After the success of the Fiesta event last September, Spring Valley Library management felt they should celebrate Black History Month. On Saturday, Feb. 8, their hunch proved right as the parking lot filled up, kids lined up for video game trucks and bounce houses, and the children’s section of the library filled with people singing, dancing and clapping along to the Martin Luther King Community Choir.
After the success of the Fiesta event last September, Spring Valley Library management felt they should celebrate Black History Month. On Saturday, Feb. 8, their hunch proved right as the parking lot filled up, kids lined up for video game trucks and bounce houses, and the children’s section of the library filled with people singing, dancing and clapping along to the Martin Luther King Community Choir.
The library had every age group and a variety of interests covered with activities. Disney Story time, World Beat Center Dancers and Drummers, catered food, and a martial arts demonstration. At this Black History Month event, culture and history took center stage.
The MLK Community Choir was a big draw and started off the event. Pastor Ken Anderson led the choir with an impressive set of “Negro Spirituals,” known today as the songs of gospel music. He spoke to the crowd about the history of the spirituals. Started in the time of slavery, the songs took from the Bible as slaves embraced “freedom in Christ,” with biblical topics and lyrics as a code for freedom, the Underground Railroad and the Ohio River. Negro Spirituals are the songs we know today, like “Swing Low Sweet Chariot,” or “This Little Light of Mine.” The choir closed with “Glory, Glory Hallelujah”, before turning the stage over to speaker Willie O’Ree, the first African-American National Hockey League Player.
Both Anderson and O’Ree held the crowd’s rapt attention as they spoke about their respective topics—history of African-American music and hockey, with common threads of being African-American, then and now.
“It’s not just Black History but American history, and music is an integral part of American history,” he said.
After the choir performance, O’Ree stepped up to tell his story as an African-American entering the world of professional hockey in the 1960’s. In twenty-one years of playing for eleven teams, O’Ree faced racial obstacles as well as physical ones. Ninety-five percent blind in one eye since the 1950’s, none of these things impeded his success.
O’Ree spoke humbly, matter-of-factly, and entertained all questions asked of him by the audience. He met Jackie Robinson twice, once in 1949 when he was fourteen years old at Ebbets Field, and again in 1966. Robinson remembered O’Ree from their first meeting, and O’Ree said, “That really stayed in my mind, about meeting Mr. Robinson and the attachment I had to him.” When asked about the meanest team, O’Ree faced adversity. Hockey in itself is not the nicest sport, but the slurs, the hatred, the fact that he even had to stay at a different hotel than his teammates inevitably shaped his career, and also, it as a person. As there was hatred, there were also those who supported him, especially, he said, his teammates.
“I have the opportunity to give back to the community now what the community and the sport have given me,” O’Ree said. “I open up the doors for not only black players that in the league but other players of color.” Once an East County resident, O’Ree is on the road often doing speaking engagements.
O’Ree speaks at schools, churches, YMCA/YWCA’s, and juvenile detention facilities.
For an inaugural Black History Month event, the Spring Valley Library and their partner recreation center organized the event.
“We started planning this in November,” said Abby Morales, assistant manager at the Spring Valley Branch. “We have the highest African-American population for our various branches, so we wanted to reach out to them. They have other events coming up throughout the month, with information available on the website.”
To see the Spring Valley Library schedule, log on to the online calendar at www/sdcl.org/location.
