VIRGINIA BEACH
TODD DAVIDSON was a 16-year-old Maury High School junior when his psychology teacher issued a challenge:
Any student who would memorize and recite a speech would earn extra credit.
The speech was Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1963 classic, “I Have a Dream.”
Davidson wanted the extra credit. He added “Dream” recitation to his load of classwork, basketball drills, cello practice and college applications.
He absorbed the speech’s passion, energy, commitment and more.
“I began to realize,” Davidson said, “that part of the reason I was even eligible to attend the College of William and Mary, being able to apply to that kind of school, was because of the groundwork that was laid by King that day at the March on Washington.
“When that hit, it left an indelible impression.”
He is 30 now, the Rev. Todd C. Davidson, pastor of the 1,000-member Piney Grove Baptist Church in Virginia Beach and youngest member of the city’s School Board.
Today, he will again deliver King’s speech, this time as the kick-off to a Martin Luther King Day parade at The Gallery at Military Circle in Norfolk.
“I don’t attempt to sound like him or mimic him,” Davidson said. “That would be a disservice to his memory, to use his tone, his pitch, his cadence. But I will do it as best I can, in my own voice.”
He won’t deliver it from memory.
“Some phrases stay right there in the forefront of your mind,” he said, quoting, “ ‘ … they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.’ But to memorize it again ... ”
Davidson began to laugh.
“When I was 16, that’s all I had to focus on. My head was empty then. Now, I have a head full of phone numbers, bills, account numbers. I have five e-mail accounts with five passwords.”
Davidson comes from a family of educators.
“My grandfather had a third-grade education, and he taught himself to read. He made the commitment that his children would get an education, and he sent three sons through college.”
Davidson’s father, Calvert, was a football coach and guidance counselor at Booker T. Washington High in Norfolk for 30 years. His mother, Doris, taught at Norfolk junior highs, including Ruffner, Azalea Gardens and Lafayette-Winona. The family lived in Norfolk’s Ingleside neighborhood.
“We couldn’t use the word ‘can’t’ in the house,” Davidson said. “He eliminated it from our vocabulary.
“One day, when I was really little, he put me on top of the refrigerator, and he told me, ‘Jump off the refrigerator, and I’ll catch you.’ He’s 6-foot-2, about 240 pounds, a football player. Big man. I said, ‘I ca ... ,’ and he grabbed my lips and held them shut. He told me again to jump, and I said, ‘I ca ... ,’ and he reached up and held my lips again. So I jumped. At that moment, I realized I could trust him, and that if I could overcome my fear of heights, I could do anything.”
Davidson grew up to play cello and piano, quarterbacked the football team, played guard in basketball, pitched in baseball. He ran for the School Board last year.
“My father tells me he believes I will be president some day. When you have a dad who genuinely believes in you, you can do anything.”
He graduated from William and Mary with a degree in government and elementary education. At age 19, he said, he felt a calling to the spiritual life and went on to seminary at Virginia Union University.
At William and Mary, he met his wife-to-be, Laia. They have two daughters, ages 5 months and 5 years.
Davidson taught at Granby High School for a year and was dean of schools at Blair Middle School, both in Norfolk, before becoming pastor at Piney Grove in 2004.
He’s working on his doctorate at W&M and teaches education classes at Norfolk State University.
“I feel like every time I step into that classroom, I am responsible for telling them what they will become. I tell them they will become the best teachers that they can be.”
That lesson, he said, is pulled right from King’s teachings.
“There’s a quote of Dr. King’s, about us being inextricably linked. I cannot become the best that I am capable of being until you have become the best you can become.
“Do I believe that King’s dream is actualized yet? No. Until all of us have made it, none of us have made it. …
“We are still walking toward the dream. Dr. King would say we still have some steps to climb.”
At Davidson’s church, those steps include a mentoring program for young people.
“Bling and rings and women with no clothes is what we’ve put on a pedestal,” he said. “We have to redefine success. Success is not measured by how much money you make or how famous you are, but on how much impact you make in your sphere of influence.”
Piney Grove, a historically African American church, also has addressed what King called “the most segregated hour in America.” The congregation has become more racially diverse and held combined services with the nearby predominately white St. John’s Baptist Church.
“Two congregations, less than a mile from each other, got together for maybe the first time ever,” Davidson said, “and that’s the kind of unity King believed in. None of us are as strong as all of us.”
One of Davidson’s own parishioners, Anita Jefferson, tapped him for the King speech.
Jefferson, a marketing assistant at Military Circle, coordinated the celebration.
“He is such a young and dynamic speaker,” Jefferson said. “He has a way of touching people. When we are in church, he reaches the youngest to the oldest.”
Davidson has been working on the speech for about six weeks, visualizing it, timing it. “It’s about 12 minutes for me, for King about 15.
“It’s a humbling experience. It means so much to so many. It spoke to what was good in us. People know what mistakes we make. People know that we are flawed. But there is a vision that we can overcome those flaws.”
King’s shadow looms large.
“The delivery, it’s an awesome responsibility,” Davidson said, “but I put it on par with Sunday morning, when I am called on to deliver God’s word.”
Truth is, with all the public speaking that Davidson does, “I’m nervous every time,” he said, leaning forward and holding out his hands.
“You’d think – I’ve spoken about 200 times here, in my own church – that I’d be over that. But you come in here on Sunday morning, and my hands are freezing cold. Cold and clammy.”
But the words he delivers today are bound to be a hit.
“With King’s speech, ‘I Have a Dream,’ at least I know the material is good.”
Roberta T. Vowell, (757) 446-2327, roberta.vowell@pilotonline.com
Delicious
Digg
Reddit
Facebook
Google
Yahoo
P-Town Hubert
There is "PURE" racism among both Democrats and Republicans. Please, let's not think for one minute there isn't. To say one political party is more racist than the other is simply wrong. This is Virginia, it is and has been a racist state, but not by all residence.
40 years later.....
It's been 40 years since MLK was assassinated. I remember when I first heard about him. It was 1987. I was 4 years old attending a preschool in Newark, NJ. My mother moved me out of Newark when I turned 5 because she didn't want me to be influenced by what goes on there.
I've been a life long admirer of Dr. King. I'm 24 now. I hope to some day have the same impact that he had. We must remember each day what he fought tirelessly for. When he died, he was 39 years old. His autopsy showed that his heart aged to that of a 60 year old. So even without the assassin's bullet, it's quite likely he would have died of a heart attack at some point in his life. Was he perfect? No. Like any man, he had his faults: adultery, plagairism, etc. But he was a man who saw a problem and fought intelligently to combat it. We should all aspire to do the same thing.
The home of racism...
George S. said, "Republican racism".
If you want to witness pure, unbridled racism, look at the Democratic Party. Two former Democratic Presidential candidates, Jesse and Al, believe that it's OK for black people to say "nappy headed ho", but white people who say those exact same words should be crucified.
Now THAT's racism!
Of course they’ll deny that it’s OK for black people to say “ho”, but they can’t produce one black person whose career they’ve tried to destroy for saying it. Actions speak far louder than words, especially when those words are coming from the mouths of racists.
King and Lee...
I'm not a thoroughbred white boy. Being neither black nor white, I'm on the outside of this issue, looking in.
How can anyone not admire what Dr. King did? He took on the Federal Government, and gave his life for what he believed in. That's the same thing that Robert E. Lee did, except for the "giving his life" part. But Robert E. Lee was willing to die for the Southern cause. I admire him, too.
Excellence and dedication are hard to ignore, unless you're in denial of reality.
Speaking of racism
Check into Loving vs Virginia. With Virginia being the Republican state it is, it was the last state to allow mixed marriage and only then because the Supreme Court said they had to. There is more Republican racism in VA then you think. Afterall, look at George Allen. Need I say more?
Re:
To the one that talked about why everyone talks about Jesse Jackson, it is that veryone decries him as someone who is one of the black leaders, yet Jackson has no incentive to stop fueling racism, check that, he does have an incentive, racism makes him money. Don't ever see him going without, like some in the rural & urban slums of our big cities. Probably sends or sent his Kids to Private Schools, while our Public schools wallow in decay.
In fact while he is shaking down big corporations for cash, you all wear blinders and believe anything a democrat tells you. They say that MLK changed things and that LBJ, a democrat president, pushed for legislation, yet what they fail to mention, is that it was a Republican controlled Congress who passed it, guess republicans aren't racist after all. And just consider that Jackson ran for office several times and couldn't get the black vote. Guess some forget that most democrats hail from the south that oppressed them and they continued to get voted in and see what you get, a never ending door of racism, that I said Jackson has no intentions of fighting anywhere near what MLK did.
A most honorable man
Like the death of John F. Kennedy I remember the exact moment when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr was killed, and I'm white. I have a copy of every speech he made hanging in my home, his words are among the most powerful you can possibly read, yet I'm not convinced the black community remembers that he lived and died for them: actually for us all. Dr. King was so desperately needed in the 60's, but I can't help but wonder how he would be peceived today. Today, it's a different world. There is still so much hate, so much raceism and violence, and his teaching seem to have all but vanished. For me it's a day of reflection, for reading those speeches hanging on my walls, but also a feeling of sadness for a life taken from us all way too soon. Dr. King will always be remembered in my home, and not just for the day.
Negative comments on MLK Day
Can't we have one day without negative comments.. I should have known coming to this post, but this is the south. And why do you speak ill about Rev Jackson (MLK aide), once again this is why we celebrate all you have to do is read these post.
All of the above
Im with everyone else that commented above. The man must be rolling in his grave.
I wonder what King would think...
of today's youth, the dropout rates, soaring illegitimate births, lack of respect for others, welfare dependency, all the crime -- especially the murders.
I don't think he'd be real proud.
If he were alive today....
I wonder, if MLK were alive today, if he would side with those that call themselves black leaders (Sharpton, Jackson, etc.). I believe MLK was for equality, not in keeping those of color repressed so he can make a living. Think about it.....