National

Latest on Baltimore Protests: Thousands March Across U.S.

Published

10 years ago

May 2, 2015

A protester walks outside of police barricades during a march in New York, Friday, May 1, 2015. About 1,000 protesters decrying police brutality marched in Manhattan at a May Day rally that took on a new message amid national outrage over a Baltimore man’s death in police custody. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

via ASSOCIATED PRESS

1:50 a.m. (EDT)

Police in Portland, Oregon, say an initially peaceful May Day demonstration turned violent Friday evening as a splinter group hurled chairs and other objects at officers. Police temporarily closed a major city bridge and used pepper spray on some demonstrators when a march deviated from its permitted route through downtown.

Police said one officer was injured and taken to a precinct for medical treatment.

The Burnside Bridge over the Willamette River was closed for about a half-hour during the height of the evening commute when protesters tried to force their way across.

The protest caused major delays for commuters.

The Oregonian reported that about 100 protesters also skirmished with police at the Pioneer Courthouse Square, surrounding an unmarked SUV with officers inside. Bicycle officers created a path for the SUV to leave the scene. Police say they used flash grenades to allow officers to safely withdraw from the crowd. The crowd broke up a short time later.

Earlier in the day, hundreds took to the streets to celebrate International Workers’ Day and protest police violence.

11:17 p.m. (EDT)

Police say black-clad May Day marchers hurled wrenches and rocks at officers and hit police with sticks as a Friday evening march through a Seattle neighborhood turned violent, injuring three officers.

Police responded with pepper spray and pepper balls, quickly arresting three people. That brought the day’s Seattle demonstration arrest total to four.

Bicycle officers shadowed the marchers, who changed direction often. Their evening event had been billed as an anti-capitalist march.

Hundreds of people earlier joined in May Day marches in Seattle and Yakima, Washington, in support of workers’ rights and other causes.

Police said the earlier arrest came when a man threw a rock at a window.

The initial Seattle march ended with a rally at the downtown federal courthouse.

In the central Washington city of Yakima, a crowd of at least 500 marchers called for increased attention to immigrant and worker rights

10:40 p.m. (EDT)

Police in Portland, Oregon, say an increasingly unruly May Day crowd hurled projectiles and chairs at officers Friday evening. Earlier, police temporarily closed a major city bridge and used pepper spray on some demonstrators when a march deviated from its permitted route through downtown.

Police said one officer was assaulted and injured and taken to a precinct for medical treatment.

The Burnside Bridge over the Willamette River was closed about 5:30 p.m. during the height of the evening commute. It later reopened.

Hundreds of protesters were reported in the evening crowd.

Earlier in the day, hundreds took to the streets to celebrate International Workers’ Day and protest police violence.

___

10:10 p.m. (EDT)

Hundreds of people have joined in annual May Day marches in Seattle and Yakima, Washington, in support of workers’ rights and other causes.

By early Friday evening in Seattle, the focus shifted from an earlier march and rally in support workers and immigrant rights to a new march by a couple hundred black-clad protesters on the move in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. Police on bicycles shadowed that march, which had been billed as an anti-capitalist gathering.

Police tweeted that many of the evening protesters were carrying wrenches.

By late afternoon, Seattle police said they had arrested one man for throwing a rock at a window.

The earlier Seattle march drew hundreds of people and ended with a rally at the downtown federal courthouse.

May Day in Seattle started with A Black Lives Matter gathering. Many of those marchers later joined the immigrant rights event.

In the central Washington city of Yakima, a crowd of at least 500 marchers called for increased attention to immigrant and worker rights

___

9:15 p.m. (EDT)

About 1,000 protesters decrying police brutality have marched in downtown New York at a May Day rally that took on a new message amid national outrage over a Baltimore man’s death in police custody.

Demonstrators streamed through blocked-off streets, bearing signs with such messages as “Disarm the NYPD” and “Justice for Freddie Gray,” the 25-year-old who died in Baltimore.

At least one man was arrested after he tried to jump over a police barricade, but the procession generally went calmly.

After the march reached its scheduled end at a lower Manhattan plaza, tensions flared as some protesters continued marching on nearby streets. As police used a loudspeaker to order the demonstrators to get onto the sidewalk, some protesters shouted back.

Some activists and officials had criticized the New York Police Department’s handling of protests Wednesday over Gray’s death. They say police were overly aggressive while arresting more than 140 people when some demonstrators splintered off, trying to get on a highway and block tunnel entrances.

___

9:09 p.m. (EDT)

Hundreds of people marched in Seattle for the annual May Day March for Workers and Immigrant Rights — part of several gatherings in the city on Friday.

Seattle police say they arrested one person late Friday afternoon for throwing a rock at a window. They say the man was carrying a machete, paint and a wrench.

A Black Lives Matter Event drew dozens who marched through parts of the city, accompanied by a large police escort, on their way to join the immigrant rights event.

Marchers made their way to the downtown federal courthouse for an evening rally.

Police also were prepared for a planned evening protest that’s been billed as an anti-capitalist march.

A May Day rally was also planned Friday evening in Yakima.

8:15 p.m. (EDT)

The May Day protest outside Oakland’s City Hall has swelled to more than a thousand people — one of several demonstrations by labor, immigrant and civil rights activists in cities across California.

The protesters are decrying racism, police brutality and income inequality in a loud, sign-waving march from the Port of Oakland to Frank Ogawa Plaza in downtown Oakland.

Some of the demonstrators are holding signs reading “Racism is the Disease,” ”Black Lives Matter” and “Stop Police Brutality.” Others say they want better wages and working conditions for the masses.

Across the bay, about 100 people gathered at Civic Center in San Francisco for a May Day rally before marching to the Mission neighborhood.

The annual May Day rallies have their roots in workers’ rights, but events in recent years have been a rallying point for immigrant-rights groups and other causes.

___

6 p.m. (EDT)

About 400 people have marched in Chicago, some to protest recent police shootings and some to recognize May Day’s message of workers’ rights.

Seventy-three-year-old activist Richard Malmin says he participates every year but that this rally is bigger due to the death of Freddie Gray, whose spine was severed while in Baltimore police custody last month. Activists added anti-police brutality to their messages.

Dozens of Seattle protesters at a Black Lives Matter event joined hundreds who gathered for workers’ and immigrants’ rights. About 1,000 are marching in Manhattan.

High school students who walked out of school are among hundreds who marched downtown in Minneapolis, protesting Freddie Gray’s case and in support of Black Lives Matter members who appeared at a hearing related to December arrests.

___

4:30 p.m. (EDT)

A protest in Denver that drew about 25 people has kept its focus on inequality rather than police brutality issues that several other protests around the country planned to rally against.

Demonstrator David Garner says he’s concerned about economic inequality, especially for people of color. May Day is historically a day where labor supporters rally for workers’ rights.

Friday’s protest near the state Capitol had been mostly peaceful unlike Wednesday night when Denver police arrested 11 people during a demonstration over the death of Freddie Gray. Gray died after his spine had been severed while in Baltimore police custody. Charges against six officers were announced Friday.

New York City union and immigration activists are planning to gather in Union Square to join Freddie Gray protesters to march in solidarity.

___

2:30 p.m. (EDT)

Some parents are bringing their children to protests in Chicago, using it as a teaching tool on how to perceive police officers.

Meredith West was informing her 9-year-old daughter that when encountering a police officer, she should stay calm and keep still.

The mother and daughter had joined a couple dozen families on Friday who marched on Chicago’s West Side, protesting police brutality.

One 8-year-old had told the Associated Press that police officers are there to protect people, not hurt them.

In New York, police have asked demonstrators from labor and immigrant rights groups to work with them ahead of planned protests.

The San Jose Mercury News reports that hundreds in California who marched to City Hall in Oakland were mostly peaceful. Other protests are planned in several California towns.

___

12:30 p.m. (EDT)

A group of Chicago protesters has demanded an end to police brutality in support of Freddie Gray, who died after his spine was severed while in police custody in Baltimore last month.

Many demonstrators were carrying signs that read: “Police Brutality Must Stop.” They were marching Friday around a fountain on the city’s West Side.

In California, crowds were just starting to gather for a rally at an Oakland train station. Labor, immigrant and civil rights activists in several California cities are expected to call for civil rights and an end to police brutality. Protests are planned for San Francisco, Los Angeles, Anaheim and Riverside County.

___

11 a.m. (EDT)

Activists across the United States are gearing up for marches and protests to mark May Day and plan to broaden their message to include issues of police brutality.

Events are being held Friday in cities like New York, Denver, Seattle, Chicago and Portland, Oregon.

May Day has historically been a day when demonstrators rooted deeply in the labor movement call for workers’ rights. But in recent years, immigration reform and civil rights issues have been adopted.

This year, marches are planned in support of “Black Lives Matter,” a growing movement in the wake of a series of deaths of black men during police encounters. Protests in Philadelphia and Baltimore on Thursday were in support of Freddie Gray, who died a week after police took him into custody.

###

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

Up Next

A Look at the Six Baltimore Police Officers Charged in the Gray Case

Don't Miss

Rebuilt Slave Sites Being Unveiled at Jefferson’s Monticello

Oakland Post

Click to comment

Arts and Culture

In ‘Affrilachia: Testimonies,’ Puts Blacks in Appalacia on the Map

Published

1 hour ago

December 22, 2024

Oakland Post

Author Chris Aluka. Photo courtesy of Chris Aluka.

By Terri Schlichenmeyer
The Bookworm Sez

An average oak tree is bigger around than two people together can reach.

That mighty tree starts out with an acorn the size of a nickel, ultimately growing to some 80 feet tall, with a canopy of a hundred feet or more across.

And like the new book, “Affrilachia” by Chris Aluka Berry (with Kelly Elaine Navies and Maia A. Surdam), its roots spread wide and wider.

Affriclachia is a term a Kentucky poet coined in the 1990s referring to the Black communities in Appalachia who are similarly referred to as Affrilachians.

In 2016, “on a foggy Sunday morning in March,” Berry visited Affrilachia for the first time by going the Mount Zion AME Zion Church in Cullowhee, North Carolina. The congregation was tiny; just a handful of people were there that day, but a pair of siblings stood out to him.

According to Berry, Ann Rogers and Mae Louise Allen lived on opposite sides of town, and neither had a driver’s license. He surmised that church was the only time the elderly sisters were together then, but their devotion to one another was clear.

As the service ended, he asked Allen if he could visit her. Was she willing to talk about her life in the Appalachians, her parents, her town?

She was, and arrangements were made, but before Barry could get back to Cullowhee, he learned that Allen had died. Saddened, he wondered how many stories are lost each day in mountain communities where African Americans have lived for more than a century.

“I couldn’t make photographs of the past,” he says, “but I could document the people and places living now.”

In doing so he also offers photographs that he collected from people he met in ‘Affrilachia,’ in North Carolina, Georgia, Kentucky, and Tennessee, at a rustic “camp” that was likely created by enslaved people, at churches, and in modest houses along highways.

The people he interviewed recalled family tales and community stories of support, hardship, and home.

Says coauthor Navies, “These images shout without making a sound.”

If it’s true what they say about a picture being worth 1,000 words, then “Affrilachia,” as packed with photos as it is, is worth a million.

With that in mind, there’s not a lot of narrative inside this book, just a few poems, a small number of very brief interviews, a handful of memories passed down, and some background stories from author Berry and his co-authors. The tales are interesting but scant.

For most readers, though, that lack of narrative isn’t going to matter much. The photographs are the reason why you’d have this book.

Here are pictures of life as it was 50 years or a century ago: group photos, pictures taken of proud moments, worn pews, and happy children. Some of the modern pictures may make you wonder why they’re included, but they set a tone and tell a tale.

This is the kind of book you’ll take off the shelf, and notice something different every time you do. “Affrilachia” doesn’t contain a lot of words, but it’s a good choice when it’s time to branch out in your reading.

“Affrilachia: Testimonies,” by Chris Aluka Berry with Kelly Elaine Navies and Maia A. Surdam

c.2024, University of Kentucky Press, $50.00.

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

Black History

Alice Parker: The Innovator Behind the Modern Gas Furnace

Born in Morristown, New Jersey, in 1895, Alice Parker lived during a time when women, especially African American women, faced significant social and systemic barriers. Despite these challenges, her contributions to home heating technology have had a lasting impact.

Published

2 hours ago

December 22, 2024

Oakland Post

In 1919, Alice Parker patented the design for a gas-powered central heating system, a groundbreaking invention. Image courtesy of U.S. Patent Office.

By Tamara Shiloh

Alice Parker was a trailblazing African American inventor whose innovative ideas forever changed how we heat our homes.

Born in Morristown, New Jersey, in 1895, Parker lived during a time when women, especially African American women, faced significant social and systemic barriers. Despite these challenges, her contributions to home heating technology have had a lasting impact.

Parker grew up in New Jersey, where winters could be brutally cold. Although little is documented about her personal life, her education played a crucial role in shaping her inventive spirit. She attended Howard University, a historically Black university in Washington, D.C., where she may have developed her interest in practical solutions to everyday challenges.

Before Parker’s invention, most homes were heated using wood or coal-burning stoves. These methods were labor-intensive, inefficient, and posed fire hazards. Furthermore, they failed to provide even heating throughout a home, leaving many rooms cold while others were uncomfortably warm.

Parker recognized the inefficiency of these heating methods and imagined a solution that would make homes more comfortable and energy-efficient during winter.

In 1919, she patented her design for a gas-powered central heating system, a groundbreaking invention. Her design used natural gas as a fuel source to distribute heat throughout a building, replacing the need for wood or coal. The system allowed for thermostatic control, enabling homeowners to regulate the temperature in their homes efficiently.

What made her invention particularly innovative was its use of ductwork, which channeled warm air to different parts of the house. This concept is a precursor to the modern central heating systems we use today.

While Parker’s design was never fully developed or mass-produced during her lifetime, her idea laid the groundwork for modern central heating systems. Her invention was ahead of its time and highlighted the potential of natural gas as a cleaner, more efficient alternative to traditional heating methods.

Parker’s patent is remarkable not only for its technical innovation but also because it was granted at a time when African Americans and women faced severe limitations in accessing patent protections and recognition for their work. Her success as an inventor during this period is a testament to her ingenuity and determination.

Parker’s legacy lives on in numerous awards and grants – most noticeably in the annual Alice H. Parker Women Leaders in Innovation Award. That distinction is given out by the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce to celebrate outstanding women innovators in Parker’s home state.

The details of Parker’s later years are as sketchy as the ones about her early life. The specific date of her death, along with the cause, are also largely unknown.

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

Activism

U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries Speaks on Democracy at Commonwealth Club

Based on his first speech as House minority leader, “The ABCs of Democracy” by Grand Central Publishing is an illustrated children’s book for people of all ages. Each letter contrasts what democracy is and isn’t, as in: “American Values over Autocracy”, “Benevolence over Bigotry” and “The Constitution over the Cult.”

Published

11 hours ago

December 22, 2024

Oakland Post

: House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries at the Commonwealth Club World Affairs Council on Dec. 2. Photo by Johnnie Burrell. Book cover: "The ABCs of Democracy" by Hakeem Jeffries.

By Linda Parker Pennington
Special to The Post

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries addressed an enthusiastic overflow audience on Monday at San Francisco’s Commonwealth Club, launching his first book, “The ABCs of Democracy.”

Based on his first speech as House minority leader, “The ABCs of Democracy” by Grand Central Publishing is an illustrated children’s book for people of all ages.

Each letter contrasts what democracy is and isn’t, as in: “American Values over Autocracy”, “Benevolence over Bigotry” and “The Constitution over the Cult.”

Less than a month after the election that will return Donald Trump to the White House, Rep. Jeffries also gave a sobering assessment of what the Democrats learned.

“Our message just wasn’t connecting with the real struggles of the American people,” Jeffries said. “The party in power is the one that will always pay the price.”

On dealing with Trump, Jeffries warned, “We can’t fall into the trap of being outraged every day at what Trump does. That’s just part of his strategy. Remaining calm in the face of turmoil is a choice.”

He pointed out that the razor-thin margin that Republicans now hold in the House is the lowest since the Civil War.

Asked what the public can do, Jeffries spoke about the importance of being “appropriately engaged. Democracy is not on autopilot. It takes a citizenry to hold politicians accountable and a new generation of young people to come forward and serve in public office.”

With a Republican-led White House, Senate, House and Supreme Court, Democrats must “work to find bi-partisan common ground and push back against far-right extremism.”

He also described how he is shaping his own leadership style while his mentor, Speaker-Emeritus Nancy Pelosi, continues to represent San Francisco in Congress. “She says she is not hanging around to be like the mother-in-law in the kitchen, saying ‘my son likes his spaghetti sauce this way, not that way.’”