• About Marylou Shira Hadditt
  • About This Blog
  • Gallery

I'm Hadditt

~ 87 year old Marylou Shira Hadditt, born a Southern Belle-Jewish Princess, is a civil rights and political activist, lesbian feminist, mother, grandmother and writer who says, “I want to share my stories before I die."

I'm Hadditt

Category Archives: Civil Rights

31 Organizations, 3000 Meetings

18 Sunday May 2014

Posted by hadditt in Chicago, Civil Rights, Hyde Park Herald, Hyde Park Kenwood

≈ Leave a Comment

Tags

activism, civil rights, Hyde Park Herald, Hyde Park Kenwood, integration

31 orgs img pt 1 31 orgs img pt2These two pages were published in the Herald’s 75th Anniversary Issue, and defined the way I saw Hyde Park. The headline reads : “31 ORGANIZATIONS, 3000 MEETINGS A YEAR and we all BELIEVE IN HYDE PARK.” Some of the outstanding qualities listed were:

  • We have an aware population. Hyde Park has the highest percentage of registered voters of any community in Chicago. Some of our organizations see to it that people register and vote and that people know what they are voting about.
  • We have an integrated population. Hyde Park is a microcosm of all races, religions, and creeds. Some of our organizations have’ seen to it that we don’t preach tolerance but instead live with our neighbors in harmony no matter who they are.
  • We are pioneering redevelopment. We have plans to improve the Hyde Park area in every material respect, to rebuild where necessary, to stop illegal conversions, yes, to close substandard buildings for occupancy. This is done through your organizations.
  • We have amazing facilities for our young people. We have numerous planned recreational and and educational projects. We have more than city-owned playgrounds – we have many community tot-lots and building facilities managed by organized groups. Our organized groups have made Hyde Park the pilot project for youth planning for the city of Chicago.
  • We have  an excellent program for the preschooler. We have non-profit nursery schools for children of working mothers, run by the community; all in the Hyde Park tradition of the very best for our population.
  • We helped pass laws locally and nationally. Hyde Parker put enough pressure on our state legislature to see that the Neighborhood Redevelopment Corporation Act – which would enable re-growth in  Hyde Park – passed. The first test case of this act was in Hyde Park. We’ve passe. national Laws. Just recently Congress enacted a bill to compensate merchants who are victims of urban renewal. This is a national precedent. Organized Hyde Parkers wrote letters and went to Washington.
  • We plan recreation for our adults. We have play reading groups, folk dancing, bridge clubs, painting classes, music groups, Great Books groups, crafts, and many more.
  • We’ve all sorts of special facilities. An Art Fair, organized sitter-swap made  up of people in the Hyde Park area, a credit union, a community operated supermarket, a winning fight on our Lake Front parks, museums, libraries…

These pages inventoried much of what Hyde Park organizations had done and were currently doing. There was a broad range of activity and an energetic belief in human nature and in the community. Years later, a book on urban renewal and Hyde Park, quoted these pages as “quintessential Hyde Park.”

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Google
  • Tumblr
  • Twitter
  • Reddit

Build a Better America!

19 Saturday Apr 2014

Posted by hadditt in Activism, Chicago, Civil Rights, Hyde Park Herald, Hyde Park Kenwood, Memoir, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

activism, Chicago, civil rights, Hyde Park Kenwood, integration, urban renewal

Build a Better America!

I believed that Hyde Park, the people who lived here and the organizations they supported would create the nation’s first interracial community of high standards. Moreover, I believed that only with a courageous newspaper, like the Herald, which serves as a means of communication and a catalyst for action, can Hyde Park succeed.

HPK - Build a Better America

School Friends Photo Courtesy of WoodleyWonderWorks @ Flickr

School Friends Photo Courtesy of WoodleyWonderWorks @ Flickr (this is not the original photo in the Herald piece, but I thought it was appropriate. ~Penny)

 

Just pause a few minutes to look at these children. Who are they? What are they? What are they doing? They are the very life blood of America … a heart which knows no color line, no religious differences, no social barriers. They are living and learning TOGETHER. These children know great things are not built alone. In their play they have discovered that two heads, regardless of faith or color, are better than one. So let the grownups pause long enough to think abut their own personal lives and those around them.

These words were written in 1953. At the time, they were considered by most of Chicago and much of the country as radical: “commie”- “red words”. For Hyde Parkers, they were words of belief in a community, words of promise and commitment. They are applicable today.

I believed that Hyde Park, the people who lived here and the organizations they supported would create the nation’s first interracial community of high standards. Moreover, I believed that only with a courageous newspaper, like the Herald, which serves as a means of communication and a catalyst for action, can Hyde Park succeed.

I was young when I wrote this- twenty-four. I believed in the power of the written word. I believed in the power of self determination. I still do.

ML 1956 1

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Google
  • Tumblr
  • Twitter
  • Reddit

Gensie

16 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by hadditt in Activism, Chicago, Civil Rights, Hyde Park Kenwood, Memoir

≈ Leave a Comment

Tags

activism, civil rights, Hyde Park Kenwood, race, urban renewal

This was written in 1950, in the early days of Hyde Park’s experiment in creating a viable interracial urban community. The Hyde Park Kenwood Conference was a strong grass roots organization which joined together diverse ethnic and racial groups by means of block group meetings and social activities. This was a beginning of a time for the white population to listen to the peoples of color.

Gensie

We sat around Herb and Lenore T.‘s living room, ten or twelve of us, at a meeting of the Maryland Drexel block group of the Conference. Everyone was busy counting white faces. black faces and Asian faces. Nobody admitted, especially to themselves, that they were counting. People talked about rats in the alleys and street lighting; how Hyde Park must not become a slum and that we need to press for city services. All valid complaints, but an easy way to avoid talking about the real issues: race. Everyone was afraid to ask what if felt like to be black (a term not yet invented in 1950) or white. No one dared ask the University professor if he liked living next door to a Pullman porter. Or how the Pullman porter liked living next to the professor. The issues were there, but never placed on the table.

Until Gensie F. appeared at a meeting.

She was a small woman, stylishly dressed is a tailored suit with a shy feathered hat perched on her head. Her soft voice was commanding, so filled with quiet rage that the room stopped breathing.

“You folks think because I moved here and because my house was torn down by Slum Clearance ? That I lived in a slum? Do you honestly believe that Negroes bring slums with them? “Well, let me tell you something. I had a home that looked out on the Lake. Every morning I woke up early to watch the sun rise over that lake and into my house. In all the years I lived there, the Lake was never the same color twice; sometimes it was purple, sometimes it was green, and sometimes, in a fog, it was silver. “That’s the house they told me was a slum, I had three fireplaces with tile scenes on them: one had cupids, another knights and ladies, and another pyracantha leaves. My oak floors were beautifully refinished and every Saturday I polished my brass door knobs.

“One day this man I never saw before knocks and my door and tells me the Slum Clearance is going to tear down my beautiful home. He offered to buy my house for a third of what it was worth. I refused. He told me I had no choice. Slum Clearance would take my house with eminent domain.

So what could I do? I took the little money they gave me and went partners with my sister. We purchased a small house in Hyde Park. I come to meetings now and hear everyone talking about rats in the alley and not wanting to make a slum. Let me tell you: I never made a slum, I didn’t take a slum with me when I moved. And like a lot of Negroes, all we want is a decent place to live, to raise our families. Sometime, I drive past my where my old home was. Everything is gone. Instead, there are white only apartment buildings for the rich folks to watch the sun rise over the Lake. Evidently, that’s not for colored school teachers like me.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Google
  • Tumblr
  • Twitter
  • Reddit

Recent Posts

  • Still Stirring Shit Up: Sonoma Seniors Protest Managment Change
  • Kaddish Poem
  • More Words on Racism
  • Dear Mr. President:
  • Breslaur’s Department Store

Recent Comments

  • Joanne Whitfield on Gallery
  • Suzanne Erfurth on Dr. Gleason
  • Suzanne Erfurth on Dr. Gleason
  • Les on Breslaur’s Department Store
  • William Schill on Breslaur’s Department Store

Archives

  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • April 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • July 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013

Categories

  • Activism
  • Chicago
  • Civil Rights
  • Family
  • Hyde Park Herald
  • Hyde Park Kenwood
  • Lesbian
  • Memoir
  • Poetry
  • Sonoma County
  • Uncategorized

Subscribe to be notified when new posts go up

Join 323 other subscribers

Proudly powered by WordPress Theme: Chateau by Ignacio Ricci.