Will the Real Eldridge Cleaver Please Stand Up? (Pt. 3)

Is this Eldridge Cleaver (Aug. 31, 1935-May 1, 1998), the former minister of information of the Oakland, Calif.-based Black Panther Party? Yes, it is. The man in Pt. 1 of this series is H. Rap Brown (Oct. 4, 1943- ; now Imam Jamil Abdulah Al-Amin), the former chairman of the militant Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), which advocated "black power," or black self-determination, for African Americans during the mid- and late-1960s. Like most archival videos available on the Web, it was posted without any historical context. However, a little digging confirms that it was filmed at St. Stephen and the Incarnation Episcopal church, 1525 Newton St., N. W., Washington, D. C., on July 27, 1967. Imam Al-Amin was speaking about the mostly African American uprising or rebellion that erupted at Detroit five days earlier, the most destructive in U. S. history before the Los Angeles rebellion of 1992. The man in Pt. 2 is James Forman (Oct. 4, 1928-Jan. 10, 2005), the former executive secretary of SNCC. I have not (yet) been able to contextualize the videos of Forman or Cleaver, but would add it here if and when I do. As you could see, none of these men resemble one another, yet, to some people, African Americans, or at least least radical black leaders, apparently all look alike. The Web, which is often the first resort of students and scholars alike, is polluted with such misidentifications, which spread like a mischievous virus to infect newspaper, magazine and journal articles; thesis and dissertations; radio and television programs; documentary films; educational resources, etc. -- all because the directors of most video and photo Web sites fail to hire persons, or at least engage consultants, who are educated or trained in history, and particularly the history of non-"white" peoples. Think of this little gallery the next time that you're looking for a video or photo of some historical figure. "It ain't necessarily so," and is becoming increasingly LESS so in this Age of Mediocrity and Carelessness. (Video courtesy eFootage.com)