Each year, Sam Waymon’s star in the galaxy of American Black culture shines brighter. Waymon arrived in Rockland County in the early 1970s, and was launched into the arts orbit along with luminaries like his sister, Nina Simone, and his creative partner, the iconic writer and director Bill Gunn. Films, soundtracks, and television shows that he performed in or wrote continue to be re-released to critical acclaim.

Since launching Nyack Sketch Log 9 years ago (on August 23, 2011), never more than now have I been so aware of the responsibility and utility of having a weekly column.

Here are some recent examples of when Nyack Sketch Log was called into the civic arena during its ninth, and most urgent year.

I know that some may say the cost of burying our electrical grid is too great to consider, especially during a pandemic-stalled economy. This is one place where we can learn from local history: both the Palisades Parkway and Harriman State Park were conceived during the Great Depression, an earlier period of massive unemployment. If that generation was able to rise to the challenge, putting people back to work and investing in the future, why can’t we do the same?

by Bill Batson

The light of a life lived to its fullest is never extinguished. From February 21, 1940 until July 17, 2020, Congressman John Lewis dedicated virtually every step he took to the moral advancement of the United States. At our darkest hours, he march into the most perilous places, armed only with the philosophy of nonviolence and a fierce determination to make America honor the creeds enshrined in our founding documents. In death, the legacy of John Lewis becomes one of our nation’s brightest beacons of hope.

by Bill Batson On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave who would become one of the most powerful public figures in 19th century America, gave his most memorable speech in Rochester, New York, […]