It is a somewhat surreal event, but I was again able to "facilitate" another Black Alumni Memorial Service last Thursday, November 6, 2025. It is surreal because I often wonder how this all came to be. There are so many interesting developments in this life, and my facilitation of these Memorial Services is just one of the more surreal turns.
Below is the program for the Memorial Service. It begins with my Welcoming Remarks. In those remarks, I told those in attendance that I had spent the morning in my bed weeping. I was weeping because I was a overwhelmed by all that has happened in my life. More specifically, I told how some 31 years ago, I found myself in a hospital bed in Fairfield, California. I was in the hospital because I had a bleeding ulcer which had caused me to lose consciousness at home. While lying in that hospital bed in 1994, I had also began to cry. I was crying because I felt as though God was not happy with me. I wondered why God would be so upset. After all, I had married a beautiful black woman and we had four beautiful children. I had dedicated my legal career to serving the people and was in the midst of a nearly 40-year stay in the City Attorney's Office for the City of Richmond, a city that was, at the time, predominantly Black. I was also in the seventh year of what would be a 34-year stint with the West Contra Costa YMCA. I was one of the officers of the YMCA and I took great pride in the fact that our YMCA managed day care centers from Yreka in the far north of California to Fresno in the middle. Our day care centers not only enabled farmworkers to have a good place to leave their children while they were working in the fields, one was also in the local Richmond high school where students could leave their children while they attended classes. That seemed to be admirable.
Indeed, my work with the YMCA also enabled a few traumatized young people to receive some free psychological counseling so that they could better cope with living in the war zone that the streets of Richmond had become in the early 1990s. And finally, as a legacy of my Amherst College days, I was proud that the YMCA had swimming programs which the black and brown children of West Contra Costa could go to learn how to swim. So all this had to be good. So why was God upset with me.
As it turns out, God was upset with me because I was not doing enough. In that hospital, I came to realize that God wanted me to write. Hoping to please God so that I would not have any more unpleasant hospital stays, I committed myself to writing for God. So, as soon as I got out of the hospital, I began to write.
I have a unique family history involving my paternal grandmother's father and grandfather. Her grandfather was one of the founders of an all-black farming community called Amber Valley, in northern Alberta, Canada. I thought that God wanted me to write about that. So, I did and after two weeks, I sent it off to publishers. To my surprise, I received a response within two months of getting out of the hospital. A publisher indicated interest in my story but they wanted me to make the story broader. Instead of focusing on the story of one family migrating from Oklahoma to Canada, the publisher wanted me to tell tales from the global migration of people of African descent.
I was stunned by the magnitude of the request. I did not know quite how to begin such a project. But all this seemed to be directed by God, so who was I to say "No".
So, I wrote. Within two years, the first volume of the Pan-African Chronology was completed, followed by a second volume two years later, and a third in 2001. I also discovered that African Diaspora was closely related to the Muslim Diaspora, so I wrote two books on the Muslim Diaspora in 1999 and 2000. Writing the books on Islam scared me because I am not a Muslim and I do not speak Arabic. But, it was clear, that God wanted me to write those books.
Of course, the books on Islam were quite timely. On September 11, 2001, it became clear to me why I was supposed to write those books.
As I told my Memorial Service audience, all five of those books are nn the reference book section on the first floor of the Robert Frost Library. I consider them to be a miracle because they are five history books written by a person who is not an historian. The two books on Islam were written by a person who is not a Muslim and who does not speak Arabic. And perhaps, most amazing of all, each of the books is dedicated to the inspiration for them all. Each of the books is dedicated to God.
I told the audience this because the story did not end there. Last week, I sent 369 pages of profiles on the Black Alumni of Amherst College. The College accepted these pages and expanded upon them by having students obtain the photos for most of the profiles provided. All of this material is now contained in four large binders of material that is to be permanently housed in the Archives and, for the time being, preserved and maintained by the staff and the students. I call the project my Living Memorial Book and like the other five books of mine that are in the Frost Library the Living Memorial Book is also dedicated to God. Indeed, you can find the inspiration for this dedication in the following song
Peace,
Everett "Skip" Jenkins
Class of 1975
Fairfield, California
November 11, 2025
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Amherst College Black Alumni Memorial Service
November 6, 2025
7 – 9 p.m. ET on Zoom
Order of Service
Welcoming Remarks Everett Jenkins ’75
Amherst Afro-American Society, Minister of Information 1972-1973; Amherst Afro-American Society, Chairman 1974
Musical Selection: My Tribute (To God Be the Glory) by Wintley Phipps
Introductions
The Libation Ceremony Junius Williams ’65, H’24
National Bar Association President 1978-1979; Amherst College Honorary Degree 2024
A Time for Remembrance Everett Jenkins ’75
Honoring Those Who Have Joined the List of Ancestors Since the Last Reading of the Names
The Legacy Address Walter White ’76
Grandson of Frederick Allen Parker, Sr. 1920, H’73; Nephew of Frederick Allen Parker, Jr. ’60; Brother of Adrienne White Faines ’82; Brother-in-Law of Larry Faines ’82; Cousin of Frederick Cliver ’86; Father of Alexandre White ’10; and Uncle of Nicholas Neisser ’14
Musical Selection: Precious Lord by Ellis Moss ’79
A Prayer by Gregory Domingue ’72
A Reading of the Memorial List
A Memorial Message Dr. Cuthbert “Tuffy” Simpkins ’69
Author of a biography on John Coltrane; Founder, President and Chief Innovation Officer of Vivacelle Bio; and the first Chairman of the Amherst Afro-American Society (1968)
Musical Selection: People Get Ready by Ellis Moss ’79
Amherst College Black Alumni Memorial Service, Continued
A Special Remembrance Everett Jenkins ’75
Honoring Carol Holt Miller (’75 Mount Holyoke College) and Nancy Holt Miller
Musical Selection: My Heart Will Go On by Celine Dion
Concluding Scripture: Matthew 5:1-16 Antonio Jackson ’78E, F’76
Attorney and Community Planner; Master of City Planning from UPenn; Juris Doctor from University of Richmond; Amherst College Wade Fellow 2000
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