Monthly Archives: June 2020

Genre Fiction Set in Charlotte

June 29, 2020 by Mark West
Categories: Storied Charlotte

Charlotte is not only the home of bestselling author Kathy Reichs, but it is also the setting for many of her popular Temperance Brennan mystery novels.   Reichs is one of many genre fiction writers who use Charlotte as a setting for their stories.  These authors show different sides of Charlotte, but they all draw attention to the Queen City.  For the purposes of this Storied Charlotte blog post, I am focusing on ten such authors.  Often these authors write books that are published as part of a series, such as the Temperance Brannan Series.  In such cases, I highlight one book in the series. Since all ten books on this list are examples of genre fiction, I mention the appropriate genre for each book on the list. 

A Conspiracy of Bones by Kathy Reichs is the latest book in the Temperance Brennan Series.  Published in March 2020, this book is 19th volume in the series.  Many of the books in this series are set in Montreal, but A Conspiracy of Bones takes place in Charlotte.  In the beginning of this book, Temperance (Tempe) Brennan is recovering from neurosurgery in her Charlotte home when she receives a series of disturbing text messages from an unknown sender.  These texts all include images of a faceless and handless corpse.  Responding to these texts, Tempe sets out to discover the identity of the corpse as well as determine why the images are being sent to her.  As is the case with all of the books in this series, Tempe draws on her expertise as a forensic anthropologist to solve this latest mystery.  In this book, however, Tempe has to deal with a new Mecklenburg County Medical Examiner who refuses to help Tempe with her investigation.  For more information about Reichs and her Temperance Brennan Series, please click on the following link:  https://kathyreichs.com/

Hard Day’s Knight by John G. Hartness is the first volume in Hartness’s urban fantasy series titled The Black Knight Chronicles.  Published by Falstaff Books in December 2010,  Hard Day’s Knight is about the adventures of two young vampires, James Black and Gregory Knightwood, who work as private investigators in Charlotte.  In this book, they are hired to save a boy from a witch’s curse, and in the process, they battle zombies, demons and various other paranormal characters, all set against the backdrop of Charlotte.  When asked about the setting for this series, Hartness said, “My characters live in my world, in Charlotte, NC, which happens to be where I live. …I set my series in the real Charlotte so that I could use real landmarks in the books. … I find as a reader that I really enjoy local color in a book, and the best way I could put that color into my books was to set them in places I could easily drive to if need be.  So in the end I decided not to build a world at all; I had a perfectly good one outside my front door.”  For more information about Hartness and his Black Knight Chronicles series, please click on the following link:  http://johnhartness.com/hard-days-knight/

Hornet’s Nest by Patricia Cornwell is a mystery novel that takes place in Charlotte.  This novel, which came out in 1997, has connections to Cornwall’s days as a crime reporter for The Charlotte Observer, where she worked from 1979 (the same year she graduated from Davidson College) to 1981.  Andy Brazil, one of the central characters in Hornet’s Nest, also works as a reporter for The Charlotte Observer.  He is on assignment to write about the day-to-day work of the Charlotte police, and as a result he ends up helping the Chief of Police (Judy Hammer) and the Deputy Chief (Virginia West) solve a mystery surrounding the serial killings of a number of out-of-town businessmen.  Hornet’s Nest launched Cornwell’s Andy Brazil Series.  For more information about Cornwell and her books, please click on the following link:  http://www.patriciacornwell.com/

Horse of a Different Killer is the first book in Jody Jaffe’s Natalie Gold Mystery Series.  When this mystery novel came out in 1995, it was named a finalist for an Agatha Award for Best First Mystery.  In writing this novel, Jaffe drew heavily on her experience as a feature writer for The Charlotte Observer and her longstanding interest in horse shows.  Natalie Gold, the central character in this story, is a fashion reporter for a newspaper called the Charlotte Commercial Appeal, but she is also a show rider with her own horse named Brenda Starr.  She boards her horse on a farm outside of Charlotte, and one day a top trainer is found beaten to death at this farm.  Natalie works with the paper’s top investigative reporter to solve this crime, and her knowledge of the horse show circuit proves to be invaluable.  For more information about Jaffe and her books, please click on the following link:  https://www.fantasticfiction.com/j/jody-jaffe/

In the Midst of Passion by AlTonya Washington is a stand-alone romance novel published in 2006 by Dafina Books, a leading publisher of commercial fiction by African American authors.  In the beginning of the novel, Topaz Emerson (the owner of an auto-repair garage) meets Alexander (Alex) Rice (the owner of a newspaper called Queen City Happenings) on a deserted street on the outskirts of Charlotte.  He mistakenly thinks that she needs help with her car, but she has everything under control.  Still, as they talk, Topaz finds herself attracted to Alex.  She eventually learns, however, that Alex has a mysterious past that could jeopardize their budding relationship.  In explaining why she set this novel in Charlotte, Washington said, “I was living in Charlotte at the time and was inspired by the area and culture.”  In addition to writing romance novels, Washington is a college reference librarian.  She worked for the Davidson College Library for many years, and she is currently the Education Librarian for Winston-Salem State University.   For more information about Washington and her books, please click on the following link:  https://alsreaders.weebly.com/

Knight in Charlotte by Edward McKeown is a work of urban fantasy featuring Jeremy Leclerc, a Knight Templar and part-time graphic designer living in present-day Charlotte.  Published in 2013, this work is told in the form of a series of inter-related adventures.  The protagonist encounters a variety of supernatural characters, including angels, vampires, and demon bankers.  Specific places in and around Charlotte figure in the work, such as South Park, Central Avenue, Balantyne, and the Renaissance Festival located in Huntersville.  Knight in Charlotte is something of a departure for McKeown, who is known primarily for his science fiction novels set in other worlds.  However, when he moved from New York to Charlotte, he decided to use his new hometown as the setting for his Knight Templar stories.  For more information about McKeown and his books, please click on the following link:  https://edwardmckeown.weebly.com/

Larceny and Old Lace, the first book in Tamar Myers’s Den of Antiquity mystery series, came out in 1996.  The central character, Abigail Timberlake, opens an antique store in Charlotte that she calls the Den of Antiquity.  The store is located on the same block where her crotchety aunt Eulonia Wiggins operates a run-down antique/junk shop.  In fact, Abigail and Eulonia are both members of the Selwyn Avenue Antique Dealers Association.   In the beginning of the novel, Eulonia is found strangled by an antique bell pull.  Determined to find out who killed her aunt, Abigail becomes an amateur sleuth.  The Charlotte setting figures in most of the other books in the series, although the final books in the series take place in Charleston.   For more information about Meyers and her books, please click on the following link:  https://www.tamarmyers.com/

Let’s Get It On by Cheris Hodges is the first of several romance novels featuring Kenya Taylor and Maurice Goings.  Dafina Books, a major publisher of genre books by African American writers, brought out Let’s Get It On in 2008.  The story begins when Kenya (a successful Charlotte lawyer) and Maurice (a star player for the Carolina Panthers) run into each other while each is on vacation in the Bahamas.  The readers learn that Kenya and Maurice had an earlier relationship that ended on a sour note, but as the story progresses, they begin to rekindle their relationship.  Much of the novel takes place in Charlotte, and the Carolina Panthers figure prominently in the plot.  In writing this novel, Hodges drew on her experience covering the Panthers as a journalist for Charlotte’s Creative Loafing.  However, in her version of events, the Panthers win the Super Bowl.  For more information about Hodges and her books, please click on the following link: https://thecherishodges.com/

Pretty Little Girls is a mystery thriller by Charlotte writer Jenifer Ruff.  Published in 2019, Pretty Little Girls is the second book in the Agent Victoria Heslin Series, although it can be read as a stand-alone novel.  In this novel, FBI Agent Victoria Heslin is called to Charlotte to help the local police solve a mystery surrounding the kidnapping of a girl from a wealthy Charlotte family.  As Agent Heslin pursues her investigation, she uncovers a sex trafficking ring that is operating in the shadows of Charlotte.  The novel is fictional, but Ruff’s description of the sex trafficking operation is based on factual research.  For more information about Ruff and her books, please click on the following link:  https://jenruff.com/index.html

Pretty Poison is the first book in the Peggy Lee Garden Mystery Series by the prolific writing duo of Joyce and Jim Lavene.  The Lavenes lived just outside of Charlotte in the community of Midland.  However, they frequently visited Charlotte, and they drew extensively on their knowledge of Charlotte in their Peggy Lee Garden Mystery Series.  Pretty Poison came out in 2005 while the 8th and last book in the series came out in 2015, the same year that Joyce Lavene died.  Jim Lavene intended to keep the series going, but he died just six months after the death of his wife.  In Pretty Poison, Peggy Lee runs a garden shop in downtown Charlotte called The Potting Shed.  As the story opens, she comes to work on a fall day only to discover on the floor of her shop the body of one of Charlotte’s wealthiest citizens. She calls the police, and they quickly concludes that the victim was murdered by a homeless man.  Peggy, however, is not convinced and begins her own investigation.  The book abounds with references to Charlotte landmarks, such as Latta Arcade, Brevard Court, Anthony’s Caribbean Café, and Queens University.  For more information about Joyce and Jim Lavene and their books, please click on the following link:  https://www.fantasticfiction.com/l/joyce-and-jim-lavene/

As the aforementioned books demonstrate, Charlotte figures prominently in many works of genre fiction.  The Queen City appeals especially to writers of mystery novels, but writers of romance and urban fantasy also use Charlotte as a setting for their stories.   These various genre writers show Charlotte from different angles and in different lights, but they all make contributions to Storied Charlotte. 

Tags: genre fictionmystery novelmystery seriesmystery thrillerromance novelsurban fantasy

Paula Martinac and the Queen City

June 22, 2020 by Mark West
Categories: Storied Charlotte

In Paula Martinac’s recently published novel Clio Rising, the central character, a young woman named Livvie Bliss, leaves her home in North Carolina and relocates to New York in 1983.  She moves to New York so that she can pursue a career in publishing and because she feels that she can live openly as a lesbian in New York.  Paula’s story has connections to Livvie’s story, but there is a key difference.  Paula spent much of her adult life pursuing a publishing and writing career in New York, but in 2014 she moved to North Carolina and took up residence in Charlotte. 

Since arriving in the Queen City, Paula has quickly established herself as one of Charlotte’s leading LGBTQ writers.  In 2017, Paula published The Ada Decades, a novel set in Charlotte between the years of 1947 and 2015.  It tells the story of the evolving relationship between Ada Shook, a school librarian, and Cam Lively, a teacher in the Charlotte public schools.  The novel deals with the prejudices facing lesbians during this time period, but it also deals with the desegregation of the Charlotte schools.  At its core, though, this novel is a love story that spans six decades.  Two years after the release of The Ada Decades, Paula published Clio Rising.  Like The Ada Decades, Clio Rising is a story about a relationship, but in this case the relationship is a professional one between the young protagonist and an elderly writer named Clio Hartt.  Last month Clio Rising received the gold medal for the Northeast Region in the 2020 Independent Publisher Book Awards.  For more information about Paula’s books, please click on the following link:  http://paulamartinac.com/

I recently contacted Paula and asked her about her experiences as a lesbian writer living in Charlotte.  Here is what she sent to me:

On June 15, the Supreme Court delivered a historic ruling in Bostock vs. Clayton County, Ga., which held that “an employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender violates Title VII” of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. My Facebook and Twitter feeds lit up with friends and colleagues telling their stories of being fired because they’re queer.

I’m lucky. I’ve been out for a long time, and no employer has fired me for being gay. Because I write on LGBTQ themes, however, homophobia has taken a toll on my writing career. I’ve been passed over for writing and teaching gigs and, just last year, “disinvited” as a speaker (a common occurrence for queer artists).

Still, I’ve had amazing support for my writing. I have strong queer readership and a publisher dedicated to LGBTQ writing. In the physical communities where I’ve lived, the sources of support have shifted over the years. When I lived in New York 25 to 30 years ago, support came from other queer friends and writers. In Pittsburgh, where I lived until 2014, it came from a mix of queer and straight people. Here in Charlotte, it has come almost exclusively from straight colleagues. UNC Charlotte friends have attended my readings, bought my books, and touted my successes. I’m connected to a vibrant writing community at Charlotte Center for the Literary Arts, where I teach and coach, and also at Charlotte Readers Podcast. I’ve received fellowships from the Arts and Science Council and the NC Arts Council. The change strikes me as huge.

I’ve channeled my energies into writing queer historical fiction because I think it can help make that history more vivid and alive. In my most recent novels, LGBTQ workplace issues have been a major theme. In my novel-in-stories, The Ada Decades (2017), the protagonist is a white lesbian who works as a middle school librarian in Charlotte during the early days of school integration and busing; her female partner is an English teacher at the same school. They have a lively circle of queer friends, but losing their jobs is an ever-present threat. In Clio Rising (2019), a young lesbian moves from western North Carolina to New York City in 1983 and determines to be out everywhere—especially at work. In my novel-in-progress, Testimony (2021), a college history professor in Virginia in 1960 faces hearings and dismissal when a neighbor spots her kissing another woman through her kitchen window. That novel was inspired by a true story.

As Paula mentions in her comments, she teaches creative writing courses as a part-time faculty member in UNC Charlotte’s English Department.  I take pride in the fact that I played a role in hiring her while I was serving as the Chair of the English Department.  Also, since June is LGBTQ Pride Month, I think that now is an especially good time for all of us who are associated with Storied Charlotte to take pride in the fact that Paula Martinac is now a Charlotte writer.

Tags: lesbianLGBTQqueerwriting career

Shelton Drum, the Founder of Heroes Aren’t Hard to Find

June 15, 2020 by Mark West
Categories: Storied Charlotte

For Charlotte’s readers of comic books, graphic novels and manga, Shelton Drum has achieved the status of a local legend.  Forty years ago, Shelton founded Heroes Aren’t Hard to Find, an independent comics shop, which is now located at 417 Pecan Avenue in Charlotte’s Plaza-Midwood neighborhood. Although he was only in his twenties at the time, he already had extensive experience collecting comic books.  His customers appreciated his expertise and enjoyed talking with a fellow comic book fan, and he soon developed a loyal customer base.  Nowadays Heroes (as the store is generally known) ranks among America’s most influential comic book retailers.  For more information about Heroes, please click on the following link:  http://www.heroesonline.com/about/

Two years after Shelton opened his store, he founded his annual HeroesCon. This family-friendly event has grown into one of the nation’s largest and best-run comic book conventions, and it regularly attracts many of the top comic book artists and writers.  HeroesCon usually takes place over the Father’s Day weekend, but this year Shelton had to cancel his convention because of the coronavirus pandemic.  However, next year’s HeroesCon is already set to take place at the Charlotte Convention Center on June 18-20, 2021. 

Shelton’s store and convention attract a wide range of patrons, including children who are just getting into collecting comics, long-time fans of particular comic book lines, and readers of graphic novels.  Alan Rauch, one of my colleagues in the English Department at UNC Charlotte, is an example of a customer who goes to Heroes to purchase graphic novels.  He often teaches courses on graphic novels, including an honors course titled  “Jewish Identity and the Graphic Novel.”  For the purposes of today’s Storied Charlotte blog post, I contacted Alan and asked him to comment on his experiences as a frequent customer at Heroes Aren’t Hard to Find.  Here is what he sent to me:

Most Charlotteans are probably only familiar with Comic Book Stores from venturing into Stuart Bloom’s “Comic Center of Pasadena” in “The Big Bang Theory.”  To be sure, it is a parody of that type of store, and like most parodies it gets a lot of things right… but also just as many things wrong.  Where it goes wrong is where Charlotte’s own comic bookstore Heroes aren’t Hard to Find goes right.  Now in its 40th year, Heroes (as it’s popularly known) is still owned and managed by the remarkable Shelton Drum, who brings self-confidence, vision, and knowledge to his work where poor Stuart could only bring a sense of despair and insecurity.  Forty years ago, we were all—young and old—in need of comic-book stores, as we watched mom and pop stores, with racks of magazines and comic book,s give way to corporate chains that could never thrive on the profits from the sale of a (then) 40¢ comic.  The opening of Heroes also coincided with new visions of what comics should look like.  The graphic novel, a now established genre of literature, was just emerging in works such as Will Eisner’s Contract with God and Art Spiegelman’s Maus, and Alan Moore’s V for Vendetta and Watchmen would be published within a decade.  While it’s true that comics also became darker, more thoughtful, and more complex, they were always—from their inception– as Shelton understood, a vital part of the culture.  (He might deny being a “scholar,” but engage Shelton in a brief conversation about comic history and you’ll see that the title fits.)

Shelton’s store was (and continues to be) a meeting place for everyone, whether they are children searching for delightful entertainment, adolescents looking for escape and validation, or adults eager to immerse themselves in new and challenging narratives.  And yes, the audience includes girls, women, and persons of color too, as the genre has developed important characters who are strong, independent, and self-determining.  One sees this not only in Shelton’s store, but in the remarkable annual conference called HeroesCon, which has drawn (before Covid) thousands and thousands of people, from artist and writers to cos-players to parents and kids, to Charlotte every year. Shelton recently made the conference free to children under 18, recognizing that all kids should be a part of the Heroes-Con experience. For me, Heroes (only blocks away from where I live), is a neighborhood experience. But I have come to depend on the store, with Shelton and the remarkably loyal staff he has assembled, including Seth, Elias, Karla, Samuel, and Phil, as a source of knowledge for the works that will appear in my Graphic Novel course syllabus.  But the reach of Heroes and of Shelton’s impact extends beyond the neighborhood, not only to Charlotte, where it is a legitimate “institution” (sometimes a bit crazy, though certainly not like Arkham), but to North Carolina, the southeast, and across the country. So, Happy Birthday Shelton and “Heroes,” and thank you for making Charlotte a little weirder and a lot better!

As Alan’s comments indicate, Shelton Drum is much more than a successful business person.  Many of Shelton’s customers see their weekly visits to Heroes as both a cultural and a community-building experience, and many families in the southeast incorporate HeroesCon into their Father’s Day celebrations.  In the past forty years, Shelton Drum has contributed in countless ways to Charlotte’s community of readers and writers. He is one of Storied Charlotte’s heroes. 

Tags: comicscos-playgraphic novelheroes

T.J. Reddy: Charlotte’s Own Civil Rights Activist, Poet, and Artist

June 06, 2020 by Mark West
Categories: Storied Charlotte

As I reflect on the on the recent demonstrations and protest marches in Charlotte and the rest of our country in response to the killing of George Floyd, I am reminded of the life and legacy of T.J. Reddy, one of Charlotte’s leading civil rights activists.  Reddy died on March 31, 2019, but he and today’s protesters are all part of a longer struggle for social justice.  As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”  For the purposes of today’s Storied Charlotte blog post, I want to take a moment to reflect on T.J. Reddy’s role in this larger story. 

I first met T.J. Reddy in 1986.  I had recently purchased the house where my wife and I still live, and my mother gave me an antique Swedish print as a house-warming gift.  I decided to get the print framed, so I brought it to a nearby business called Ready Art Shoppe.  The sign said it specialized in “Quality Custom Framing and Afro American Art.”  T.J. owned the business, and I ended up having a long conversation with him about the print and the importance of honoring one’s ancestors.  I explained to him how the print was tied to my mother’s Swedish ancestors, and he showed me some examples of art tied to his African ancestors.  He did a beautiful job of framing the print, and it still hangs in our dining room.   After I picked up the print, I told Ann Carver (one of my colleagues in UNC Charlotte’s English Department at the time) about my interactions with T.J.  She then informed me about T.J.’s background as a civil rights activist, poet, and artist.  Ann retired many years ago, but she and I are still in contact.  I invited her to share her memories of T.J for this blog post, and she sent me a moving essay (see below).

Thomas James “T.J.” Reddy was born in Savannah, Georgia, on August 6, 1945.  He moved to Charlotte in 1964 to attend Johnson C. Smith University, and the next year he transferred to the University of North Carolina at Charlotte where he studied history and creative writing.  While a student at UNC Charlotte, he became involved in various civil rights activities and protests.  He and two of his fellow activists (known as the Charlotte Three) ended up being arrested on dubious charges, and 1972 he was sentenced to a twenty-year prison term. The case drew national attention with Tom Wicker, a New York Times columnist, calling it a “miscarriage of justice.”  In 1979 Governor Jim Hunt commuted T.J.’s sentence. 

During the 1970s, T.J. focused much of his creative energy on his poetry.  In addition to publishing poems in various literary journals, he published two collections of poetry:  Less Than a Score but a Point came out in 1974, and Poems in One-Part Harmony came out in 1979.  In the words of poet and critic Skylark Aberjhani, Reddy’s poetry “provides unsettling snapshots of the impact of racism and poverty on the psyches of African-American children. … Ultimately, however, [Reddy’s poems] are defined by the qualities of political outrage balanced with spiritual contemplation and romantic inclinations that inform his aesthetic sensibilities.”

T.J. continued to write poetry throughout his life, but in the 1980s he began focusing his attention on the visual arts.  He opened the Ready Art Shoppe in 1982, and in the late 1980s, he studied painting at Winthrop University.  As a visual artist, T.J. aligned himself with the social realism movement.  His art often deals with difficult topics, such as incarceration and police violence, but he offers hope for a better future. In many of his paintings, T.J. celebrates teachers.  When talking about his art, he frequently expressed his desire to provide children with positive examples of caring and responsible adults. 

In the summer of 2017, the Projective Eye Gallery at UNC Charlotte Center City sponsored a retrospective exhibition of T.J.’s work titled “Everything Is Everything,” which included both his poetry and his paintings.  After viewing this exhibition, I came away feeling in awe of T.J.’s ability to integrate his commitment to the civil rights movement with his passion for the poetic and visual arts. 

“Everything Is Everything” was T.J.’s last major exhibition, but his art continues to touch the lives of young people.  One of his paintings is on display in the main stairway of UNC Charlotte’s Atkins Library.  It’s titled “The Child as an Open Book,” and it depicts a mother and a child reading a book together.  I think it is the perfect image to capture T.J. Reddy’s many contributions to Storied Charlotte.

Remembering T.J. Reddy

By Ann Carver

When I met T.J. he was painting, working to make positive change in Charlotte’s African American communities, and actively opposing the Viet Nam War. At a community center, he was counseling young African American men about how to avoid being drafted.

Just after a local riding stable refused to allow him and some friends to ride because of race, the stable burned and horses died in the fire. T.J., Dr. Jim Grant, and Charles Parker were charged with the crime. Both T.J. and Jim Grant were well-known civil rights and anti-Vietnam War activists. Neither of them knew Charles Parker well.

At their trial, it became clear that the men were being tried for their political views and activities, not for the charge of setting fire to the barn. The prosecution brought no physical or forensic evidence. They claimed to have found a bottle with gasoline at the site, but the bottle had somehow been lost. They brought in “witnesses” to testify, both of them unknown to the defendants, both of whom were convicted felons who had made deals with the prosecution for lower sentences in exchange for their testimony.  The prosecution constantly referred to them as dangerous militants and with other negative politically charged terms. T.J., Jim Grant, and Charles Parker all had solid alibis for the night and time of the fire. None had any prior record, and both T.J. and Jim Grant were known to have non-violent philosophies of protest and activism for positive change.

Nevertheless, they were judged “guilty” and sentenced to prison. There were so many irregularities and flaws in the prosecution’s case that it seemed inevitable their appeal for a new trial would be granted. It was not. They were sent to prison. As one appeal after another was denied, and when the same exact formula was used in Wilmington to charge and convict another UNCC student, Ben Chavis, and 9 other young black political activists, it became undeniably clear that a formula to convict black political activists on trumped up charges was being tested in North Carolina.

T.J., Dr. Jim Grant and Charles Parker became “The Charlotte 3,” and Ben Chavis and the other 9 young men in Wilmington became “The Wilmington 10.” The North Carolina Political Prisoners Committee was formed, and we worked tirelessly for years until their freedom was achieved when North Carolina Governor Jim Hunt commuted their sentences in 1979.

During the time T.J. was incarcerated, his wife and members of the N.C. Political Prisoners Committee took picnic lunches and visited him every week on visitors’ day, regardless of weather. We realized his life was in constant danger from those who wished to silence him and the others. T.J. and also Ben Chavis were suddenly moved a number of times, without allowing them to notify anyone, from one prison facility to another. It was important that those in authority knew people were watching so that nothing could be done in secret and go unnoticed. While in prison, T.J. continued to paint, using the materials at hand: dirt, grass and other plants, gravel, crayons and pencils. He taught other inmates how to read, and he helped inmates properly file appeals and other legal documents. T.J. also completed his M.Ed. degree through UNCC in 1977.

When T.J. was at last released from prison, he devoted himself to developing his art, teaching and working with youth in the African American communities, working with students and faculty at UNC Charlotte, working with the African American Cultural Center, writing poetry and storytelling.  T.J.’s beautiful, masterly crafted, and powerful art speaks for itself. I have donated my collection of T.J.’s paintings, which I collected over the years from the time we first met, to the UNC Charlotte Atkins Library. It is available for exhibit and study.  Through the legacy of his community work and his art, T.J. made, and continues to make, a difference.  He was my friend.

Tags: activistAfrican ancestorsartcommunitypaintingspoetrystorytelling