Category: COMMUNITY

BY IAN MacCALLUM
NNB Student Reporter

ST. PETERSBURG – When it opened in 1948, the Royal Theater became the second theater in town that catered solely to the black community during the Jim Crow era.

The occasion was so momentous that “they had a big celebration, with a parade right down 22nd Street S,” said Jon Wilson, a journalist and historian who has co-authored two books on St. Petersburg’s African-American neighborhoods.

The theater’s premiere featured a showing of a B-rated Western titled “Panhandle,” which offered the “most action-packed fight sequence ever seen on film,” said Wilson.

When equal rights became the law of the land in the mid-1960s, however, the Royal became a victim of progress.

Black residents could now live, shop, attend school and see movies in once-forbidden parts of the city. The Royal closed in 1966, one of several well-known venues along 22nd Street S – “the Deuces” – that shut their doors.

In recent years, the Royal has been home of the Boys and Girls Club. Its director, Kayren Lovett, says the club is a fitting tenant for the historic building – long a symbol of the community along the once-vibrant Deuces – and she wants to help ensure that it stays that way.

“Our main objective is to provide hope and opportunity,” said Lovett, 39, who has worked for the Boys and Girls Club of the Suncoast for two decades, the last two years at the Royal.

“The Royal is actually one of the most unique facilities I’ve been in, not only from the structure of it, but from the programming provided here,” she said.

The structure at 1011 22nd St. S is, in fact, special. It is one of the few so-called “Quonset huts” remaining in the city, and it was designated a historic landmark by the City Council in 2001.

The building style, which had its origins in England in World War I, got its name from a World War II production facility near Quonset, R.I. The huts were simple, inexpensive and portable, and they were widely used as barracks, warehouses and hospitals during the war.

In the postwar years, architects used the same elements in designing public buildings like churches and theaters. That was apparently the case with the Royal.

The theater, which hosted talent shows as well as movies, became the second theater to serve all-black audiences. The other, the Harlem, operated from about 1937 to the mid-1950s at 1017 Third Ave. S in the Gas Plant neighborhood, which was supplanted when Tropicana Field was built in the 1980s.

One of the downtown theaters, the La Plaza, admitted black customers, but they had a separate box office and entrance and had to sit in the balcony.

(Nearly three decades earlier, in 1921, a movie house for blacks called the Dream Theater opened on Ninth Street S. It closed after it was bombed – apparently by white residents who were part of a push to get blacks out of the area, according to Wilson.)

After the Royal Theater closed in 1966, the building housed a laundromat for a time and also stood vacant, according to city records. In 1975, it became a youth center, and in 1977 it was sold to the Boys and Girls Club.

In 2004, three years after it was designated a historic site by the city, the Royal got a $1.2 million renovation that restored some of its previous glory. The renovation was financed by the city, with additional funds from philanthropist Bill Edwards.

Once a single, open hall that held 700 seats, the Royal got separate rooms in the renovation – classrooms, computer rooms, a state-of-the-art recording studio, offices, and a stage area for productions.

The arching, white ceiling towers over the rooms, creating a sense of openness while still retaining its charm.

The Royal Theater Arts Academy is one of seven Boys & Girls Clubs in Pinellas County. For the busy summer season, the Royal has 60 children registered for its programming.

To Lovett, the programming at the Royal is as special as the architecture. She sees it as a venue to effect positive change in the community.

“For the kids to have a supportive relationship with caring adults, I think it makes a difference in the child’s life,” she said. “We are going in a great direction, helping the kids and the community that we serve.”

The Royal has programming year round, with summer the busiest time. Lovett wants to see continued growth in attendance and showcases throughout the year.

“I hear a lot that we’re one of the best-kept secrets in the area,” she said. “Hopefully the parents throughout the county will take advantage of the Boys and Girls Clubs.”

The spring and fall programming at the Royal were close to Lovett’s goals in attendance. She is counting on word-of-mouth to bring in more children.

“For the kids’ sake, I hope we grow beyond that secret,” she said.

Lovett herself is a product of the Boys and Girls Club. As a child, she attended clubs in Sarasota, where her grandmother lived, and in Tampa, where she grew up. She worked for Boys and Girls Club chapters in Hillsborough County for 18 years before moving to the Royal.

BY MARK WOLFENBARGER
NNB Student Reporter

ST. PETERSBURG – For decades, the sprawling warehouse district on the northern edge of the Midtown neighborhood was as lifeless as the dried-out, wheat-colored grass that surrounded the mostly abandoned buildings.

The district sprang up after a railroad freight depot was built at 420 22nd St. S in 1926. Forty-one years later, the depot closed and the commerce around it gradually crumbled.

In 2000, the St. Petersburg Clay Co. and its ceramics operation moved into the former depot, and the warehouse district began a comeback, slowly at first, then rapidly.

In 2010, Duncan McClellan, a renowned glass artist, moved his operation from Tampa’s Ybor City to St. Petersburg, where a blossoming arts community was gaining national attention. Before it suspended publication at the end of 2012, the magazine AmericanStyle ranked St. Petersburg as the top midsize city for art three years in a row.

McClellan transformed a former tomato packing plant at 550 24th St. S into a glass art utopia – and his home. In the process, he helped transform the seedy warehouse district into a trendy arts mecca where more than 200 artists now work.

“I know art can really change a neighborhood,” he said.

Not just artists are noticing. On the second Saturday of every month, when dozens of galleries and museums around town open their doors to the public in an event called ArtWalk, people who were once reluctant to venture south of Central Avenue are visiting the shops run by McClellan and his neighbors.

“To a lot of people, Duncan is a savior in many ways,” said Michele Tuegel, who runs a cozy gallery at 320 Central Ave. and helped start ArtWalk two decades ago.

On the southern edge of the warehouse district, which stretches from First Avenue N to 10th Avenue S between 16th and 31st streets, another art establishment is beginning to attract attention, too.

The Dr. Carter G. Woodson African American Museum at 2240 Ninth Ave. S became a stop on the ArtWalk tour in January. The modest museum – a red-roofed, yellow-and-white building that was once the office of the Jordan Park public housing project – unveils a new exhibit in its one-room gallery every month. Much of the art is contributed by the community.

Although the area’s image is improving, many of ArtWalk’s attendees are scared to venture deep into the warehouse district at night, said Terri Lipsey Scott, chairwoman of the Woodson museum’s board.

“The trolley (carrying ArtWalk visitors) makes its way here, and it’s filled with white riders,” Scott said. “They are afraid to get off the trolley because of the area.”

In June, the Salvador Dali Museum hosted a trolley tour that made a noon stop at the Woodson museum, Scott said. Several of the riders marveled at the museum’s African art exhibit, Scott said, and several returned that night with friends.

“There’s a comfort level when you can do it en masse,” Scott said.

There were no trolleys in the early days of ArtWalk and only six or seven galleries, including the Museum of Fine Arts. Nor was ArtWalk a monthly event; it had a loose bimonthly schedule.

Tuegel used to participate in art shows, but now dedicates her Central Avenue gallery and most of her time to the work of 60 artists from around the globe.

The ArtWalk’s founders were a “loose-knit group” who came together to market their institutions as a unit, she said. They also wanted to debunk the myth that art was only for the rich.

From 1988 to 2004, Tuegel was director of the nonprofit Florida Craftsmen, one of the artist organizations that kick-started ArtWalk – then known as the Gallery Hop. It became ArtWalk about seven years ago.

While she can’t give an exact history, Tuegel  said, “I think we were probably one of the first cities in the U.S. to have an art walk.”

By the mid-‘90s, the founders of ArtWalk  became known as “pioneers of the arts community,” Tuegel said. People later called art an “anchor for downtown revitalization and culture.”

In its first decade, ArtWalk saw slow but steady growth. Sales weren’t great; word-of-mouth was the biggest asset. The St. Petersburg Times would often sponsor ArtWalk to help with expenses.

By 2000, Tuegel said, there were about 12 galleries in ArtWalk. Today it comprises more than 30 galleries across five arts districts: The Waterfront Arts District, Edge District, Central Arts District, Grand Central District and Warehouse Arts District.

Although it has grown dramatically in size and popularity, ArtWalk has maintained its ethos: art education and artist exposure. “The root of any creative community is supporting the artists,” said Tuegel.

In the warehouse district he helped establish, McClellan’s operation stands out.

Rope lights stream high above brown wicker seats and a large patio surrounded by a lush, green yard outlined with trees. A walkway connects two green warehouses.

The front warehouse displays the work of 40 international artists, most of which is blown glass. McClellan rotates exhibits and flies in the featured artist for a month, which he said is “very good for creating the buzz.”

The artists provide demonstrations in the 2,400-square-foot rear warehouse – a sweltering hot shop that smells of sweat and torch fire. Because of the extreme heat, the hot shop is closed from June to September.

The front warehouse also contains a massive glass shower, two kitchens and a bedroom.

McClellan is so connected to his work that he and his wife, Irene, live in their gallery.

His hot-shop artists, Jacob Stout and Mariel Bass, craft their own art and assist the featured artists. They said that creating glass art is an intricate process that requires at least two people. “Generally, hot-glass-making is a team sport,” Stout said.

McClellan sponsors local events, donates money to various charities and provides glass-art education for inner-city youth and students of all grade levels.

He is self-funded, but donors contribute to programs. He said that ArtWalk generates attention and money.

Meanwhile, at the Woodson museum, a young, Jamaican-born visual artist named Sharon Norwood opened her first solo exhibit for the April ArtWalk.

Norwood graduated from the University of South Florida in Tampa with a bachelor’s degree in fine arts.

Norwood – who is now the museum’s curator – visited the museum several times and became acquainted with its volunteers. This led to the invitation to open her exhibit there.

“The ArtWalk really made a difference for me,” she said.

Until the museum’s invitation, Norwood said, she thought that her art’s controversial and political themes of identity would force her to move to a state known for art like New York or California.

“I attempt to rewrite and give a different narrative to popular images of blackness,” she said. “It is like reading a book and imagining yourself as one with the characters.”

The museum embraced her aesthetic and handled all the marketing. “I could show my work without having to censor it,” Norwood said.

In addition to visual art, the museum features a musician from the Al Downing Tampa Bay Jazz Association at each ArtWalk.

If you go
ArtWalk runs from 5 to 9 p.m. on the second Saturday of every month. For a map and list of venues and trolley stops, go to stpeteartsalliance.org

BY JACOB COONFARE
NNB Student Reporter

ST. PETERSBURG – A new opportunity for residents of Midtown and nearby neighborhoods is rising on the corner of 22nd Street and 13th Avenue S.

When in opens in mid-2015, the three-story building for St. Petersburg College will quadruple the college’s space in Midtown and enable it to expand its offerings for students.

The $14 million, 45,000-square-foot building will have classrooms, labs, rooms for counseling and financial aid, a library and community space.

It will be named after the late Douglas L. Jamerson Jr., who grew up in Midtown and served as a state legislator, state education commissioner and state secretary of labor. He died in 2001.

St. Petersburg College has had quarters in Midtown since 2003. But its 10,000-square-foot building at 1048 22nd St. S, two blocks north of the new facility, has just a handful of classrooms. In March, that building was renamed to honor Cecil B. Keene Sr., a longtime Pinellas County school administrator and former member of the St. Petersburg College Board of Trustees who died in 2008.

Kevin Gordon, provost of the Midtown and downtown campuses of the college, called Jamerson and Keene community icons.

“Each made significant contributions to education, St. Petersburg College and the community,” he said in a college news release in December 2013. “This is the perfect way to continue their legacy and uphold the vision they held for Midtown.”

During the groundbreaking for the new Midtown Center in March, Mayor Rick Kriseman commented on his excitement.

“You have to know where you’ve been to know where you’re at,” he said. “Here we are now – we’re going to have a place of learning. We’re going to have people who can go to college right here on 22nd Street, on the Deuces.”

The expansion of the Midtown campus could help business ventures in the area, said Nikki Gaskin-Capehart, the city’s director of urban affairs.

“We have absolute excitement and energy going into the campus,” she said.  “I would love to see Midtown become a ‘college hub’ and grow business around the area.”
Workforce training will a part of the expanded campus.

Jessica Eilerman, the city’s small-business liaison, said that the college will help fledgling small businesses and get people exposure to the workforce.

“I think the impact will be great,” Eilerman said. “When you have an institution like SPC in the area, it makes a huge impact.”

LumaStream Inc., a company that makes low-voltage, highly efficient lighting systems, recently  moved its manufacturing operation from Canada to a building at 2201 First Ave. S. in the Midtown area. LumaStream will supply the space and the college will supply the teachers to train workers for the company.

In an announcement in May, the company said it plans to increase its workforce in the St. Petersburg area from 25 to 200 in five years.

“They’ve already hired three or four folks from the program,” Eilerman said.

The college is one of 11 state schools in a consortium that provides short-term, advanced manufacturing training to high school and college students, returning veterans and the unemployed. It is financed by a $15 million grant from the U.S. Department of Labor.

“A college in an urban area is exciting,” Gaskin-Capehart said. “There are so many opportunities with a campus in Midtown.”

Information from St. Petersburg College News and the Tampa Bay Times was used in this report.

For more information
Additional details about the Midtown campus of St. Petersburg College and its expansion are available on the college’s news blog.
Click here for additional details about LumaStream.

BY EMILY WEHUNT
NNB Student Reporter

ST. PETERSBURG – It was a slow Saturday afternoon at the Tampa Bay Times. Photojournalist John Pendygraft, was editing a video at his cubicle. Suddenly, a text alert went off on his cell phone.

Within seconds, he was up from his desk. Carefully but swiftly, he gathered his belongings and headed out the door.

“One of the biggest mistakes reporters can make is running out of the building before making sure they have everything,” said Pendygraft.

A minivan had run into an apartment complex’s guard gate. Although he made it to the scene quickly and snapped some photographs, there was nothing newsworthy about the accident. You never know what you will find until you get there, he said.

Pendygraft, 43, graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 1992 with a bachelor’s degree in anthropology. During his college years, he was the photo editor for the student newspaper, the Daily Texan, and worked at KLRU-TV as a production assistant for “Austin City Limits,” the popular music performance program.

Although Pendygraft was an anthropology major, he believes the field goes hand-in-hand with journalism.

“The universal stories about human struggle are both journalism and anthropology. Good ones – if you do it right,” Pendygraft said.

In his work, he has covered natural disasters, the hardships in Third World countries and the trials of individuals. He and reporter Lane DeGregory told the story of one young woman, a prescription drug addict working toward recovery, in a package titled “If I Die Young.”

After graduating from college, Pendygraft got an internship with the St. Petersburg Times. The Times didn’t have a full-time job opening so he took a job as a crisis counselor at a mental health care center in Tampa, a job he held for two years.

“I worked in the Baker Act unit,” he said. “It was an amazing, amazing experience.”

Under the Baker Act, people with possible mental problems can be involuntarily committed for up to 72 hours by police, doctors or mental health professionals.

Following that, he worked at the Baton Rouge Morning Advocate before returning to the Times in 1997.

In 1998, he began traveling for the paper. He spent a lot of time in Latin America, covering stories with reporter and good friend David Adams. The duo worked on countless stories together over a 10-year span.

“We went everywhere, from Cuban to Honduran jails, you name it,” said Pendygraft.

He also covered the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which hit New Orleans in 2005.

“It was the first time I had been somewhere in America where it felt like a Third World country,” he said.

When an earthquake hit Haiti in 2010, Pendygraft was there to cover it. He documented how the Haitian people dealt with the aftermath.

“I pitched a ‘we will rebuild Haiti’ story about the Haitians who will actually rebuild Haiti. That is how it happens, after all of the big plans and promises; that is what it comes down to,” he said.

Steep budget cuts at the Times have meant less travel for Pendygraft, but he has become both a photographer and reporter for the paper.

In recent months, some photographers have left the paper and one was laid off. This has resulted in more work for those who remain.

He is working on a series called “In My Shoes” – a character study on a person with an interesting story to share. He has published one piece so far and a second is in the works. For each person, he will do a story, a photograph and a video.

Pendygraft is confident in his photography skills, and he is working to perfect his video editing. He uses Final Cut Pro – which he taught himself – to do his videos.

“Final Cut is just Legos, for the easy stuff. I can put something together quickly, but will edit it for a long time,” he said.

Pendygraft lives in Gulfport with his wife, reporter Letitia Stein, 34, and their 2-year-old daughter, Isadora. They met at the paper in 2004 and married in 2007.

Pendygraft handled the courtship the same way he tackles an assignment – with focused energy.

“We meet at the paper, and I stalked her,” he said. “Only because I could tell we had something.”

BY JAIMIE LUNA
NNB Student Reporter

SARASOTA – With a sense of adventure and $500 in his pocket, he bought a round-trip ticket to Queensland, Australia.

His plan?  To stay for two weeks.

He stayed for a year, making surfboards to pay the bills.

During that time Eric Nalpas began to discover his love for photography. And by the time he was 25, he had turned that love into a career.

“I realized with photography, you really have to give it 100 percent to make anything happen,” says Nalpas.

He became a part-time correspondent photographer for the Sarasota Herald Tribune, covering Red Cross efforts during Hurricane Katrina and the San Bernardino wildfires.

Nalpas, 37, is now the photographer for the Sarasota Polo Club in Lakewood Ranch. During polo season, he covers up to nine games a week. Sunday is his busiest day.

After the first year, he started playing polo himself. “I think if I didn’t start playing, I wouldn’t still be there,” says Nalpas.

His skill in the game helps him predict what is going to happen next, capturing the best moments with his Nikon D800.

His assistant, 23-year-old McKenzie Chadwell, is pleased to be working with him.

“I see life in angles and so does he,” says Chadwell. “It’s nice to be able to see our work together through a camera lens. I give him my own perspective on things, all while he’s teaching me how to become a professional in this field.”

On top of everything, Nalpas has taught Chadwell it doesn’t matter what kind of photography equipment you have. What matters is what you do with it.

His favorite part about being a photographer is interacting with people and traveling. He says he’s always had a thirst for travel.

“I love it. I love every minute of it,” he says.

Before becoming full-time photographer, Nalpas was shaping surfboards around the world for famous surfboard builder Juan Rodriguez.

“I used to joke and say I made surfboards for the life and the style,” says Nalpas. “Turns out I didn’t have a life or style. I wanted more.”

When he’s not working at the Sarasota Polo Club, Nalpas is an independent photographer, part-time bartender at the Selva Grill, and dad to 6-year-old Logan Nalpas.

Nalpas also recently dove back into making surfboards.

“It’s my familiar getaway,” he says.

Despite his successes, Nalpas strives to be a better photographer.

“I don’t think I’m the best,” he says. “On a scale of 1 to 10, I give myself a 6. I want to be better; that’s what keeps me going.”

BY MARK WOLFENBARGER
NNB Student Reporter

CLEARWATER – Sitting at a table in the cafeteria of the Pinellas County Justice Center, courts reporter Curtis Krueger organizes notes as he prepares for Monday morning pre-trial hearings.

Like the attorneys who pass by, Krueger is dressed for the occasion – white dress shirt, blue necktie, dark gray dress pants.

A casual demeanor and a green Tampa Bay Times neck strap holding a press badge separate him from the attorneys who stop to chat.

Becoming acquainted with attorneys is invaluable. This is one of the ways Krueger discovers and keeps track of interesting cases.

In fact, it is how he heard about Le’Genius Wisdom Williams.

Krueger says an attorney asked him, “How come you didn’t write about the 13-year-old who shot somebody?”

Williams was arrested in August 2013 on an attempted murder charge for shooting a 15-year-old boy on 17th Avenue and 26th Street S. Prosecutors may seek adult charges.  A trial date has not been set.

Krueger, 55, is from Bloomington, Ind. He attended Indiana University – and ultimately got a bachelor’s degree in journalism there – until he became a reporter at the Journal Gazette in Fort Wayne, Ind.

Once he gained confidence as a journalist, Krueger joined the St. Petersburg Times (now the Tampa Bay Times), where he has been a staff writer since 1987. He has covered courts for the Times since 2010.

Krueger scans a piece of paper with a list of five names written in black ink, each tagged with a letter. The names belong to defendants whose cases have Krueger’s attention. The letters identify which judge (and division) is presiding over the case.

After getting organized, Krueger heads across the first floor to the media room, where he drops off a Styrofoam cup filled with coffee and a black bag containing his laptop.

He then takes a series of escalators to the fourth floor. That’s where most of the felony pre-trial hearings and trials are held.

Most of Krueger’s writing is about trials. Pre-trials offer updates and sometimes a new case to follow. “Pre-trials are usually uninteresting,” Krueger says.

He enters the first courtroom, marked D.

More than a dozen people – defendants, family, friends and observers – sit in the wood-paneled room. They are separated from the judge’s bench and attorneys’ tables by a partition with a swing door in the center.

Bailiffs stand guard as defense attorneys, accompanied by their clients, approach the lectern to confer with the judge. Most are given a trial date.

Krueger says about 20 defendants can be in a courtroom at one time. Because there is no schedule, Krueger often has to wait for his case to come up. Atop his list today is Leonard Lanni Jr.

Lanni was arrested at a St. Pete Beach resort in July 2013 on a disorderly conduct charge; police say he was drunk and belligerent. On the way to jail in the transport van, police say, he savagely kicked another drunken man into a coma.

When the victim later died from his injuries, Lanni was charged with second-degree murder.

A shackled Lanni enters the courtroom in a blue corrections uniform.  His attorney and the judge discuss a trial date; it is tentatively set for Oct. 7. Krueger writes it down, then leaves and walks down the hall to the next courtroom, marked A.

Krueger doesn’t see his next defendant or the attorney.

While he waits, another attorney stands at the lectern. When one defendant finishes, the next joins her.

A large man wearing a suit approaches the lectern and stands next to the attorney. “It’s interesting when a client is dressed as well as the attorney,” Krueger says. It often indicates a sex offender.

After about 10 minutes, the judge calls for a five-minute recess. Krueger exits. He says the recess is probably a bathroom break.

Krueger stands in the hall and identifies familiar faces, mostly attorneys, then walks to the opposite end of the hall. He stops to speak with an attorney named Richard Watts.

Watts is a slender man with white hair and charisma. He and Krueger have a brief discussion about law and journalists’ favorite amendment. “I am a big believer in the First Amendment, but I don’t like my name in the paper,” Watts says.

Before heading to the media room to gather his belongings, Krueger stops by the office of Ron Stuart, the public information officer for the Pinellas-Pasco circuit court.

Stuart is a tall, older man with a belly and a Southern accent. He and Krueger often discuss cases.

Stuart’s office has a variety of decorations including framed newspapers.

One is a Clearwater Sun front page from May 9, 1980, the day one span of the original Sunshine Skyway collapsed after being rammed by a freighter. “That was one of the last extras in America,” Stuart says.

He was managing editor of the Sun, which folded in 1989.

From Stuart’s office, Krueger heads to the media room to retrieve his black bag and neglected cup of coffee. He walks across the first floor and down the hall toward the doors next to the cafeteria where his morning began.

For many, the courthouse is where their stories end. For Krueger, it is where stories are born.

BY EMILY EVANS
NNB Student Reporter

ST. PETERSBURG – It’s quiet and dim in the cluster of desks for the design team at the Tampa Bay Times. It’s a typical day for them – another deadline, another design – except for one thing: Most are wearing brightly colored pants.

One of them is Tara McCarty, 24, a Times designer since April 2013. Adorned in bright red skinnies, a basic black-and-white striped top, and a statement necklace, she types away at her keyboard, staring at her computer with a bright smile on her face.

“I was interested in newspaper design when I became involved in my high school newspaper at St. Petersburg High School,” she says. “And I ended up being involved with it as well at my college newspaper,” the Crow’s Nest at the University of South Florida St. Petersburg.

Working in Adobe InDesign, McCarty moves quickly, making everything look simple. Page by page, she makes sure text is aligned, images correspond to each story and the layout is aesthetically  pleasing.

“I work in programs such as Adobe InDesign, Illustrator and Photoshop,” says McCarty. “We also use our data center and InCopy, but that is mostly for editors.”

McCarty designs the sports section on Mondays, regional news sections on Tuesdays and Wednesdays and the B section on Saturdays and Sundays.

With such a busy work life, McCarty seeks diversion with her boyfriend and family, especially her niece, who can be seen in photos spread around her desk.

At USF St. Petersburg, McCarty majored in mass communications with a concentration in journalism. She was also in the honors program.

She did well in her writing classes, she says, but they weren’t the focus of her schooling. “I enjoyed my design classes like magazine design and visual communications.”

While working at the Times printing plant and preparing her senior thesis, titled “50 things I learned without going to design school,” McCarty caught the attention of a design editor at the paper, who offered her an internship.

Now, a year and a half later, McCarty chats with the East Hillsborough bureau chief, Ernest Hooper, about a photo she needs for his story in the Brandon section.
She says she’s glad she majored in journalism, not design.

“It’s better to major in journalism with a background in design, than just major in design,” she says. “You learn hierarchy and the importance of deadlines.”

Another deadline looms. Smiling broadly, she begins to work the next story into the layout.

BY KIM DOLEATTO
NNB Student Reporter

ST. PETERSBURG – “Hallelujah! He comin’! You won’t have to wait much longer!!”

The bishop’s voice blared from speakers outside the tiny church on 22nd Street S.

“They have a real good sound system,” Veatrice Farrell said with a resigned chuckle.

She is the project manager of Deuces Live Inc., a nonprofit committed to revitalizing Midtown’s main artery – 22nd Street S, otherwise known as “the Deuces.”

It’s 10 a.m. Sunday. The service at the Refuge Church of our Lord, at 920 22nd St. S, is in full cry.

Meanwhile, in the clearing across the street, Farrell helps vendors set up for the Deuces Live Market. From 1 to 6 p.m. every Sunday, vendors sell clothes, jewelry, smoothies, barbecue chicken, homemade pies and more. There is a DJ, too. (The market is closed for the summer until Sept. 14.)

Edith and Antonio Trejo unpack their colorful bounty: peaches, oranges, watermelon, lettuce, jalapenos and more.

Theirs is the only produce stand and they are the only Latino vendors. But they don’t feel left out.

“We can really feel the city supports this market. Here, everyone helps each other,” he said.

Since its April 6 debut, the market has been part of Deuces Live Inc.’s mission to “provide redevelopment services to the area,” Farrell said.

But it’s not just business; it’s personal. Volunteers are the backbone of the market.

Elihu Brayboy directs people setting up tables and umbrellas where shoppers can enjoy market goods.

“Instead of young black men being noticed for being in trouble, here they are setting up for market,” he said.

He has stock in the future of the once-thriving, now-struggling area. He and wife Carolyn – vice president of Deuces Live Inc. – bought four buildings adjacent to the market. Public records show the Brayboys spent close to $500,000 buying the properties, according to the Tampa Bay Times.

They have since transformed the spaces – boarded up for 30 years – into an ice cream shop, consignment clothing store, art gallery, hair salon and other small businesses.

The Brayboys grew up in Midtown and remember when 22nd Street was a thriving center for the African-American community.

Carl Lavender also has close ties with the area. He braves the hot sun to wave people toward the market and direct parking; he helps bag-laden customers to their cars. “How are the kids? How was church this morning?” Lavender asks them.

He’s the Deuces Live Market maitre d’, but he used to be the director of the Boys and Girls Club at the historic Royal Theater down the street. It opened in 1948 to serve St. Petersburg’s African-American community during segregation. It closed in 1966. It now serves the Boys and Girls Club, where Lavender was executive director for many years.

One of the vendors knows all about it. Empress PJ Crosby produced a CD there with teen musicians from the neighborhood. It’s for sale at her stand: Romantic PJ’s Jewelry Booth, along with other handcrafted items.

Since developing a nerve condition, Crosby said, she wanted to “stay constructive and keep her hands going.”

She fashions tie-dyed hair wraps, earrings and T-shirts. One says, “nails, breasts, hair—all mine.” Another, “Irony is….ugly.”

Crosby is a teacher of spoken word and poetry. Through the arts program at the Royal Theater, she helped create the Poetic Colla’ge Youth Society and has performed at poetry and spoken word festivals in the U.S. Virgin Islands and throughout Florida – all funded by the Royal Theater Boys and Girls Clubs.

Crosby will take her poetry program to the Virgin Islands for the summer while the market is closed for the summer.

“It’s so hot to be hanging around outside in the summer; plus, a lot of the vendors like to tour the local events that need vendors,” Farrell said.

Crosby will be back, though. “It could be a good day or bad day, I always love it here,” she said.

Although 22nd Street S has suffered the effects of neglect over time, some residents have never abandoned the memory of what it once was and is today: their home.

At the market, “you have everything you need,” Farrell said.

“Home is where you live.”

If You Go: The Deuces Live Market is closed for the summer. When it reopens Sept. 14, shoppers can visit from 1 to 6 p.m. every Sunday on 22nd Street S and Ninth Avenue, rain or shine.

BY MATTHEW LIDDELL
NNB Student Reporter

GULFPORT – It was Mother’s Day 2010, and families and friends gathered to visit the graves of their loved ones. Some of them were stunned at what they found:

Lincoln Cemetery was in shambles.

Six-foot-tall grass and weeds. Broken headstones. Graves that could not be found. The historic African-American graveyard, established in 1926, was once again a victim of shameful neglect.

How could someone let this happen?

That is what St. Petersburg City Council Member Wengay Newton intended to find out. Newton heard about the cemetery’s condition from Bay News 9, which reported the Mother’s Day debacle. Residents contacted him in hopes that he would take an interest in the issue, since he was the only African-American council member.

“People think it’s a political thing, but it’s not,” Newton said. “For me, it’s personal.”

Newton’s mother was buried at Lincoln Cemetery in 1985. To hear that the cemetery had gone downhill again was disappointing. He wanted answers just as much as everyone else.

The cemetery, 9 acres at 600 58th St. S, was established during the Jim Crow era, when graveyards were strictly segregated. Over the years, 6,000 people were laid to rest there – military veterans, civil rights leaders, prominent people and ordinary folks.

The cemetery has changed hands several times, and charges of shoddy maintenance go back for at least half a century, according to the Tampa Bay Times.

In 2009, ownership passed to Sarlie McKinnon III, whose father and grandparents are buried there. He also received more than $100,000 in state-mandated “perpetual care” funds for maintaining the cemetery.

Most of that money was spent, according to Gulfport City Manager Jim O’Reilly. “And once perpetual care funds were gone, we had to take action.”

The city of Gulfport is now mowing the cemetery twice a month, but there is still more to be done.

A number of people have found a reason to get involved. Many have joined because Emma Booker, the namesake of Booker High School in Sarasota, is buried there. The Daughters of the American Revolution has helped maintenance efforts because more than half of the 6,000 graves hold veterans.

But it’s not as simple as getting some volunteers together to fix everything. If everyone cleans up, Newton said, then they’re doing McKinnon’s job for him. If they let it go and don’t touch the cemetery, then they are neglecting the legacy of their loved ones.

In the cemetery today, it’s plain to see that little has changed since 2010. Palm trees and bushes have grown in front of some headstones, obscuring the names and epitaphs. Large tree branches have fallen and crushed other headstones. Ground-level graves are covered in weeds, leaving barely any sign that someone rests there.

The conditions seem even more shameful when looking just to the north, where Royal Palm Cemetery appears immaculate and pristine compared to Lincoln Cemetery.

“It’s a mess, it’s a mess,” Newton said. “It’s in better shape than it was, but not where it needs to be. It’s an ongoing journey.”

Newton said that McKinnon is no longer selling plots in the graveyard. The only people being buried there now are those who bought plots years ago.

People who want to buy plots now “call often, and it goes as far back as 2011,” Newton said as he pulled out an inch-thick pad of papers. “I just keep them, hang on to them, and let people know that we’re working on it.”

Unfortunately, all they can do is wait until McKinnon makes major changes or gives up the cemetery. This seems even more difficult since McKinnon now lives in Georgia.

The veterans “deserve a better resting place than this,” Newton said. “We just need to get it in local hands to make things better.”

There may be hope for Lincoln Cemetery, and it might happen soon. Rev. Clarence Williams of the Greater Mt. Zion A.M.E. Church recently conducted a funeral at the cemetery, and he was appalled by what he saw, Newton said. Williams decided to take action and contacted McKinnon.

McKinnon agreed to transfer the cemetery to a nonprofit organization run by Williams, Newton said. It seemed that change would be coming.

“I attended a meeting (about the transfer) with Newton,” O’Reilly said, “and then what happened was I haven’t heard anything since.”

Williams and McKinnon could not be reached for comment.

Newton said he is hopeful that the transfer will happen by late summer, but there is still the fear that things may fall through.

“This is an issue we’ve tried not to consider at the moment,” O’Reilly said. “We are hoping that the agreement would work out between them, because at this point, to keep doing what we’re doing, we’re not going to let it get any worse than it is now.”

For now, Lincoln Cemetery is stuck in limbo, with an owner who is neglecting it and a community that hates to see it languish any longer.

Information from the Tampa Bay Times was used in this report.  

Who’s buried in Lincoln Cemetery?

• An estimated 3,000 military veterans
• Elder Jordan, a prominent developer in the area around 22nd Street S.
• Fannye Ayer Ponder, a stalwart in education and civic activism
• Robert Swain, a dentist, businessman and civil rights activist
• C. Bette Wimbish, a civil rights activist and first black elected to the St. Petersburg City Council
• Ralph Wimbish, a physician and onetime president of the NAACP
  Source: Tampa Bay Times

 

BY TAYLOR WILLIAMS and IAN MacCALLUM
NNB Student Reporters

ST. PETERSBURG – On one side of the window, a woman and three small children were digging through a dump outside an abandoned factory.

On the other side, a woman with a gin and tonic in her hand sat by the pool of a five-star hotel.

Until that moment 14 years ago, Tiffany Fakus was happy with her life as a $100,000-a-year executive for a multimedia software company. She was taking a break from a conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, when she happened to look out the window.

“I looked away and tried to ignore it,” said Faykus, now 43. But when she returned to the conference she couldn’t shake the image of the woman, the children and the dump.

“What am I doing on this side of the glass?” she thought to herself.

“It was so profoundly impactful,” she said. “Nothing felt right after that. The little things that didn’t use to bother me now did.”

The glance out the window in Baku became a look into Faykus’ future.

Within a few months, she had resigned from her corporate job and begun an odyssey that eventually brought her to St. Petersburg, where she is executive director of the Heart Gallery of Pinellas and Pasco, a nonprofit organization that matches foster children with adoptive families.

The Heart Gallery showcases the pictures and stories of hard-to-place children in the belief that “there’s a family out there for every kid,” Faykus said.

It is her job to raise money and public awareness. “It’s all about spreading the word,” she said.

Over the last five years, she said, 176 children have been adopted through the Heart Gallery. Watching a judge preside over an adoption is the most rewarding part of her job.

“I played a part – however small, I played a part,” she said. “There’s one judge that says, ‘It is my pleasure to make official what love made true.’ ”

Many of the matches don’t lead to adoption, however. The Heart Gallery’s children are generally older. Some have physical disabilities or emotional problems. Some have siblings and they can’t be separated. There is, Faykus acknowledged, “a 40 to 50 percent fail rate.”

“When kids don’t get adopted, it’s the worst part of my job,” she said. “When I tuck my (own) kids in at night, I think, Who is tucking in those kids?”

Faykus grew up in a religious family that believed in giving back to the community. Although they frequently moved, her mother found causes to champion at every stop – Meals on Wheels, a wheelchair sports camp, a national charity organization for mothers and daughters.

“I remember playing in the church library while she was cooking the meals,” said Faykus.

Her parents started a foundation they called WGG (for With God’s Grace), she said. “That says my family. That’s how I was raised.”

As a teenager, Faykus dreamed of a career in theater. That carried her to New York City, where she majored in theater and history at New York University and appeared in several off-Broadway plays.

It was in New York that she met her husband, Preston, who was there on an internship. They lived in Russia and then Budapest, Hungary. That’s where she landed the corporate job that eventually took her to Baku and what she calls her “aha moment” – the sight of the woman and children in the dump.

When she, her husband and their three children – now 12, 10 and 8 – moved to St. Petersburg several years ago, Faykus said, she was not enthusiastic about the city.

That changed as they got settled and joined a church and she began volunteer work. In 2012, she became executive director of the Heart Gallery.

Now Faykus looks at the world through a different window.

When a promising adoption falls through, she said, she tries to remain upbeat. She sees value in serving a cause she embraces passionately. The biblical guidance her mother and father stressed still rings in her head:

“To whom much is given, much is expected.”

NNB reporters Jennifer Nesslar and Jaime Luna contributed to this report.

The Heart Gallery of Pinellas and Pasco is at 100 Second Ave. N, Suite 150, St. Petersburg, FL 33701.
Telephone (727) 388-2910 or (866) 388-0790
http://www.heartgallerykids.org/