Friday, Aug. 29, 2008

‘Yes we can’ resonates in Eastover.

‘I didn’t think I’d live to see this’

Tens of thousands gathered to watch Barack Obama make history in Denver, and three generations of the Green family invited friends in Eastover to do the same.

Emma Green, a politically active retired social worker, laid an attractive spread of fried fish, cold shrimp, cheese, fruit and red velvet cake. But the center of attention was the flat-screen television in her spacious family room as anticipation built for the big moment.

Obama, the first African-American ever to accept the presidential nomination of a major political party, was about to speak.

“I’ll do anything I can to elect Barack Obama,” Green said. “From the beginning, when I first saw him, I said, ‘Here goes a man whose life is just like mine.’ When I listened to him talk, he reminded me of my younger days, trying to bring hope to people.”

Seeing an African-American nominated to be president was a day Green and her family and friends never thought they would see.

“I didn’t think I’d live to see this,” said 61-year-old Sylvia Montgomery, a Summit resident who was invited to the party by a friend of Green’s. “I mean, I went to segregated schools. I didn’t think I’d live to see a black man actually make it this far.”

Montgomery said Obama’s trailblazing campaign for the White House brought out some personal firsts for her: It’s the first time she’s been involved in a campaign, she said. It’s also the first time she’s ever given money to a campaign.

“I’ve cried so many times,” Montgomery said. “I’ve been emotionally bursting — overwhelmed.”

Gladys Reed, a “60ish” Lake Carolina resident, said she met Montgomery at a Columbia-area restaurant, and they found they had an Obama bond. “He’s all about change,” Reed said.

“I, too, grew up in the South,” she said. “I remember the water fountains, the segregation, all the limitations they placed on blacks. To me, (Obama) is carrying on Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream.”

Reed said Obama’s acceptance speech couldn’t have happened on a better day — 45 years after King’s venerable speech on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., in 1963.

“Dr. King was like our Moses, and Obama is like our Joshua,” she said, alluding to the Bible.

“There’s something about this man that’s different than anybody I’ve seen,” said 63-year-old Barbara Green, a younger sister of the party’s hostess. “It’s unbelievable this day is here.”

The Greens attributed their political involvement to their late father, Coley Green, who they said always made them watch the news.

That attention to world events, they said, brought this day when they decked out the two-story brick and vinyl-siding house in rural Eastover in Obama campaign material. Obama T-shirts were neatly draped over the chairs in the formal dining room, and little Obama booklets describing the Illinois senator’s life dotted the table in the living room.

On the white kitchen counter, a red, white and blue frosted cake bore the words, “Congratulations, Barack Obama.”

When Obama took the stage in Denver, the Eastover living room exploded in screams and cheers.

“Yes we can!” they chanted. “Yes, we can.”

Reach Burris at (803) 771-8398.

Get The State newspaper delivered to your home. Click here to subscribe.