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Session:         Page of 592

Sidney, Sidney Poitier came. I remember Godfrey Cambridge came one time, where he flew in from California, and we never knew if he was going to make it. I remember vividly, we then had moved to Hunter College, and there he ran down the aisle, rushed up the stairs to come up, and hit his knee on the steps. Blood was flowing from him and there he was, doing his comedy act. It was that kind of thing.

I made some notes as to the kind of people who performed. We also would give out contributions to the civil rights organizations at these programs, to the NAACP and to the SCLC. If it was a Panther issue, we gave to the Black Panthers. We did the whole business through our campaign for funds for Solidarity Fund, we called it. We raised money for that purpose. That was a good time, because say you gave out $2,500 to the NAACP. Well, a life membership in the NAACP was $500, so that I worked it out where we'd give it to the NAACP in the form of five life memberships, and every year we would select important people who would get life memberships. There are all kinds of people around town who have life memberships in the NAACP through this format. Whether it was political people, prominent people, all kinds of people.

Q:

You mentioned last summer, I think, Bruce Wright.

Foner:

Bruce Wright, Bill Booth, Herman Badillo. Joe Papp, Basil Patterson. Any number of people. Ossie, Ruby, everybody became a life member in the NAACP this way. Cesar Chavez.

I made some notes as to the performers at the Salute to Freedom. In 1970, Mahalia Jackson, Dick Gregory.

Going back to '56, I see at the Negro History Program Sidney Poitier, Ossie and Ruby. In '57, Earl Hyman. In '58, the cast of “Jamaica,” the musical. Guest speaker, Ralph Abernathy, on the Montgomery boycott. '59, Leon Bibb, John Henry Faulk, Sidney, Ossie, Ruby. Guest speaker, Thurgood Marshall. '60, guest speaker, A. Philip Randolph. Performers, Olatunji, DeCormier, Ossie, Ruby, Belafonte Singers.

To digress for a minute, I have notes here on Teen Time at 1199, that I think I mentioned earlier. Some of the guest stars, I mentioned some. Sal Mineo, Sammy Davis, Jr., Susan Strassberg. The Salute to Israel in 1958 featured Morris Carnovsky. More on the Salute. 1970.

Q:

What happened to 1960 to 1970?

Foner:

I gave you '60 to '61, '62, I don't have them. I didn't get through the magazines on that. It doesn't matter. In '70,





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