Applause erupts as Andrew Young, center, nears the Plaza de la Constitucion in preparation for the dedication of the Andrew Young Crossing monument on Saturday morning. Pictured, from left, are Donna Dobbs, J.T. Johnson, Carolyn Young, Andrew Young, Bishop Felipe Estevez, St. Augustine Mayor Joe Boles, former U.S. Sen. George McGovern and Diane Spoden. By DARON DEAN, daron.dean@staugustine.com [1]
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Sidewalk for Young dedicated -- Symbolizes struggle for 'human decency and respect'
By PETER GUINTA
Created 06/12/2011 - 12:09am
Summary:
Former U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young walked the same path Saturday that he'd taken on a hot June night in 1964 when his group of 300 marchers -- headed for the Plaza de la Constitucion -- was attacked by a white mob and Young was beaten down several times by racist thugs.
Former U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young walked the same path Saturday that he'd taken on a hot June night in 1964 when his group of 300 marchers -- headed for the Plaza de la Constitucion -- was attacked by a white mob and Young was beaten down several times by racist thugs.
Each time, however, Young stood up and kept going.
This Saturday, he was St. Augustine's guest of honor, invited to speak at the dedication of "Andrew Young Crossing," a 25-foot-long granite, coquina and bronze monument built by the city to commemorate his courage, leadership and non-violence.
"They were not really bad people," Young, now 79, said of his attackers. "They were God's children, too."
The purpose of the civil rights struggle was "to seek the human dignity and respect that allows us to live together as brothers and sisters and not perish together as fools," he said.
The monument features bronze castings of Young's shoes walking over four coquina sidewalk panels, each five feet long and six feet wide. Each panel is named after a different civil rights goal written in bronze letters: freedom, non-violence, equality, justice.
Each panel also features a pertinent quote from notables such as the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and President Lyndon Johnson, in addition to Young.
Designer Jeremy Marquis of Halback & Associates, St. Augustine, said it represents following Young's steps or walking with him into the future. Marquis volunteered his services for this design.
"Fred (Halback) and I realized that his generation knows the Andrew Young story, but mine doesn't know," said Marquis, who is in his 20s. "This is all about memorializing the story for future generations."
The dedication
From the Casa Monica Hotel, down a closed-off King Street, Young walked to the monument about 10 a.m. to the cheers of a waiting crowd.
He then walked down the Crossing panels, reading some of the quotes aloud.
Notables in audience included Martin Luther King III; former St. Augustine native and Freedom Rider Hank Thomas of Atlanta; Billye Aaron, wife of home run king Hank Aaron; civil rights leader Cora Tyson; the Rev. Ron Stafford; former U.S. Sen. George McGovern; St. Augustine hotelier Kanti Patel; and Bishop Felipe Estevez of the Diocese of St. Augustine.
City Commissioner Errol Jones, who had initially made a motion in March to build the monument, introduced Young, first thanking the "unknown persons who spent many hours and evenings marching in St. Augustine for justice.
"In 1965, our 400th year, there was a dark cloud over this city. St. Augustine was two separate communities," Jones said. "In 2015, as we approach our 450th, we say, 'Never again!' 2015 will be a very inclusive year and the celebration will include all our citizens. This is a new day."
Young, smiling, said, "This more than makes up what happened (to me) here. If blacks (in St. Augustine) had not dedicated themselves to non-violence and had done evil for evil, the entire civil rights movement would have been set back a half century."
He cited the Birmingham bombings, one of which took the lives of four little girls, and the assassination of President Kennedy as examples of the violent times.
"We didn't come here naive. We know this was a struggle we'd have to repeat over and over," Young said.
"But it was an honor and privilege to join the people of St. Augustine who had already suffered so much."
The surprise
To Ruth Lowery, 84, of St. Augustine Shores, the day was already beautiful.
She said she greatly admired Young, adding, "He's an inspiration to everyone."
Brought to the luncheon by a friend, she was talking about the charms of the town.
During the Civil Rights years, she said she was raising her twin girls.
"That's all I could do. They were two years old," she said. "My three friends rode the Freedom Bus from Newark, N.J. They were so scared, but they did not get hurt."
Just then, a man bent down to talk to her, smiling.
She conversed pleasantly for a minute, then asked politely, "Who are you?"
The man said, "Martin Luther King III."
Lowery began to cry, overcome with emotion.
Her strawberry-colored hat fell off, her face streaked with tears.
"I love St. Augustine," was all she could say.
The book
Young's entourage was selling many copies of his 1996 book, "An Easy Burden: The Civil Rights Movement and the Transformation of America," which he said was never promoted by his publisher, PA Inc., a division of HarperCollins.
He said, "I wrote this book because I needed money. I had three kids in college and the mayor of Atlanta's salary at the time was $50,000. I made $6,000 a year from the SCLC, so I was literally broke."
He said he was too busy to go out and promote the book.
"This book came from someone who was inside the room when most of the decisions were made," he said.
Former ABC producer and videographer C.B. Hackworth, a close friend of Young's, made several DVDs for the ambassador, and said that one especially would interest the public.
Margaret Mitchell, the author of the novel "Gone With The Wind," was "judged pretty harshly" by the black community because of her descriptions of slaves in her book, Hackworth said.
The film describes Mitchell's secret financial backing of Dr. Benjamin Mays, president of Morehouse College in Atlanta, her support for the training of 40 black doctors and the first black hospital in Atlanta and her financial support for the Civil Rights Movement.
Mays later became a mentor for Martin Luther King Jr. Young also knew Mays.
Hackworth's DVD is called "A Secret as Simple as Black and White."
Actress Joanne Woodward came out of retirement to do the voice of Mitchell, he said.
"The secret's come out of the past decade, but not in this much detail," he said.
Recalling the attack
Someone asked Young why he kept getting up after he was knocked unconscious and beat again and again.
"It was part of our discipline," he said. "You never let violence stop a movement. You never stop. If one person falls, or even is killed, someone else must take their place." He stood up to try to reason with the crowd, he said. Thugs swung at him and he dodged. One attacker tried to kick him in the groin, but the kick hit his leg instead, giving him a large bruise.
"I kept talking. I never stopped talking," he said. "A state trooper said to the crowd, 'Let them through.' They did so. I don't know who (that trooper) was. His wife wrote me a note to tell me, but the note somehow got lost. I'd love to know his name."
In the end, he said, nothing really hurt him badly.
"I was just knocked out quick," he said.
Fellow marcher James Jackson of St. Augustine went to Young to absorb some of the angry blows.
Jackson said that the marchers had been trained to do that.
"It was a protective measure. The next person was supposed to take some of the punishment off someone being beaten," Jackson said. "I got kicked a couple of places that weren't too nice. If I see someone being beaten, I'm going to go there and try to protect that individual."
Jackson later worked for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference with the Rev. Willie Bolden in Macon, Ga., in the election of Lyndon Johnson.
Reluctant warrior
At the end, Young said, "I didn't want to go with Martin Luther King. I wanted to go somewhere nearby where I wasn't going to get beat up. But I couldn't keep away from what was happening. I got drawn into it."
peter.guinta@staugustine.com
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