DRUM TV: Documenting Harlem Before the Smartphone

DRUM TV was the creation of the late Richard Martin who was the first black cameraman at NBC Network television national headquarters in New York City. During his distinguished career he mastered many of the technical and operational aspects of television production. After retirement Richard vigorously pursued his vision of developing a television network in Harlem with a global outreach.

The idea was to produce and curate content that emanates solely from within the Black experience in New York City and throughout the Africana Black Diaspora. DRUM Studio was a major contributor in the development of original content generated to serve the early exploration of public access television’s vast potential to democratize media in ways that give the people a voice within government and within their communities.

DRUM TV evolved on the cusp of broadband’s encroaching global outreach. Prior to the ubiquitous smart phone camera, up through the advent of universal Internet with its capacity to connect the world as a “Global Village,” DRUM TV offered a unique platform for curating content and sharing stories, unfiltered by mainstream media outlets – shows that offered a diversity of views and opinions, with new talent and void of commercial interruptions.

I am fortunate to have been part of DRUM TV’s production staff as a producer, writer, reporter, cameraman, correspondent, and interviewer. The weekly DRUM show, Uptown Soapbox was a person-on-the-street segment in which DRUM crew elicited the opinions of passersby on 125^th Street each Saturday morning. The idea evolved from the notion of an era in which public orators stood on boxes or ladders on Harlem’s broad throughfares during the Harlem Renaissance and ensuing decades, mostly along 125^th Street, Harlem’s main commercial corridor.

As a public forum the Uptown Soapbox show was a means by which everyday citizens exercised their First Amendment rights of freedom of speech, reflecting on current events and addressing the day’s most topical issues. In this Uptown segment, I was credited as Production Assistant. In that assignment I was privileged to produce interviews featuring some of Harlem’s political, clerical, and civic luminaries on the occasion of Harlem’s Annual el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz birthday, widely known as Malcom X Day in the Village of Harlem.

Each year since Malcolm was assassinated in February 1965 many of the New York City’s City’s esteemed Black political and civic leaders came together in unity to honor his life and legacy. Among those I interviewed in this DRUM program are Dr. Wyatt Tee Walker, known universally as Dr. Matin Luther King’s “Lieutenant” and Pastor Emeritus of Harlem’s Canaan Baptist Church; Dr. Manning Marable, Professor, Columbia University and a biographer of Malcolm X; Ms. C. Virginia Fields, former Manhattan Borough President; and the Honorable Percy Sutton Esq., former Manhattan Borough President, and creator/Executive producer of “Showtime at the Apollo” and Chairman/ Founder of the Apollo Theater Foundation. A Howard University lawyer by professional training, Mr. Sutton was also the Attorney for the late Malcolm X. Also two of Malcolm X’s six daughters, Ilyasah Shabazz and Malaak Shabazz, spoke about the significance of this annual day honoring their father.

Malcolm X Day was a day when all businesses were expected to close along 125^th Street for one hour. However, rapid gentrification accelerated by the arrival of Starbucks, a new Disney store, and former president Bill Clinton’s post-presidential Uptown Harlem office surfaced underlying tensions between the traditions of old Harlem and the burgeoning corporate interests resistant to any notion of “interrupting business” along the busy boulevard for any reason.

This segment of DRUM TV Uptown Soapbox, moderated by Marcia Fingal, is from my archive, DDay Media Group Inc. and is presented in memory and honor of Richard Martin.