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RUSSELL C. MAIOR:

EDUCATORANI) CIVIL RTGHTS LEADER

My interest in civil rights and racial bias really began in
i3 at age twenty-one when I observed a black servant trailher employer and behaving rnore like a dog than a person. ihort time later, a Iewish family tried to join the Eastern nt Yacht Club in Gloucester, Massachusetts. I was a mernof the board of governors, most of whorn were antinitic, and although I was young and inexperienced in mati of debate , I said that I saw no reason not to accept as mems a thoroughly respectable ]ewish family. Another member he yacht club and board of governors) slighdy older than I, re or less agreed with my position and made a strong case admitting the family. In the end we prevaitred over our prejced fellows. After living in Babylon, New York from L957 to 196I- a .white comrnunity on the south shore of Long Island the ch family decided it was time to rnove, although it was not r to leave the good friends we had made. When Frances and :ad in the ldew Torh Tirnes of a civil rights struggle in ;lewood, New ]ersey, we both exclaimed at once) "Let's [< at the possibility of moving to Englewood and joinirg the '." We found a house in Englewood and lived there until '2, for a total of eleven years. Among the first persons I met inglewood was Russell Major, an African-American, who at time was leading the fight to integrate the Cleveland ele-

linglewood, in spite of failing to achieve all of his goals. For ycars he was a leadirg force in the long battle to integrate the sc-hools and provide affordable housing for the poor AfricanAmerican population, which represented nearly twenty-five pcrcent of the city. Russell was a man I admired, a man who rlcepened my interest in civil rights and taught me about the ycarnirg of the African-American for equaliry. Russell Mujor's life goal was civil rights. Shirl.y Lacy, a lrlack activist and a former member of the Englewood City (louncil, said in the Bngen Record on tr)ecember 9, L997 , "Russell was a gem. F{e was unique. What Martin Luther King was doing nationally Russell Mojor was doing locally." In our conversations about the problems of the African-American community in Englewood, Russell was an optimist and believed that African-Americans and white Americans would cventually understand one another and learn to get along within their different cultures. But we both felt that the road to integration of the public schools and the eventual integration of society would take some time to achieve. In the realm of sports, thoush, there was much for Russell to be hopeful
about.

rtary school" The story of Russell Mnjor is really the story of racial interion in Englewood, New ]ersey. Russell u'as a complex and itive figure) one who made a large difference in the city of

tell you about Little League baseball, which is one activiry that is entirely integrated, where blacks and whites all play together. Even the whole conservative Jewish community, includirg the Orthodox, comes out to play Little League baseball. That should be some lcind of a basic beginning, a foundation, of the integration process. But that is about as far as we have been able to get. Russell believed strongly that Afro-American students rnust work harder than whites in order to compete with other segments of soci.ty. "They've got to give their all and it's a tough road because they start with so many strikes against them. It's not going to come easy to them." I wonder if Russell got his inspiration from a statement by Thurgood Marshall, a prominent advocate of civil rights in the forties and fifties. Following the L954 unanimous decision of the Supreme Court, calling fbr the integration of the public schools in "Brown vs. the
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Board of H,ducati()Il)" 'l'ltttl"tloorl M.u'slrilll, rl llrirrcillirl lrtlv()c:rte for integration, said, "Now this dccision will forcc thc Afi'icrln American people to compete with whites anci wfiitc sc[s6ls, Blacks will have to measure up." True integration still has pst come to the Englewood public schools, but until his dcirtlr Russell worked toward that goal, even though some timc ag() in a low moment he said, "Oh, let the whites go, if they really want to desert the ship." Through all the information I havc been able to gather on the life of Russell Mujor, there is llo doubt in my mind he felt that the bringirg together of AfricanAmericans) whites, Hispanics, and all other peoples woul,C be beneficial to all. Russell was a cheerful man who laughed easily. He was intelligent and honest and spoke his mind freely. Althougl: easygoing in his manner) Russell was not one to compromise; he believed what he believed and went for it. He was a good looker, heavyset but muscular and tall, with a medium-dark complexion, a full, kindly face, and always a twinkle in his eye.
Russell's basic life-long interest was that all children might get a fair shake in education, in sports, and in other areas includitg the arts. f couldn't agree more with Walter Ganz, a former president of the Englewood City Council, when he said that Russell was a man of integrity and a positive force in the community. In addition to these qualities I tiked Russell's zeal, and I looked to him for leadership in those early Englewood struggles. As a friend, Russell would wander up to Ward Two to play touch football with us in the Patch baclcyard. He was as quick and agile on the football field especialty in his younger years as he was light as a feather on the dance floor. During one such game in our yard, when Russell was the only AfricanAmerican present, a police car drove up. A neighbor had reported a rumpus of some kind going on at the Patches. I looked at the policeman in disbelief. The policeman looked at Russell, smiled and said, "F{ow's life, Russelll" The game went on. Russell had numerous friends and was well respected around town.

My tllttrg,lrlct'., Itt'nn\' lt,ll.lt, slrr'nl s('\'('t'.ll yc.tl's irr tlrc Stltrtlt on tltc votcl'l'cg,islt',tliulr tlr=rvc. ( )lr ()tlc ()ecltsitllt whcn she was Ironrc li)l'r.l visit., we lrclpctl lrer'()l'grtttizc a party to which guests we rc askccl to bring crlns of'fixrd and clther items for the poor l)coplc of Mississippi. About two hundred blacks showed up for r hc party, and Russell was there to greet the kids and join in the (.vcning's festivities. Around nine o'clock, three or four police ('rrrs showed up; once again) one of our neighbors had called in ro say there was an invasion happening in the Second Ward. In .rctuality it was a very orderly gathering, and the police had nclthing to do or say but look around and accept our offers of refreshmenr. Although the house was packed wall-to-wall with young people - the only white faces that of my children and a fbw friends - it was clear to the police there would be no trouble at f B 5 Maple Street that night.

BEGII\TNINGS

Ethel and Wilford Major were Russell's parents, both Caribbean-born, Ethel in a Spanish province of ]amaica and
Wilford in the Bahamas, in a place called Aleuffa at Toplin Bay. Ethel immigrated to Canada and stayed awhile, then went on ro New York City where she met Wilford. Wilford had immigrated ro the lJnited States sometime earlier and had made his way to the great city, where the patterns of ethnicity crossed
and crisscrossed.

Ethel and Wilford moved to Englewood in 1915, where they produced three sons: F{oward, who lives in Englewood, Reggie, who is somewhere in California, and Russell. Russell said his mother worked in factories, also as a maid or at whatever jobs came along that brought in money for the family. Of
his father, Russell said: My father worked for a copper company as a smelter operator; he was a hard worker. A smelter's a big furnace for meltirg down all kinds of junk to get at the copper old cufflinks, tie clips, all kinds of second-hand material that would have cop-

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l)o'irl it. LJsurally they used raw marerial but fell back on seconcl-hand stuff when it was slow. I{e worked for the Force Dodger Company, a notorious name in the copper field, where they used mobsters to break up strikes when i6. workers took over. He retired with that company. Pamela, Russell's daughter, told me about the influence on Russell of his mother Ethel, a resourceful as well as forceful woman: My grandmother Ethel was very interested in culture and history. She took Russell to speech competitions, to libraries and museums and other cultural institutions. And that really helped to shape my father in terms of his tremendous respecr for women. I have met few men who believed that women could, in fact, do, think, write, create) run - do whatever as my father did. F{e taught me how to play football. F{e encouraged me to do and be whatever it was that r wanted and never set limitations on me; he had the same effect on my friends. Most of my female friends looked upon him as a father and called him Dad. r cannot think of any major evenr that I participated in that Russell didn't artend, wherher r was performing in a play' singing in a choir or cheerleading; he was always there. According to Pamela, Russell's father believed that responsibility was a k.y element in the shaping of characrer, which meant always paylng one's bills and keeping one,s word. My father told me a story about his father that made a big impression on him. Wilford and Ethel had asizable morrgage on their first house in Englewood, which they had bought in the forties. The person who held the morrgage would stand out in front and stare at the house for lonf jeriods of rime. After this had happened a few times (Wilfora amays made his payments on time), he asked the man why he was doing rhis. The mortgager replied, "f don't think you are going to continue to meet the monthly payments as you are a Negro.,, Wilford was incensed ancl toldRussell, a young boy ar the rime, to put on his coat- Together they walked Urisruy down across town to the owner's house. They paid off the .rriir. mortg?ge ,

I think this made him understand, although my father's never been money-hun gry, the importance of beitg responsible, saving money, and being prepared fbr whatever it is you need to do to make your point with it. For both of Russell's parents, the priorities were hard work, church and family, and these were what drove them and formed the lives of their three sons. And Russell carried this ethic forward into his own family. In Pamela's words again: So even though you would have to call him a force in the ciry and the county, maybe even the state, because of the influence he had on some of the bills and laws that were passed, he still was a family man. FIe still managed to do things that fathers need to do with their children. He helped to shape the school system, but he also taught me how to tell if you are getting the best bargain on this size versus that size of corn flakes. F{e taught me how to make applesauce, and he cooked as well as he taught. I've just said this to one person (I didn't always believe it but I do now): his real concern was for how my mother and I felt about him. F{e had friends and was dedicated to them, and certainly had a lot of great acquaintances and associations. But above all he was concerned with how Janice Major and Pamela Major felt, and after that it didn't matter, and I think that's what helped him to be as effective as he was. Because he didn't have to compromise he didn't have to live with anybody else, he lived with us. Russell Cameron Major was born during the l)epression, on August 28, L932, in New York City. There he attended public schools until his fifteenth year, when he moved to Englewood with his parents and entered Dwight Morrow High School as a freshman. I{ere he played football and was an expert wrestler; he graduated four years later. In reminiscing about his early life with his parents, Russell told me: We lived a fairly comfortable life, and you have to understand, ns we reflect back on it now, about the intense poverty of blacks in America during the thirties, forties and fifties. As a lower middle-class family of that era) we could not identift with much of this; we just never experienced not knowing where the
and that was the end of that.

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next meal was coming from. f cannot think of anything I was not able to do when I was a kid. If it called for money, my family was able to afford it. We went to summer camps, we played baseball and football, and we went on vacations. Russell grew up in Englewood at a time when de facto segregation existed: African-Americans and whites attended separate neighborhood schools. He spent the rest of his life as a champion of integration; he knew that bringirg together kids of all races) creeds and religions would enrich their lives from early youth on. Russell's life was marked by extraordinary dedication to helping lcids advance academically and participate in sports, all on an integrated basis. FIe was successful at least on the sporting side, where there was no segregation on the baseball or fbotball field. F{ere is Russell again, discoursing on one of his favorite subjects: Kids are kids, and during my tirne at l)wight Morrow High School there was far less friction among the kids than among parents. The kids started school with certain ideas they'd learned from their parents, but after they'd been there awhile they all got on perfectly well with each other, and I think it's pretty much the same story today. I had no trouble mixing with white kids. We were friends, and I still see a number of them today, particularly at our reunions every five years. Again I say it is the adults who set the tone; the way the white parents treated the Afro-American kids did not help to produce a positive attitude in their children) or in the Afro-Americans. If you take a bunch of children and put them together, all nationalities, they won't think about what color they are. They will play and have fur, and friendships will come out of that, as they have for me. ft's just such fun to meet them on the street. But the parents, oh my. One of Russell's good friends, perhaps his best friend) was Alan Sklar, a classmate at Dwight Morrow who now lives in Paramus, New ]ersey. Years ago Alan told me of his great respect for Russell as a person, as well as for his views on integration and his work with children. Alan, a white man in his late sixties, told me recently on the phone that Russell was a

man of the highest integrity who fought for his beliefs. "Rtlssell was my moral compass. He was a man I looked up to, a man who was decent and honest and a wonderful friend to me. F{is

influence on my life was great and still is." FIe added that Russell had a lively sense of humor and was able to laugh at hirnself, even when it was difficult to do so. Russell attended Allen College in South Carolina, an allblack college where most African-American athletes went in the forties and fifties. Russell played football, some basketball and softball (probably to stay in shape for football), and he wrestled and swam. As far as baseball was concerned, I couldn't hit a curve ball. I loved basketball but couldn't shoot. I was just good at football and so I put rnost of my effort into that game. I had the speed so it was a natural for me. Looking back on the two years I played football at Allen College, the garne was my main motive for going to school. I really wasn't getting much out of the academic side. It was f95f or '52, and if you looked around to see how many AfroAmericans had good jobs based on education, there wasn't any reason to push your academic life. I think that was a psychological factor. I thought it was fun to learn and to study but there just wasn't much you could do with it. ft was more fun to plry football. When I talk to my daughter abor-rt those days when I ptayed football, she can't believe I ever had that kind of energy. By the time Pamela was growing up, I reaLrzed football wasn't the all-important thing, and it was time to settle down and accomplish some studying. When Russell joined the U.S. Army he encountered some of the same gllys on the football field he had played against in college, the only difference being that now the group was desegregated. "You played against any and everybody." He tried out once for an NFL league team but wasn't competitive enough to be successful. Some of the players I met were absolutely insane they would put their hands through windows or their heads through glass, nothirg fazed them. When they got out on the football

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field, heavens to Betseg they could take any kind of abuse or beating. In f953 I ran across Rosie Brown who played for the Nf Jets. I{e told me he was making $12,000 a year and I told him he was crazy. That was big money then, tremendous money. (Now a guy with his talent would be making two or three million a year. ) Now poor Rosie is living in Virginia, and he can barely walk. You see the price you pay for playing football.

was the home

his sudden death in 193f . In the twenties Englewood was prospering, as was the whole country. In the words of Norman
Davis:

of one of his Amherst College classmates) a man named Dwight Morrow, for whom the high school that Russell Major attended is named. Dwight Morrow, father of Anne Morrow Lindbergh, was Ambassador to Mexico at one time, a U.S. Senator, and also a possible presidential candidate before

Concerning the wage business in professional ball, Russell didn't believe that players are overpaid. "Nobody pays to see a manager or an owner. You pay to see the players play ball. But it does bother me when a guy who doesn't produce is paid several million dollars a year; he bats 2L0 and he still gets his
salary.
tt

Russetl felt that ]ackie Robinson's impact on the whole athletic scene had been tremendous. When he was finally accepted

into the big leagues and played for the Brooldyn Dodgers, thc barrier came down; from then on the blacks gradually filtercd into the big leagues of baseball, basketball and football. "Jackic was a wonder, a brave and courageous guy who took a tremeltdous amount of abuse when he first ran out on the playing field, but that did it for the blacks and the sports situatiolt would never be the same." ENGLEWOOD THEN AND NOW: A BRTEF HISTORY
On March 17, L999, Englewood celebrated its centennial, The following historical notes were obtained from a presentiltion by Norman Davis, a former member of the Englewootl Board of Education. Europeans first moved into the Flackensack Incliirn Territory in the early I600s. The area largely consisted of fanllers until the mid-1800s when the Northern Railroad arrivccl utt the scene, after which the population increased consideralrly, By IB99 it had reached 6,000, and the city was incorporafcrl, In 1924, when Calvin Coolidge was president, Englewoorl

Wealthy p.ople) many associated with Wall Street businessprominent architects and built large homes in the First lnd Second Wards, often on large lots. Other people, largely African-Americans in the Fourth Ward and various immigrant groups in the Third Ward, moved into smaller homes to provide goods and services for them. By L924, Englewood's population had more than doubled in a quarter century and about I0% were African-American. Erglewood's exceptionally wide range of wealth levels was already evidenr. The George Washington Bridge was opened in t93I, but its effect on the city was delayed by the Depression, when many people were jobless, homeless, and destitute. During the housing boom of the late thirties and forties, high-rise construction was banned, but single-family homes and garden apartments llourished, and large estates were subdivided with the arrival of rrriddle-class families. But by 1945 housing was substandard in t he African-American Fourth \\hrd. Norman Davis continued: [It] had become an increasingly embarrassing blot on the ( )ity. As time went on, the people who lived in the poorer areas of the City would become more politically active, bur lrnglewood had yet to face fully the social and political turmoil t hat would erupt in the 1960s. On the surface all seemed well, t hanks to post-war prosperiry, broadly though unequally discs, hired

tr-ibuted.

Population peaked at around 26,000 by 1960, when little utrdeveloped land remained. The Englewood of then and now lrreaks down into four wards. Ward One on the northeast hillIop section of the ciry contains many large and prestigious lr<lmes with spacious grounds, although a segment of the ward

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embraces some middle-class homes. The residents are largely white. Ward Two to the northwest, still on the hilltop and across Englewood's main street) contains a sizable Jewish Orthodox population and a growing number of Hispanics. There are some large houses inhabited by whites and two middle-class African-American complexes. Ward Three, down the hill to the southeast, is the most integrated part of the city, with African-Americans, whites, and Hispanics in residence. Subdivisions are fifties-style, and houses are generally more modest. This is the home of Dwight Morrow Fligh School. Across the main street (Palisade Avenue) to the southwest is Ward Four, which has been overwhelmingly African-American for many decades. Each ward has its own elementary school that remains largely unintegrated. At Dwight Morrow High School, thirty-three percent of the students are Hispanic a sharp rise in the recent decade; African-Americans dominate,

comprising approximately sixty-five percert, and there is a srnattering of whites. Norman l)avis again: Englewood today has unique features that differentiate it from its Bergen County neighbors. As has been true during most of its historg the city has an exceptionally wide range of wealth levels, from multi-millionaires to welfare clients. Its population is more diverse than that of most suburbs, ethnically and religiously as well as economically. Its proximity to New York City is a major attraction, but Englewood has a distinctive character of its own that has continued to attract talented people with a wide variety of backgrounds, includirg well-known artists, actors, musicians (the jazz artist Dizzy Gillespie), TV
personalities and sports figures.

TI{E RADICAL YEARS

Russell married ]anice in L957 . ]anice ) a native of Englewood, lost her mother at age two. F{er father remarried and he and his wife live happily in Teaneck, a neighboring suburb, after fifty-nvo years of marriage. Pamela said of Janice's

stcpmotherr "She is a real cutie." When Russell carne back to lrnglewood after the Korean War, he eventually went to work lirr the Lowe Paper Company, where he was employed until 1983. He was a blue-collar worker, a machinist, and a union nrAn. Russell described to me what first drew him into politics .rfter his army discharge in the fifties. F{e had respect for learnirrg and books and felt the McCarthy 'or,vitch hunt" was a seri( )us threat to our democracy. I came home just before I was discharged from the service, .rnd a teacher at St. Cecilia fthe Catholic school in Englewood] by the name of Cartwright told me that some of his kids were :rnxious to see me. The story was that certain books in the high srhool were thought to be unsuitable for the children. Not only were books being removed but also some of the teachers wcre in trouble. There was no union at the time, and the school could do just about anythirg it wanted. During that Iirne a lot of,teachers were lost to the Englewood public school system. It was the McCarthy era) a strange and frightening time in our country. I had a problem because I was never afraid of t'r)rrlrilunism; I thought it was a system that never worked, a ioke actually" I believe that pro-McCarthy people did terrible tlrings to Englewood. Marie Mcloughlin was going to speak at the First Municipal Chariry Church, until someone decided she \vils a communist. The church elders said, ulf she comes here, )/ou will not have church next week. " In the fifties and early sixties, the integration of Englewood prrblic schools became increasingly controversial in the comrrruniry, and Russell Mnjor was in the forefront of the integrati<rn movement. In 1962 he organuaed the "Freedom Schools" t() protest the Bclard of Education's refusal to integrate the allrvhite Cleveland and all-black Lincoln schools. After trying sitirrs and demonstrations without success, Russell called on part'rrts to take their kids out of class and start "FreeCom Schools" irr their own homes. The Bergen RecorC of l)ecernber L997 (luotes Russell from an earlier issue of the paper: That was a hard struggle. I still don't like to think about it. ll'you understand that the [U.S. Supreme Court] in L954 had

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ordered that schclols be desegregated [itt the famous Brown vs. Board of Education decision that struck down the separatcbur-equal doctrine], and that in L962, in a Northern liberal community, it had not been done) one would imagine therc was a little frustration behind it. In f961 Harry Stearns, Superintendent of Schools in Englewood) was authortzed by the Board of Education to do a depth study of school enrollment, which was completed with assistance from able consultants in the fields of political science, sociology, and human relations. The study included projectecl school enrollment, as well as dctailitg the variables that were unpredictable. Most importantly it recommended desegregation of the Englewood school system and contained various proposals fbr dealing with racial imbalance. Soon after it came out, the State Commissioner of Education in New ]ersey ordered the integration of the Cleveland and Lincoln elementary schools. Russell believed the Stearns report had accurately documented the current state of affairs in the schools, as well as the future trends. He worked hard over many years tcr achieve the elusive goal of integration in the schools, which has not yet been successfully reahzed in Englewood. The December LggT artrcle in the Bergen Record, continues Russell's story: The coalition of tiberal whites and blacks that had integrat-ed Cleveland School next went after the Republican Party, which dominated politics in the city. Sandy Greenberg, a former Englewood mayor) remembered Mr. Mnjor hitting the city stre ets to muster political power among the disenfranchised. "There was a railroad trestle in town where all the homeless and the burns used to hang outr" Greenberg said" "Artd Russell went down there and registered them all to vote. There was never anyone like him, before or since." By L97L I)emocrats had taken over cicy government and built the foundation of thc liberal stronghold that today is the 9th Congressional District. Russell told rne with pride, "You know, there's been nothi*g but l)emocratic mayors in Englewood since L97L, and thc Fourth Ward has been l)emocratic since about L946." I believc

that ]ohn Reich was the first Democratic councilrnan from the Fourth Ward. Russell again: "As for the Third Ward, ir was largely composed of city workers, who had always voted Republican, I suppose because the town was Republican. But
the years went along, by the sixties the city government wasL967 they elected a l)emocratic councilman. This was the first year that the Democrats controlled the city of Englewood over the course of sixty-two years." But according to Russell, there was a lot of "tough sledding" in the sixties. Today the leadership is spineless in comparison: The trouble today is that the leadership in Englewood does not have enough sweat. They think that things have always been just like they are now, but we know only roo well what a tough road faced us in the sixties. ft's hard to believe you are automatically elected now when you run for one of the offices as a l)emocrat, if you think back to the time when Republicans dominated the town. f haven't met anyone in years who even owns up to being a Republican. But I want to say very clearly this does not make for good government, when a one-party system takes over the city whether it be Republicans, who were in control for more than sixty years, or now the Democrats, who have been in control for several decades. Russell often came back to the subject of those friendships he made in the sixties, whites and African-Americans alike, which have persisted up to the present time. F{e had kind words to say about Vincent Tibbr, who was l)emocratic councilman from the Fourth Ward during the sixties , &t the time that f was councilman-at-large. Tibbs was very much involved with civil rights in Englewood and never failed to remind us that his grandfather had been a slave. Russell referred often ro the remarkable group of "white radicals" that included Suzie Gamrin, Sandy Greenberg, Fran and Herb Honig, O'Brien Boldt, Suzanne Platoff, Anne and Herb Stone people who just happened to be in the right place ar rhe right rime. I don't know how that was. You will often find a handful of activists most places, but we had a barrel full of, activists
as

n't paylng enough attention to the Third Ward, so in

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people who wanted to do something. I don't know if yotr'll ever see that again. In every war you'll have groups of peclplc you can depend on to come out and fight if there is a gootl cause. People in Englewood didn't reahze they couldn't cltl sruff so they just went ahead and did it. If you've got a mintl like F{erb Stone, you are probably going to win the electiolt. F{is job was to win and this was very important. I never was quite sure what he thought about all the issues and so on br,rt that didn't matter. Herb wanted to win and that's what mattered.

Ilyron Baer just went out and did it and it's been a big thing for Englewood and the poor people, because now they have
low-cost housing. Byron said similarly of Russell: "Even when he wasn't president [of the school board], he dominated the board. If he asked for the board to do something, he got it done." Pamela said the two of them were a dynamic team. "They really worked some incredible things together." Byron Baer came to the fore in many situations in the sixties, often on behalf of the oppressed African-Americans living in the Fourth Ward of Englewood. He was a key to the buildit g of afficrdable housing for them and other minorities. FIe was one of the leaders in civil rights and school integration. It was Byron who appeared at a City Hall hearing sometime in the sixties and deposited a heap of garbage on the floor before presiditg Republican Councilman Tichnor - this in protest to Ciry Hall's failure to collect the garbage in the Fourth Ward largely populated. by African-Americans. Byron has served in the New ]ersey state legislature for many years and the bills he continues to draft often becorne law. The sixties were a tirne of great change in Englewood, and in the years that followed many of these changes became endurittg realities. The building of low-cost housing was one of these. The city's services, which had never brought comfort to the poorer sections of Englewood, were greatly improved, and the Fourth V\Iard was given equal treatment with the other wards. Swimming pools were built, and integrated swimmirg becarne a fact of life. Back in the early days of the centurg the swimmitg pool in the Engle Street School had been cemented over to avoid any integration of races in the pool. During the sixties integrated swimmirg pools were built at the junior high and in McKay Park in the Fourth Ward. Janet Stearns, a Republican living in the Second V/ard, was enthusiastic in her financial support of causes such as the swimmitrg pools, nr effort in which I joined her. Enthusiasm and optimism ran high in those years but started to fade in the next decade. "I think what happened is that

Herb Stone had this to say about Russell in a letter to mc: Russell was one of the rnost politically astute members of our group. F{e loved to talk about the political dynamics of thc issues, how to most realistically deal with the Republicans and our own wild bunch. I think the conversations I had with Russell and ]ack Heller, many in our dining room or kitchen, were some of the most stimulating and instructive "think sessions" of the sixties , at least for me. Russell was a pragmatist, a nuts and bolts guy who knew what was going on not only in the Fourth Ward but also throughout the city. Russell was a wonderful person, bright, arnusing, passionate. F{e had wide inrerests and could talk intelligently about almost any subject really a delightful cornpanion. Anne and our two girls thoroughly enjoyed his visits. I asked Russell what he thought were the big achievements of the sixties in Englewood. F{is answer was immediate: "schools and housing, no t"wo ways about it. Rennember the great Englewood housing corporation that is now the Rock Creek Trumble Parkl That's a lot of housing." When I asked him who he thought were the heroes of the sixties, the name that came forward was Byron Baer, who was responsible for much of the housing built during the sixties and later. He was a man who would go out there and do what had to be done. There was no book, no manual - you'd just go out and do it. If somebody printed a book on revolution and you read it and followed everything they said you'd probably fail.

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during the sixties and early sevcnties many of us assurned that since everything was off to good start, we could get on with ^ our personal lives, but it just didn't work out that way." F{owever) Russell did have some good things to say about the
seventies and eighties:

went up in the middle of the seventies but people were diversifting. Byron Baer, who was the main instigator and fulfiller of the housios, decided to run for the legislature. We had an interesting council in the late seventies and early eighties, with Sandy Greenberg as mayor and three ladies on the council. That was a good time on the council: these were forward looking ladies and we had a dynamic mayor. After that it was preffy downhill; the spirit of the movement toward integration and the excitement of the sixties were
gone.

I think more housing

ON TI.[E BOARD OF EDUCATION

Russell C. Major served for six three-year terms on the Englewood Board of Education, having been appointed and reappointed by four diffbrent liberal-minded mayors from L975 ro L993. I{orrnan Davis from the First Ward wrote about Russell for the centennial ceremony: Mujor \^/as probably the single most influential member of Englewood's Board of Education during rnost of his tenure. Much of his inftruence was exercised out of the public eye, in such important areas as personnel activities, decisions) labor negotiations and budgetary matters. His political know-how helped to assure adequate funding for the public schools. He continualty stressed the importance of preparing students for college, and of requiring adequate academic performance before students could participate in sports and other extra-curricular activities. In the December L997 article of the Bergen Record mentioned earlier, Russell is quoted as having said, "The competition is not berween Englewood or Tenafly or Ridgewood [neighboring suburbr]. The competition is against France or

wherever. Our kids have got to compete and get along. lSlack F{istory month is not going to do that" Martin l,uther X(ing's birthday is not going to help. You'\re got to get in there and do it." And he felt the best way to achieve this was through firllscale integration. Russell Major was well respected in the cornmuniry. In the I{orth Jerrsey Swburbnnite of }vlry 1981, City Councilman Eugene Skurnick prof rs congratulations to Russell Vlnjor and ]anis Dismus on their reappointrnent [o thc school lroard: "As presidents of the school board in '78 and '80 rcspectively, each has expertly guided our educational system. Thcir leadership has yieldcd improvements that have treen both qualitative, i* terms of the continued public confidence in oLrr schools, and quantitativc as measllred by dramatic improvement in pupil achievement and a sustained high level of college acceptancc"" Pamela didn't rnince words, either, in speaki^g of her father: I think for him being on the Board of Educatiorl was a great responsibility, which he de cided to fulfill to the trest of his ability. F{e took serving on the board, not so much as an honor ) not so rnuch as something to add to his r6sum6, but as sonlething that would give hirn the opportuniry of making the city he loved a great place for children. I hate to rnake it sound as if he was some kind of a fairytale king, but the reality was, h* was intercsted in children" F{e loved the ciry of Englewood, and he wanted people to know that great things could come out of it. Being on the board gave him the opportuniry for that. F{e worked feverishly. F{e read every board packet that came his way, whether two hundred or five hundred pages. Fle did research. He went on educational retreats. I{e wcnt to collventions. F{e checked on new technologg anythi*g that could benefit the children of Englewood. He was going to try ancl find out if it was a fit for the cicy, and if so, h* \ /as going to prescnt it as such to the board. One difficulry for Russell was sornehclw to reconcile being a blue-collar worker and union man with being a member of the school board. In Pamela's words, "The union is srrpposed to fight for more, and the hest, and security, safery, and coffl-

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fort for their union members. That's their jtb. And the board is supposed to want a good school district at any price, and thatos their jrb." Russell encouraged Pamela to belong to the union by helping her understand how teachers had fared historically without unions and without tenure. I know that he believed very strongly in both, even if he knew that sometimes tenured teachers didn't measure up. Russell felt that without tenure or union, the board could hire and fire teachers at will a situation that was bad for morale and ultimately for the
quality of teaching. But as president of the Board of E,ducation, he had ro try and find the middle ground that would satisft both sides, and I believe he did well by all parties. I spoke with Fran and F{erb Honig of Englewood, members of the old guard who have been active in Englewood politics and ardently interested in matters of education and the integration of schools. Both served on the Board of Education during Russell's years as president, and they regarded him highly as a leader in the civil rights movement, &s well as in his quest to improve the educational standards of the Englewood public schools. Herb, r,vho was defeated in the sixties when he ran for Second Ward councilman) was victorious at age seventy-five and served out his term as councilman. He knew Russell well and considered him to be a man of integrity and strong will, but being human he made mistakes. F{erb recalled one particular African- American principal whom Russell wanted to promote to superintendent; the man was not a success as principal and only lasted two years, after which the Board of Education had to b.ty off his tenure contract. According to Fran Honig, Russell sometimes pushed too hard on certain questions but also knew when he had made a mistake and would act accordingly. Byron Baer, too, said of him , "If a principal or superintendent advocated by Russell took the job and it didn't pan out, Russell made sure the person was not retained, because that would be a tragedy to the school system." Byron Baer went on to speak of the Board of Education in general terms: To be really effective, the Board of Education should bc

hiring the best superintendent they can find and making sure that person has all the resources and money and any other supports needed to do the job. But for board members to get involved in the day-to-duy kind of operation, which has been going on for years, that's all wrong. They don't know what they're doing. ft's like giving a passenger control of an ocean liner. Russell Major understood this and he did his best to find the most qualified people for the job. Bernice Kenney, a long-time resident of the Fourth Ward and a delegate to the Democratic national convention in L972, had similar strong views about who was or wasn't appointed to the Board of Education, as well as feelings about Russell. I spoke with her recendy' There were good people appointed to the Board of Education, people with doctorates in education, who were not reappointed. Well, if I have a leak in my apartment, I need a plumber, rightl We need the people with the training. Dr. Leroy McClaren [principal of Lincoln school in the Fourth \Ahrd] was one of the first black teachers in the public schools, a graduate of Lincoln College in Pennsylvania, with a doctorate in education. I didn't care what color they were, but I felt that people who had a degree in education would be most sensitive to the problems. And Russell Major felt the same way. Harry Passow, at the time one of the country's top people in the field of education, was another member of the board who was not reappointed. And the current mayor, Donald Aransor, who generally appoints his cronies to the Board of Education, did not reappoint Russell. Bernice said to me: "I think that Russell gave his all to the Board of Education, which reminds me of a lady at his memorial service, who said that Itussell would come to Board of Education meetings having read a fifty-page document line by line. He was truly dedicatcd.
tt

Moving into the eighties, Bernice said that you had some prettf "crazy" I)emocrats on the board, who lacked the fiery .spirit of those earlier Democrats so dedicated to improving c:clucation in Englewood. These were unqualifieci appoint-

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ments. "People nowadays seem to be losing interest or they never did have it. They so rarely come up with any new and progressive ideas." Russell said much the same thing during our interview: Personally I don't think there is the same selflessness in the people who serve now as opposed to those years ago. At least I haven't found it. When I talk to board members now, it's all about what -I can do or am going to do; you don't talk in terms of a town or a movement anymore. Everybody acts as though they are independent agents. People just don't think the way they used to, back in the sixties and earlier. And many of us who were active are now laid back; we just do not have the energy to keep going. Russell Mnjor's love for children extended beyond serving on the Board of Education. He cared about kids as individuals and spent a lot of time coachirg a number of teams over the years, especially kids age nine through middle school. But he believed that the importance of the child's academic record equaled, or even surpassed, that of any sporting endeavor; when students reahzed that Coach Major was interested in their academic records as well, and would be coming to class to see for himself, they began to put more attention to their studies. Pamela speaking: He really was interested. Many coaches are interested in athletic ability but are not interested in the whole child. I've seen my father take some of his best players out of a game if their grades were not up to snuff- or if it looked as if theywere injured, rather than push the child and possibly have a life-long injury. It was not that Russell wasn't extremely competitive, but the whole child was important to him. I saw him make tough decisions; if a ldd didn't come to practice or came late to a game - and it could be a star player - he would have to sit out

for the boys'. He has influenced hundreds, possibly thousands, of children, because he coached midget league football for over twenty years, as rn'ell as supas

for the girls'sports

porting the girls' teams. Russell felt it was his obligation to talk with any child who needed him. Continuing, Pamela said: I have friends who tell me now just how much they had shared their thoughts with Russell and come to him for advice. I would have parties, and the people who wanted to dance would be downstairs. Then there was the other set of people, some of them quite young, who would come upstairs and literally sit at my parents' feet and just tallc to them. I never minded it because I knew my parents always had time for me when

needed them.

INTEGRATION THROUGI{ REGIONALTZffiT ON

There have been a number of approaches introduced in Englewood to address the question of integration. The idea of bussing children from one neighborhood to another, so as to integrate the elementary schools in the various wards, was not met with much enthusiasm. There has been some success in the integration of neighborhoods, although progress is slow. More African-Americans and Hispanics have moved into the Third Ward, with some whites and Hispanics infiltrating the Fourth, and there are two African-American housing complexes in the otherwise nearly all-white Second Ward. At Dwight Morrow F{igh School, the student body is largely African-American, Hispanic, and Asian. As a school board member, Russell did not back off from his pursuit of integration in the schools, in spite of the fact that white families were sending more and more of their children to private schools the famous "white flight." He turned to the idea of regionahzatioo, through which several communities would band together, and in 1985 helped the Englewood Central Parent Teacher OrganLzation (ECPTO) draft a propos-

the game" He was very much a supporter of girls' basketball and went to more of their games than I did. F{e felt they should have cheerleaders and knew all the players on the team. He just believed that you should be willing to budget the same amount

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al for a seven-town district aimed at achieving racial balance itl Dwight Morrow High School. My plan is to bring in seven communities Englewood, Englewood Cliffs, Tenaflg Leonia, Ridgefield, Edgewater, attrl Alpine. You would end up with seven thousand kids, from prc kindergarten through grade twelve, in a regional district, witlt a minority population of about thirty percent, most of whiclr would come from Englewood. (If you include Hispanics ancl Asians, the number is higher. ) The proposal envisioned two high schools Tenafly ancl Dwight Morrow - each with a racially diverse student population that would vary no more than ten percent from the com-

position of the region's total high school population. It was hoped the seven districts would voluntarily agree to regionalizirg their grades K- L2, but if they did not, that the state would order them to do so. Various special programs would be available to students through all grades, such as a Dual Languagc Program offering Korean and |apanese as well as the existing English and Spanish. The curriculum would include courses in Russixn, Greek, Renaissance Art, cultural studies, ethics and civic responsibility, and courses preparing students for twentyfirst century technology. The proposal emphasized that it was not moving children about solely for racial balanc, but also tcr "create a larger and more effective model to deliver quality
integrated education. " The plan for regionahzation was in response to Tenafly's (a neighboring white suburb) attempt to woo students in Englewood Cliffs away from Englewood, after the former had agreed to send white students to Dwight Morrow. But Russell Mrjor's proposal generated so much intense opposition outside Englewood that the State Board of Education was reluctant to act on it, and the matter is still pending - as well as a legal battle in which Englewood Cliffs sued Englewood so as to officially sever all ties benveen the two towns. Of course the suit has further strained relations benveen Englewood and the surroundirg white suburbs. In January of L996 a task force consisting of thirteen

llergen County educators and administrators was created to scek a voluntary alternative to forced" region ahzation. They came up with the so-called magnet school concept, its main tcnet being to increase the school's excellence so as to attract a nrore diverse student population. This would be accomplished by linking the school with at least one university and offering college courses for credit as early as the tenth grade. Included in possible magnet programs were a school-to-work program .rnd theme schools in technologg fine arts, health, and legal rrnd commercial studies. ]ack Drakeford, outgoirg president of the Englewood lloard of Education, supported the task force plan. F:[e believed tlrat integration was not the only important factclr. uIf we're competing against private schools we need something better" l)on't tell me people will come because they want to integrate. 'l-he concept is to make the schools so good that if people don't come... they are the losers" (Suburhnnite, Mry 15, L996). Nevertheless, the Board of Education voted five to two to conrinue the legal batde to end racial imbalance through regionali'zatton with neighboring districts. They felt that a voluntary rcmedy as outlined by the task force would not guarantee integrated schools, as had been mandated by the U.S. Constitution. 'fhe board stipulated they would accept the plan only if it contained specific racial benchmarks i.e. if in four years the school's population did not consist of thirty percent non-Latino whites, the state could order forced regionahzation. Some African-Americans opposed regio nalization because rhey felt it implied there was somethirg wrong with a majority African-American school. The head of Bergen Counfy NAACB irr a comment that did not reflect the organtzatton's viewpoint, stated: "Equal and quality education in all schools, regardless of racial balances) should be our goal." But Russell stood firm ;rnd fought to the end of his life for regionahzation, which he bclieved was the only way to reintegrate Dwight Morrow High School.

I think the regional idea is working slowly but surely. Llnfortunately I've been sick for a year, but I get calls from

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people now and then trying to keep rne abreast of what's goirrg or, ald while there is not as much news in the newspaper il,$ there used to be, people are still working on this question. Thlt is the ultirnate answer and not just for Englewood. I mean wt: arc in a state rvith 611 school districts, and the state has alreacly looked into it and has planned to cut these down. But it's all political and has norhing to do with education. They want to make changes) and they will make the changes, but because it's political it will take a while. First they're going to try and starve the districts into getting together by takitg the money away. Towards the end of my interview, I asked Russell to give nle his ideas on what has happened with the schools in Englewood; perhaps he could speak about some specifics, as well as about

the general trends: Well, I tell 'yu, the biggest thing for the schools was thc change in the Second Ward. By the middle of the eighties, there was nobody from the Second Ward enrolled in the public schools. It was incredibte; there were not enough kids ttr have a third and fifrh grade in the Roosevelt School. And thc third and fifrh grades were short in the Cleveland School. Thc bclard did a study on comtrinirg the schools; you end up with a L-2-3-4 configuration where all kids would go to all schools. There was no way to duck that. If you were in the first gradc you would go to the first grade school, and so forth. I talk ro people now who will argue about our eighth gradc being in the high school; they think the kids are too yollng. But our of forry high schools in Bergen County fburteen have sevenrh graders in the high school - because there is just too much capaciry and not enough kids. "So, where Cid they gol" I asked him. "White flight was a major factor) wasn't itlo'At least I thought so during my residence in Englewood in the sixties. Perhaps those of us whct were concerned with integration looked for the easiest answers, Well, there was not as much white flight as people think, if you look at suburbia as a whole (forget Englewood). Whitc birthing numbers) they're just different. If you have the samc number of white families as African-American, the birth rate is

going to be higher for the African-Americans. At one time, Englewood Cliffs had zero growth, when the number of people dying cancelled out all the people being born. It happens. You have to look at a lot more than race; it's a lot of things combining to create certain circumstances. Population centers move and change. For examPle, Paramus used to be a town full of farms) now it's a town full of slroppirg centers. I'll bet when you folks moved here in L96L, they started putting the shoppirg centers there. But Paramus has closed seven schools in the last five years because of loss of population. First you had the boom and then yoll had the loss of population. In Englewood right now I would say that between fotty and forty-nine percent of the community is still white. It's not that we don't have whites moving into the city. They're movirg in all the time, but there aren't many school-age kids, whereas there are a lot of African-American lcids living in Englewood and moving into Englewood. In the Second Ward there are lots of kids who don't go to public schools. Only F'orrest Avenue apartments have some African-American kids who attend the public schools. And the rest is the Jewish population, Orthodox Jews. The ]ewish population has its own school, Moriah. Pamela spoke to me about this: Because of the type of population Englewood has, there's no getting around a certain percentage of people taking their children and putting them in private schools, always. The orthodox ]ewish population of Englewood and its surrounding communities are not putting their children in the public schools. It's never going to happen! It has nothing to do with race. It has everything to do with religious belief. No, you can't combat that. You can't consider that as white flight, because if they lived in an all-white community, their kids would not go into this public school system. Vllhen Pamela graduated from Dwight Morrow in L982, it was forty-five percent black and fotty-five percent white. She said that by the late I9B0s, the percentage of whites to people

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of color had changed dramatically. It was very evident that minority populations were ln tlte' majority. More Columbians, more Dominican Republicalts, and East Indiars, Pacific trslanders and Asians started coming, in. And that's not a bad thing. The bad thing is making the decision that a school district is inferior based on one set of tcst scores. But that is what's done. And it's very sad and disheart ening to see a return of this kind of racism and segregation. I f' we ever needed to get along, this is the time. In the years of Russell's service, the SAT (college entrancc exarn) scores went down, probably for a nurnber of reasons. Certainly one was the fact that the lack of whites in the school system left a preponderance of African-Americans ancl I{ispanics who perhaps had not taken school seriously enough "had not measured upr" as Russell would say. But Pamela remains optimistic. As a teacher in the public school system, shc believes that in the years to come the Englewood public schools will come out somewhere near the top in Bergen
County.

s() alive

that it doesn't matter what we do.

Pamela said that the SAT scores were higher then than they

During my time in the high school, we had National Merit scholars and we had a nice percentage of graduates going to Flarvard and ltale, Brown and Columbia. And there were African-Americans who were getting 1500s on their SAT's. I think at one time there were eighry-five percent or more going on to four-year institutions. That's well beyond the national average, which at the time was somewhere between seventy and
sevenry-five percent.

I think what bothered my father was that after all the work
he had done in the early sixties (along with a number of other people, includirg Byron Baer, Bernice Kenney, and Walter Toombr, a Freedom School student) to develop a quality product - in terms of students who were getting accepted into these ivy league institutions - the parents still insisted we had an infe rior educational system. Durirg the court case fregarding Russell's plan for regio nahzation]) some of the recruiters from Yale came down to testify and talk about how they looked for Dwight Morrow applicants. The racism that's in these people is

irrc now, but that it was "certainly not the only thing that got us into a Yale or a Flarvard or an MIT." Russell echoed some of her sentiments, in speaking of Dwight Morrow in the rr ineties: Dwight Morrow stands with some of the best of all the schools in New ]ersey. The proLrlem is, and nobody wants to .rdrnit it, as Americans we do not believe that any school where the minority is in the majority could produce a good education. We just don't believe that, black or white, so you're fighting rrgainst that particular thing all the time. The last four or five years the scores coming out of the Englewood school system have not been the best in Bergen County. In fact they have been the worst. So it doesn't matter how you compare with the rest of the state. We live in Bergen County and that's where your numbers have to come from. I was looking at a real estate book the other dny from Virginia and they publish the SAT scores from every community. The scores in Virginia barely cqual ours. But if you don't have the f400s, the 1200 and t 300 SAT's, if you don't produce these kids in Bergen County, you're in trouble. The more affluent a community is, the more that snob appeal is important. Russell said to me he will never be totally satisfied with Dwight Morrow, or any other school, because education is too important. F{or,vever, he reckoned that the kids coming out of Dwight Morrow could compete with anyone. There are still between seventy and eighty-five percent who go on to college

cvery year. For Russell Mujor, the saddest thing about Englewood in recent years is that there is not the social mix of L976 and earlier. Dwight Morrow now has only about eight or nine hundred kids, as opposed to thirteen hundred when Pamela was there in 1982. Pamela said of her years: "You had people of many races, many ethnicities, working together, applying to the same colleges, goirg to the same prom - learnitg about each other, going on shoppirg trips together. We'd run into different friends at the mall. Yor-r got invited, you saw

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integrated sweet sixteens, because we bonded as a group and it was great." In our conversatiofls, Russell often rnentioned the importance of a diversified population, in that it encouraged

tion that they were tired of getting beat up and were only
st;rnding up for themselves. I said to the superintendent that the real answer is that you ,lon't have Asian gangs; you just have Asians who are refusing lo be taken advantage of. The only thing you have against them is that they are different from your own child and it's sad. As Russell had discovered in his own youth, the answer is t o get the kids interacting with each other. I have been involved in groups that have been slowly but srrrelg without a lot of publicity, getting kids together. Right r"row that's all you can hope for. When the kids get to lcnorv cach other, and the earlier the better, then the fear is not there end they grow more comfortable with people as they become edults. I've just discovered this fairly recently, but quite a few white families are moving into the Fourth Ward, because it's the best deal around, and there is a chance they will send their kids to the public schools. I do hope so. Can you believe it, the house of Vincent Tibbs [forrner councilman from the Fourth Ward] has been sold to a white familyl Some last thoughts from Russell, as he harked back one more time to the sixties and seventies: When I think of all the time and effort that was put out by people during those years, it was all worth it because it does make a difference who is in charge. I think that people like you, Suzie, Sandy Greenberg and the judge's wife, Suzanne Platoff, have all made a great difference in the life I've lived. A lot of kids and adults have been affected regardirg things they will never forget and hopefully it helps them to lead a better life. I think we're all dissatisfied but we should be dissatisfied, because everything didn't go the way we wanted it to go. When you get too lackadaisical because you reahze you can't do everything, you become less effective. I'rn convinced we have made a positive impact that won't be forgotten in the fields of education, housirg, and all the other things that came out of our efforts, such as services to the Fourth Ward, which were far from adequate during the Republican administrations.
1r I

competition. I look at the economy of the country and the way things are going and I think that now more than ever we need desegregation. A boy or girl growing up in a segregated community and attendirg a segregated high school cannot then go out and compete in soci.ty, be it economically or any other way. I think that human nature is such that if I don't know you, I'm going to be a little bit afraid of you. You don't have to do anythirg bad to me for me to come up with bad thoughts about you. And I question that. Ask the guy in Englewood Cliffb, tell me how you raise your kids with no minority experience at all. At college you may run into one or two, and then you want to go into international trade expecting to get along better. I don't believe it because you're not ready for it. At one point in our interview, Russell digressed into a story about the so-called Asian invasion: tlnfortunately or fortunately I was on a committee writing about Tenafly in an attempt to calm the fears about what they saw as an Asian invasion. I said to the Tenafly official that these people are worth more money than you are; they can b.ty and sell you and you're worrying about them being here. I could never understand it, but it's a real fear. It started with a racial incident at Tenafly High School and they didn't know how to resolve it. It just happens that I have good relations with the superintendent and he called and asked me to meet him in a diner. This ticldes me. In Englewood, if you and I were to meet, we'd meet anywhere, rightl But with these people from other communities, you meet in a diner out on Route four. At any rate, I went to the meeting, and he told me there were Asian gangs in the Tenafly schools. It turns out a non-Asian had attacked an Asian kid who was waiting for a bus in the school parking lot. When he ran and hid between the buses) several other Asian kids in the vicinity went after his nonAsian pursuer and roughed him up. Later they said in explana-

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If there's anythirg I've learned, it's don't leave anything to chance" There has to be some better relationship between the blacks, whites, and Hispanics. People just aren't making thc effort. I was in the L963 march, when we all walked with ollr arms around. each other and thought, it's all over) nothing rnore to be done. Not true of course, although it is harder now to discriminate. If only more people would learn from Russell's experience and insight into this issue . I asked him, "And where do we go
from herel" Well, my hope is that the group of politicians we have now that are part of the Democratic Party will reach out to one another. There are two I know who were personal friends before they got into politics one is black, one white who just gravitated towards each other. It's those kinds of people who are the role models. The problem of segregation in the schools has not been solved, and I believe what's missing is
imagination" When I interviewed Bernice l(enney, quoted earlier, I asked her if there was anyone in the black community to follow in Russell's footsteps. She said she didn't think so and added that it's also very hard to find anyone in the white community who is dedicated to the calrse of integration, except for the oldtimers like Sandy and Suzie. Bernice did bring up one promisirg name, that of Marion McI(e nzie, a dynamic young black woman) Jamaican-born, who has been the chairperson of the Central Parent Teacher Organrzation in Englewood (ECPTO); she also runs General Services, a computer business. Soon after my interview with Russell, I met with Marion McKenzre, who explained to me that the Englewood CPTO scrves as an umbrella group for all five public schools and has strongly supported regionaltzation as a means to desegregate the schools. The organrzatron has made a point of keeping abreast of the very complex ten-year court case, and has kept parents in a knowledgeable position in regard to the issues. It operates under the belief that parents must be equal partners in their children's education. Central PTO gives a clear, concise

view of the advantages of regionali zatron: Regionahzation is the only way to achieve true racial balance. ft will allow us to broaden and enrich our curriculum, to cxpand extra-curricular programs by increasing the size of the student body and by giving each child a larger staff to improve education. It will also allow us to use our education dollars more efficiently - to spend more on the things that will reach children in the classroom and less on administrative functions that are duplicated in each small school disrricr. Marion, an intelligent, forthright, articulate, and dedicated woman, has made it clear to me, and in the statement that follows shortly, her enthusiastic respect and caring for Russell Mujor, who was advisor to CPTO from 1991-97. Pamela M*jor informed me that her father had been mentoring Marion McKe nzre over a period of four years, "showing her just how to work within the political system, how to do research, where to Bo, and what kind of questions to ask. " Marion's statement about a remarkable, thoughtful, creative man committed to promoting the cause of education whom she called her "father by choice" and "special friend"- speaks for itselfi We [ott the Central PTO] reached out to Mr. Major and drew on his expertise, and he generously gave of his time. F{e empowered us with his knowledge and his courage and we moved from fund-raising moms and pops to advocates for excellence in public education. With his guidance we tackled many hard issues and like him made many people uncomfortable, because he taught us that we had to do what's right for our childrr, not what was popular. FIe taught us how to anaWt" facts and make hard decisions based on what was best for all children. He taught us that knowledge was power and that we had a right to information, and that getting the information was not a privilege but our right. He taught how to challenge things, how to disagree and search for the truth, and accept diF ferences of opinion. He helped us understand the history [of the Englewood school system] and he infused in us a deep sense of commitment, dedication and pride. f remember the weekends we

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would meet in his basement and the nights in my living room) going over the budget, the teacher contract, funditrS, grade reconfiguration, bussing, every aspect of his passion for his Englewood public schools. One night we were working until 11 p.m. the dny before he was scheduled to have triple bypass. We were working on special education facts. Mr. Major never told us about the triple bypass; he would only say periodically throughout the night, time is running out, and we have to get them all the facts. Imagine my surprise the next time tr saw him, he was in the hospital. This is the kind of dedication that personified the rype of person Russell Mnjor was. FIe was totally committed, dedicated, and consistently thorough. Even when he was in rehab, in and out of therapy, he didn't want to talk about how he was, he wanted to know what was going on in the schools, how was regionaLtzation, he wanted updates" I remember having to read to him a fifty-page document when he didn't have his glasses. No matter how sick he was he always kept the focus on his issues the schools, the children of
Englewood" There were many times when the various battles we fought lef,t us scarred and cynical but he helped us to stay focused by reminding us that our children were worth fighting for. Fle reminded us of his struggles and how he never gave up. Mr. M"jor rnade us walk the talk. F{e taught us to stand up for our convictions, and he rnade us do it on every issue. Mr. Major had a tremendous impact on my life and many other parent leaders who worked with him. His life has inspired me and has helped to shape my life today. His legacy will live on in the many people with whom he shared his life, and especially in those of us who shared a kindred spirit. According to Pamela, Marion McKenzie was an important person to Russell, and he wished for more people like her to carry the torch forward. "f think he had hoped for more people who would be willing to get into the struggle, not so much

hc was. But I don't really think he gave up hope." Pamela cxpressed anger, too, ns she spoke about the intensity of Itussell's belief in integration and the tenacity with which he lrcld on to that principle to the very end of his life : "I was so llrrious at all the white people - I mean, what do they wanrl I rtreet people out in the world who live in lily-white communities, and they don't have a clue what it's all about""

In addition to his life-long interest in sports and education, l(ussell was also a champion of the arts. This interest likely stemmed from trips as a child with his mother to museums and cr,rltural centers. It led Russell to work with Sandy Greenberg, lirrmer mayor, to reahze the dream of a Fine Arts Center in
lrnglewood. Over the course of his years in Englewood, Russell Major lcft us a legacy of achievement and the hope of further gains in the future. Ffe shnds out as a leader and beacon of light - for nte personally and the community as a whole . I know Russell best from the sixties when he was in the forefront of the l)emocratic battle to regain control over the city after sixty-two ycars of faulty Republican rule. Walking the streets and under railroad trestles, he pleaded with and cajoled citizens of lrnglewood to register to vote, and they did. FIis political .tstuteness and knowledge of the city were indispensable to the l)emocratic take-over. With his Democratic cohorts, he helped t o create low-cost housing and made some progress in the journcy to integration of the schools, despite all the forces arrayed rrgainst him, perhaps most particularly factors such as populat icln dynamics that were beyond anyone's control. As a coach hc stressed the importance of the whole child who would nor only excel athletically but also academically and participate constructively in his home and community. As a member of the li<lard of Education, Russell influenced decisions that related to l)crsonnel and budgets and labor negotiations. He did not just t.rl[< but was the sort of person who made things happen. Russell particularly mattered to me as a leader and a mover

in leadership, but willing to fight ro make the ciry of Englewood a better community. And so I think he was saddened and disheartened by some of the things he saw.

know

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for civil rights.

I had spent parts of nvo summers in the early

of the African-American leaders, and on returning to Englewood found that Russell Major was as strong, effective, and highly principled a leader as any in the field. F{e wanted integration and equal rights and opportunity for all cittzens, and I did too. Russell was my benchmark in the struggle for integration, and I believe, xs Shirley Lacy does, that he was the Martin Luther Kirg of Englewood. I interviewed residents of Englewood who had known Russell for several decades. They all had good things to say about him with little criticiSffi, although some of his decisions) such as appointments, were critici zed when he was president of the Board of Education. But as Suzanne Platoff, a one-time candidate for mayor of Englewood, said, "After all, he was on the school board for more than eighteen years!" She also said to me, "Russell was a strong leader who spoke passionately and with authority, and he was even-handed with people, 3s well as being a good judge of character. F{e was a compendium of knowledge on kids and education. F{e worked continually and courageously for education and a better break for kids." This was always his focus; Russell never ran for office) never sought the limelight. ft's possible his crownirg achievements were those that were invisible, hidden in the many young individuals he encouraged and counseled and supported, who went on to lead successful lives. At the end of our interview, Pamela, who is currently a teacher at the Cleveland School in Englewood, related to me Russell's special love for history and his abiliry to apply it to the
present: F{e really examined history. I think one of the things that impressed me about him was his parallel understanding of history. He could look at a year, let's say the year 1948, and say, Ok, this was the year the United Nations agreed to Israel's sovereignty as a nation. This was the year that apartheid started. This was seven years after World Vlhr IL He was able to look at

sixties in Mississippi and Georgia living with African-Americans and working on the voter registration campaign. I met several

the world in view of the year f 948 and map out what kind of changes had taken place and what kind of impact these situations had had on the world. And he would take a topic and go through a time line: With regard to genocide, he would draw parallels benveen what the Nazi party did and what the slaveowners and slave-traders did, and then the genocide that's occurring in diffbrent countries right now. My father devoted his life to the things he really believed would help to change the system. Lookirg to the future he devoted himself to children. I)urirg the sixties he devored himself to helping to change Englewood from a Republican stronghold to a city controlled by Democrats. In terms of the past, I think that through studying history he hoped to relate the past to the present, and thus to avoid in the future the social disasters of the twentieth century. In a student video on the integration of elementary schools, Russell had said, "These kids need to know that their mothers and fathers, their grandparents, were heroes. They fought for freedom right where they lived in a thousand different batdes." Certainly Russell Major was himself one of those heroes. Janice Smith Major, Russell's wife of nearly forty years, died in 1996, and Russell died the following year on December 7., 1997, at age sixty-five. There was a memorial service at the Drzzy Gillespie Auditorium of Dwight Morrow High School, attended by over two hundred persons; many spoke in tribute. In an interview in the Bergen Record after Russell died, Pamela stated that until his dying dry her father was talking about the Englewood school system. "F{e spoke about how important it was for people to step up and be genuir, and do it because it was the right thing to do, not because it looked good. I hope my father's legacy is that more people get involved." In a sense) Russell's was a voice in the wilderness. F{e tried to lead the way; so few were ready or willing to follow. The Russell C. Major Foundation, which was set up after Russell's death with funds from private sources) gives out scholarships to needy students. Byron Baer sits on the board, and he and Pamela would like to develop leadership-training

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courses. On ]une L2, L999, the Russell C. Major Foundation sponsored a dedication ceremony in which the Liberty School was renamed the Russell C. Major Liberty School. There were tributes from several people includirg Byron Baer, musical selections, and messages from family members. Quoted on the program was Russell's favorite hymn, "Brighten the Corner Where You Live":

SANDY GREEb{BERG

AI\D

SIJZJE GAIYIKTN:

Do not wait until some deed of greatness you may do Do not wait to shed your light afar To the many duties ever near you now be true Brighten the corner where you are. Chorus: Brighten the corner where you are Brighten the corner where you are Someone far from harbor you may guide across the bar Brighten the corner where you are ]ust above are clouded skies that you rnay help to clear Let not narrow self your way debar Tho' into one heart alone nnay fall your song of cheer Brighten the corner where you are. F{ere for all your talent you may surely find a need F{ere reflect the Bright and Mornirg Star Even from your humble hand the bread of life may feed Brighten the corner where you are.
Russell said to me once, in speaking of this beloved hyffin, that it was "one of the inspirational forces" of his life . " I'll never forget that. You do what you can where you are - that's what I say to my daughter. And that's my goal for life. If you want to change the world, it's going to be one person at a time,

POLITICAL D)NAA{OS
Suzie Gamrin and Sandy Greenberg were and continue to be a dynamic team after forty years one that is unique and Llnmatched, nt least in my own experience. They are distinguishecl partners who have worked together tirelessly to make Englewood a better city reachitg out to the ctttzenry of Englewood, whether l)emocrat or Republican, Catholic, Protesranr, Muslim or Ieq White, African-American, Asian) or Hispanic. They are still going full-throttle. I've enloyed watchi^g them function in the political world. I've enjoyed the inner spark, the crusadirg spirit that spurs them ever onward, their intrinsic goodness, friendliness, and devotion to their families. Both women believed the Democratic Party wor-rld best solve E,nglewood's problems, pnrticularly with AfricanAmericans and whites working together. I shared their beliefs and principles, but their focus was sharper than mine; therefore they served as models in my endeavors to solve similar problems. Both fought for the rights of minorities, whether that meant opening up educatiotr) or appointing minorities to positions of authority, or making sure the police did not overextend themselves in their dealings with African-Americans, so often the case in the big cities. Both are sharp-witted and purposeful; both are caring, loving human beings. Both are willing and able talkers, on the telephone or off, and they share a lively sense of humor. And they are thinkers; ideas flow from them like water over the falls. Integrity is their tradernark, and many, many people have sought their advice on a host of issues and

starting in Englewood and then lrranching out to the rest of Bergen County and on farther. And then see what happens."

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Table of Contents
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Copyright e 2002 by Isaac Patch All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electrical or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems) without perrnission in writing from the author, except by n reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

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