Boat U.S. - March 2009 - (Page 68)

boathouses along the Anacostia wasn’t Seafarers is known for its an option; they only accepted white people. Even filling up with gas or buyneighborly members, gentlemanly ing parts for his boat was difficult for sportsmanship, and its Friday fishfry Green because of the color of his skin. He began to dream of establishing an members persevered, filling in the swampall-black boat club. Given the segregation laws of land, building docks, and gathering together the time, the odds were against him. Repeated in the evenings after work to enjoy their requests to the U.S Department of the Interior, boats and families. which controls the riverfront land, for a plot were refused. He was told it would take an act of Congress to change the department’s mind. Another Man, Another Friends In High Places Green was a modest, hardworking man, but he had one ace — he knew Mary McLeod Bethune, the pioneering education advocate for black children. Bethune had the ear of President Roosevelt, thanks to her friendship with his wife Eleanor. Roosevelt frequently referred to Bethune as “her closest friend in her age group,” which gave the civil-rights lobbyist unprecedented access to the White House, something Bethune later used to form the Federal Council on Negro Affairs, known famously as the “Black Cabinet.” It took a bit of talking, but Bethune convinced the First Lady to have the decision of the Department of the Interior reversed, and in 1945 Lewis T. Green was leased a piece of government land to establish the Seafarers Yacht Club. Their mission was simple: “Engage in the enjoyment of the waterways through safe boating and gentlemanly sportsmanship.” But while the Department of the Interior had been overruled, it still had the power to determine the club’s location. “Of course they gave Mr. Green about the worst piece of land on the river,” says Bob Martin, a former student of Green’s, “way down at the very end, next to the railroad tracks, where there was nothing else.” Though the piece of allotted land was almost unusable marshland, Green and fellow club BoatU.S. Magazine March 2009 Dream, Another Club Green’s woodworking student, Bob Martin, now 78, had also experienced what it meant to be black in 1940s America. He was a gregarious child, growing up on Capitol Hill in a cramped house with no gas, heat, or electricity, and with an outhouse in the backyard. At only 8 years old, he got a job at a seafood stall cleaning fish, and began his love of the water — and seafood! He was paid partly in fish, and on Saturday afternoons after work he treated his friend Willy to a fried-fish sandwich at the nowdefunct Benny’s seafood stand. The boys would park themselves with their lunches on the grassy banks of the Tidal Basin to watch paddleboats full of white folks go back and forth across the water. That image made him dream. By the age of 12, Martin got a job with Dr. Reed’s Pharmacy, delivering prescriptions and cleaning up the shop. One Saturday over lunch, he announced to Willy that they were going for a boat ride. “It cost 25 cents to rent one of those boats,” Martin recalls, “the same identical boats they have to this day.” But when the boys went down to the waterfront with their savings, the operator told them they’d also need to leave a $5 deposit.

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Boat U.S. - March 2009

Boat U.S. - March 2009 Contents Reader Forum Boat U.S. Reports What’s New In The Brew? The Perfect Paint Job Launch Into Spring Boats Gear Wheels One Mom, Two Teens, No Exit So, Nigel Had This Idea Ice Devices It Was A Club Of Their Own Expanding The Boating Universe Tech Connection A Case Study In Getting Results Let’s All Do This Together Classifieds Member Benefits/At Your Service

Boat U.S. - March 2009

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