MLK celebration in Santa Rosa features song, discussion and cake

Maurice Travis told a rapt audience at Santa Rosa High School Sunday night that his life checked off all the adversities of growing up a black male.

Speaking at an annual celebration honoring the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Travis described weighing only 2 pounds, 3 ounces at birth and being given no chance of surviving outside the hospital. By age 21 his mother had three children by three different men, none of whom stuck around.

“I became a young, angry black man,” said Travis, whose experience also included being uprooted and moving to Ukiah, where he stood out as one of the few black students at the local high school.

Today, Travis is a licensed therapist who specializes in working with at-risk youth and developmentally disabled young adults. He also is an instructor at Santa Rosa Junior College.

Travis was among four men - three black and one white - who took the stage Sunday inside the high school’s auditorium for a panel discussion on the black experience. The group setting was a novel twist on the King celebration, which has been ongoing for several decades in Santa Rosa and typically features a keynote speaker.

Were King still alive, he would have turned 88 Sunday. Several hundred people - more than in recent years - gathered at the high school Sunday to again pay tribute to the civil rights icon and his legacy of nonviolent activism.

Several in attendance Sunday cited President-elect Donald Trump’s upcoming inauguration Friday as cause for renewed commitment to activism.

“The movement is alive,” said Michael Vosler, a retired United Church of Christ minister who lives in Rohnert Park.

Gloria Robinson, a founder of the King celebration in Santa Rosa who has attended the event for decades, said if King were alive, he would preach a message of peace and love toward the president-elect.

“But we’re hoping and praying for an impeachment,” Robinson said.

Another major theme of Sunday’s program was the moment in young people’s lives when they become aware of how others perceive them, and the ensuing struggle to overcome those stereotypes.

Karen Roberts, the Santa Rosa-based founder of Hautebutch, a clothing line for masculine women, said the political climate is such that it’s a “time for change right now, and a time to listen to each other.”

Rubin Scott, another member of the panel group who belongs to 100 Black Men of Sonoma County and who has written four adolescent development books, described growing up with a mentally ill mother and his struggle to embrace his “full lips and nose.”

Scott’s words drew shouts of recognition from many in the audience.

Sunday’s celebration also included a singalong to the anthem “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” a performance by Christian rapper Mickale Jones, aka Tru Lyric, and an award presentation for oration and art contests.

The event was dedicated to Dyan Foster, a Sonoma County youth advocate who died in 2016.

You can reach Staff Writer Derek Moore at 707-521-5336 or derek.moore@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @deadlinederek.