Walter Cronkite "Uncle Walt"

Walter Cronkite was the voice that is etched in my head from the time that I was a little girl. The news was something that my family and many African Americans families tuned into about twice a day. This was our way of being aware of what was going on in our country. It was also the time of the civil rights movement with two of the most prominent and well loved figures of our history, Martin Luther King, Jr. and President John F. Kennedy. It was normal for African American families to gather in front of the television after dinner as a family to watch Walter Cronkite. He was trusted by our community to report fairly and truthfully what was happening during this time; the 60's. A time when African Americans were fighting so hard for racial equality in a country that brought us here, but wanted to keep up 2nd class citizens and less than human, segregated from those that thought of themselves as more human. Even at two years old I watched the news, and was told by my family that I was watching the day that President Kennedy was assassinated and called to them in the kitchen telling them that "President Kennedy was shot" and they came running. My mother says that I was talking before I was walking, and I have yet to slow down.

This was a time when families were still families, and they had dinner together and watched the news together, we all watched " Uncle Walt" because our parents and grandparents watched and trusted his reporting.


In 1940 Cronkite married Mary Maxwell, who was his wife for 65 years until her passing in 2005.

Walter Cronkite defined what it meant to be an anchorman.
The first radio news broadcast was in 1938 and the first television news broadcast was in 1948, but it was not until 1963 when the three largest networks, NBC, CBS and ABC extended their news coverage from 15 minutes to 30 minutes.

On March 6th, 1981 Walter Cronkite delivered his last news broadcast for CBS, and was replaced by Dan Rather.

Walter Cronkite will always be remember and we greatly appreciated his work.
photos taken from LA Times

Valley Club, Absolutely Unbelievable

There is an ongoing debate on whether the day campers were turned away from The Valley Club because they were black and hispanic. These sentiments were verbalized by various adults surrounding the pool as they retrieve their own children from the now tainted environment. The debate should be what to do about this situation not whether it happened or not. Some of these kids were in tears, from shear disbelief and from the fact that there were adults not accepting them because of the color of their skin.

We so often don't want to believe that these things are still happening in such a developed world, but hatred is very much alive, and racism is merely a form of this hatred. We see this in the media all of the time, just look at the frenzy surrounding Michael Jackson, O.J. Simpson, and many other people of color.
This is why it is so important for us as African- Americans to build strong families and a strong communities to safeguard our young children and give them the strength and foundation necessary to help them cope with what they may have to endure in their lives. We need to own more of what we use, and this is what I truly admire about the Tyler Perry's and Ervin 'Magic' Johnsons of our time.
Our children experienced this hatred in the 50's and 60's but this fifty years later and our children are still feeling the pain of discrimination. If law suits are necessary then so be it, but use the award to build a beautiful community center where these children have a beautiful pool where the various day camps can go and not feel the humiliation, but a senses of pride.

Still Controversial after Death

It amazes me how Michael Jackson is still such a controversial figure. Why is it necessary to know who are the biological parents of his adopted children, when in many cases we have gone to great lengths to conceal this exact information.

Whether he chose not to use his sperm because of fear of passing on his genetic misfortune to his children or he wanted to create his own children is nothing different than what many others do. Science is even to the point where you are able to chose the gender of your child if you chose. Why does it matter? He is legally thier father and that is all that matters. He is the only parent that they know and they certain appear to be happy well adjusted and very bright children.

Why is it important if he bleached his skin because he wanted to be lighter or he had undergone some medical procedure for vitiligo. He had the money and the connections to do what ever it is that he chose to do. It is no different than many others bleaching their skin, changing their nose, breast implant, calf implants, etc.

Who is to say that his life was strange? By whose standards? Why are we always imposing our standards on others? It is just sickening how this is all playing out.


Bill O'Reilly and Dr. Marc Lamont Hill, Ph.D. debates the racial issues in reference to Michael Jackson. As usual O'Reilly doesn't let a person disagree with him on his show even though he calls them on to debate an issue.
It appears when it comes to people of color there are always racial issues, and as Dr. Hill says, it is not always racism, but always racial.

I will leave you a post by a blogger for The Root, by Jimi Izrael, entitled, Now He's Home.
This post is beautifully written and were my exact sentiments of familiarity of MJ's memorial service. Even though I was not there and merely watching it on television as were millions of others, the tone and the program was so much like many I had been to, just on a grander scale.