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Updated: Saturday, October 8, 2005
Published: Monday, May 24, 2004 |
Contact:
NABJ Communications
(866) 479-NABJ
NABJ Celebrates the Life and Legacy of Past President Vernon Jarrett
WASHINGTON — The National Association of Black Journalists celebrates the life and legacy of Vernon Jarrett, the associations president from 1977-1979 and one of its 44 founding members, who died last night in Chicago, succumbing to cancer at age 85, NABJ President Herbert Lowe said today.
Also president of NABJ's local chapter in Chicago, Jarrett began his newspaper career nearly 60 years ago at The Chicago Defender. He became the Chicago Tribune's first black syndicated columnist in 1970, and later joined the Chicago Sun-Times as a columnist and editorial board member, continuing there until 1995.
NABJ meant everything to Vernon Jarrett, and he meant all that and so much more to NABJ, said Lowe, a courts reporter at Newsday in New York. Just as important, what Vernon meant to black journalists, meant to black America, meant to America, meant to journalism, meant to Chicago, meant to the world will never be forgotten. There simply can be no overstating his legacy.
A native of Saulsbury, Tenn., Jarrett was one of the nation's foremost newspaper, television and radio commentators on race relations, politics, urban affairs and African-American history. Such was his stature in NABJ that even though Jarrett received NABJ's Lifetime Achievement award in 1990, last month the Board of Directors voted to honor him with this year's Legacy Award, Lowe said.
Vernons death is a tremendous loss to NABJ-Chicago, NABJ Region V and to NABJ, said NABJ Region V Director Marsha Eaglin, a health news producer at Christian Community Health Center in Chicago, and the local chapters secretary. Journalists all over the world can remember a moment in which he touched their lives, said Eaglin, whose region includes Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin.
He made such a difference in using his expert skills as a journalist to herald the causes and issues that concerned the African American community. He loved our history and our people, especially young people. His legacy will live on.
Long before he became NABJ's second president, Jarrett was among those black journalists who, as he put it, "agitated" for their own national organization, Lynn Norment wrote in Committed to the Cause: A Salute to NABJ's Presidents, which the association published as part of its 25th anniversary in 2000.
During his administration, in 1978, 12 NABJ board members were among 29 black press representatives invited to the White House to meet with President Jimmy Carter and his cabinet. The meeting legitimized the organization to mainstream media executives, wrote Norment, a managing editor at Ebony. As the years passed, Jarrett remained a constant presence at NABJ conventions and mentored succeeding presidents, always charging them to keep advocacy for black journalists at the forefront of the associations goals, Lowe said.
Vernon Jarrett was more than my friend and mentor, said DeWayne Wickham, NABJ's president from 1987-1989 and another founding member. He was my bridge to a time long past my link to the legendary black journalists of the Harlem Renaissance era. Like Langston Hughes and W.E.B. DuBois, two great black literary figures with whom he once worked, Vernon was a race man.
He used journalism as a way of ensuring that the achievements of blacks would never be forgotten, and the struggles of blacks would never be ignored, said Wickham, a columnist for USA Today/Gannett News Service. More than just a journalist, Vernon was also an historian whose late-night stories about the places he'd been and the people he'd met were told with the rhythmic voice and unquestionable authority of a griot. His departure from this life leaves a gaping hole in the ranks of those men and women who are true champions of our race.
Lowe said he planned to represent NABJ at the services for Jarrett, which were set for 1 p.m., Saturday, May 29, at Rainbow PUSH Headquarters in Chicago.
An advocacy group established in 1975 in Washington, D.C., NABJ is the largest organization of journalists of color in the world, with 3,600 members, and provides educational, career development and support to black journalists worldwide.
An advocacy group established in 1975 in Washington, D.C., NABJ is the largest organization of journalists of color in the nation, with more than 4,100 members, and provides educational, career development and support to black journalists worldwide.
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