The People’s Professor: Community Education Goes Ivy League

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Ben Armstead seized on the opportunity with missionary zeal, luring a new batch of folks with the promise of a chance to “finally be heard” on the Columbia campus. And heard they were, often staying well past midnight to discuss human nature, the origins of violence, the presidential election, and, indeed, Columbia’s expansion into Harlem. To his wife’s chagrin, the professor refused to leave, no matter how bleary-eyed, until his friends did.

One evening Dalton lectured for 25 minutes about Malcolm X’s conversion from segregationist to inclusionist, only to be interrupted by a bear of a man who said, “Not to be disrespectful, professor, but you got it all wrong. I was one of X’s bodyguards.”

Another Dalton devotee who attended the forum regularly was Danny White, a friend of Ben. While Ben is all bravado, Danny is humble and reflective. He lingers, like Ben, after class to ask the professor a pressing question or to urge him to look at a political problem from another point of view. The professor listens to Danny’s take—usually economic—with rapt attention, often tenderly putting an arm around one of his bony shoulders. If they were 50 years younger, they’d be drinking buddies or brothers down for the cause, Dalton soaking up the cooler, Kangol-clad Marxist’s every word.

Today it is Danny who is soaking up Dalton’s words. A noose has been found on an African American professor’s office door at Columbia’s world-renowned school of education, Teachers College. The anticipation in the lecture hall is palpable as Dalton picks up a piece of paper off the lab table behind him and quietly begins: “President Bollinger has sent an e-mail to the Columbia community in response to the recent incident on campus. I was struck by one line in particular: ‘An attack on the dignity of any member of our community is an assault on all of us.’ ”

He tosses the paper back onto the lab table before going on: “This is not, I hope, to suggest that this kind of attack is new on this campus. Institutional racism is not new to Columbia. When I came here in 1969 the whole place was closed down because of the so-called Columbia riots. A lot of people think that was sparked by Vietnam. It was not. It was sparked by Columbia’s attempt to build a gym that offended Harlem. The Columbia students—Zeus bless them—stood up and brought this university to a standstill!”

Getting louder and louder, he goes on: “Those were the glory days, when injustice was not overlooked so easily, when we identified with a larger community here in Harlem. What might bring us to our senses today?” he asks the students, his voice booming with urgency.

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