HR0884 95TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

HR0884 LRB095 14900 KXB 40843 r

HOUSE RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois House of Representatives are pleased to honor Eugene Redmond on his seventieth birthday, December 1, 2007; and

WHEREAS, Eugene Redmond was born December 1, 1937 in St. Louis, Missouri; he was orphaned at age nine and was raised by his grandmother and "neighborhood fathers," made up of members of the Seventh Day Adventist Church and friends of his older brother; during high school he worked on the newspaper and yearbook, performed in school and church plays, and composed for neighborhood singing groups; and

WHEREAS, From 1958 to 1961 Eugene Redmond served as a U.S. Marine in the Far East, acquiring a speaking knowledge of Japanese; he was an associate editor of the East St. Louis Beacon from 1961 to 1962; in 1963 Redmond co-founded a weekly paper in East St. Louis, the Monitor, working at different times as a contributing editor, executive editor, and editorial page editor; at Southern Illinois University he was the first African-American student editor of the university newspaper; after receiving his bachelor's degree in English literature in 1964, he earned a master's degree in English literature from Washington University in 1966; and

WHEREAS, In 1965, while still in graduate school, he won first prize in the Washington University Annual Festival of the Arts for his poem "Eye in the Ceiling"; in 1968 he published his first volume of poetry, A Tale of Two Toms, or Tom-Tom (Uncle Toms of East St. Louis and St. Louis); he has been poet-in-residence at Oberlin College, California State University, the University of Wisconsin, and Wayne State; and

WHEREAS, From 1967 to 1969 he was a senior consultant to Katherine Dunham at Southern University's Performing Arts Training Center, where he acted, directed, wrote plays, and supervised the drama and writing departments; twelve of his plays, ballets, and choral dramas have been produced on university campuses and on California television; and

WHEREAS, Eugene Redmond has been a professor at Southern Illinois University since 1990; he also works in the public schools and has established a feeder system, following some writers from elementary school through high school as a way of bringing "literacy to the many and the literary to the few"; his other community activities include organizing the annual "Break Word with the World" event in East St. Louis, a month-long "mock trial of the media" culminating in a reading and publication; and

WHEREAS, He has received wide recognition as a poet and teacher; in 1976 he became poet laureate of East St. Louis, the first poet laureate named by a municipality; he was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts creative writing fellowship in 1978; the Eugene B. Redmond Writers Club was founded in 1986, with writers such as Maya Angelou and Amiri Baraka on the board of directors; Eye on the Ceiling won an American Book Award in 1991; in 1993 Pan-African Movement USA awarded him a Pyramid Award for lifetime contributions to Pan-Africanism through poetry; and he received a "Tribute to an Elder" award from African Poetry Theater in 1995; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE NINETY-FIFTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we congratulate Eugene Redmond for his many contributions to society and culture and wish him a happy birthday; and be it further

RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be presented to Eugene Redmond as a symbol of our respect.