[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 147 (Monday, December 4, 2000)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E2111]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   TRIBUTE TO MINISTER CLEMSON BROWN

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                          HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                        Monday, December 4, 2000

  Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Speaker, I wish today to pay tribute to one of the 
outstanding videographers of the African experience in New York City, 
Minister Clemson Brown. During the past 25 years, Minister Brown and 
his ubiquitous video camera have captured over 20,000 hours of 
contemporary history in New York City. He has recorded and documented 
the issues that have shaped and defined the experiences of African 
people from Howard Beach to Central Park, from Clifford Glover to 
Amadou Diallo.
  Minister Brown is currently involved in a project to create a new 
museum--the Living Museum of African People. It is to be a multimedia 
spectacular, consisting of exhibits, artifacts, and film representing a 
chronological timeline that extends from the dawn of human civilization 
in Africa and culminates in the present millennium. It is hoped that 
this museum will eradicate the racist stereotype that Africans are a 
people without a civilization, and create in young people a new sense 
of pride and self-worth.
  For the past 25 years, he has recorded and documented the 
personalities and landmark events that have shaped and defined the 
destiny of African people. He is the president of Trans Atlantic 
Production, which has archived the world's largest collection of 
African and African-American history on videotape. More that 20,000 
hours are raw and edited footage of film and videotape are included in 
this historical treasury.
  Minister Brown is a world traveler, as well as a respected 
videographer. His work and abiding interest in the unsung people of the 
world have taken him all over the United States, as well as the 
Caribbean, Panama, Cuba, El Salvador, Nicaragua, England, Mexico, 
Ethiopia, and Kenya. He has traveled along with Reverend and Mrs. Jesse 
Jackson, the Reverend Herbert Daughtry, Dr. Yosef Ben Jochannan, and 
Dr. Ivan Van Sertima. Minister Brown served as head of the American 
delegation that journeyed to Kenya to investigate the promising AIDS 
therapy, KEMRON.
  His interest in young people led to the production of over 75 major 
documentaries, which have been used as learning materials in scores of 
community programs, schools, and colleges across the country.
  Minister Brown has also trained uncounted numbers of young people in 
the use of media equipment and video technology. He has done this 
through apprenticeship programs and the establishment of media training 
courses in schools in the New York City area.
  He is married to Lady V. Brown and has two children--Clemson R. Brown 
and Herlinda Brown.

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