Lorraine Hansberry: memories

A friend telling me she is reading James Baldwin’s “Giovanni’s Room” gets me thinking about an iconic photo of Baldwin and Lorraine Hansberry, sitting on a couch with cigs and drinks before them, when people did those sorts of things.

Hansberry had written “A Raisin in the Sun,” done on Broadway with Sidney Poitier, who died recently in Beverly Hills at age 94. (Surely he would have preferred to expire in Barbados, as would I ...).

With the success of “Raisin”, which later became a musical, entitled by the shortened name, Hansberry was besieged by the press to give her thoughts about Blacks in America. She very succinctly said that she did not want to opine about her race. She wasn’t writing generally about them, but quite specifically writing about one family on Chicago’s Great South Side on one block in one specific apartment. Nothing general about it.

A memory surfaces: Poitier and Harry Belafonte on the Johnny Carson show. The occasion: Both Black men, both from the islands, were turning 50. Carson asked Belafonte what it felt like. He went on. And on. Carson looked as If Harry would never stop. Finally, he did. Carson, not easy to ruffle, turned to Poitier, who stood up, went right down to the camera, did a perfect pirouette and returned to his seat, having uttered not a syllable.

I have heard that Poitier and his wife came to Salisbury, looking to buy a house. They stayed with people on Salmon Kill Road. They did not buy a house. O, what we missed!

Hansberry and Baldwin. Both gay. A Black friend, who has been living with HIV for decades — I am not talking out of school, he is quite open about this — and who, on his third try just won a Tony, said to me years ago that if the Black community could ever get over its homophobia and realize the power and wealth that Black gays have, then finally some things could get accomplished.

I don’t have time or space to recount the anti-gay, anti-women attitudes that rappers and others have expressed. I can only say I believe my friend is right.

A classmate’s father was the Executive Director of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai Brith. At his funeral service, my friend gave the eulogy at Temple Beth Immanuel in Manhattan, the most stirring eulogy I have ever heard. I was in the back and I noticed the great Bayard Rustin, stalwart of the Civil Rights Movement, and a gay man. A man who was largely ostracized by the Movement. I remember his silver-tipped cane.

Baldwin felt he had to leave the country and went to France; Hansberry died in her thirties.

He kept writing and one of his many haunting books is “The Evidence of Things Not Seen,” an exploration of the multiple child murders in the Atlanta area, supposed to have been done by one Wayne Williams. A 23-year-old Black man.  Baldwin is not at all sure.

The title is taken from “Hebrews,” perhaps St. Paul: “Faith is the thing hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

But something else seemed perfectly possible to Baldwin, too: Given the panic over Williams’s alleged homosexuality, either fate, murdered or accused, might just as easily have been Baldwin’s. “We all came here,” he writes, “as candidates for the slaughter of the innocents.”

Williams remains in prison, having been convicted more than 30 years ago.  The children’s relatives are, like Baldwin, not convinced.

The mayor of Atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms, has opened up a re-investigation.

We need Baldwin to look at it again. Again and still. And Hansberry as well.

 

Lonnie Carter is a writer who lives in Falls Village. Email him at lonniety@comcast.net. or go to his website at www.lonniecarter.com.

The views expressed here are not necessarily those of The Millerton News and The News does not support or oppose candidates for public office.

Latest News

Local, county candidates gather for NorthEast-Millerton Library forum

Millerton and North East residents crowded into the NorthEast-Millerton Library Annex on Friday, Oct. 24, to hear from 10 candidates seeking office.

Photo by Christian Murray

MILLERTON — A crowd of about 60 people filled the NorthEast-Millerton Library Annex for a political Q&A session with candidates for local and county offices on Friday, Oct. 24.

Panels of candidates rotated across the stage, answering questions submitted beforehand and impromptu questions from audience members in the room.

Keep ReadingShow less
Rural Health Fall Fest highlights care options

The Sun River Health Center in Amenia welcomed visitors to its Rural Health Fall Fest on Wednesday, Oct. 22. Assembling for a photo at Sun River’s booth were, left to right, Cherise McDaniel, Director; Crystal Marr, Associate Vice-President of Substance Use Disorders; Yvette Ramirez, Outreach Coordinator; and Elizabeth Phillips, Vice-President of Community Engagement.

Photo by Leila Hawken

Photo by Leila Hawken

Representing Astor Services of Poughkeepsie was Athena Galarza, the home-based services coordinator, visiting with Alexa Cruz, 10, who had come through Astor’s Head Start program some years earlier.

Millerton Fire Commissioners adopt $787K budget

MILLERTON — The North East Fire District held a public hearing Tuesday, Oct. 21, to review its proposed 2026 budget. With no public comment, the Board of Fire Commissioners approved the $787,813 plan during its regular monthly business meeting, which followed.

Fire District Chair Dave McGhee read a resolution to override the tax levy limit established under New York’s General Municipal Law Section 3-c for the 2026 budget year. In a roll-call vote, the Board approved the resolution and adopted the budget.

Keep ReadingShow less
Listening session shines light on rural transportation issues

The Dutchess County Transportation Council hosted a listening session at the NorthEast-Millerton Library on Oct. 22, giving northeast Dutchess County residents an opportunity to express the challenges they face in getting transportation.

Photo by Aly Morrissey

MILLERTON — Transportation challenges in northeast Dutchess County took center stage last week during a listening session held by the Dutchess County Transportation Council at the NorthEast-Millerton Library Annex.

The event, held Oct. 22, was part of the Council’s effort to update its Coordinated Public Transit–Human Services Transportation Plan, which aims to “improve mobility for older adults, people with disabilities, low-income individuals and others who struggle to access reliable transportation.”

Keep ReadingShow less