Alonzo Pendleton has carved out a legacy of his own at WDIA

Alonzo Pendleton, WDIA's chief engineer, worked 48 years at the station and
retired in late April. (Photos by Mark Stansbury Sr.)

By now most people know that WDIA AM 1070 was the first radio station in the United States in 1949 to provide programming entirely for blacks featuring black radio personalities.

Remember Theo “Bless My Bones” Wade, Nat D. Williams, Martha Jean “The Queen” Steinberg, Maurice “Hot Rod” Hulbert, Ford Nelson, A.C. “Moohah” Williams, Markhum “Mark” L. Stansbury Sr. and other black on-air radio pioneers?

They were integral to WDIA’s successful transition from country and western to urban oldies and classic soul. The latter format was conducive to the station’s output of 50,000 watts of black listening power.

But it is unlikely that the WDIA listening audience would know Alonzo Pendleton. That’s because Pendleton worked behind the scene to make sure the signal and other electronic gadgetry at the station operated at optimum levels.

WDIA luminaries (l to r): Tracey Betha, Alonzo Pendleton,
Stormy Taylor and Mark Stansbury Sr.

Pendleton was hired as an engineer in April of 1971. He retired this year in April after devoting 48 years of his life doing what he loves best.

“I started with WDIA because that was one of the things that I was good at – radio technology,” said Pendleton, a former amateur radio operator prior to joining the station.

He was in his mid-20s when good fortune knocked on his door. In fact, it was Pendleton who came knocking on WDIA’s door looking for a job after graduating from Memphis State University in 1970 with a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering.

“When I graduated, it was the year that the space program was laying off thousands of engineers around the country. So the engineering field was flooded,” Pendleton recalls.

That year – 1970 – the nation’s space budget and jobs were slashed. As a result, thousands of engineers and technicians scampered to find any kind of job just to take care of their families. The aerospace industry had essentially crashed.

“I couldn’t find a job in engineering anywhere. In the Memphis area, there wasn’t anything. So I stopped telling people that I had a degree.”

It was slim pickings for engineering jobs – anywhere. Pendleton, however, forged ahead, focusing his job search instead on WDIA. Not knowing if he would get a job, he completed the application nonetheless and hoped for the best.

“The chief engineer asked me to come in one night because I kept bugging him about a job every other day or so,” Pendleton remembers.

That night, he said Henry Fones, the chief engineer, was trying to restore the power to a transmitter that had stumped Fones and his assistant. Pendleton said he had never seen the transmitter, but offered to help.

 “They could not find the problem with the transmitter,” he said.

A transmitter produces radio waves with an antenna and travels through the air at the speed of light. Electric current is then produced and sends a signal, the heartbeat of radio. If the signal fades, or dies, it could cost a radio station more than money.

“I was sitting at the desk as they worked on the transmitter, and looking at the diagram, and listening to what they were saying as they made checks and measurements.”

It then occurred to Pendleton that the capacitor in the transmitter might be the problem. He told Fones what he’d deduced, but “the chief engineer said, ‘No, it couldn’t be the capacitor.’”

The transmitter, he said, continued to baffle Fones and his assistant. “So he got frustrated and said, ‘Okay, I’ll check that capacitor.’”

Pendleton said Fones couldn’t find the capacitor in the transmitter and was sure – without a doubt – the capacitor wasn’t there.

“I argued with him and said, ‘No. It’s got to be there.’”

Pendleton was steadfast; he held his ground. Fones, however, relented and took another look. He discovered that the capacitor was indeed in the transmitter; however, it had exploded into shreds.

Fones ran home to get a capacitor, he said. “It took him about 30 minutes. He got back, put the capacitor in, and the transmitter came right up and started working.”

Pendleton had impressed Fones. His knowledge and forethought had spoken volumes about his skillset. “He said, ‘I got to have you on my team.’”

Pendleton had trudged ahead in spite of the grim job market for engineers and landed squarely on his feet at WDIA.

Over the course of his employment, Pendleton had worked with Theo “Bless My Bones” Wade, Nat D. Williams, Robert “Honey Boy” Thomas and others. They’d taken the station to new heights. Pendleton, however, provided the power – 50,000 watts.

“It was a blessing to work with them, to even know them,” said Pendleton, being modest about his own legacy and contributions to WDIA.

Management had been all white until 1972 when Charles “Chuck” Scruggs broke the color barrier. He was hired as WDIA’s general manager and vice president, the first black person to hold the position.

Scruggs had added a little color to management and understood the importance of Pendleton’s job. When the chief engineer position became vacant, Scruggs promoted Pendleton.

“You can’t get any higher than chief engineer,” said Pendleton, who had survived several buyouts during his tenure. After carving out his own legacy at WDIA, he bid farewell to iHeartMedia Inc., the station’s owner.

“I love the industry,” he said. “I actually didn’t want to retire. But you get older.”

Juneteenth returns to Robert R. Church Park June 14-16

Relaxing underneath the canopy of a shade tree, revelers listen as music reverberates
from the stage at last year's Juneteenth Urban Music Festival in historic Robert R.
Church Park. (Photos by Lakendrex McNeil)

When history and culture converge at the historic Robert R. Church Park in downtown Memphis June 14-16, revelers on the ground will experience the best that the Juneteenth Urban Music Festival has to offer.

“We’re working hard to bring Memphis the best in music, food and entertainment,” said Telisa Franklin, the festival’s president/CEO. “We’re expecting somewhere around 40,000 people to attend the three-day festival.”

Memphis is ripe for such a festival as Juneteenth, where children, adults and entire families come together to support one of Memphis’ longest running African American festivals – now celebrating 27 consecutive years of fun and excitement.

An estimated 40,000 people are expected to revel in the
park during the three-day festival.

“The festival is a staple in Memphis,” said Franklin. “Festivalgoers can look forward to another year of eclectic music, choirs, entertainment, arts and crafts, food vendors, majorettes, dancers, steppers, cheerleaders, a car and bike show, activities for seniors and kids and more.”

The artists line-up for the weekend include the Tennessee Mass Choir, Pam Armour and The Memphis Shop, Courtney Little, Wendell Weathers & Greater Purpose, the Disciples of Mime, Tabitha Adams, Brandon Lewis, Sherry Self, Diamond Praise Dance Company, Donte Everhart & End Time Movement, Hope Church, and many more.

The festival is open to the public.

Prior to the three-day festival, festivalgoers can look forward to the Juneteenth Career and Health Fair Expo on Tuesday, June 11, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., at J.I.F.F., 254 S. Lauderdale St. Job seekers will get an opportunity to talk to dozens of potential employers.

“We advise job seekers to bring their resumes and dress for success,” said Franklin. “This year the Shelby County Reentry Program will provide assistance to help felons. We just want to provide a service for those who are having a hard time.”

In addition to the Juneteenth Career and Health Fair Expo, attendees can look forward to the Memphis Juneteenth Lifetime Achievement Awards on Thursday, June 13, at the Holiday Inn University of Memphis, 3700 Central Ave.

The awards program will begin at 7 p.m. and include dinner and an original play, “I Know Who I Am,” written by local playwright Dr. Sharli Kay Adair, Juneteenth’s director of operations.

The honorees include The Rev. Ricky Floyd, pastor of Pursuit of God Transformation Center; Sheila Whalum, first lady of New Olivet Baptist Church; Gina Y. Sweat, director of Memphis Fire Services; Bishop Wesley J. Arije, Presiding Bishop and Chief Apostle of the March of Faith International Fellowship, Inc.; Vincent Tharpe & Kenosis; Shania Brown, a young filmmaker, producer and actress; Stanley Smith of Erole’s Expose Modeling Agency; Felecia Bean Barnes of Felicia Bean Catering & Food Service; choir director Adrian Maclin; Gwendolyn Turner, co-founder, Billy Rivers and the Angelic Voices of Faith, Inc.; Memphis Police Director Michael Rallings; and Timothy Mason, Grammy nominated and Stellar Award-winning musician, producer and writer.

On Friday, June 14, from 10 a.m. – 10 p.m., the Juneteenth Urban Music Festival officially begins with live stage performances, activities for seniors, a number of vendors, and Kids Zone, with rides, games and inflatables.

There will be a mobile outdoor educational museum on the grounds each day depicting the history of Juneteenth, including the abolition of slavery and the facts surrounding President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation.

The next day – Saturday, June 15, from 10 a.m. – 11 p.m. – live stage performances will continue in addition to the “Juneteenth Ultimate Dance Showdown,” featuring the “best of the best” majorettes, dancers, steppers and cheerleaders. Other activities are scheduled for the youth and the entire family as well.

Sunday, June 16, is “Food Truck Sunday” and “Praise Fest at Juneteenth,” featuring gospel music, inspirational and encouraging words spoken by ministers, preachers and gospel artists and more from 12 p.m. – 10 p.m. Some of Memphis’ most talented choirs, singers and musicians will take center stage.

 “Juneteenth is here to stay. We celebrate our freedom from slavery because it is important that we don’t forget where we came from,” said Franklin. “This is an opportunity for all of us, including other ethnicities, to eat, dance, worship and be merry.”

Juneteenth is a national holiday in the United States commemorating the abolition of slavery and the freeing of the last African-American slaves in Galveston, Texas, on June 19, 1865. The commemoration began in Memphis 27 years ago.

(For more information about the Juneteenth Urban Music Festival, contact Telisa Franklin at 901-281-6337 or log on to www.memphisjuneteenth.com.)

Youth tackle violence in writing class conducted by Ted Lange from The Love Boat

Ted Lange, best known for his role as the bartender, Isaac Washington, in the TV
series "The Love Boat," was in Memphis as artist-in-residence for a two-week writing
class. Here he searches through a folder for Carolyn Matthews' writing assignment.

When it comes to gun violence, Memphis ranks pretty high compared to cities its size. On any given day, someone is left for dead or seriously wounded.

Conflict and violence led to the shooting death of a young man by his friend in an excerpt from “Ritual Murder.” The excerpt focused on the senseless killing and ensuing investigation.

 “When murder occurs for no special reason on a Saturday night, it’s ritual murder,” said Levi Frazier, narrating the scene when Joe Brown Jr. (Brandon Lewis) shoots and kills his best friend, James Roberts (Willie Perry).

Young actors from Blues City Cultural Center perform an
excerpt from "Ritual Murder," a play written by Tom Dent in
which one friend kills the other. Levi Frazier (right) was the
narrator. (Photos by Wiley Henry)

In the original one-act play, written by Tom Dent, Brown knifes Roberts. In the excerpt, the actor from Blues City Cultural Center (BCCC) brandished a handgun. The play was staged at the Memphis Office of Youth Services (MOYS) on April 29.

Levi Frazier and his wife, Deborah Frazier, co-founded the performing and visual arts organization 40 years ago. The couple, both actors, playwrights and performing artists, took part in the play.

Ted Lange (pronounced Lunge) observed the action from the audience with a small group of budding writers. Lange is best known for his role as the bartender, Isaac Washington, in the TV series “The Love Boat.”

He was BCCC’s artist-in-residence for “Peace in the House,” a program that uses the creative arts as a platform to engage youth in activities that promote peace and reduce violence.

“Ritual Murder” was included in “Peace in the House,” which was tapped for a National Endowment for the Arts Challenge Grant. Lange was then given the green light to teach a two-week writing class.

Nearly a dozen youth from MOYS got a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to work with the renowned actor and writer in late April prior to BCCC’s presentation of “Peace in the House.”

But Lange didn’t come to Memphis to teach acting. “I didn’t give them any acting classes,” he said. “I told them what I was doing and why I was doing it. And I told them that ‘I want to see where your imagination takes you.’”

Imaginations varied from one participant, or future thespian, to another after Lange gave them an assignment and made sure that they wrote something each day. The assignment yielded different results.

“I gave them exercises and I tried to teach them some of the tricks that I learned as a writer in the process,” he said. “I wanted to give them the benefit of what I learned.”

The class in turn used what they learned and scripted a storyline, or used poetry, to ascertain what happened in the young man’s life that prompted him to kill his friend in the excerpt from “Ritual Murder.”

“Before a young person can do anything, they have to have peace,” said Deborah Frazier, meaning peace from within.

Lange observed a couple of adults taking part in the writing class. They, too, sought his opinion and expertise. Some of them – both youth and adults – are aspiring writers. A few are professional.

One of them was Carolyn Matthews, a freelance writer and coordinator of BCCC’s “Sew Much Love,” an entrepreneurial program for homeless and marginalized women. She listened intently and picked up a few pointers.

“The focus was to learn playwriting,” Matthews said. “He would elicit from us prompt lines, devices and literary strategies to get us to think outside the box. He also talked about word choices and diction.”

She added: “The writing exercises were an invigorating experience.”

“You got to do exercises. Just like you work out your body, you have to work on your writing,” said Lange, more than just a stage and screen actor. He directs and writes plays as well. Twenty-five are currently in the hopper.

He said working with young people is a natural fit. Levi and Deborah Frazier thought so too when they brought Lange to Memphis. They first met the actor and writer in Poland in 2017.

“Levi was bringing over his one man show (about Ira Aldridge) and I was bringing over information on a musical (about Ira Aldridge),” Lange remembers. “What brought us together was the legacy of the first black Shakespearean actor in Europe.”

Ira Aldridge was the crème de la crème in Europe in the 1800s, a black Shakespearean actor so revered Poland honored him with a state funeral after he died in 1867.

He was the connection that brought Lange and the Fraziers together.

“Often times when you see an actor on TV, you think Hollywood actor. You don’t have time for young people,” said Levi Frazier.

Lange debunks that perception and looks forward to coming back to Memphis.

High school graduate defies the odds and excels academically

On April 25, Ivy D'vynne Wicks spoke at First Assembly Christian School on the
Rho Kappa National Social Studies Honor Society. She is the president of the local
chapter. Also on that day, Wicks was inducted into the Mu Alpha Theta National
Mathematics Honor Society. (Photo by Dr. Sharli K. Adair)

More than $511,000 in scholarship offers from 11 colleges is quite an accomplishment for a high school graduate who was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) when she was two years old.

When Ivi D’vynne Wicks graduates from First Assembly Christian School on May 18, she will head to Oglethorpe University in Brookhaven, Ga., in August on a full academic scholarship to study pre-med and theater – or filmmaking, perhaps.  

But Wicks’ academic prowess may not have been possible if her mother, Dr. Sharli K. Adair, hadn’t stepped in and taken control after noticing that her school-age daughter at that time was becoming “extremely ADHD.”

Dr. Sharli Kay Adair gives Ivi D'vynne Wicks
a congratulatory hug and flowers after Wicks
was presented with the International Thespian
Award after her last production at First Assembly
Christian School. She played Mrs. Gloop in
the Willie Wonka play. (Courtesy photo)

The doctors wanted to prescribe medication to control Wicks’ impulsive behavior, but Adair wouldn’t entertain the thought of medicating her daughter or subjecting her to a stimulant.

 “I realized the medicine was a deterrent; it only slows you down. And Ivi was too young,” said Adair, who had other plans to try to bring her daughter’s behavior under subjection.

ADHD is a disorder with ongoing symptoms of inattention, impulsivity and hyperactivity. Stimulants are generally prescribed to reduce the symptoms and improve behavior.

Adair wasn’t buying any of it. So she turned to God, prayed daily, controlled Wicks’ environment, worked on her study habits, turned to family for support, and surrounded her daughter with role models.

Wicks wasn’t aware that ADHD had invaded her body. “I didn’t know that I suffered from it until I was 14 years old,” she said. “When I found out about it, I just said, ‘Wow!’”

To understand how Wicks could brush off ADHD so easily, you’d have to understand her mother’s tenacity, her grandmother’s fearlessness, and the village concept that they embraced to help raise young Wicks.

“When Ivi had a temper tantrum at two, my mom called it out,” Adair remembers. “She told me to open the door because Satan is leaving today. She had oil in her hands and anointed Ivy. Then she said, ‘Leave, Satan! You will not take this child.’”

The late Dorothy J. Marlow was a praying, God-fearing woman since Adair, a single, working mother, could remember. After the birth of Wicks 18 years ago, she moved her mother into her home. The arrangement was a godsend.

“I always looked up to my grandmother,” said Wicks, cherishing the matriarch’s wisdom and her elder status. “She was another mother figure in my life. She taught me to be strong and taught me how to pray.”

Her mother, she pointed out, worked all the time to provide a comfortable living. But that didn’t preclude Adair from tending to Wicks’ needs and developing a moral code that her daughter should live by.

“She represents Christ first,” said Adair, noting that no one should be afraid to raise a child in the spirit of holiness. “I tried to live a life that would make her make the right decision.”

On top of that, she added: “I made sure that I parented my child.”

With Adair and her mother working in tandem to stop ADHD from causing chaos in Wicks’ life, the path to a good education hasn’t gone unnoticed. In fact, Wicks has excelled in school in spite of the disorder.

 “In sixth-grade, they wanted to put her up in the eighth grade. But socially she wasn’t ready. Her behavior was not on an eighth grade level,” Adair surmised. She said her daughter would have missed the transition from elementary to middle school.

Wicks, however, hasn’t missed a step academically since Adair first enrolled her in grade school – not that she hasn’t struggled some along the way. In fact, Adair said Wicks has maintained a 4.5 GPA and above since ninth-grade.

ADHD isn’t as noticeable now since Wicks is able to channel the disorder in the right direction or use it to propel her aspirations. “When I get really excited, I get anxious,” she explains. “I have a million things on my mind. So it fuels my creativity.”

Wicks also sees ADHD as a blessing. It didn’t hamper her studies or cloud her thinking either.

“I think of things that I can do for the future,” she said, such as drawing, writing music, singing, performing on the stage and, believe it or not, developing business plans. She also is the recipient of several awards, honors and citations.

Wicks’ math teacher at FACS thinks the world of her. “Ivy is a top-notch student, a hard worker, and she’s diligent,” said Marcia Coleman, who has taught Wicks math since the eighth grade.

“She’s in the highest math level that we have in school,” she said. “She’s certainly a young lady with extreme high character and strong morals and integrity. I wish I could package her up and multiply her by 140.”

Chrysti Chandler plans new home for the Young Actors Guild

The advance students of the Young Actors Guild performed at the April 4th
Foundation's 19th Annual Commemorative Awards. (Photo by Wiley Henry)

Chrysti Chandler stood in the back of the room and looked on approvingly while her young dance troupe was performing at the April 4th Foundation’s 19th Annual Commemorative Awards at the Hilton Hotel in Memphis.

This was one of the dance troupe’s finest moments and more than entertainment filler on the program that evening. It was symmetry and poetry in motion. Their precise moves were imbued with the spirit of the ancestors.

“I think they did a great job,” said Chandler, basing her opinion on the applause from the audience and numerous positive comments that were posted on social media platforms.

The venue was one of many for Chandler that showcases the talent and creativity of the members of the Young Actors Guild (YAG), a nonprofit dance and theatre academy she founded 28 years ago.

Chrysti Chandler is the group's founder and
artistic director. (Photo by Sabrina Norwood)

YAG Community Arts is located at 619 North Seventh St. in Memphis. There are two satellite locations: 1926 First Commercial Dr. N. in Southaven, Miss., and 1391 Ferguson St., also in Memphis.

YAG has performed at hundreds of venues in the Mid-South and before prominent individuals since its inception. The impact that YAG has had in the community has touched over 10,000 youth, according to the group’s website.

In 2021, Chandler will be preparing to move YAG’s complete operation into the old Memphis Fire Station No. 22 at Lamar and Pendleton after the building is converted into studio and dance spaces.

The building will be christened the Harriet Performing Arts for Children.

“It will be named after Harriet Tubman (the abolitionist who freed more than 300 slaves),” said Chandler. “We’re planning to break ground in six months and complete it in the next two years.”

There will be space for artists to practice their dance moves and a lobby as well. “I don’t know the seating capacity right now,” she said, adding: “We will do workshops so they (youth) can do their own work on stage.”

After the “Harriet” is up and fully operational, Chandler plans to teach youth to develop, direct and produce their original plays. She wants them to learn the full gamut of production.

“Our hope is to bring in tourists so they can see the talent that we have in Memphis,” she said. “We will have other ongoing productions, but this will be coming from Memphis’ own playwrights.”

If the “pieces” are good enough, Chandler plans to enter them into festivals. She is confident that her group can measure up in talent and creativity, no matter the age bracket.

Alexandria Edwards, for example, is proof that Chandler’s performing arts group can move up to the next level. The 15-year-old breezed through the monologue at the awards program with passion and emotional fervor before the entire group started moving to the music and rhythm of gospel artist Kurt Carr’s “For Every Mountain.”

Alexandria is one of 150 kids that Chandler is training at the dance and theatre academy. “They come from everywhere,” she said, even as far away as Philadelphia, Chicago and Atlanta, when the summer camps convene.

Three of her students, she pointed out, auditioned in California and were accepted into the Debbie Allen Dance Academy Summer Intensive in Atlanta. Others have gone on to realize varying degrees of success.

In 2006, Gideon McKinney made it as a semi-finalist in Season 5 of “American Idol” before he was eliminated. In 2013, Kris Thomas, also a singing phenom, competed in Season 4 of “The Voice.” And in 2018, Gideon’s younger sister, Evvie McKinney, won the first season of “The Four: Battle for Stardom.”

“I trained them all,” said Chandler, who performed her first play, “Little Red Riding Hood,” when she was just 5 years old in the back yard of her mother’s home in South Memphis.

She converted the patio into a stage. The audience, she said, filled up the backyard. Many of them arrived from Glenview, Castalia and other neighborhoods in South Memphis. Her creativity was just beginning to blossom at that tinder age.

“The arts kept me alive,” she said. “That was my escape.”

Chandler’s group is scheduled to perform a tribute to Michael Jackson, “To Michael With Love,” on May 4, 6 p.m., at the University of Memphis Rose Theatre. This is another opportunity for them to show their teacher and trainer that they are ready for the big stage.

For more information about the Young Actors Guild, call 901-240-2103 or 662-536-6122. A capital campaign is underway to help transform the firehouse into the Harriet Performing Arts for Children. Contact Sabrina Norwood at 901-240-2103 for details.

Former sheriff and mayor pens book about his ‘legendary life’

Former Shelby County sheriff and mayor William Noel "Bill" Morris discusses his
new book, "Bill Morris: A Legendary Life," at Novel Memphis. (Photo by Wiley Henry)

Jim McCarter sat quietly in a packed room thumbing through a recently published book that he’d purchased at Novel Memphis minutes before the author’s 6 p.m. book talk and signing Thursday, March 28.

While waiting on the former Shelby County sheriff and mayor William Noel “Bill” Morris to address the capacity crowd, an age-old photograph on page 181 in the book, “Bill Morris: A Legendary Life,” caught McCarter’s attention.

“That’s my picture. I had to look at it closely,” said McCarter, who’d granted Morris permission to use the vintage photograph. “I showed the picture to Bill and he said he wanted to use it in the book.”

Morris is seen interviewing the owner of Canipe's
Amusement Company in 1968 minutes after Dr. Martin
Luther King Jr. was killed. (Courtesy photo)

McCarter was pleasantly surprised that Morris had actually used the photograph.

The black and white photograph captures the moment in time when a bundle – wrapped in a bedspread and containing an overnight bag, binoculars, suitcase, and the rifle that James Earl Ray had reportedly used to kill Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. – was discovered at the entryway of Canipe’s Amusement Company at 424 South Main St.

Morris can be seen through the plate-glass window questioning the owner of the amusement company, Mr. Guy Canipe, which was next door to the boarding house and one street over from The Lorraine Motel on Mulberry where the shot rang out.

McCarter said he was around 17 or so when the photograph was snapped in 1968, minutes after a young sheriff Morris made the scene. McCarter would eventually become Canipe’s son-in-law after marrying his daughter.

The aforementioned photograph, along with the widely published photograph of Morris escorting the accused handcuffed assassin to jail, catapulted the young sheriff into the national spotlight.

Even so, Morris encouraged the audience to read the book rather than provide them with too many details.

The book was published by Legacies in Print on Jan. 1. It is loaded with historical accounts and information on Morris’ exploits in government – as sheriff when pandemonium erupted after Dr. King’s death, and when he was the four-term Shelby County mayor.

The book also includes Morris and community stakeholders, decision makers, pioneers and legends, including his friend Elvis Presley. Add to that Morris’ affiliations, civic involvement, and his role as an unofficial ambassador for the city of Memphis.

 “The last 60 years…there has been a lot of history,” said Morris, explaining his reasons for penning his autobiography. “Some of the history should be recorded differently than [what was covered in] the media.”

Morris pointed out that the arduous writing project began several years ago in his mind before meeting his co-writer, Darrell B. Uselton, who transcribed 268 recordings before working with Morris on his 400-plus-page autobiography.

“It was a little over two years in the process and sometime before that,” Uselton said matter-of-factly. In addition to the writing, the book is punctuated with more era photographs than the ones with Ray that made Morris a household name.

Just to give the audience even more of a peep into the book, Morris dropped a few names, including the infamous mayor Edward Hull “Boss” Crump. Crump – “not Trump,” he joked – built a political machine that dominated Memphis and Tennessee politics for decades.

“Mr. Boss Crump was one of the most marvelous persons I ever met,” he said. “He was good to me.”

The name Richard C. “Dick” Hackett kept coming up in Morris’ discussion about his work in government. He said he and Hackett had often traveled together to bring business to Memphis and Shelby County.

“We were successful, because we worked hard,” said Morris. “We believed Memphis could be better.”

 As a result of their efforts, he added, “I think the community is working better than we ever had compared to Washington.”

“Bill Morris: A Legendary Life” is an important read for those with an appetite for history and compassion for one man’s journey from Itawamba County, Mississippi, to Memphis, where his enduring legacy is anchored.

He eventually raised himself up from the depths of adverse poverty to become an important figure in the political and historic annals of Memphis and Shelby County.

“It’s the best I can do to tell the truth,” Morris said. “You can’t write an autobiography unless you tell the truth.”

New Sardis honors ‘Memphis Living Legends’

The 2019 Memphis Living Legends. (Photos by Wiley Henry)

On Sunday morning, Feb. 24, New Sardis Baptist Church invoked the spirit of African-American ancestry coupled with Afro-centric music and the unadulterated Word of God. This was the culmination of African-American History Month and the presentation of the church’s annual Memphis Living Legends program.

The morning worship service was devoted to the men and women whom the church honored and celebrated for blazing a path in their respective fields and making significant contributions in Memphis and beyond.

“We honor men and women who have made our society better,” said the Rev. Dr. L. LaSimba M. Gray Jr., New Sardis’ pastor emeritus and worship leader for the morning celebration.

The Rev. Darell Harrington, pastor of New Sardis Baptist
Church, delivers an impactful message to honor and
celebrate Memphis Living Legends.

Donning African attire, the church’s leadership team – headed by its pastor, the Rev. Darell Harrington – welcomed the 2019 Living Legends: State Rep. Karen Camper, Captain Albert T. Glenn, Dr. Howard Glenn, Bishop William Graves Sr., Estella Mayhue-Greer, Henry Hooper, Bobby O’Jay Jones, Clarence Jones, Jerry C. Johnson, John McFerren, Tajuan Stout-Mitchell, the Rev. Dr. Rosalyn R. Nichols, Rosetta Hicks Peterson, Dr. Larry Robinson, Mark Russell, Dr. Theresa James Shotwell, Madeleine C. Taylor and Fayth Hill Washington.

Jimmy Ogle, Shelby County’s historian and past chairman of the Shelby County Historical Commission, was presented The Frances Wright Award. Wright was a 19th century Scottish-born abolitionist, social reformer, lecturer, freethinker and writer.

Honoring “living legends” was the brainchild of Dr. Erma L. Clanton, a playwright, lyricist, former teacher and member of New Sardis. The inaugural salute to living legends began in 2003 after Clanton, now 96, pitched the idea to Gray.

Celebrating black achievement in the U.S. first began in 1926 as Negro History Week – the precursor of Black History Month – founded by Carter G. Woodson, an historian, author, journalist and founder of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History.

Of course, James Weldon Johnson’s “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing,” known as the “Black National Anthem,” was integral to the program – as it is each year – and key to setting the tone for the morning.

“Everybody here today – black, white, blue or green – that’s your native land,” said Gray, referring to the continent of Africa. “Native land should be replaced with Africa because we all came from the continent.”

Harrington posed the question: “How does our history impact the relevance of our present?” and composed his message, “The Transformative Power of Truth,” from John 8:31-36.

Recognizing the history of black contributions throughout his sermon, Harrington referred to the passage in John when Jesus said to the Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed.” Then he added: “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

“What does it mean in the 21st century to be free?” Harrington asked the congregation. He followed up with an answer to the question: “It should mean you ought to serve God.”

He said Black people have offered the world the best that the world has to offer and added, “It’s easy to forget one’s history. It’s easy to forget because we’ve become comfortable.”

Using as an example, he said, “It was illegal to write, but God made a way.”

Harrington continued to espouse the relevance and cultural significance of black pioneers and trailblazers, and undergirded the message with the importance of keeping God first.

“We celebrate black history,” he said. “But we have to celebrate a risen Savior.”