The Iowa Stater, Sept. 1997

May
February

1996 September
May

1995
December
September
May

The Iowa Stater
Sept. 1997

DeLores and Vern Hawkins in the newly renovated Black Cultural Center. Photo by Michael Haynes.

Home improvement

BCC repairs restore house, spirits

A crack in a wall can symbolize a lot - age, neglect, division. Fixing the crack also can symbolize a lot - rejuvenation, coming together.

On a snowy April afternoon, Iowa State students, faculty, staff and administrators and Ames community leaders gathered at 517 Welch Ave. to celebrate a crack that had been fixed and much more. They came together to celebrate the rebirth of the newly renovated Black Cultural Center (BCC).

"A home away from home" is the most common description for the BCC, a private, nonprofit organi-zation created in 1969 to promote cross-cultural understanding and provide programs to benefit ISU students and employees.

"For many students, who in most cases don't have the benefit of their immediate families in Ames, the BCC offers the closest thing they'll find to a 'home away from home,'" Carlie C. Tartakov, assistant professor of curriculum and instruction, remarked at the rededication. "It is a place to gather with what we call extended family during breaks - to relax, to let our hair down in a place where those around are more likely to understand where you are coming from."

That "home away from home" was not here when Vern and DeLores (Williams) Hawkins arrived at Iowa State in the late '60s - he from Des Moines in 1967, she from Chicago in 1968. Then, the popula-tion of minority students, faculty and staff at Iowa State was minuscule.

"With the exception of student athletes and a few non- athlete students, there was no permanent African American identification on the ISU campus," said Vern Hawkins, who now works for ISU's admissions office. "The (Martin Luther) King assassination was the catalyst that got us all focusing on the same thing - that African Americans needed an identifiable presence on this campus."

When she arrived, DeLores Hawkins was one of five or so African American women at ISU.

"We looked around and didn't see any visible symbol of who we were," said DeLores Hawkins, who works in student financial aid. "It was very important for me to know when I got here that there were murmurs and workings to establish a center to allow us to have a place where we could get together."

The BCC's creation and the activities of its early years reflected the social activism of the time, said DeLores Hawkins, who served as BCC director in those early years. Spurred by changes going on across the country, students saw a need and fought to make it happen. Establishing the center required a grassroots fund-raising effort.

DeLores Hawkins remembers going door-to-door collecting contributions to create the BCC. Several campus organizations contributed to the cause, including the Government of the Student Body with $5,000; Veishea with $2,000 and the former Science and Humanities Council with $500. People even supported the BCC by designating part of the cost of a ticket to a concert by folkie Glenn Yarbrough to the drive. All of this, combined with more than $12,000 in contributions from alumni and friends, made possible the purchase of the house at 517 Welch Ave.

The BCC originally was dedicated on Sept. 27, 1970, the same day ISU dedicated George Washington Carver Hall. At the dedication, the late Judge Luther Glanton, a leader in community diversity efforts in central Iowa, provided a description of the BCC that rings true today: "Communication and exchange among the community, the university and students with varying cultural backgrounds is the nature and purpose of this center."

The BCC had two complementary purposes - to provide a place where the community could get to know African Americans and recognize their accomplishments and a place where African American students could gather and feel at ease.

The BCC quickly became a place where African American students gathered to socialize, study and hold meetings; where the still-singing Gospel Soul Innovators were born; where African American artists and activists Gwendolyn Brooks and Dick Gregory were hosted after campus lectures.

As the intensity of the Civil Rights Movement decreased, so, it appears, did the condition of the BCC. While still a special and important place for ISU's African American students, the building's condition gradually declined due to neglect and lack of funds for upkeep.

Alan Nosworthy, a graduate student in creative writing and president of the BCC, got his first tour of the center shortly after arriving on campus in the fall of 1995. What he found was an old building with lots of little problems, including a crack in the wall. He also found the Jack Trice Memorial Library on the second floor of the building (the first facility on campus to honor Trice) and a house filled with African artifacts and other cultural items that "were hard to find in a place like Iowa."

In 1996, Kyle Pierce and the organization he headed, the Black Student Alliance, began efforts to raise funds from the university to renovate and revitalize the BCC.

During the same period, discussion of the university commitment to diversity was under intense scrutiny, primarily because of controversy surrounding the naming of Carrie Chapman Catt Hall. The building was named for the ISU alumna who led the successful campaign to give women the vote. However, opponents of the name said Catt made racist remarks during the drive for women's suffrage and naming a building for her was offen-sive. (See February '97 Iowa Stater.)

Just as the Civil Rights Movement spurred the creation of the BCC, the diversity discussion on the ISU campus energized its rebirth.

Following lengthy negotiations, work on the BCC began in the fall of 1996 after ISU officials formalized the university's relationship with the BCC and committed at least $40,000 for the renovation project. So far, the university has provided nearly $70,000 to the renovation and lent another $10,000 for furnishings.

"In rededicating the newly renovated Black Cultural Center, we are rededicating our commitment to the spirit of diversity," said President Martin Jischke.

Under a new 10-year agreement, university officials recognized the BCC as an organization affiliated with the university and established terms for the university and the center to support each other.

Under the agreement, ISU will cover costs of utilities, special property assessments and general liability and casualty insurance for the facility. The ISU Foundation is assisting in fund-raising endeavors to benefit the center's operations.

For its part, the BCC will continue to give attention to programming that supports the success of African American students; maintain communication among various academic, student and administrative groups on campus; and seek guidance from the director of Minority Student Affairs regarding major changes in the activities of the center.

At the rededication ceremony, Nosworthy reminded the crowd about the crack in the wall.

"That crack was one of the things that needed fixing," he said. "The ISU and Ames communities came together to fix that crack, which I see as an example of what we can do when we really put our minds to it, when we are sincere about our commitment to diversity. If we can come together to fix that crack, then we can come together to fix our society."

Steve Sullivan, News Service

Iowa State homepage