Educational Excellence

It’s Monday … yes, it is! Let’s get this week started, okay?!?

True … it is the first day of Fall 2014. Temperatures are changing in some areas as the rain continues to pelt South Florida …. making it a tad bit cooler!! Still, I have a lot of gratitude today … just because! Yesterday, I had the opportunity to attend the International Day for World Peace at an event hosted by the Brahma Kumaris Hollywood Meditation Group. It was held at the Hillcrest Country Club Hollywood, FL. It was very memorable as singers sang, flutist fluted, meditations and music filled the air there as we overlooked the golf course from the event room. It was also the “Day of Gratitude” and the first “People’s Climate March” held in New York City, which was attended by 100,000 people there! “People do make the world go ’round!”

Most of you know that I taught history in the White Plains Public Schools System for 10 years. I often had occasion to add tidbits of history lessons that weren’t in our books. And, as Sandy Nobles says about the Black Holocaust, “It’s something that you won’t find in your children’s history books … not because it didn’t happen, but because it was one of the most horrific events in human history!” Now, I don’t write this piece to play “one up-manship”. I am writing it to shed some light on a subject that has been tucked away from human memory for so long.

The event was held at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center where Dr. Edmond Abaka, associate professor in the history department at the University of Miami also has an art work exhibit which is part of his new book, “House of Slaves and The Door of No Return”. This book is quite remarkable in that it pulls together so much “unwritten” history about the castles and dungeons that sprang up along the “Gold Coast” of Africa in Ghana. When one has the chance to see the fortifications built in Africa by Portuguese and Dutch slave traders, not to mention to “tools” used to transport the slaves to “the door to no where” on the Atlantic Ocean where they were transported for many many years across the ocean to America, one can truly see the crimes against humanity. This was truly an inhumane system of “chattel” (property) slavery. It was as dehumanizing as it can get!! Dr. Abaka mentions in his book, “Even the routes of sharks across the Atlantic Ocean had changed, since they, too, followed the slave ships to get that “free meal” of a human who could not make it to no where!” …. Peace be still!

There were others who participated in this event directed by Ms. Sandra “Nefertari” Nobles, retired guidance counselor from Broward County Schools, which has been designated as an official “Black Holocaust Memorial Commemoration” Day in Fort Lauderdale! My hat goes off to you, “Sandy”, and all the hard work you put in. Dr. Abaka’s book is available now since its release on September 10th, 2014, and his exhibit is in the African American Research Library and Cultural Center for another week, I believe. Thanks to all who participated … It was a great lesson!

Have a great week. Be inspired by others who paved the way for us …

Peace,

John I. Cook