>> From the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. ^M00:00:04 [ Silence ] ^M00:00:23 >> Good afternoon everyone. I'm Helena Zinkham, Director for Collections and Services here at the Library of Congress and it's my great pleasure to welcome you this afternoon. We're going to celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday by honoring a woman who inspired him. You can all tell me her name right? Rosa Parks. Our speakers, already assembled on the stage, worked very closely with Mrs. Parks and continue her legacy today as they run the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development and also the Pathways Program right here in D.C. They're eager to tell us about Mrs. Parks' life beyond the bus, how much she accomplished before and after that famous moment of courage in 1955 when Mrs. Parks refused to give up her seat for a white man. But first I'd like to tell you just a little bit about where you are today. The Library of Congress, we seek to spark imagination and creativity, to further human understanding and knowledge by providing access as well as preserving our magnificent collections and making all of that information available through special programs like today, through publications, through exhibitions, through educational teacher programs too. Founded in 1800 we've been collecting African American history and also women's history for well more than 100 years. Among our 158 million items significant collections include the original handwritten documents of such Presidents as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. We also have absolutely up to date digital data sets for maps from all over the world and of course vast genealogical databases. So we're both antique and modern in our look at life. One of the most heavily used collections in the whole library is the official records of the NAACP, but you can also turn to us for the personal papers of many leaders who fought for many kinds of equal rights. That would be Susan B. Anthony and A. Philip Randolph, Bayard Rustin, Thurgood Marshall, Jackie Robinson and Congresswoman Patsy Mink to name just a few. We also have remarkable oral history interviews with former slaves and extraordinary photographs from the March on Washington. In other words the history of many voices has long been captured through the holdings of the library in newspapers, sound recordings, movies, music and much more. We were especially honored last fall to receive the Rosa Parks collection. We'll talk more about her papers and photographs in the coming months through blog posts in February to recognize her own birthday on February 4th and then followed on March 2nd we'll have a month long special display of highlight items of the this brand new collection for the library. But an excellent exhibition all about the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is already on display, well attended, just two flights up from where we are now and I'd encourage you to take a look. It's running through September of 2015 and there is an exceptional resource guide designed for students and teachers, free to download, you can see how extensive it is, so lots of good ideas for teaching the history of civil rights. So please come back and visit us in person. I know many of you already know our URL but the address for quick reference www.loc.gov. And now please join me in bringing Michele Chisholm, the President of our Blacks in Government Chapter up to the stage. >> Thank you. I am Michele Chisholm, President of the Library of Congress Chapter of Blacks in Government. It is my pleasure to introduce today's guests. Elaine Eason Steele worked for more than 20 years for federal, state and local governments, rising from clerk to supervisor. In 1987 she co-founded with Rosa Parks the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development in honor of Mrs. Parks late husband Raymond. For many years as an Executive Assistant to Parks still traveled with and coordinated all appearances by Mrs. Parks with leaders, heads of state or organizations throughout the world. She gained national recognition as the co-founder and developer of the Pathways to Freedom Program. Thank you. Ella McCall Haygan is co-director of the Washington D.C. Metro Regional Chapter, Pathways to Freedom's Youth Program of the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development. Mrs. Parks' Pathways to Freedom's Youth Program offers educational and historical research opportunity for students ages 11 to 17. Haygan also founded and runs a free social services organization from Streets to Skills Social Services on Wheels to bring skills and services to youth, homeless families, former gang members and others in need. Last but not least, Mrs. Anita Peek has served as the Executive Director of the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development since 1996. Under her leadership the organization has grown to offer five separate programs including the signature Youth Development History Expedition, Pathways to Freedom and the Rosa L. Parks Learning Center which specializes in inter-generational computer based training. Mrs. Peek. Thank you. Joining them on stage to conduct the interview is my brother, my friend and a hard working guy for blacks in government. His name is Mr. Louis Clavel [assumed spelling]. He is the Legislative Advisor for the Library of Congress Chapter of Blacks in Government and he will join us on stage now. Please join me in welcoming all our guests. >> And we're actually going to have, Mrs. Haygan brought with her a clip of Rosa Parks herself during an interview. I'm going to play a brief moment of that for you now. >> Now a forum with civil rights leader Rosa Parks. This month marks the 43rd anniversary of her refusal to surrender her bus seat to a white passenger in Montgomery Alabama. On Saturday she talked with students at Howard University. Joining her were others including Washington D.C. Mayor Marion Barry. >> Thank you, thank you. This has been a wonderful day. I've been enjoying it so much and I enjoyed the music and I enjoyed the young people and I'm very glad to be here with my relatives, Mr. and Mrs. Williamson and Mr. [inaudible] friend, and I'm just happy. I don't know how to express myself otherwise. And of course Elaine Steele is my, is wonderful to be with her in her company and she and I have been, as she said, we have been friends for many years. And of course when we decided to organize the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development to train and help young people from the ages of 11 to 17 years of age, that was our real, our real thing that we wanted to do because we wanted to do something that's going to help and educate our young people, because we do need all the education we can get. And I'm very, very glad that we have this program today and I'm so glad to see so many students as well as adults. As we go into the next century I am looking forward to have seen many of our young people be very successful, be very aware, spiritual awareness and all of it that goes to make life what it should be. >> Her presence and her words are something that I like leads us into a very nice part of our conversation, and that's Mrs. Peek is now the Director of the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development and her message that we heard was that children in the future were very, very important to her. We're starting to understand an American icon in a broader sense now, and when we can do that and have testimony from people who knew her, we have an opportunity to get a sense of even beyond what she did for the bus boycott but her vision for the future, for where we might be now. So I'll ask Mrs. Peek a question about how Rosa Parks' philosophy for self-development involves us in conversations about the now, where we are now in civil rights. >> Anita Peek: It's amazing how similar things are in the last 50 years. Amazing, I always think I can talk loud enough. It's amazing how similar things are today than they were 50 years ago. Mrs. Parks and Mrs. Steele started the institute so that all young people would have an opportunity to develop when it came to, in particular social science. History, civics, math and science have always been very important and they will always make sure that we get that, but they don't always make sure we are literate in our history and in the social sciences, and Mrs. Parks wanted that for all children. Now there are usually programs for gifted children or there are programs for children with developmental disabilities but Mrs. Parks wanted to make sure all kids, it didn't matter what your grades were in school that you had the opportunity to know your history and that was one of her reasons for starting the institute. As Mrs. Steele always reminds us, it was in honor of her husband who was not allowed to go to school past the third grade. He lived in a time when a male was not allowed to go to school past the third grade in his time. Now there were some towns that did allow you to go up to the fifth grade, but males had to work. And the idea was they did not want black males, in particular, to be too educated. And so he always read a lot, he always was active and Mrs. Parks encouraged and was one of the reasons that she loved him so much was because he was such an activist and he helped to activate her spirit of activism, which was always there, but this was an opportunity to bring it forth. And she wanted young people to have opportunities that she didn't have. She wanted to make sure that the schools were representing the things that they should represent to all children, and that was an accurate history of America. >> Thank you. Ms. Peek that's a fantastic answer, especially because Howard Buffett who purchased the Rosa Parks collection and loaned it to the library for ten years, says that we should make it available to as many people as possible. That means school children should be involved with the collections as well as adults; lifelong learners and school children. If we do it properly fulfills Rosa Parks' intentions, not just others that may be preserving and collecting. Thank you for that and I'd love to ask a question to Mrs. Steele now. Mrs. Steele knew Rosa Parks for 47 years and she, I know that she met Mrs. Parks when she was very young. I'd like to ask you a question of what it was like to meet Mrs. Parks at the time that you did and if you could tell us the year and the framework of history around the Civil Rights Movement. >> Elaine Steele: Well I met Mrs. Parks when I was a junior in high school in the 60's and it was awesome. I met her at a sewing factory where I got a job. In school my major was dress design and I got a job in a sewing factory and my seatmate was Rosa Parks. Well to say I was excited was putting it mildly, but she was so gentle and so kind. I thought I knew how to sew since I was in dress design but we used Domestic machines, you know, the white machine, that was the brand name and Singer machine, another brand name, but in this sewing factory they used Power machines and they went very, very fast. So the first time I stepped on the presser foot the stitches just went zigzag and she was so kind in showing me how to remove the stitches. She just took her time and showed me how to use a razorblade to take the stitches out so that I could do it easier. And you know she, you know, was not miffed because I couldn't sew. But actually I lasted there all of about five days and it was a mutual decision between the employer and the employee that perhaps there was a better profession for me. And later, a couple years later when I graduated I got a job in the clerk's office of the United States District Court, and Mrs. Parks by then was working for Congressman John Conyers. And we met again in the hallway and we hugged and later we started going home together. At that time Mrs. Parks was driving so she would drive me, but later I was able to get a government car at an auction and I had the car and then I began to drive and the rest is history. I drove and drove and drove. >> Well fantastic. I heard that you met her in the 60's and of course the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is something that's being celebrated here through the exhibit that's in this building, also the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were in the same time frame. Was she involved in that legislature and preparing it? >> Elaine Steele: She did not go to the signing, she was not invited to the signing, but working with Congressman Conyers she was very much involved and was very much supportive and very excited that it finally came about. She in fact wanted freedom for all people. We had been deprived for so long and all that she had to go through in trying to vote was indeed an atrocity, and if any of you have seen Selma you know the story there, and if you've not, please see it because it really shows a part of history that is very important to us. And although there is not a character of Rosa Parks specifically that all the people were Rosa Parks because they treated us all the same. So you don't have to be miffed that there is not a Rosa Parks character because that is what she tried to explain to people that we were all treated the same and that we all worked together for freedom, so those were just some of the things. And she had to take--have you read the book Rosa Parks My Story? That was authored, thank you Ella. That she explains very clearly that she had to take the test three times before she was allowed to vote. And on the third time what you had to do was to write all the answers of the questions so that she had them when she gave them to the clerk that was to correct them and let him know that if she did not pass that she would be going to the authorities, and miraculously she passed. >> Well phenomenal. I think that there's a lot to find out about Mrs. Parks' life that the collections and discussions with people like you, it's going to bring into light into our American minds and show us some possibilities. I think there's a lot of myth around Rosa Parks and the new research is showing things like Rosa Parks being involved with the NAACP from 1944 to 1955 in ways that people would be surprised. It also shows that Rosa Parks when she did move to Detroit worked for civil rights in Detroit for 40 years and people don't identify Rosa Parks with a lifelong involvement with the movement. What are some of the myths about Rosa Parks that we should dispel by having you here with us today? >> Elaine Steele: Well one of the things is that Rosa Parks had an easy life and that is very far from true. And Detroit was not as welcoming as everybody would like to think. There were some that were welcoming and some that were not because they thought that the Civil Rights Movements or the protests would in fact follow her into Detroit. She was not--it was very hard for her to find employment. In fact because it was so difficult she had to find employment at Hampton University and you'll read more about that in My Story, but she never had a life of ease. Her life was always challenging. There were times when her personal things or their personal things, hers and Mr. Parks, were set out on the curb, and unfortunately we've seen that in our lifetime and not only is it embarrassing, it is hurtful and they try to break your spirit like that but her spirit was never broken. That would energize her that she would indeed do better. And she worked no matter what kind of work she had to do and that was, you know, very, very important. She was a seamstress, she sewed for her family, she sewed for neighbors and she was just a very, very kindhearted person trying to assist in whatever way she could. That's why she was so loved was because of her sweet, sweet spirit under any condition. >> Yes I think we heard in some of the letters that are newly acquired Rosa Parks' voice yesterday. That sweet, compassionate pain of clear observance of things that weren't fair in this country. I think that when people are able to get into the letters within the collection they'll be able to steel more of this steely backbone of a revolutionary spirit supported by a peaceful, spiritual and calm demeanor which could be a great example for us today. The movement is still going forward, the issues in Ferguson and New York are relevant, but we don't have to be so swollen in exalting ourselves in order to achieve these levels of progress. That example really comes through in her letters. I'd like to ask Mrs. Peek if she could describe something of Rosa Parks' courage that she personally encountered and new about her from knowing her. ^M00:25:22 >> Anita Peek: Well young people, she always just loved children and that was exemplified by the organizations that she, the institute that she founded and organizations that she affiliated herself with. And the NAACP as youth leader it was the library that she tried to integrate because she thought it was horrible that young people not only could not, if you were a person of color, you couldn't enter the library but you couldn't even get the book that was assigned. So if your teacher assigned the book, like for example, Carter G. Woodson's The Mis-Education of the Negro, there's no way that the book mobile that came when it felt like it, but it was supposed to theoretically come at least once a week, but it came when it felt like it, they weren't going to give you that book. They were not going to give you books that they felt would only quote unquote cause trouble. So they would give you whatever they wanted to, so you couldn't even do the assignment that was given to you. So she wanted to make sure that those type things didn't happen. Literacy was so important to her, having access, the fact that when you pay your taxes, which we always had to pay a larger percentage. When you're poor most of your money would go to taxes in some form or another, and, but you didn't have access to anything. And her youth group she had them to dress up in their Sunday best and she took them to the library and they went in line and they asked if they could take a book out, well the first one of course, the librarian, looked up, no. And the young person asked why and that was when the librarian really looked up when they asked why and she could see that there was a whole line behind. So she said because I said so. Okay, so the next, so that child went out and the next child stepped up and they kept that going until they closed the library. But those were the kinds of things she would always be respectful and in my lifetime what I remember the most was that when we would go to a march or where there were picket signs, the police would say to Mrs. Parks, you know we're not going to arrest her or you know we're not going to arrest you. The rest of you, you better move on but there's no way that we're going to arrest her. >> Mrs. Haygan, let's talk a little bit about Rosa Parks and when she came to the D.C. area for events here. I had a lovely conversation with you yesterday about Mrs. Parks being a vegetarian and some of the people within our D.C. community supporting and loving her so much, so if we could hear some of that. >> Ella McCall Haygan: Yeah. I need to go back a little bit when I first met her. I met her in 1970, no; I'm sorry, 1990 when she was 77 years old. Dr. [inaudible] Tucker, Kathy Hughes, that's how I met her through them. They were on, Mrs. Parks and Mrs. Steele was on Kathy Hughes's radio show and I was there because I worked within the community, they helped me, Ms. Hughes and Dr. [inaudible] Tucker helped me with the kids that I was working with in the community because I worked with a lot of kids that were homeless. And so Dr. Tucker was giving her a big birthday party at the Kennedy Center and Ms. Hughes was one of the chairpersons and one of the sponsors. So Dr. Tucker told me, she said I want you to be a part of my host volunteer committee and we're having all these stars come, they had stars everywhere coming in, so some kind of way, I don't know how, they say we'll I'm going to assign you to Mrs. Parks and Mrs. Steele. So I thought it was going to be a weekend and it turned into 25 years. And when they got back to Detroit that weekend my daughter, she's a baker, she baked them some cookies and so they called me but I didn't believe it was Mrs. Parks, I thought it was one of my friends playing a joke because they would tease me all weekend. Oh you hung out with Mrs. Parks huh? And so when they called and she said this is Mrs. Parks, I said girl stop playing. And Mrs. Steele was on the phone too. She said no this is Mrs. Parks and Mrs. Steele. I said oh I'm so sorry. I said [inaudible] I almost fainted. I said why in the world are they calling me? But anyway after that we just, you know, I was just part of their world. And she asked and what she did, Mrs. Steele, Dr. Parks and Ms. Steele, they handpicked a group of us. Now I wish you guys would stand up. They handpicked a group of us, we all worked with kids in D.C. and Maryland and Virginia and we all had our own organizations. We had you know our organizations that we worked with kids, and they handpicked us and they asked us to put the chapter together. And Linda Sampson, I hope she's here, she was the first director. She pulled it all together and then we were coordinators and everything and we. ^M00:32:01 [ Applause ] ^M00:32:10 This was the girl who put it together and then we had all kinds of coordinators. Dr. McCloud, she was responsible for so much, where we stayed, I mean where the kids stayed, where everybody, stand up Dr., and she is my co-director. And you know the other ladies they're still part of it, they're working, they have their own groups and things and you know they're working hard but anytime I call them you know they're here, they're with me, so I'm proud of them. I think I talked about Louise, she was the first chaperone, and I mean you know and the kids that are here, these two young men but 11 years old when they went with Mrs. Parks and them. Okay. The boys, you want them to stand up. So [inaudible] and Shawn [assumed spelling]. And Barbara Dunn where are you? Okay. Barbara Dunn. And [inaudible] was 11 years old; his father told him he couldn't go. It broke his heart but he is at a center with Ms. Hannah Hawkins and she begged his father to let him go. Barbara and I we took him to the airport, 11 years old, put him on the plane going to Mrs. Parks, going to the Pathways to Freedom and Mrs. Steele [inaudible] so he got there. So it was, I mean you know you asked me a question. Anyway we had so much to do, we all multi-tasked so this is what they told me to do. Alright Ella, Mrs. Parks and Ms. Steele and them are coming to town, you go pick them up. I said how can I go pick them up in this raggedy van that I'm [inaudible] and the infamous--I said yall need a limousine to pick up Mrs. Parks. Dr. McCloud, go girl go, we got stuff to do here. Go pick up Mrs. Parks and Mrs. Steele and I did, prayed all the time, and Mrs. Parks was sitting up there like she was in a limousine and Mrs. Steele was just laughing and cracking jokes and my heart was going boom, boom. Suppose this car breaks down? I'm trying to get them to Howard University has fast as I could, so it was something else. And when they came here they made me the point person, I had to know when they came and to make sure that they had a place to stay and everything was covered and food, they're vegetarians, both ladies were and I had to make sure I had a vegetarian cook who you know who supplied all that. So the story is just-I'm writing my book yall. I got to because it's so much, I would be here, I don't want to take up nobody's time, I would be here all day telling you about the stories that happened to us. And Mrs. Parks saved our lives a many a day because we said we're with Mrs. Parks. You are? Okay. One more story and I'm going to let it go. We went to, I had to take Mrs. Steele to the airport to see about some tickets and she left me and Mrs. Parks out in the car and I had to stay right there, couldn't drive around, and this police came up. Big, strapping, white policeman came up and say you gotta move. I said sir I can't move. I said sir I got Mrs. Rosa Parks in the back and can't move. And he looked back in the back and said, that is Mrs. Parks. He said okay, okay you can stay and we stayed when she came out, and I guess she went, how did yall stay here so long? Yall supposed to be trying to find a parking space. But there's so many crazy stories. I'm sorry I took so long. >> No. Thank you. To have you share those rich stories with us is just so important and it's just a wonderful moment. Just to share the stage with all three of you is just phenomenal for me, to talk about the American icon of Rosa Parks and to be here with American icons as well of Mrs. Haygan has saved thousands of people in D.C. from homelessness. She puts coats on thousands of people in D.C. every winter. She is a frontline community person that has basically been saving our lives for a long time. So I think we can clap for all three of them. Thank you. I would like to ask another question about Mrs. Parks and her perspective on international issues. I was reading about how she met Nelson Mandela and a Pope and other heads of state. And I know that she has such an impact internationally for people within freedom struggles that it's important for us to have a clear definition of who she is as we go through current international issues. So if we could all just talk a little bit about that part of what Rosa Parks' life was like and what it means to us now. >> Elaine Steele: Well Mrs. Parks believed in the beloved community as Dr. King did and felt that we were all connected throughout the world, so she looked at everybody as family. She was completely a non-judgmental person, I'm still in training, but she would do, sometimes I would say to her we might walk into a room and we would say good morning, good afternoon, and no one would say a word and I would say well what is wrong with them? Do they know who this is? And she would say to me, she'd say maybe they didn't feel good. She's say it's alright. She'd say they'll be okay. And she always had that gentle spirit no matter what the issue was. When we went to Japan and with [inaudible] and Dr. Acada [assumed spelling] in fact had invited her to be his special guest, he and his wife, there was the longest motorcade that we've ever been in and the Japanese custom is to bow. And the people were just bowing and crying and she says why are they doing that? I said it's because of you. She says oh they don't have to do that, get up, you know, get up. And she was indeed a humble person like that. And I would tell her do your wave, do your queenly wave. And she said, that was her queenly wave. So she never thought that she was all that, that others in fact recognized that she was, but she was indeed a very beautiful person. Also that she learned to greet them in Japanese and with her southern accent speaking Japanese they were just so very excited, and I'll tell one more international story. When Nelson Mandela came to Detroit very shortly after he got out of jail, in Detroit it had been some difficulty with being able to get the credentials needed to meet him when he arrived. And I indeed called Judge Damon Keith, he is now a retired appellate judge but he's still on the bench, and when I told him what had happened he said well I'll come by and pick you up myself. And he did, he drove over and picked us up and took us to the airport and as we got, as we walked to the tarmac, when he got off the plane because he had to come down the stairs at this particular section of the airport where we were, the first person that he recognized out of all of the large delegation that was there to meet him, heads of state, that he said Rosa Parks, Rosa Parks. And Winnie Mandela answered in the same, Rosa Parks, and she just bowed her head. She was, you know, just very elated and very humbled that they recognized and knew about her. >> So interesting. >> Ella McCall Haygan: Can I just kind of add to? One of the things, I said we multi-tasked, I did a lot of things and I got to be part of security too with the ladies, and what happened, the reason why I noticed it is because Mrs. Parks was like a rock star. Everybody wanted to touch her, you know, and we just want to see her, touch her. One of the things they used to do and used to make me mad, they would push this lady here aside, Mrs. Steele, they would push her aside to get to Mrs. Parks. Reach over here like she wasn't, you know, like she wasn't there. And I said oh no, uh huh, no, you're going to respect both of these ladies, no, uh huh. This is the lady that takes care and does everything, you know, uh huh, you not going to do that and that's what I tried to, you know, get involved with security. And I got a D.C. detective, a young woman who traveled around with her and former Mayor Marion Barry got, and I went to him and he was the one that got me anything I asked him for for Mrs. Parks he would do it. I just wanted to throw that out. I understand why rock stars, I see them girls running and knocking people down who's with them. I understand that now. >> Mrs. Peek I know that the Pathways to Freedom Program has a focus on having young people understand international travel. It finishes in Canada for very specific reasons. What was Mrs. Parks' thinking in preparing young people for international experience? >> Anita Peek: It doesn't finish in Canada, we always go to Canada because that's the Underground Railroad, okay, Second Baptist Church where it's located in the basement was part of the Underground Railroad, the Eastern Market, all this is in Detroit, in Detroit Michigan. That was part of the Underground Railroad and we have done enactments where, because I couldn't figure out how the enslaved people got across that Detroit River. Because I used to try to go swimming in it and I couldn't go anywhere. And so I found out that it froze in the winter and that was when they went to Canada. And it was at the shortest part and that's how they went across the river in the frozen wintertime. ^M00:45:18 Now if you've been in Detroit lately it was at zero the day that we left, so you know the winters were pretty rough and they didn't exactly have the best clothing, but I think about what freedom meant. When people try to say we didn't want to be free, let me tell you, we went through it. And so we would go from, cross over to Canada and Puce Ontario is where the Walls Farm is and this was a location where enslaved people found freedom. Now of course you know Canada had slavery too but it ended it in the 1850's when in the United States it wasn't until 1863, so that is another one of the reason why Canada was chosen; Amhurstburg was the place. And so we want the young people to understand number one, the importance of Canada to the Civil Rights Movement to freedom and for them to understand crossing borders because it's very important that we're all connected. That's why there's many pathways to freedom, and so our program has always had an international flavor. So, just as Mrs. Steele and Mrs. Parks traveled to Japan and to Sweden and to other places outside the United States, our pathways students, if we couldn't always get them to every place we wanted them to go, we would bring students from these foreign lands to participate in the program. And for example, Nova Scotia, we learned a lot that there were African navigators that came up the north and into Nova Scotia. You can't get me started, I'll be too long, but the bottom line is that we, it was a worldwide program. >> Thank you. Okay so we're going to try something tricky now, we're getting towards the end of the program. >> I think we have time for one final question. What do you say? >> Okay, alright, well great. Well for a final question I'd like to give everyone an opportunity to talk a little bit about what you would like us to leave here with from your experience with Rosa Parks and from knowing her philosophy, what's important for us to leave here with today? So I'll start with you Mrs. Haygan. >> Ella McCall Haygan: First of all the children. Mrs. Parks loved the children and she wanted them to be educated, she wanted them to work together, she loved teamwork and you know she just wanted them to be all that they can be. So I would love to see a state of the art educational building for her starting in Detroit of course with the institute, I would like to see one down here in Washington D.C. with the chapter too. You know state of the art with teaching and everything, that's one of the things. And you just have to be there to see her with the kids and how much the kids loved her and how much she loved them, and this is something, we need to keep her institute going, we need to provide help to the institute, when we can send donations, you know, whatever we can do to keep her work going and that's what, that's what I want to do. I wish we could hit the lottery or something but that's what I'd like to see happen, working with the kids, continue to work with the kids and be able to teach them the Rosa Parks philosophy. Teach them all the things that she taught us. >> Anita Peek: I would, I of course agree with everything that Mrs. Haygan said. The young people, she believed in non-linear education. She believed in reach one, teach one and that when you believe in a child they will do better in school. It makes a difference when you're in an environment where you know that you are expected to fail. People live up to the expectations and when there's no expectation that's what they do. And in Pathways when a young person, they're many different ways to teach, and so for example there was a young man that was a protegee as far as music was concerned, the piano, and he knew all the, he knew how to read music, but there was another young man who couldn't read music and he was struggling in math. And the young protegee was able to show him how music is mathematic and it really helped to improve his mathematics, but if he wasn't in a program where you worked together so that your gifts and she believed in [inaudible] your gifts. Use your gifts to help someone else and that's what we do, and especially the 11 to 17. I call them the hormone generation that a lot of people don't want to be bothered because they're very challenging, but she wanted us to take on that challenge because their minds are so rich and they have so much to offer and they're not just mental the way most people are, so young people from all over the world can help each other if they're allowed to. >> Elaine Steele: Mrs. Parks and I founded the institute in 1987 and the primary reason was as I traveled with Mrs. Parks students would ask her all the time how are you so strong to combat racism that we find it here on our campuses all the time and it hurts us and we want to fight. How are you able to maintain your self-respect and your dignity? And her response to them was it begins in you. It's your heart, it's how you feel about yourself and how you feel about your other human brother and sister. So when it begins in you and that you can show that respect and that kindness to your brother then it will change their hearts also. ^M00:53:15 [ Applause ] ^M00:53:22 >> I'd like to say thank you to our guests and >> Ella McCall Haygan: Can I make an announcement? >> And Mrs. Haygan is going to make an announcement. >> Ella McCall Haygan: Hopefully February the 7th over in the Anacostia at the Lady of Perpetual Help will be having a birthday party for Dr. Rosa Parks and the children of the Children of Mind Youth Center and the Chapter here will be working with the children. They want to do this on their own. They're going to do the program and everything, so we would love for you to come over there. And if you know where the panorama room is, alright, that's where we're holding it. We're holding it, like I say, on the 7th from 1 to 4. Please come out and support these children. They're doing their whole program, they're reading all the books and everything, Mrs. Parks' books, and they're going to do their thing. They want to honor her, so I just wanted to let you know. Thank you. >> We're getting to the end of our program but I do want to thank our guests once again and also give us a quick opportunity to honor some of the students from the Pathways Institute. If you could come up just for a quick second and say one or two things about how the programs really have affected you. Come on up and introduce yourselves. >> Good afternoon. My name is Ronald Shawn McCloud and I've been a member of the Pathways to Freedom Program since 1994, that's when I actually started, so that's what, 21 years ago. I'm 30 so that makes me old. I can honestly say working with Mrs. Peek, Mrs. Steele, Mrs. Haygan, my mother, Mrs. Roberta McCloud, Mrs. Dunn, Mrs. Sampson and Mr. Harris my brother in Pathways to Freedom, it's been an excellent journey. My mom didn't let me go on the actual trip, she thought I was too young at the time, but she did have the guts to send me to Utah with Mrs. Haygan where we missed the flight and had to stay in the hotel in Baltimore and catch the flight the next day and things of that nature to be a part of the Touched by an Angel series which was on CBS featuring Mrs. Parks. When these ladies talked about international travel, being a part of the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development, also offered me the opportunity to travel to Durbin South Africa in my senior year of high school as a youth delegate to the United States in conjunction with the World Conference on Racism. Yes I did sit in the same room as Fidel Castro and other delegates of many, many, many nations that the United States has relationships or there other with. It's definitely beneficial. I was talking to Mrs. Haygan backstage and I said you know I really would love alumni type reunion, things of that nature, to say okay you know what, let's see where everybody is, to reconnect. Also if it's good, bring actual tour back for 2015 moving forward because with the injustice that our African American men and our African American women are going through, not just in Ferguson, not just in New York City, it's happening in all urban communities and metropolitan areas and that's definitely something that needs to be brought about. Pathways to Freedom is definitely important for today, for 2015, because a lot of these kids don't know their own history that's stepping outside their backyard, that's in their front yard. And I'm going to go. Mr. Clavel played the Grammy music so I'm going to let Mr. Harris go. Thank you. >> Good afternoon. My name is [inaudible] Harris and I'm a proud member of the Pathways to Freedom Program where our theme is where have we been and where are we going. So I was privileged to travel with Mrs. Parks when I was 12 years old. As you heard Mrs. Haygan say that almost didn't happen but I'm glad that it did happen. And the biggest impact for me from the program was the history and the connection to my history and how rich my history is. And because of the program I feel as though I am forever connected to history. I was able to travel and see firsthand a lot of historic sites; the birth home of Dr. King, the Lorraine Hotel where he was assassinated, his gravesite where the Woolworth sit in's took place, where the march in Selma took place. So seeing those sites first hand really gave me a deep, deep appreciation for my history. And because of the program I was able to experience some of the history moving forward firsthand. When I came back from the program I was able to be on the stage at the Million Man March. Following that I was able to work in Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton office. As you know she was a member of SNCC so I was connected to history in that manner. Moving forward I was able to connect with another youth program [inaudible] Youth of Empowerment Organization which their mission is using history and peer generational interactions to empower youth to abstain from [inaudible] drugs and violence, and as in that program I learned that there were no slaves. Our ancestors were enslaved and that's a big difference. That's a big change of mindset for me from what I learned in school. And moving forward from that I was always also connected to another program, the Metropolitan Saturday Program for Science and Technology, which focuses on STEM, and they also connected me to my history and I was able to learn how our enslaved ancestors used astrology and geography to escape to freedom using the North Star and the [inaudible]. So because of all of that deep history and the struggle that I saw us as a people go through in the Civil Rights Movement, it continued to motivate me to continue to take advantage of opportunities that I was given today, and that's what I did. I went to college, graduated with an electrical engineering degree, also have a master's degree and now I'm working giving back to my community. One thing that I take away from Mrs. Parks was she was a servant. She loved to serve so that's what I'm doing now in my community giving back and serving. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you. Speaking of youth empowerment, Cameron Clarkson [assumed spelling] class of 2015 Howard University and poet is going to share a quick poem with us. >> [Inaudible] everybody. [Inaudible] everybody. Alright. Thank you, first and foremost thank you for having me. I wrote this piece to reflect on what exactly Rosa Parks meant. Sometimes power is loud, bright lights, blaring sirens, patrolling the parts of the city more prone to violence. Sometimes power pulls up on you four deep, slams your face into the sidewalk, cuffs you, frisks you for the dangerous dime bag in your back pocket. Sometimes power has a billy club, a belt of tools to subdue dissention. The parade route has been marked out by the appropriate authorities in advance. Stay in between the lines at all times, please. No sudden movements. Sudden movements are frightening and frightened fingers find triggers far too frequently. Sometimes power sounds like bombs going off, teargas canisters, clouds of chaos, dog teeth tearing through flesh, fire hoses, Tasers, choke holds. Sometimes power rose through the streets like tanks, like blood, like fear. There are two things said the professor to the class, fear and fascination, radical militant, radical terrorist, radical, the root of the thing, the soul of a thing. Sometimes power is quiet. It sounds like millions of people marching or one woman staying seated. Sometimes power rises out of the concrete like the hope of the people billowing into the sky. Thank you. >> Yes indeed thank you that had to be done. I'd like to really encourage everyone to join us in membership in Blacks in Government and the Daniel A. Peet Mary African American Historical Association. We take everybody. Please join us. Participate with the collections. Do cool stuff. Develop yourself. Meet great people. Share your love. I just want to say I encourage you to also visit the Civil Rights Exhibit in this building and I want to give a special thanks to Helena Zinkham, our very great champion for this event. Our partnerships with library services just go so much better because of her leadership. I thank you. >> This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress. Visit us at loc.gov.