theblackbottom

By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
Published: October 25, 2012
DETROIT — Tired of battling legislative efforts to roll back union rights in state after state, organized labor is trying a new strategy: going on the offense. The first target is Michigan, the cradle of the United Auto Workers and a bastion of union power.
Michigan’s unions are asking voters to [...]

DETROIT (AP) — Willie Horton Day is being celebrated in Michigan for the eighth consecutive year.
The Tigers great is being honored Thursday, as he has since former Gov. Jennifer Granholm signed House Bill 5200 into law in 2006 that permanently decrees Oct. 18 “Willie Horton Day.”
It coincides with the seven-time All-Star’s birthday.
Horton was a Tiger [...]

Interview by ANDREW GOLDMAN
Published: September 21, 2012
You once wrote that Michael Jackson stopped working with you because he felt threatened by the credit you were getting for his music. Considering he was never able to repeat the success he had with “Off the Wall,” “Thriller” and “Bad,” how much credit do you deserve?
Well, What [...]

Michigan Radio
By KATE WELLS
They called it the “Black Eden.”
From the 1920’s to 60’s, tens of thousands of African Americans poured into the resort town of Idlewild, Michigan. They came to escape steaming summers in segregated cities, and to see some of the greatest musicians of the age.

As Idlewild’s centennial summer comes to a close, 90-year-old [...]

Emberly Vick, otherwise known as Emberly “The Writer,” admits that she passively ignored relentless urges to write for years. Still, whether explaining a concept or conceptualizing herself, she was clearly ordained to write at an early age.
Excelling in state writing tests in elementary, “TheWriter” never considered writing, not even as a hobby, until college. After [...]

By : Alexandra Zawia
At the Locarno Film Festival to pick up the Golden Leopard Honor Award, the singer and actor also talks about his fears of a Fourth Reich and why Mitt Romney shouldn’t be president.
Harry Belafonte, at 85, is as active and activist as ever. At the Locarno Film Festival, despite walking with [...]

By : The New York Times
A Very Long Journey Was Very Swift
LONDON — To become the Olympic champion in the individual all-around event, Gabby Douglas first had to leave everything she knew best.
She had to pack up her bedroom in Virginia Beach, where she lived with her mother, two sisters and brother. She had to [...]

The whole world opened to me when I learned to read~Mary McCleod Bethune
Once you learn how to read, you will be forever free!~Frederick Douglass
REVIEW Stephen L. Carter is the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law at Yale University, where he has taught since 1982. He is the author of eight books of nonfiction, writes a [...]

The whole world opened to me when I learned to read~Mary McCleod Bethune
Once you learn how to read, you will be forever free!~Frederick Douglass
REVIEW Uzodinma Iweala is the author of Beasts of No Nation, which won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the New York Public Library Young Lions Award, and the Sue [...]

The whole world opened to me when I learned to read~Mary McCleod Bethune
Once you learn how to read, you will be forever free!~Frederick Douglass

REVIEW After retiring from professional basketball and executive positions at Kentucky Fried Chicken and Procter & Gamble, Will Allen became the CEO of Growing Power. He lives in Milwaukee.
Charles Wilson is [...]