Читать книгу The Gang of Four - Bob Santos - Страница 7

By Larry Gossett, One of the Gang Of Four

It has been good for me to reflect upon the story about the historic impact the “Gang of Four” had on the greater Seattle community. It is even a more exciting phenomenon when you are privileged enough to be a member of such an awesome foursome! Though our lives were filled with many tough struggles for minority community empowerment and involved many personal sacrifices, I feel blessed that I was part of such a magnificent team of brothers who valiantly helped lead the social justice movement in the Pacific Northwest for over forty (40) years!

Sometimes, people have also affectionately referred to us simply as the “Four Amigos.” Regardless, of the term one uses to describe us, it remains a fact that our individual and collective political work had a profound impact on our surrounding environment.

The other three members of this remarkable formation of community leaders and activists are Bob Santos, Roberto Maestas and Bernie Whitebear. When I wrote this preface, I was almost 70 years old and the year before (2013), I was lucky enough to attend Bob Santos’ 80th birthday party. Bernie died in 2000 and Roberto passed away in 2010.

This book arrives in the market place as the “Gang of Four” has begun to fade away, and as such, is an extremely timely production. I hope it is destined to inform generations of readers about the community issues and struggles we successfully mobilized people of color around. It is a book that will inspire folks because it chronicles the history of how we collectively rallied people of all walks of life around common causes that helped change the political landscape of Seattle and Martin Luther King, Jr. County for more than four decades.

Another factor I think helps make this book a must read is the fascinating description of how the “Gang of Four” all grew up extremely poor, but never doubted their abilities to build unity through the love they had for their people and for each other as brothers, and as political comrades. The “power and unity” we created and maintained among African American, Latino, Asian American, and Native American people in our community was something to behold. This book clearly presents our lives, successes and the struggles we had forging a viable coalition that allowed us to stick to our plans of action, even when the FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, and other conservative law enforcement entities, were trying to disrupt our unity.

I remember people of color, liberal as well as progressive whites from throughout the Pacific Northwest, generously responded to our calls for mass action and involvement on many fronts over the years. It did not matter much what the issue was --if we were active in organizing it, many people were always ready to accompany and support us. For example, every fall we would put out the call for activists from both minority and white neighborhoods throughout Puget Sound to come out by the thousands to join us in building Seattle’s annual salute to Martin Luther King, Jr.’s. legacy. These great events (educational workshops, marches, rallies) took place on the third Monday of January at Garfield High School. As a result of our MLK events, the city of Seattle has the reputation of being the only locale in the nation, that for 35 years straight, has launched a massive grassroots salute to the legacy of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Finally, In reflecting back on the lives of the Gang of Four, I think our best organizing effort occurred when the four of us rallied activists from the Black, Latino, Asian American, Native American and progressive white communities to support Tyree Scott and Todd Hawkins. With our help, these leaders of the United Construction Workers Association (UCWA) dramatized the plight of Black workers battling to close down construction sites all over King County because of their racist, exclusion of African Americans from decent paying jobs in the construction industry. UCWA was composed of very tough and mostly unemployed Black construction

workers. They struggled for four long years (1968-1972) with hundreds of them (and us) going to jail, before the federal court, in the fall of 1972, issued a court order requiring white contractors and unions to affirmatively hire Black workers.

I believe the reader will be able to form an excellent picture of how challenging it was for us to weave together, such an amazing,

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