By Lil Nickelson
On Sunday, November 10th, 2024, my friend and photographer Rudy Collins and I met around 12:00pm in Marcus Garvey Park entrance at 124th Street and 5th Avenue in Harlem.
From there we boarded a golf cart together to take a ride up a steep hill on the side of the park right behind the swimming pool. Our destination was the Acropolis, an artificial plateau at the center of the park to house the Harlem Watchtower, which we will discuss more later. The Acropolis looks like a gigantic 19th century stone floor that reminds you of a modern day “fire pit,” without any fire.
The Soapbox Presents in conjunction with the Marcus Garvey Park Alliance decided to offer our community a much-needed rejuvenation session even before the election took place. They planned an afternoon of live music and spoken word performances to get us out on a Sunday afternoon to feed our souls and lift our spirits. The Mellon Foundation was a major sponsor of The Soapbox Presents in 2024, along with their community partners like Harlem Arts Alliance, Street Corner Resources, Harlem Honors, and Harlem Inc. Marija Abney, the founder of The Soapbox Presents is an accomplished actor and producer that is on Broadway in the current production of Death Becomes Her.
Harlem Night Markets came on board provided the DJ, DJ Relly Rell and curated a diverse variety of seven vendors came to sell their products to attendees from food, beverages, bandanas, jewelry, and journals. Dj Relly Rell held court the first hour from 12 noon to 1pm, and he had people dancing and moving around to the jams he was playing. He helped us generate some personal body heat up on the mountaintop.
Jswiss, the host for the afternoon stood on the soapbox to open up the afternoon performances by introducing the five-piece band that started playing, and was comprised of the following musicians: Bass – Jonathan Michel, Saxophone – Christopher McBride, Drums – Charles Goold, Guitar – Flavio Silva, and on Keyboard – Luke Carlos O’Reilly. The band played a couple of tunes before the host returned to soapbox to introduce each of the four spoken word artists that performed, who had the opportunity to recite four of their original pieces for the enthusiastic audience.
The works recited by the artists had people relating to the emotions that each artist brought out as they recited each piece. We laughed, said amens to agree and just totally enjoyed their performances. After the spoken word performers were through, a singer joined the band and belted out several songs to get the crowd moving around because there was a definite chill in the air, but not in our spirits.
Now a little additional information about the Harlem Watchtower that I gathered from Wikipedia. It was designed by Julius H. Kroehl and erected over the years 1855 through 1857 of cast iron. The watchtower allowed observers to use the natural elevation of the park with the added height of the tower to search for fires, in an era when most buildings were still made of wood. The forty-seven-foot tower is the only one to remain of the eleven towers that had been constructed in the city. The tower was fitted with a ten-thousand-pound bell cast by Jones & Hitchcock. It was designated a NYC landmark in 1967 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1976.
As Rudy and I boarded the golf cart from the ride back down the hill before the concert ended and we noted how we both grew up in Harlem, and have frequented the park on a regular basis over the years and never realized how far back that park holds Harlem history, It’s remarkable because you just never know what historical places still exist in our beloved village of Harlem.
Lil Nickelson
Lil Nickelson is a Senior Consultant with an MBA degree focused on Finance and Financial Management Services from New York University, Leonard N. Stern School of Business. Skilled in sales, management, business development, marketing strategy, and social media, with a history of working in the food and beverages industry. Her column “Dining with Miss Lil” has been featured in Harlem newspapers and with Harlem World Magazine for numerous years.
Rudy Collins
Harlem photographer of the beautiful brownstones and things Harlem for 20+ years. He has been a photographer with Harlem World Magazine since 2016. Find more of Rudy’s book “Harlem is Art ll” on Blurb and his work on Fine Art America. Read his Rudy’s World column.
For more information go to Rudy Collins.
Photo Credits: 1) Marija Abney and Lil Nickelson. 2) Band. 3) Crowd. 4) The Watchtower. By Rudy Collins.
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