The Woods Hole Community Black History Month Committee presents
2016
Monday, February 1
Derrick Z. Jackson
Co-Author of Project Puffin: The Improbable Quest to Bring a Beloved Seabird Back to Egg Rock. Published by Yale University Press, 2015
*Noon, MBL Swope Center, Meigs Room
Derrick Jackson has been a columnist and contributing columnist at the Boston Globe since 1988. He was a 2001 finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in commentary, a 9-time winner of writing awards from the National Association of Black Journalists and a 2-time winner in commentary awards from the national Education Writers Association.
He has been a winner or finalists in journalism contests 23 of his 27 years associated with the Globe. He is also a featured contributor to the 2009 book, “The Speech: Race and Barack Obama’s ‘A More Perfect Union,’ ” published by Bloomsbury.
Derrick Jackson is also a photographer whose presidential campaign images of Barack Obama were exhibited in 2010 by Boston's Museum of African American History. His images of Obama, wildlife and landscapes earned a 2013 exhibit at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education. He was a 2013 and 2012 finalist in Outdoor Photographer magazine’s The American Landscape Contest.
About Project Puffin
Project Puffin is the inspiring story of how a beloved seabird was restored to long-abandoned nesting colonies off the Maine coast. As a young ornithology instructor at the Hog Island Audubon Camp, Dr. Stephen W. Kress learned that puffins had nested on nearby islands until extirpated by hunters in the late 1800s. To right this environmental wrong, he resolved to bring puffins back to one such island—Eastern Egg Rock. Yet bringing the plan to reality meant convincing skeptics, finding resources, and inventing restoration methods at a time when many believed in “letting nature take its course.”
Today, Project Puffin has restored more than 1,000 puffin pairs to three Maine islands. But even more exciting, techniques developed during the project have helped to restore rare and endangered seabirds worldwide. Further, reestablished puffins now serve as a window into the effects of global warming. The success of Dr. Kress’s project offers hope that people can restore lost wildlife populations and the habitats that support them. The need for such inspiration has never been greater.
Thursday, February 18
Richard Taylor
Speaking on his forthcoming book, Martha's Vineyard: Race, Property, and the Power of Place
*Noon, MBL Swope Center, Meigs Room
Writing about African Americans who have made dreams come true, Richard Taylor is author of the forthcoming book, Martha's Vineyard: Race, Property and the Power of Place. He has written for the Dukes County Intelligencer, a publication of the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, an article entitled “A Shared Vineyard Vision: Harry Burleigh, Luella Coleman and the Rise of an African American Summer Colony.” This article is adapted from his upcoming book.
Richard Taylor is executive in residence and director of the Center for Real Estate at the Sawyer Business School at Suffolk University. He is responsible for designing and developing full range of undergraduate and professional partnerships in real estate courses and for forgoing academic and professional partnerships in real estate development.
Richard Taylor has development experience in the residential, retail and commercial sectors of the real estate industry. He has developed in excess of $400 million in real estate, largely in Boston's urban markets. In his early real estate career, Taylor was Vice President of development at FMR Properties, Inc. where he worked to convert the old Commonwealth Pier in Boston Harbor into Boston's World Trade Center. During the real estate recession in the 90s, Taylor joined Governor Bill Weld as his active in "horizontal construction," reestablishing rail service from Worcester to Boston and also started construction on the $14 billion Big Dig project. He is part chairman of the Urban League and the Partnership, past president of the Minority Developers Association. He has been deputy chair of the board of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and chairman of the board of the MBTA. Taylor also completed a six-year term as gubernatorial appointment to the Board of Higher Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
He earned his BS in Journalism and Communication, Boston University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar and MBA from Harvard Business School and his JD from Harvard Law School. He also holds honorary degrees from Wentworth Institute of Technology and Bridgewater State University.
Thursday, February 25
Harambee
*4:00 p.m., MBL Swope Center
Join us in our annual ethnic potluck feast celebrating everyone of every race! Enjoy multicultural arts, delicious food, and entertainment.
Woods Hole Black History Month events are sponsored by the Marine Biological Laboratory; the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the National Marine Fisheries Service, the U.S. Coast Guard Group Woods Hole, the U.S. Geological Survey, Woods Hole Science Center, and the National Academy of Sciences J. Erik Jonsson Center. All events are free and open to the public.