde just click. "I like what he's trying to do. It's really wonderful to have someone who has an intellectual approach to filmmaking but still has the artistic sensibility to make it fun and interesting to watch."
To date, Akintunde has arranged limited bookings in mid and major markets, ranging from Minneapolis and Birmingham to Denver, Las Vegas and Los Angeles. It's one continuous run was at the Edge 12 in Birmingham, the home of Tim Jennings, who has a supporting role. Akintunde says an Edge Theaters official "became a big fan and supporter" of the film and offered a one-week run.
Future screenings are scheduled in Chicago, Atlanta, Washington D.C. and New York City. He's negotiating with Edge for new, multi-date runs.
Kim de Patri (Kim Patrick)
With Wigger, he's taken a subject and set of conventions rife with stereotype and exploitation possibilities and dramatized them as an extension of his scholarship. His goal is as much to frame a dialogue as to make a profit.
"My biggest objective here was to really put a story out there that would compel people to talk about institutionalized bias in a way that I don't think we've had. I really wanted to have a national conversation about this."
In the tradition of Do the Right Thing and A Time for Burning, which was shot in Omaha 45 years ago, Wigger makes a full-frontal assault on our expectations.
"Obviously, I chose a very provocative and incendiary title because I want it to evoke a very strong, visceral response. I want to incite people. I want to grab America by the collar and just shake them," he says. "The title itself is very problematic for people because we live in a society where we won't even pronounce the word nigger. It becomes the "n word" in any context in which we use it.
"In many of the (Q & A) discussions we talk about why I gave the film such a provocative title — it's because I want people to stop and think. Certain words are simple, symbolic representations of a much deeper social problem that we tend to mask by using silly euphemisms, as if we do not know what they mean, instead of looking at why the actual word bothers us."
The film deftly handles topics usually glossed over or overdone without becoming pedantic or sensationalistic, though it does get melodramatic. As an "ethnic" genre pic, it draws largely black audiences, but enough of a mix that Akintunde is able to gauge how it plays to black and white viewers.
"There has not been a huge disparity in response and I think that's because Wigger takes on multiple kinds of institutionalized biases. What I find is people see in a sense the mirror being held up to themselves."
If nothing else, he hopes the film encourages viewers to see past the taboo or race.
"In our society we're taught the way you demonstrate you're not racist is to pretend you don't know race exists. Because of this color blind mentality we're all supposed to be adopting, we have come to a point where we can't discuss the 600 pound gorilla in the room, and what Wigger does is give people an opportunity to discuss the 600 pound gorilla.
"But it goes beyond that — to our gender, our class, our sexuality, our religious beliefs. These are so interwoven and so inextricably bound that it is impossible to construct yourself in any of those domains without taking into consideration the others."
Wigger shows how racism, sexism and other isms thrive in both white and black culture. Everyone is guilty of some kind of bias.
"I try not to make a compelling argument of black versus white," says Akintunde, "but about what it means to be either and how we can transcend these boundaries, these ridiculous social constructions, these radicalized expectations that keep us divided. I believe we have the ability to cross these boundaries and truly become a society resolute in its solidarity.
"I think the reason people don't leave that film feeling as if they're more divided is because of the way the film is structured. I think you cant help but see how really alike we are. It's hard to walk away from this movie seeing the world in, no pun intended, black and white."
Relegating someone to a narrow category or box, he says, diminishes that person and in the process only widens the gulf between individuals and groups.
"I don't think they are things that exist on their own. I don't think people are born heterosexist or are racist or Christian. We are taught these positions, we are taught these ideologies, and we reinforce them in our social context in such discreet ways that we're formed and shaped into opinions and ideas long before we understand that's what has happened to us.
"Nobody can be plugged comfortably into one of these slots. It ain't that damn simple. It never has been that simple. It's a very complex thing."
The film unabashedly "goes there" by unearthing the fear and anger alternative lifestyles generate, from gay revelations to interracial affairs to wigger mainfestations.
"Society paints a picture of what it wants to see and some people just don't want to see certain things," says de Patri (Patrick).
Overcoming these barriers, in Akintunde's view, starts with recognizing them for what they are and how complicit we are in maintaining them.
"The thing I want to get across to people is that it's all of our problem. Even if you think you're just a victim, you're not, you are a participant. It's not a white problem, and it's not a black problem, and it's not a gay problem. It is a human problem."
Omowale Akintunde reviews script with cast
Akintunde enjoys the canvass film provides for expressing multi-layered themes.
"I'm very attracted to film as a way of telling that story because I think it allows you more complexity."
Wigger marks the beginning for what he hopes is a string of films, but for now, he says, "it's the fruition of my life's work." He's justifiably proud the film's getting seen.
"For an independent filmmaker to even get a film to run continuously anywhere for any length of time is an extraordinary achievement, and I got that to happen."
The exhibition schedule is being revised as new screening opportunities surface.
"I had this carefully laid out plan, man, with absolute linearity, and instead things are happening in the moment."
Zaina Ark'Keenya
He says the film's well received wherever it plays and is invited back in some cases for additional screenings, including Las Vegas and Birmingham.
"Obviously, I would love to see the movie in an even larger roll out and I think that that is happening," he says. "I didn't plan that Edge Theaters was going to pick up the movie. I didn't plan these people in Vegas and Birmingham would want me to come back. I'm going to go with what happens in that moment and just enjoy it. I'm sort of like riding the wave."
He says there's been preliminary talk about Rave Theaters pickiing up Wigger. He's also following up a lead about potential interest from BET in acquiring the film for network broadcast. Wigger will eventually go to Blu-Ray and DVD.
"I am still seeking a distribution deal."
Considering its small marketing budget, he's pleased with the film's performance.
"We sell out the house wherever we play. I'm not making a killing, but certainly making back the money invested to bring the movie to these theaters. I have a real job, so for me it's not so pressing my movie makes a lot of money, Of course, I want it to make money if for no other reason then to allow me to make more films."
His unpublished novel, Waiting for the Sissy Killer, is the basis for a new feature he's planning. The partly autobiographical story concerns a young black man trying to cope with identity issues in the 1960s South. Akintunde hopes to begin pre-production in the fall. He plans shooting the project in his native Alabama.
Omaha rapper ASO headlines the 6:30 p.m. Wigger pre-show at Twin Creek Cinema. Performing at the Blue Martini after-party is co-composer Andre Mieux.
Tickets are $20 for the screening, pre-show and party and available at http://www.WiggerThe Film.com, Youngblood's Barber Shop, Loves Jazz & Arts Center and Twin Creek.
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Luigi's Legacy, The Late Omaha Jazz Artist Luigi Waites Fondly Remembered
I wrote the following two pieces in memory of the late, much-beloved Omaha jazz artist Luigi Waites. I only met the man once and I only saw him perform a few times, but I knew a lot of people who knew him and his music well. I had always meant to do a full-blown profile of him but it just never worked out. These short recaps of his career will have to do. I wish now I had pressed forward in doing something with him. It's a reminder that particularly with older subjects the time to interview them is now, because one never knows when they might be gone. And once gone, the wisdom of that elder goes with them.
©by Leo Adam Biga
Originally appeared in Encounter Magazine
The April 6, 2010 death of Omaha jazz percussionist, vibraphonist, band leader and music educator Luigi Waites brought an outpouring of tributes to this Classic Omaha Hep Cat.
Luigi, whose first name identified him for legions of fans, became an ambassador for jazz in his hometown of Omaha. Unlike the bombast of another local jazz icon, the late Preston Love Sr., Luigi was sedate. Contrasting personalities aside, these "brothers" came out of the same African-American social-cultural milieu to carve out careers.
The humble Luigi made friends wherever he laid down licks. It's not surprising then his passing prompted memorials befitting a beloved hero. He touched innumerable lives with his timeless music and generous spirit.
Long ago divorced, the 82 year-old was survived by six children.
Wearing his signature floppy hat, Luigi exuded a Zen master's inscrutable calm. His signature performance spot, Mr. Toad in the Old Market, lasted some 1,700 Sundays. Manager Rick Renn said what he'll cherish most about Luigi is his "absolutely unique personality, adding: "He was just comfortable with everybody and he made everybody comfortable; he was one of these people who you met for the first time and you loved about a minute later; he was unusual, he was cryptic, he was always making you think."
Whether playing a bar or festival, doing a school residency or giving private music lessons, Luigi was always teaching. Bandmates say he turned gigs into symposiums, encouraging an open exchange of ideas and approaches.
"You knew he was serious when you watched him play. You knew he was going, as the great ones do, into his element,. You'd sit and watch him on the vibes, the concentration on his face, but at the same time the fun he was having," said Renn.
For years Luigi traveled the Midwest for the National School Tours program and Nebraska Arts Council. He provided music lessons, often for free, all over Omaha. His touring multicultural drum and drill corps, The Contemporaries, served at-risk kids. Professional side man and session player Arno Lucas credits his stint with the Contemporaries for saving him from the streets. He considered Luigi "a true mentor."
For years, too, Luigi booked all the entertainment for the Summer Arts Festival downtown. He was also a clinician for Sonar, Trixon and Ludwig drums.
The lifetime learner never stopped being a student himself, whether teaching himself to play drums, later the vibes, or trying new things with his group, Luigi Inc.
He had some formal music training, courtesy a hitch in the U.S. Army and attending the Midwestern Conservatory of Music. Like many musicians of his era though he picked up his chops informally, traveling the country and Europe, but mostly in his hometown, where a vibrant live music scene back in the day saw him haunt the local night spots, sitting in on jam sessions galore and playing in various bands.
Luigi never lost his enthusiasm or curiosity. Late in life the amateur photography buff learned digital techniques from Omaha professional photographer Herb Thompson.
"He was always just very young at heart," said Thompson, who mentored Luigi for a Nebraska Arts Council project that resulted in an exhibition.
Thompson said the only time he saw Luigi slow down was after the ailing musician underwent chemo treatments. The artist finally lost his battle with cancer, but till the end was making plans — for a new CD, for new photography projects.
A memorial service at Omaha North High School and the funeral at St. Cecilia Cathedral drew hundreds each.
"Neither of those was really a sad occasion, they were more a celebration," said Thompson. "People just said how much they loved him, how much he meant to them. It was a cross-section of this city who celebrated the life of a man who had contributed so very much to his community. I don't think there's anyone in the black community of a certain age who hadn't been touched by Luigi. Another thing that struck me is that it's obvious he crossed racial barriers. It came out in almost all of the comments folks made at the tribute but also in the kind of racial mixture you had there."
Playwright Monica Bauer can attest to Luigi gracefully defying social constraints. She was among many whites who took music lessons from him. In the 1960s he was teaching at Swoboda Music Center at 20th and Q. Few blacks worked in the heavily Czech area and despite some raised eyebrows from neighbors, owner Johnny Swoboda hired and kept Luigi, and the two became friends.
If anybody had objected to Luigi's presence, Swoboda would have stood by his man. "We were buddies," said Swoboda. "He made quite an impression on all kinds of people. It's quite a legacy." Swoboda's children became the first white Contemporaries.
Bauer echoed the sentiments of many in describing Luigi as "a terrific music teacher" with a "kind and compassionate" manner. His students say he taught philosophical life lessons as much as music. She said she "learned how to be an artist" and a mensch from him. "Luigi always told me, 'Be kind to everybody, and they will be kind to you.' I took those words with me through two Ivy League degrees, three Master's degrees, and a Ph.D."
Her play My Occasion of Sin dramatizes Luigi's social action of taking on white students in the racially tense '60s. He didn't see it as making a statement. He was just being Luigi.
Luigi Gone But Not Forgotten
©by Leo Adam Biga
Originally appeared in The Reader (www.thereader.com)
As much as the music he made. the generous spirit of iconic Omaha drummer and vibraphonist Luigi Waites is likely be remembered even more. Waites died early Tuesday morning at Immanuel Hospital. He was 82.
His 70-year performing career encompassed much of the Omaha live music scene but extended well beyond his hometown borders. He's perhaps best known for the more than 1,700 Sunday night shows he and his group, Luigi Inc., performed at Mr. Toad in the Old Market. Luigi was also a fixture at the Dundee Dell. As a Summer Arts Festival board member, he booked the event's entertainment.
As early as age 12 he began playing drums and soon gigged at local nightclubs, where his mother served as his escort. He studied at the Midwestern Conservatory of Music in Chicago and worked as a clinician for drum manufacturers. He influenced many youths through the touring multicultural marching corps he formed in 1960, The Contemporaries. He applied R&B rhythms to the traditional military-style marching band aesthetic. Professional musicians Arno Lucas and Victor Lewis "graduated" from The Contemporaries.
In a 2007 interview Lucas spoke for many when he said "Luigi was the guy who made it possible for me to stay focused and to keep out of trouble." Lucas recalled Waites as a "mentor, teacher, step-father."
For decades Waites did artist-in-the-schools presentations.
His many honors included 1996 Nebraska Artist of the Year from the Nebraska Arts Council and 2009 Best Jazz Artist from the Omaha Entertainment and Arts Awards, which previously honored him with a lifetime achievement award. Waites was also inducted into the Omaha Black Music Hall of Fame.
The father of six leaves behind some recordings but mainly a legacy of teaching and sharing. He lives on in YouTube excerpts of his Mr. Toad shows.
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