Where Vernon Jarrett Is Coming From (Father-in-law to Valerie Jarrett)

Chicago Reader ^ | March 24, 1988 | Florence Hamlish Levinsohn

[Eagle of Liberty]

The young sailor, Vernon Jarrett, is used to myths about the "coloreds." In northwestern Tennessee, where he grew up, the tall stories abound. But this is a new one, and he doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. The truck driver had been commiserating with him about the terrible treatment blacks were getting in a white Navy.

And yet, despite the segregation and mistreatment, Jarrett had a good time in the Navy. For one thing, it took him to the big city. All the blacks who enlisted from his part of the country were sent to boot camp in the black section of the Great Lakes naval base about 40 miles north of Chicago that Jarrett would come back here to live soon after he was discharged. Among the many wonders he experienced in Chicago was a speech by Aleksandr Kerensky, an early leader of the Russian Revolution, who was driven from power by the Bolsheviks and exiled to the U.S. People like Kerensky were barely rumors in Paris, or in Knoxville, where Jarrett went to college, or even in nearby Nashville, a big city by southern standards.

Vernon Jarrett is still covering civil rights, in his three-times-a-week columns in the Chicago Sun-Times, in his twice-weekly 4:50 PM commentaries on WLS TV, and in his early Sunday morning WLS TV call-in show. He has earned what black Tribune columnist Clarence Page describes as "a very special position in the black community, as a commentator who reflects the attitudes, the anger, the frustrations, and the goals and aspirations of black Chicagoans. He is like James Baldwin, who said, 'I'm trying to bear witness to the truth.' Vernon is a grand old-fashioned teacher."

[Eagle of Liberty]

Jarrett offers an explanation. "I'm not a journalist in a vacuum. I'm a role model in a sense, as a successful person. These youngsters have to believe that there are some people who are successful--some of them think I make a lot more money than I do, that I'm up in the half-million class, which I'm nowhere near--but I want people to know that you can be a successful person and not be an Uncle Tom or a sellout. This is part of the big response I've had since the Pavilion speech. The most flattering thing is to walk into a church and have everybody stand up and applaud."

[madison10]

Excellent article. He put up with a great deal.

[BreezyDog]

I thought he was a card carrying communist and was friends with Frank Marshall Davis, Obama’s Mentor?

[gr8eman]

He is like James Baldwin, who said, 'I'm trying to bear witness to the truth.' Vernon is a grand old-fashioned teacher."

Yep...teach everyone to stick it to "the man", but never provide "the man's" address!

[newheart]

[drpix]

He was and that's who taught him how to fabricate a party-line biography of "solidarity" defending Japanese American and Jews. That's "journalism" a la Frank Marshal Davis and the other comrades.

"The following officers and council members were elected at the June 1946 convention of the Communist Party USA youth wing American Youth for Democracy:

Illinois: Iz Cheifetz, Evelyn Fargo, Sam Freidman, Delores Gerrard, Leon Gurley, Pat Hoverder, Vernon Jarrett."

LINK

[Coldwater Creek]

Quite a coincidence Vernon Jarrett and Van Jones are from the same area of West Tenn............