Pittsburgh Photos & Videos | The Soul Pitt

CHECK OUT THE PHOTOS HERE!I thoroughly enjoyed the trip to Washington, DC for the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Dedication!  Being joined by Beaver County’s NAACP, Pittsburgh’s B-PEP and other community activists and organizations from Pittsburgh to as far as Ohio reminded me of a movement that was not yet born into but now have the opportunity to be a part of.  One lady on one of the two sold out buses, from the Beaver County branch NAACP actually walked with Dr. King on the March on Washington and she spoke about her experience on the bus. 

Everyone was very friendly and well behaved and I met some great people.   John Ayers of the AKA’s the trip organizer and Leanne Spearman hung out with me and two other members of the Christian Sistah’s With Voices for Obama group Yvette Robinson & Tori Walker who worked on Barack Obama’s campaign in 2008 and will be working on his 2012 campaign.    A new member of CSWV Rometa Pollard and her family were handed tickets to go on the White House Fall Garden Tour while at the event.  They really enjoyed touring the First Family’s Garden!

Listening to the event’s speakers and singers on such a beautiful day in a crowd of more than fifty thousand people was more than awe inspiring and reminiscent of CSWV’s trip to Barack’s Inauguration!  Listening to Rev. Al Sharpton coin a new phrase “It’s not about Obama…it’s about our Mommas” referring to Social Security, was so empowering.  Then as we anticipated our President of the United States of America speaking, the First Family and The King Family dramatically walked along the Memorial site viewing the words of our great leader of the past and their father.  I can’t even imagine how overwhelmed the King family must have felt to finally see their father and our champion honored in the Country’s Capitol.

It was just a beautiful day for this memorial dedication.  It couldn’t have been rescheduled on a more beautiful morning and afternoon following the disappointment that Hurricane Irene brought that destroyed the original unveiling date back in August.  Surely God was shinning down on this day of celebration and honor of one of his greatest modern day disciples.

I always enjoy when we as a people can come together to do anything meaningful and good.  Watching the people from all over the country and beyond set up camp across the street from the Memorial to just have family time, break bread and enjoy the music that continued on in an after concert with Ledisi singing her rendition of Louis Armstrong’s “A Wonderul World” and then Stevie Wonder trying to upstage her (which was impossible) redoing the song and singing others.  With those joyful sounds filling the air and such a beautiful sun shinning and people all around smiling…how could you not stop, look around you and say “what a wonderful world?”  So wonderful that even Frederick Douglas had to come all the way from the grave to see THIS!  YES, his name is Frederick Douglas…believe me I asked!

And of course as Fashion Editor form some fashions caught my eye, but this particular season it was all about Martin, Malcolm & Barack!  Long denim patch work skirts patterned after the old days of slavery where women wore long skirts and threads patching together what good rags they could find.  At the bottom of these skirts were pictures of three great leaders,  two from our past and one from our present and prayerfully our future.

When we approached the actual Memorial “Out of the Mountains of Despair” it was beyond intimidating as Dr. King’s statue towered over us all.  There were so many people there taking pictures, children wanting to also feel the pride and joy they saw on their parents and grandparents faces, climbed onto the granite base like children sitting at the feet of an inspiring giant!  We were later joined by other Pittsburgh Chapter AKA’s.  The Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity was responsible for this great monument that took ten years to bring to fruition.

We ended our visit at the Lincoln Memorial where we stood in the exact spot where Dr. King gave his “I Have A Dream” Speech in 1963.  God Bless you Dr. King for all you did for us and what you lead us through and to.  Let us all remember the sacrifices he made so that we too could have a dream and fulfill it.  We’ve come a long way with his civil rights activism, but we have to continue on with that same amount of selflessness, faith, integrity and drive to see to it that our children and grandchildren can dream too.