AREA BRIEFS

NBA Great, Buffalo’s Own Cliff Robinson, Remembered

2021 TRAILBLAZER AWARDS: Among those receiving 2021 Trailblazer Awards presented during the two-Day Cliff Robinson Remembrance event were: Cedric Holloway/Omega Mentors, Pastor James Giles, Michael Wright (aka DJ Slick Mike), Stevie Johnson, Howard Johnson, and Marsha McWilson. Pictured from left to right: Dewitt Lee, Michael King, Michael Wright (aka DJ Slick Mike), Stevie Johnson,Legislator Howard Johnson, Pastor Tim Newkirk, and renowned vocalist Marsha McWilson. Street Legacy Photos by Darvin Adams

Former Portland Trail Blazers All-Star Cliff Robinson died last August at the age of 53 after a yearlong battle with lymphoma. Buffalo born and raised, Robinson, who was a star at Riverside High School, went on to become known as an NBA player that played 18 years in the League. He scored more points than some of the NBA’s 50 greatest players including Magic Johnson, Isaiah Thomas, Kevin McHale and Scottie Pippen. He currently ranks 54th on the NBA ”All-Time” scoring list. Last weekend Oct. 2 and 3 an event was held to remember the beloved athlete at the Johnnie B. Wiley Athletic Photos by Darvin Adams Sports Pavilion on Jefferson Avenue. It was sponsored by Pastor Tim Newkirk and GYC Ministries . On Saturday Mayor Brown presented Pastor Newkirk with a proclamation declaring October 2 Pastor Newkirk Day in the City of Buffalo. He also received a proclamation from Erie County Legislators Howard Johnson and April Baskin. Common Council Darius Pridgen, on behalf of the entire Council, also honored Pastor Newkirk for his achievements and work in the community. In addition, the mayor proclaimed Sunday October 3 Cliff Robinson Day in the City of Buffalo.

-Beyond Basketball-

Cliff Robinson's greatness extended far beyond the basketball court. A statement released by his family after his passing in 2020 read in part: “In this day, where the call for social justice and reform are being demanded loud and

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Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, PhD Bennett High school Grad, Daughter of UB Professor, Named McArthur Fellow

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, PhD, a graduate of Bennett High School and currently a professor in the Department of African American Studies at Princeton University, has been named a 2021 MacArthur Fellow. Regarded as one of the nation’s most prestigious awards for intellectual and artistic achievement the award, commonly known as the “genius grant,” carries a $625,000 stipend, paid in quarterly installments over five years with no strings attached on how

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, PhD recipients can spend the money. She is the daughter of Dr. Henry Louis Taylor Jr PhD, Director of the Center for Urban Studies at the University at Buffalo School of Architecture and Planning; Keeanga-Yamatta is the daughter of Dr. Dr. Henry Louis Taylor Jr PhD, Director of the Center for Urban Studies at the University at Buffalo School of Architecture and Planning. A historian and writer, she is author of Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership, a semi-finalist for a National Book Award for nonfiction and a 2020 finalist for the Pulitzer in History. Taylor’s book From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation, won the Lannan Cultural Freedom Award for an Especially Notable Book in 2016. She is also editor of How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective, which won the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ nonfiction in 2018. She is a contributing writer and columnist for The New Yorker. Her essays have been published in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Guardian, The Paris Review, and Jacobin, among other media outlets.

“Our history did not begin in chains. It will not end in chains.”