Ma Rainey’s Big, Black Bottom

Earlier this weekend a couple classmates and I took a trip to Homewood’s Carnegie Library to see August Wilson’s first Broadway play, “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.” Not knowing quite what to expect, I was eager to experience part of Wilson’s legacy. After all, I am working to preserve his memory; I should have a true sense of what that memory really is. What I saw helped bring into perspective the passion, art, and culture that makes August Wilson such a powerful figure to this day.

            The play itself was so full of ideas and emotions that it’s almost too much to try to absorb in one sitting. The cast and stage were quite small, but the characters that stood upon it had huge presence; quite fittingly, Ma Rainey was the biggest of them all. In harmony with the director Vernell Lillie’s vision, Ma Rainey (Teri Bridgett) controlled every second of her dealings with Mr. Sturdyvant   (Eric Leslie) by having a sharp mind and a stern foot, not by screaming him into submission. In sharp contrast, Levee (Herb Newsome) was too naïve to know how to deal with the racial inequalities of 1927, and lost control of everything.

            Whether it was through the immovable Ma, or the unstable Levee, Wilson’s portrayal of African American strife in the ‘20s was compelling. The play very obviously struck a chord throughout the entire audience. “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” stands as a testament, not only to the artistic ability of August Wilson, but to the determination of the entire black community. Hopefully, this determination will aid in preserving one of the most talented and distinguished playwrights of our time.

Note: “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” will be running next weekend (Thursday – Sunday) at the Homewood Carnegie Library. I recommend going to see it, especially if you haven’t had the chance to see a play from August Wilson’s Pittsburgh Cycle. 

 

Dom DeBiasio

 

 

Meeting Dr. Kathleen Roberts and Lina Dostilio

                Yesterday afternoon our class met with Dr. Kathleen Roberts and Lina Dostilio to discuss our plan/project for this class.  Dr. Roberts is the director of the Honors College.  Lina Dostilio is the director of service learning at Duquesne.  Ms. Dostilio defined service learning as a teaching method that engages in community work.  The community work is then linked to the content of the class or vice versa, and then the students reflect critically on the work.

                The majority of the conversation focused on the inner workings of the Honors College and how the service learning program at Duquesne works.  Dr. Roberts and Ms. Dostilio gave an overview of who can use as assets from the university, such as the faculty interested in service learning and other honors students.  Next, we discussed the potential of elevating awareness of the collaboration between Duquesne University and the Daisy Wilson Artist Community. 

                Dr. Roberts and Ms. Dostilio clarified what our class’s job was.  told us that our product was a plan, and broke it into three parts.  First, we need to determine what the Daisy Wilson Artist Community’s goals are in this collaboration.  Second, we need to determine what Duquesne University has to offer in regard to these goals.  Third, we need to figure out how to get what we learned from steps one and two to work out.

                This brief talk proved to be very useful in clarifying some of the gray areas of this project.  I believe that Dr. Roberts and Ms. Dostilio will be very helpful resources in the future for our class.

Jon Archer

“This Little Light of Mine,” Shining in a Community of Faith

 (Image of St. Benedict the Moor church Interior, taken from website)

Yesterday, a couple of us had the opportunity to attend Mass at St. Benedict the Moor church in the Hill District. I was amazed at the sense of community and family in the parish. The parish was quite large, but everyone seemed to know one another and treated everyone like family. According to their weekly bulletin, they average around 120 people at each liturgy. The priest, Fr. Zelik, welcomed the three of us at the beginning of the service, which was slightly embarrassing as he made us stand up and we were the only visitors.

Even though the pianist was not there due to the icy conditions, everyone still sang out clapping their hands to the “Gloria” and tapping their feet to “This Little Light of Mine.” During the “Our Father,” it caught me off-guard when the woman behind be tapped my shoulder to hold my hand during the prayer. As I looked around, I realized the entire Church community was connected by one large chain, winding around the pews. During the “Sign of Peace,” parishioners walked all around the church greeting friends and family with hugs and handshakes. So many people came up to us and welcomed us with cheerful smiles.

As we were leaving the church after mass, I noticed one elderly woman waiting outside for her ride. I stopped her and asked her if she happened to live in the Hill District. It turns out, she was the perfect person to ask. Ms. Mary Sey told me she has lived here now for 85 years. She grew up where the Mellon Arena stands and now lives about two blocks up from the church. She was married in the church 60 years ago, and she reared her 5 children in the neighborhood. Her children still live in the Hill District too. Ms. Sey said she loves it here, and she would never think of living anywhere else. Her ride then arrived and we parted ways.

This experience has shown me what a strong community lives in the Hill District and I am now really looking forward to connecting the community to Duquesne and building a partnership that will benefit them for years to come.

 

-Christine Sajewski

Retrospect and Expectations: History and Hope in the Hill

 

Today, just a few hours before our class, I was sitting at the desk at work (as a Spanish tutor here at Duquesne), reading through my copy of August Wilson: Pittsburgh Places in His Life and Plays and waiting for someone to wander in for a session. Whenever someone finally did, it was an adult student, and before we got to work, I asked her a bit about why she had decided to go back to school. She shared with me that she had been motivated to get a degree so that she would be able to work with troubled youth in her community.  I already had a sneaking suspicion of what the answer would be, so when I asked her where she was from, I wasn’t surprised to hear her say, “I’m from the Hill.”

Smiling slightly at this strange twist of fate, I held up the copy of my book and told her a little about our class and our efforts to learn about August Wilson and the Hill. Her eyes flickered with excitement and delight and then dimmed into a haze of nostalgia as she said, “Oh, I could tell you a lot about that.” In those few moments of conversation with her, I sensed what I have often found in other conversations with long-time residents of the Hill District: both the enormous importance of the Hill’s history and the bright hopes for its future that are embedded in the hearts of its community members.

Later in class, when we had the opportunity to hear from Rob Pfaffmann and Kevin Acklin about their vision for the August Wilson House, I sensed the same spirit. From Mr. Pfaffmann’s description of the careful attention that has been put into documenting and preserving the unique historical aspects of the Wilson home, to Mr. Acklin’s emphasis on programming that fosters community, empowerment, and pride in the Hill, the plans and projects initiated by the Daisy Wilson Artist Community seem to be just what the community so desperately desires and needs.

 In the end, there were two other points that I took away from both my chance encounter and our class meeting today that I think summarize the situation that the Daisy Wilson Artist Community (and now our class and the Duquesne Honors College) faces: the project is young, the road ahead is long, and there is much work still to be done. Nevertheless, the support of a community with cherished memories of its extraordinary past and eager hopes for its future will be a powerful motivator and asset for making the August Wilson House a reality.

 

 

Alyson Nolte

 

 

 

 

The Arts In The Hill

The Hill District has a great reputation as being a hub for the arts. The focus of our project is on August Wilson’s boyhood home, but the neighborhood was a famous jazz hub in its day. Not only was it the birthplace of August Wilson, but it also was the place where jazz guitarist, George Benson, grew up. Within its borders, the Hill also contained legendary Crawford Grill jazz club. 

With such a foundation in the arts, it seems obvious that, in an attempt to restore the Hill to what it was, artists and their work should be at the core of the effort. Plan’s for the house include spaces for young writers, musicians, and artists, which will certainly help to bring a living sense of the arts in the Hill. But is there anything going on now? The answer is yes.

When we walked through the Hill last week, I noticed murals around the neighborhood. In fact, the August Wilson home had paintings on the front of it. I did some research and found out that these murals are part of a program called Moving the Lives of Kids. MLK; in partnership with Sherwin-Williams, Councilman Daniel Lavelle, and youth from the Schenley Heights Community Development Program (SHCDP); set out to serve a need of the community and enrich the neighborhood at the same time. By having young artists paint murals depicting the rich history of the Hill on ply-wood boards, and using those boards to mask broken windows and board up abandoned buildings, the partnership creatively answered several calls in the Hill. They enriched the lives of the youth, beautified otherwise miserable homes, and celebrated the Hill’s artistic heritage.

-Sean 

August Wilson Center for African American Culture

As a theater student, I am extremely excited to be involved this class and the effort to renovate the August Wilson Boyhood Home. While not the artists’ residence that the Boyhood Home someday will become, I discovered while researching Wilson that there is already an impressive structure dedicated to him in Pittsburgh. Currently downtown is the August Wilson Center for African American Culture. It at 980 Liberty Avenue, just shy of the corner of Liberty and 10th. It contains a 486-seat theater, art galleries, and education spaces. 

The programming, or “cultivation”, as the website calls it, is varied. Thursday lunchtime book clubs and monthly Monday round table readings are free to the public. Select Thursdays feature a programming line titled “offSite” which may include spoken word, jazz, film, or other genres, and are occasionally accompanied by a cover charge. The January 26th offSite, for example, is $25 but features and Benny Bennack III and Duquesne University guitar instructor Joe Negri.

Beside their weekly and monthly events, the center also hosts special events from musical performance to dance. Their brochure details all upcoming events. The first such even listed on the website is upcoming “Tribute” concert by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra on January 20th. 

The AWC also holds multiple art galleries. Exhibitions on the first floor are free, and special exhibits on the second floor are $8 for adults, $4 for students, Tues-Sat from 11AM to 6PM. A permanent exhibit is Pittsburgh: Reclaim, Renew, Remix  which offers visitors a chance to make their own video collage of their experience in the Pittsburgh region. 

The existence of this Center makes the planned artists’ center at 1727 Bedford Avenue all the more appropriate and necessary. I think the two can potentially complement each other, the Boyhood Home providing a residence, and the AWC providing an exhibition space, forum, and a way to connect the Downtown Cultural District with the Hill District. I also think that if there is going to be an art center Downtown named for August Wilson, that there should also be some sort of center or memorial in the much more significant Hill District. Now that I know of its existence, I look forward to visiting the AWC the first chance I get, and also continuing to work on our efforts to help with the August Wilson Boyhood Home. 

 

Alexis Jabour

 

Vacant Lots: A Two Way Street

      After class on Thursday, I began pondering about the number of vacant lots in the Pittsburgh Area. The numbers I found are quite staggering. Reports state that roughly 13% of all housing available in the city of Pittsburgh is now vacant. That places the number of vacant houses, according to the 2010 census, near 55,000. The causes are fairly clear. Between the collapse of the Pittsburgh steel industry nearly 3 decades ago, declining industry all around after, followed by the far more recent housing crisis, the problem has grown without rest. 

     Looking from an outside perspective, however, it is important to note that Pittsburgh does not face the worst battle against housing vacancies. In Cleveland and Youngstown, the vacancy rate is about 19%, a staggering number. At 19%, nearly every one in five Cleveland homes is vacant. I find it hard to imagine walking down a street where every fifth house is abandoned, deteriorating, or worse. But here in Pittsburgh, the problem is certainly still important. It poses a major threat to the progress within the Hill District, as well as other communities, such as Homewood, who are currently experiencing the same situation.

      When looking at the problem of vacant lots, quite a few issues present themselves. For one, many have leans against them, some of which outweigh the market value of the home itself. This makes it near impossible to find a buyer for the land. Another issue is deterioration and safety. Some of the vacant homes on the Hill are clearly in no place to even be repaired. This, while hazardous, provides a unique opportunity for the city of Pittsburgh and the Hill. If the community can get the rights to those properties, perhaps via the city itself paying the leans, the community stands to be in a truly remarkable position. Small parks and gardens could be planted on the lots, perhaps with even some bought by private residents for their own personal use. If the vacant lots can be rehabilitated into something beautiful, the Hill as a whole stands to look much better. Not surprisingly, people tend to buy houses when the surrounding area is as beautiful as the home they are looking to buy. On a broader note, I personally believe the Hill can rise above the stigma attached to it, and do so without sacrificing the wondrous culture which makes it so unique. The answer may just lie in the vacant lots.

 

Bronson Domasky

The Hill in Our Back Yard

As a junior attending Duquesne, I have lived next to the Hill for the past two and a half years. Why then is the only thing I’ve heard about it is to avoid it? Why haven’t I heard anything about its quiet streets, its stunning views, or its rich history? It seems to me the people who have told me to avoid the Hill know about as much of its true nature as I did before this semester.

Mark Twain said, “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness…” and a simple five minute drive was all it took to change my entire outlook on the Hill District. I know I’ve only visited a small section of what is a much greater community, but now my eyes are open to what else the Hill might hold. Perhaps if more of my peers would take time to explore the Hill, to see it for temselves, a better relationship between Duquesne and the Hill District could be formed. Not just a relationship by way of the honors seminar, but a true relationship between the two communities.

To take the next step toward this future, we must pose some questions. What will draw Duquesne to the Hill? What will keep the students coming back? I believe the coffee house is exactly the type of attraction needed to draw and strengthen the community around it. What do you think?

 

Dom DeBiasio

Reflections

Similar to my classmates, when I stepped out of the van I never would have guessed I was in the Hill District.  The August Wilson boyhood home is on a quiet street.  There are neatly manicured lines, abandon toys hinting of kids, and shades fluttering in open windows.  Here in the Hill District we met Ms. Loretta Payne, an ambitious woman with big plans for the August Wilson house.  She satisfied our sweet tooth with warm chocolate chip cookies so, before we even began to explore the neighborhood, she was good in my book!

To give you a little history the area is very family based but is slowly diversifying.  Many houses have been there since the 1950s, but there are also newer houses that have been built within the last ten years.  Families grow but gather in the area with each new generation getting a house nearby.  Another distinctive feature is a coal seam, once bustling with miners, still affects the area.  Houses cannot be built on the seam area, however the land is perfect for roads, including a path into the woods that Ms. Payne says is in the progress of becoming an official nature trail.  However the most impressive piece of history was a ridge that used to be another Pittsburgh incline.  We had a view of the city like we had never seen before.  From one end to the other I felt like the king of Pittsburgh.

 

   

To give you a taste for the culture there is a church on every corner, but net t that you never know if you will find a vacant lot filled with rubble, or a new townhouse complex.  This is clearly a neighborhood in transition.  I can’t help but wonder what it is like to actually live in the neighborhood.  How many of these houses are lived in?  Is it growing?  Or is the community just the older family members and the youngest generation is moving elsewhere?

Lauren Boehm

Walking Around the Hill District

Today our class got together to meet with Ms. Leeretta Payne and explore some of the neighborhood surrounding the Wilson home. I learned a lot on our walk around the Hill District and was pleasantly surprised by the good condition of many of the houses. A few of my classmates and I decided our idea of the Hill District had been quite biased due to the way it is discussed by most people at Duquesne. Instead we walked around quiet streets with many nice houses, a school, parks, and great views of the rest of the city. Although there are certainly areas of improvement, such as abandoned homes, vacant lots, and litter, I feel our plans and those of others will benefit the community greatly.

Our group was especially excited to hear about Ms. Payne’s idea for a coffee shop and hope to be able to help as much as we can. I think a coffee shop could be a nice place for people of the community to gather and hope it could then provide more opportunities, perhaps with writing workshops, poetry readings, etc. I look forward to being able to delve into the area’s history and to finding the best use for the Wilson home.

Emily Bittle