Black Horizons; 3812; History

You're welcome to Black Horizons. I'm your host, Chris Moore. Tonight meets the Reverend who's helping a historical church reach new heights. Learn about an upcoming play that you don't want to miss, plus catch a sneak peek of another offering from the producers of Black Horizons for Black History Month. Well, first we'll speak with the Reverend J. Van Alfred Winsett who saw the rebirth of the Ebenezer Baptist Church last year with its conservation service. We'll talk about his hopes for the second act of this historic church that has been the site of so many great African -American events in the Pittsburgh area. Reverend, welcome back to the program. Glad to have you here again, sir. Thank you very much. This must be an exciting rebirth for you given the tragedy of the burning of your church. It really is. It's a glorious time for me to live in. It was a little more than two years ago that the church called fire on one Saturday morning, about 33 months ago. 33 months ago? That must have been hard horrific. I can remember Olga George who now produces this show. She's always in

touch with the news. She called my house and said, look out of the window. And I looked out the window and I said, boy, something close to downtown is really burning. And when I turned on the TV and saw it was Ebenezer, I was a guest. You must have been too. And you were right there. I was right there. I was there. In fact, I'm the one that called the fire department and told them to come. And I couldn't believe it myself. I was sitting and looking at it. And I really couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was an electrical fire. It was an electrical fire. It was an electrical fire. Yes. And you were having regular Saturday morning services as you always do for the community. Yes. We had four events that were getting ready to start. And one of them was a prayer breakfast with some of the senior citizens. One was a youth meeting that was getting ready to go on. One was another auxiliary meeting and then my executive board meeting. I was right there. And one of my men came to me and told me called the fire department because the church is on fire. I couldn't believe it. I thought maybe it was a grease fire over in the kitchen. Something had happened. You know, one of the sisters was fried up and

chicken and they got away from her. But then I come out and then I'm looking. I couldn't even believe it. When the fire department came and said everybody must get out of the church. I walked over to the parking lot and I just stood there. I just could not believe what I was seeing. I had hoped that it might be just a small fire. But then when I saw they had a back draft. The windows blew out and the fire department where they were chopping the windows open and the doors open. I knew that this is really bad. A historic church with all that beautiful wood in it and the beautiful stonework and that's not to mention the windows, stained glass windows and all of that. The events that happened in that church must mean a lot to this community. Oh yes. You know, not only did the church burn a lot of memories burn. That church has been it's a landmark. It was there and so many things had happened in that church and when all of this fire comes about it burns up everything. But

now it's in it's in our minds now we we still have to historical down in our minds and in our hearts. But we're glad to be back in operation in business. Now tell me about the consecration service and we're going to go to some videotape in just a second. But tell me about that event itself and actually being back in your new home. Well I couldn't believe that I was back home. When the day finally arrived where we could walk back into the church you would be surprised at how you you get the feeling. It's a feeling of awe. It's a feeling that you can't hardly describe. You're going back home to church where you can call home. Now we're getting settled in. All right let's take a look at some of that beer. Well it must have been a happy

day to be back in that sanctuary or in that new sanctuary. Oh yes it was a happy day and it's a lovely sanctuary. It has everything in the church that we that we thought we would need but we put everything in there that we felt could serve the community in which we are located. You know over the years I've been there to look at some of the boy scout programs advanced for sales ran down in your basement. I've looked at all the things. I've attended countless meetings there that the community has been concerned about whether it was violence in the neighborhood or police brutality or what's happening to the black family. You've been a rock in the Hill district for a number of years. Even in Wally Avenue days we had some old film with big men and their hats and coming outside the church and ladies and their big Sunday go to meet and hats coming outside the church. You've been a rock in that community. You had to come back didn't you? Oh yes well I've been that 33 years now and Pittsburgh is is is like home now. I came here and well I came here from Wisconsin but my home is Louisville Kentucky

but I'm a Pittsburgher now. The only thing I don't do I don't say you and as people as people in Pittsburgh say but anyway I've been there and I plan to be there for a few more years. Now what's the best thing about this new building? Do you have more of the facilities that you need to conduct a lot of those community programs as well as your number one mission to serve God? Oh yes oh yes we have we have we have a larger facility to worship in and a larger facility to have other activities in. We've got not only the sanctuary itself but we have a chapel we have a fellowship hall we've got a full commercial -sized kitchen we've got plenty of areas for our administrative staff for the pastor for the secretary whatever it is what a big how big is the pastor's study? Well the past study is quite large not the pastor said the pastor's sweet. It's quite large and then there's another conference room

that's right off from the pastor's office so that when you conduct business you don't have to sit in your office and try to conduct business you can sit around a conference table and really do it right so the fire we hate the fact that the fire occurred but this is God's way of providing us with a new larger facility and you still are giving testament to those two firefighters that unfortunately lost their lives that's that's that's got to be one of the biggest concerns that you have how do you pay homage to them? Well we in the area whereby the Bell Tower fell we carved this out to make this the memorial to the firefighters and we just had the dedication of it just a few weeks ago but in there we have the the fireman's boots their helmets their axe their pictures there's a lot that's in that area and I had thought that maybe some of the kiddies would come in and disturb some of the items that's in there

if there's nothing to protect it but not not one time I mean it's almost like sacred ground when we had the dedication we invite firefighters paramedics political leaders but the families of these fallen men they were invited and they were they were moved but they were very well pleased with the win which we have put it together we will be eternally grateful to those men they lost their lives trying to save that building plus 28 firefighters were injured I understand 19 of them will never fight another fire because it was just that bad but we're grateful for the sacrifice that they made that does it this show to you how to out of all this misery and tragedy that God can make away oh yes I bet you can preach that sermon all yes I've always known that God can make away but now I believe it even more that God can make away and we have we have come up

out of the ashes because if you saw that building after burn that was that was nothing there just the ruins just the ashes but now if you ride by Wally in the village street you see a brand new edifice it's beautiful a testament to the to this city a testament to God the testament to the congregation and I'm sure a number of people have come to see just the building but you invite people to worship with you I'm sure yes we have people just about every day to come and ask can they take a tool of the building and we and we're we're conducting tours through the building all day long sometimes you can't get your work done you should you should take up a free will offering for the tour that's what I wish I could it got to pay off that mortgage remember we wish you the best and we wish you God speed for you and the congregation and thank God you've risen like a Phoenix from the ashes God bless you sir thank you very kind all right keep up good work in the community thank you thank you all right now grab your pin and paper to make note of some great events being offered in the community calendar then we call on the horizon

if you have an event that you'd like folks to know

about send it a month in advance to black horizons on the horizon wqed multimedia 4802 5th Avenue Pittsburgh PA 15213 it once was a play then a movie which explored the struggle of apartheid in South Africa and soon it will grace the country repertoire theater stage joining me now are the director of the play also all a sagoon or jewee and a choreographer or rendez -shareef welcome to the program both of you how are you pretty good all right sir Fina well -known in the theater going community is there anything that you're going to do differently to give us a different take on the play well it's already different because it's being done by contours it makes it different okay the first was on Broadway which we know it's you know what's for the Broadway audience the second was a movie which I call Sarafina goes to Hollywood Hollywood has a way of just more than everything

right exactly and so this production of Sarafina I call it retrieval retrieving it from Hollywood back to its original place and the one of the best places to do that would be Pittsburgh so there's something really special installed for the Pittsburgh audience we are not shy of the subject that it treats we are playing on the music and the dances so those who are coming to have fun will have fun but we're also going to face squirrely the subject matter of apartheid or those South Africa has moved beyond that but they're still residues of that experience in South Africa and of course we have some parallels that we're going to point it out in this country too sort of bringing home in a lot of different ways a rendezvous difficult to treat such a difficult subject matter and still be able to dance

and and sing and bring music to it also was that part of our cultural heritage that we we do that well we do do that but I think the struggle well not so much the struggle but the kind of the hard part about it is making sure that everyone kind of understands the cultural aspect of the people because we never want to characterize the dancing to make it you know not fit with the people are doing it on more fit with the movies about let's have a good time and and we we classily have to say okay we don't want BET we don't want MTV dancing we don't want no Beyonce there's a meaning in the movement of both the the students that are in the show the students that participated in in those riots and and the movement itself in terms of the dance and of course doc wouldn't have it any other way would you know okay how do you two work together to blend that to achieve the aim that you you mutually evidently see there are three

components to of the production one is is the as a dance which is taken care of by the choreograph by Orande the other segment is that of the music and we have a music director I direct though the overall you know production which is the basic task is to interpret the story diligently using those resources music dance in their most appropriate forms and I you know a contour has really blessed this production by providing the expertise necessary to achieve those is a very simple story the story of kids in high school living their ordinary lives and responding to their society in very important ways that I think is a very important example that youth kids of

any country at any time can always draw from and is very very resonant in the in our context now in this country that the youth especially in the black families should start being more sensitive more responsible to their communities to their societies and actively claiming their history in order to build a more constructive future not just leave it in the hands of you know the older people or government or politicians here in this country though there's so many distractions for youth that it's kind of hard for them to be that serious about it maybe apartheid helped those children focused who saw many of their schoolmates die from from the terrible horrors and tragedies of that kind of oppression definitely you're you're very right about that but you can always react to a situation in two ways you can react by ignoring it or you can react by

responding to make to get a positive result of that situation I believe that kids here have also witnessed drive by shootings and they've also witnessed you know drugs and the neighborhood you have a choice ultimately the pressures are heavy and we I'm not trying to dismiss that and theater are often even here like zoom in and assign theater brings out some of those things when they look at those subjects and I've seen young people respond to that how do you hope both of you were only 30 seconds left I hate this around it how do you hope young people will respond to this hope they get the picture and understand that even though they have everything that they need now they still have a responsibility and that responsibility has to be initiated and fulfilled through them and what do you think I should the same viewpoint but I also I just want them to come come and have some fun and also see the appears you know doing something constructive if that's the only thing in the

tickle we that's good enough for us all right well thank you both for being here I know it's going to be a great show and my wife and I with our season tickets will be this right all right come to repertoire theaters presentation of Sarah Fina can be seen starting January 25th through February 10th for more information please call 412 624 7298 that number again is 412 624 7298 or you can visit their website at www .con2 .org a new hour documentary that takes a look at Jim Crow in Pennsylvania and what it was like will air doing black history month and here's a sneak peek oh Jim Crow why you've been there down in Mississippi and back again Jim Crow there's a lot

of amnesia especially in the north about questions of racial inequality discrimination in past and in present northerners define themselves as not the south we aren't you know the hooded clansmen and the violent racists of Alabama and Mississippi and Louisiana what's wrong with you most Americans think that the discrimination that resulted from Jim Crow was a southern convention that it only affected blacks in the south and not those above the Mason Dixon line which forms Pennsylvania southern border but that's simply not the truth Jim Crow thrived in our common wealth too and this is a ranch home in 2010 that we decided on and it had three bedrooms that we needed had oversized garage

and we liked it very much the salesman for leverage would not show a home to a black family in other words they wouldn't even let you look at it housing and job discrimination only part of the story Pennsylvania has also been visited by the very real horrors of lynching lynching could and did include being burned alive tough stuff join me now is one of the producers of the documentary manad seat senior producer here at WQED okay see well what was this life for you to discover some of this stuff and and go through it and tell the story it wasn't surprising I mean all my life I've heard relatives say there's a whole lot of Mississippi in between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia and this show I think really brings out a lot of that a lot of the the legwork the discovering of the stories and the interviews as you know we're done by you and Olga George and she's in the control room right now which is why she's not sitting in this chair but to have

heard those stories and actually see them in the flesh to see the photographs to see the actual written things and the words of the people who experienced them it's pretty amazing and startling I remember when Olga said she was looking into the lynching and coldsville that occurred in 1911 a lot of people started telling why you want to bring that away why is it important you think to document this and let people see it I'm a firm believer that if you do not recall history if you don't keep it in front of you every day you are doomed to repeat it and that's what human beings love to do they love to make the same stupid mistakes over and over and over again so I think it's important for people to remember that these things happen in order that they don't happen again I also think it's important for us as a people as African Americans to know exactly what happened and when it happened and how it happened to prepare yourself for the world that's around you and there's some stories here that are not necessarily about doom and gloom but the necessity I guess of black people like Fairview Park to get together to provide institutions of their own I mean we just got through talking about Kuntu Repertory Theatre and that sort of

stuff a lot of times these people who have been so discriminated against have responded by creating their own institutions which are very important for the African American community the Fairview Park story is is a happy hope -filled wonderful story it's very pretty but it's it came out of a necessity it came out of the inability of African Americans in the Greater Pittsburgh area to use many of the facilities at Westview and at Kinneywood Park and other parks like that and so they came together and they bought a lot of land and they made the most of it and it's still in operation today as you know as you're on the board and it's it's a wonderful place it's a good thing and the irony is that now that everyone can have access to any place they want to go no one goes to these things anymore nobody supports them and makes them as strong as they should still be it is amazing in that respect and that's why the institutions that continue to exist need to still be there and perhaps why we shine lights on them too I guess yeah it's good because I think that

people think all the stories that have been told about Pittsburgh and Philadelphia they're done we've told them all there's a million stories in this state and hopefully we just scratch a little bit of each one and keep going up this is again just like the second Berbershop series this was funded by the Pennsylvania Public Television Network and they give us money along with the work that we've already done to make these specials that air state -wide and so everybody gets a little bit of a message what message do you want to give in your next piece are you thinking about that yet I'm thinking about a lot of things I have to think a lot about sitting around not doing anything we've had a really big year you and me and Olga and it's been kind of non -stop so I would like to say I'm gonna be resting on my laurels but I had a long meeting yesterday and I don't think that's gonna happen what about the Vietnam program and the experience of going to Vietnam for you having never been there before what was that like because I still get comments a lot about in -country or Vietnam it's amazing and it was still one of the things that will always stick in my mind I think as long as I live as one of those when's changing trips I ever took of my entire life I was just

at Ton Armagost's house last week with the Friends of Denang they have a once -monthly Friends of Denang dinner and everyone's funny and happy and working hard now they're collecting money to build a bridge you know near Hanoi they're they're going to build a bridge all by themselves and another elementary school and they're still getting together they're still having meetings so hopefully if I can drag you into it we'll be doing another story about them and the work that they're doing real soon probably for on cue or for a black arise in -country the Redux yeah I'll go back again yeah let's see if we can get Perry and Boone to go with yeah we'll drag everybody on all right is there a message in this last piece in Jim Crow that you'd like people to take away with him without making white people feel guilty and black people feel sad um watch it and absorb the lessons that are in it you don't have to feel guilty and you don't have to feel sad if anything take strength from it and knowing that what you've endured or that you were the kind of person who would have never let this kind of thing happen that's the thing

and if you are the kind of person who would let this thing happen shame on you but that's good enough for me thank you man it's always a pleasure to work with you and Olga and get these shows done I really appreciate thank you all right now if you would like to see the documentary Jim Crow Pennsylvania it will air right here on WQED TV 13 on Thursday February 8th at 8 p .m. that's Thursday February 8th at 8 p .m well that about do it for today's edition of black horizons be sure to join us next week and every Friday in most Sundays right here on WQED TV 13 more interesting shit chat I'm Chris Moore and for all of us here in the Black Horizons family have a good evening bye set pieces provided by the history store Craig Street in Oakland and Chris Moore's wardrobe provided by Larry Morris of Pittsburgh