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September, 1999 issue

Ceremony Marks 50th Anniversary of Peekskill Riot at Paul Robeson Concert
In what has been termed "A Remembrance and Reconciliation Ceremony," Peekskill community activists will join Westchester County Executive Andrew Spano, Pete Seeger, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Nadine Strossen, president of the American Civil Liberties Union, Winston Ross, regional director of the NAACP, community activist Darrell Davis, retired trade leader Henry Foner and Paul Robeson, Jr. on Saturday, September 4 at noon, to mark the 50th anniversary of Paul Robeson's historic 1949 concert on the grounds of the Hollow Brook Golf Course, Cortlandt Manor.

The event is sponsored by the Paul Robeson Foundation, a national, non-profit education organization, headquartered in New York and dedicated to preserving the legacy of this world-renowned artist, scholar, athlete and civil rights activist. Paul Robeson Jr., a consultant to the Foundation, has stated that his father would have been "thrilled that we will use the anniversary of Peekskill to express his abiding belief in peaceful relations among all people..."

The 1949 concert's aftermath was marred by a near-riot when local vigilantes showered departing concertgoers with a barrage of rocks and baseball bats, while state troopers and county police stood by and, in some cases, physically abused the targets of mob violence. The ceremony will take place at the site of the concert.

About 20,000 people came from far and near that day, half a century ago, not only to hear Robeson's inimitable voice, but also to defend his right to be heard -- a right that had been challenged a week earlier, when the originally scheduled concert had to be canceled because a menacing picket line prevented people from attending. Dozens of those attending the September 4th concert, which had gone off without incident, were injured in the post-concert violence. Signs carried by the protesters contained slogans that were both racist and anti-Semitic.

Although an official investigation later exonerated the state troopers and the county police, the ACLU's report of the event accused both local authorities and the Peekskill newspaper, The Evening Star, of deliberately inflaming the rioters and then condoning the violence that brought national and even international attention to Peekskill.

William Pickens III, president of The Paul Robeson Foundation, expressed the hope that the presence of local and county officials, together with that of an honorary committee of those that attended the concert, will, at long last, append a note of healing to a shameful violation of civil liberties in the Cold War period.

Mr. Seeger, one of the speakers at the ceremony, was a witness to the post-concert violence. The windshield of the car in which he, his wife and his children were riding, was smashed. He later used the rocks that caused the damage in building a chimney to heat his log cabin home in Beacon. He also collaborated with folksinger Lee Hays in writing a song, "Hold the Line," the chorus of which went, in part, "As we held the line in Peekskill, we hold it everywhere!"

Following the ceremony, which is scheduled to last about an hour, there will be a reception at the Mount Lebanon Baptist Church, 648 Harrison Avenue, Peekskill, to which the public is invited.