The observance Saturday afternoon in the county’s courthouse may have been part sermon boasting of God’s goodness; part push urging people to join an organization’s advancement; and part admiration supporting the nation’s first African-American president.
For certain though, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy was intertwined with all three parts.
Rev. Bernard Clarke asked those in the packed courthouse room for an annual King Day ceremony to continue the mission of the slain civil rights leader.
“Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me,” read Clarke from Isaiah 6:8. That, Clarke said, is what he could hear King say and that is what people should say and do.
“Dr. King was a Godsend,” Clarke said. “This day is not just for people of color, but for everybody.”
The Jan. 16 ceremony followed a rainy parade in King’s honor that wound down Main Street, West Ogeechee Street and Mims Road to the courthouse. The national holiday for the birthday of King was Monday as many businesses and government agencies were closed.
A majority of the parade participants chose to ride instead of walk as waved to those holding umbrellas on the sidewalks.
A bullet April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tenn., ended the life of King, an ordained Baptist minister, but it did not silence the movement, said Clarke, the pastor of Greater Gaines AME Church in Savannah. Clarke is the former minister of Asbury AME Church in Sylvania.
“We’ve come a long way, but we’ve got a long way to go,” said Clarke whose church choir, Screven County’s Male Chorus and the congregation provided musical selections for the observance.
The reverend said the movement of peace and unity must begin in the home by raising boys into men and daughters into women – both with morals and values. The church should be a safe haven. Crime and drug use must be controlled, he said.
“We must answer to the 2010 Census – answer it accurately and with pride,” Clarke said. “I love Sylvania and I am glad to be here today. God told me to tell you that everybody was going to be all right.
Although people have lost their jobs, Clarke said they cannot lose their focus on God.
“Hold on,” he told the crowd. “You are still eating and still living. Then tell Him ‘thank you.’
“Open up your hearts. Open up your minds,” Clarke said. “Here I am. Send me Send me. Send me.”
Sylvania Mayor Margaret Evans said King established his own legacy, but now it is the community’s turn to create its personal legacy. King skipped the ninth and 12th grades and entered Morehouse College at the age of 15. He was the youngest person to ever win the Nobel Peach Prize at 35 years of age.
“What kind of legacy will we have?” Evans asked. “We are going to be remembered for what we did.”
People need our assistance.
“We need to do the very best we can to reach out to them,” Evans said. “If we reach out to others, they will reach out to us.”
County commissioner J.C. Warren said he attempted to run for a seat on the board, but was unsuccessful when the commission was not divided into districts. Warren said Screven County is 55 percent white and 45 percent black.
When the commission was separated in districts, however, Warren was able to win his district that represents the Jenk Hill area. Warren and Dennis Lawton are blacks on the commission.
The school board, also divided into districts, has three blacks.
However, Warren said the city council of Sylvania has only one black board member.
“We should have a district drawn in the city of Sylvania,” Warren said.
The commissioner said if it were reversed and the council consisted of seven blacks and one white board member, people, he said, would call that “unacceptable.”
“I don’t have a problem working together, but I would like equal representation,” said Warren, praising Sheriff Mike Kile for hiring blacks to his department. “All we want is a chance to do it.”
Kile said that without blacks in the county casting their election votes for him, he would not have been elected and re-elected to the office of sheriff.
“I want to thank you for what J.C. said,” said Uley Roberts, vice president f the county branch of the NAACP. “I think that will put a fire under someone.”
As a way of keeping the dream alive locally, Rev. Thomas Norman asked those in the audience to join the county’s chapter of the NAACP. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was formed in 1909 to deal with the injustice of all people of color. The Screven County chapter formed in 1958 and currently has 60 members under the direction of chapter president Roosevelt Culver.
“The NAACP is your opportunity to give to the organization who has done so much for others,” said Norman, the pastor of St. Andrews and Horse Creek UMC and the master of ceremony for the observance.
Clarke, Warren and school board member Raleigh Cail each said that if it had not been for King and NAACP, they would not be in their current positions.
Cail said better education correlates into less crime and more knowledge.
“The Screven County Board of Education knows that education is the key,” Cail said. “Our goal is to get that key to every student.”
U.S. Rep. John Barrow, a “Silver Life” member of the NAACP, said it was fitting that it rained during the parade earlier in the day. King’s changes for the better were not without struggles.
“Rain or shine we are going to have a parade in this county,” said Barrow, who flew back in from Washington, D.C., to be in Sylvania parade that was grand marshaled by Greater Bethel AME pastor Benny Wilkey. Barrow also had plans to meet with other District 12 constituents during his return to the Southeast.
Barrow’s parents James and Phyllis Barrow, the congressman said were courageous and outspoken leaders in the effort to desegregate the University of Georgia.
“Don’t let the issue of race get in the way,” said Barrow, who praised voters for electing the nation’s first black president, Barack Obama. “Dr. King was a great statesman.”
Barrow said King’s works help lead to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. This act broke the Jim Crow laws that were state and local laws enacted between 1876 and 1965. The Jim Crow laws mandated racial segregation in all public facilities. These laws usually led to treatment and accommodations that were inferior to those provided for white Americans.
“God blessed Dr. Martin Luther King and for that we can all be hopeful,” Barrow said.
Rev. Joe Herrington, vice moderator of the Pilgrim Association, said people must continue the “march.”
“I want to say to Screven County: Fight on until you hear the voice of God call you home,” Herrington said.
Joe Flowers Jr., pastor of the Charlestown UMC, provided the invocation, while his wife Beveah Flowers, offered the scripture.
The program committee for the ceremony was Loretta Conley, Karen Gatson, Bobbie Jean Scott, Emma Scott and Rodney Williams.