Black History

Peralta College Trustee Speaks of ‘Passing the Torch’ at Marin City’s MLK Celebration

Marin City Community Service District and Oshalla Diane Marcus co-produced the program at the MC Art and Culture Gallery in Marin City. It was seen virtually through hopin.

Published

6 years ago

January 27, 2021

Kiki

Left: Dr. William “Bill” Riley. Right: The cake for the celebration was baked by Teyonna, Marin City’s local baker and entrepreneur, who is just getting started. (Photos from Facebook)

Marin City celebrated the Rev Dr. Martin Luther King Birthday on the afternoon of Jan. 18, 2021. The theme this year was “Passing the Torch.”

Marin City Community Service District and Oshalla Diane Marcus co-produced the program at the MC Art and Culture Gallery in Marin City. It was seen virtually through hopin.

Dr. William “Bill” Riley, EdD, the president of the Peralta Community College District’s Board of Trustees, was the keynote speaker. During his message “Reflections on Passing the Torch,” Riley lists the many Black people who have passed away and are passing the torch since Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

King’s great-grandfather, grandfather, and father were all ministers, and they passed the torch of leadership to King. According to Kimberly Powell of Thot.com, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s father, Martin Luther King, Sr. was a pastor for the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. His maternal grandfather, Rev. Adam Daniel Williams, was famous for his fiery sermons. His great-grandfather, Willis Williams, was an “enslavement-era preacher.”

Now, 61 years later, Rev. Raphael Gamaliel Warnock, the current pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church, was just recently elected as a U.S. Senator in Georgia.

In 1957, King passed the torch to the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, the National Urban League, and the Voters Education Project.

Sport figures who have passed or are passing the torch: Muhammad Ali, Wilma Rudolph, Willie Mays, Bill Russell, Stephen Curry, Tiger Woods, Venus and Serena Williams.

Civil rights activist Rosa Parks and poet Maya Angelou have passed the torch.

Black artists have passed the torch by raising funds and bringing the artistic consciousness to the cause. Entertainers, such as Harry Belafonte, Mahalia Jackson, Denise Nicholas, James Brown, Eartha Kitt, Lena Horne, and Dick Gregory, played crucial roles in raising money to further the cause.

Politicians who have and are passing the torch are: John Lewis, President Barack Obama, Mayors Willie Brown, London Breed, and Vice President Kamala Harris.

“We would need to compete with people of all races and nationalities. Therefore, we cannot just merely be good in our work and calling. We must set out to do our best, irrespective of our race, and do it so well that nobody else can do it any better,” says Riley.

“Where would you be now if King, who said in 1956, ‘I still believe that love is the most durable power in the world,’ had not been a person of radical love and didn’t pass the torch,” asks Riley. “Who in your life has passed the torch to you? Have you accepted it?”

“I leave with this” say Riley, “keep Marin City passing the torch. Many thanks to the Marin City MLK Coalition Celebration and may Godspeed.”

Kiki

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Oakland Post: Week of September 2 – 8, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of September 2 – 8, 2026

Published

3 days ago

September 7, 2026

Oakland Post

To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.

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Black History

Jackie Wright Champions Bay Area Stories, Filmmakers and Cultural Institutions

As an award-winning communications professional, Wright has worked with corporations, nonprofits, government agencies, educational institutions, artists, and community organizations. In 2026, she expanded that work by launching an introductory public relations class for small businesses and nonprofits, offering practical tools for gaining visibility, shaping messages and building productive relationships with the media.

Published

2 weeks ago

August 30, 2026

Post News Group

Jackie Wright of Wright Enterprises. Photo courtesy of Wright Enterprises.

By Carla Thomas

Jackie Wright has spent more than two decades helping people, organizations and communities understand the power of a well-told story.

As founder and president of Wright Enterprises, a San Francisco-based strategic communications and public affairs firm, Wright has built a career spanning journalism, public relations, media relations, crisis communications, community engagement and multimedia storytelling.

Wright’s commitment to storytelling is also deeply personal. She wrote and co-directed the 15-minute documentary, “Love Separated in Life…Love Reunited in Honor,” which chronicles the story of her parents, Specialist Five (S5 Wyley Wright Jr. and Ouida Fay McClendon Wright. Her father, a U.S. Army helicopter crew chief, died in Vietnam in 1964 while serving as an honor guard during a visit by then-Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. Decades later, Wright and her siblings had their father exhumed from a segregated cemetery in Jacksonville, Florida, and their mother moved from her burial place in Georgia so the couple could be reunited at Arlington National Cemetery in 2014.

The family journey later took Wright and her sister to Vietnam, where they discovered the former military compound that had been named in honor of their father and another fallen soldier. The documentary, centered on love, war, family, racial understanding, and remembrance, earned festival recognition at screenings.

“It was quite an honor to learn about my family’s history and share it on film,” said Wright.

That filmmaking experience complements Wright’s longstanding advocacy for independent cinema. She has served as a media partner and brand ambassador for Bay Area film festivals, including the San Francisco Black Film Festival, Oakland International Film Festival, and the Durban International Film Festival in South Africa.

“It’s important to help filmmakers and underrepresented stories reach broader audiences,” said Wright.

Whether promoting a neighborhood organization, championing an independent filmmaker or preserving her own family history, Wright has remained consistent. Through Wright Enterprises, she has turned communications into both a profession and a form of community service, telling stories that might otherwise go unheard.

“Our stories are an integral part of our history, and our history is not only American history, but worldwide,” she said.

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Black History

BOOK REVIEW: Every Inch of a Lady

“Born, bred, toasted, buttered, jellied, and honeyed in Harlem” in 1937, Audrey Smaltz was a force to be reckoned with almost from the time she could walk. Her parents imbued confidence in her; they nurtured her creativity and sent her to charm school, but they never allowed her to create a stir.

Published

2 weeks ago

August 30, 2026

Post News Group

Audrey Smaltz' latest book "Every Inch a Lady" with Alina Mitchell, is a colorful autobiographical story following a young Black model's pursuit to become a fashion designer in New York City during the pre-Civil Rights era.

By Terri Schlichenmeyer

Author: Audrey Smaltz with Alina Mitchell, foreword by Michael Kors, Copyright: c.2026, Publisher: Amistad, SRP: $27.99, Page Count: 256 Pages, Snaps, zippers, buttons, ties.

Toss that garment on, pull it up, wrap it around; you know what you like and how to wear it. The color is perfect for your skin tone, and the fabric enhances your figure. Yep, you always look your best and, as in the new book “Every Inch a Lady” by Audrey Smaltz (with Alina Mitchell), that best is fabulous.

“That,” says Smaltz, “is not what ladies did.”

By the time she was a teenager, Smaltz was modeling for New York City designers. Shortly thereafter, she started working for a married man with whom she had an affair, and whom she loved very much. She broke up with him, attended college, and worked a series of jobs that taught her about fashion and jobs that didn’t seem to fit her. An ill-fated marriage took her to Chicago, where she ultimately landed a position that sent her to work in Ebony magazine’s New York office.

Working at Ebony was a career-changer, in a way. Smaltz traveled the world and learned more about fashion, but she didn’t exactly get along with her boss.

Finally, seizing an opportunity, Smaltz decided to launch her own company, Audrey Smaltz, Inc., a “fashion production business,” but she couldn’t get any designers to take a chance on her. Undaunted, she reorganized, re-branded, hit the streets, and knocked on doors until she finally found one client, which led to many others.

Through it all, her personal life was a whirlwind. She dated “more men than you can shake a book at,” settling down occasionally, briefly. Fashion had always been her first love, but she accidentally found real love, “the love of a woman,” at a leadership course…

There’s an old saying that writers need to add lots of “color” into their stories. Read a little of “Every Inch a Lady,” and you’ll notice immediately that author Audrey Smaltz (with Alina Mitchell) quite literally takes that to heart by mentioning nearly every color of the spectrum here. Hmm.

That oddity aside, Smaltz is a wonderfully lively storyteller, speaking with the energy of a woman much younger to the heart of anyone who loves fashion. That glee extends to collectors of vintage clothing, who will be delighted to read about the industry long ago and the way things worked then. Smaltz says she experienced racism, which is not unusual for pre-Civil Rights America, but doors were surprisingly closed for other reasons that will astound anyone who’s savvy about the fashion industry, even today.

There’s quite a bit of name-dropping in this book, but most of it belongs in the anecdotes, so you likely won’t mind. If you’re a fashionista, too, find “Every Inch a Lady,” and snap it up.