“Past to our Future” 3-Building Mural Project

An energizing symbol of African Americans in Huntington, reflecting the valuable contributions many have made to the community. Three directors of long-standing community centers are partnering with All Here Together Productions to bring this to life; Unlimited Future Inc., Ebenezer Day Care Center, and Positive People at the JW Scott Center. This advisory team works together to choose muralists that have stellar skills and know the power of honoring community voice. 3-Building Mural Project seeks to vision our future along with honoring local Black citizens, placing it within an image never seen. Ernel Martinez and Betsy Casañas are both trusted artists who have mirrored back to us, who we are in a beautifully powerful way.

Mural #1

Artist Ernel Martinez was born in Belize. He was raised in South Central Los Angeles and Detroit. His introduction to the art world came in the form of graffiti. He Studied art at Pratt Institute and attained his BFA from Kutztown University. In 2004 he received his MFA from the University of Pennsylvania. In 2003, Ernel began making public art in the city of Philadelphia, as well as working with various non-profits and social services to provide art to disenfranchised youth. His artistic practice focuses on creative methods to give urban communities the tools to tell their stories through art making. He uses their stories as a framework to produce social-practice artwork to engage and build dialogue. He believes that art enriches communities and is the path to true collaboration. 

Featured in Mural

Audrey Farrow McClinton was a lifelong resident of Huntington, WV. She is a 1951 graduate of Douglass High School and has always had a love for children from an early age. A few years after graduating from Douglass she began working with children at Head Start. Teaching pre-school age children at Barnett Child Care Center was her next endeavor.  Her guiding philosophy: teach with love and introduce children to the skillsets they’ll need for kindergarten, first grade and beyond. She loved every child she had the honor to have in her classroom as if they were her own. 

Over the years at Barnett she taught many of the youth that grew up in the Fairfield West Community. For many of those youth she was their favorite teach. It was said by one of her former students that “She was always nice and made me feel good about myself. Mrs. McClinton was my first example outside of my family to show and tell me we were more than just athletes.”

Lorenzo Dowell Batts Jr. XXX

Reverend Idus Jones in 1980 he lead the construction of Ebeneezer Outreach Community Center Inc. with the combine help of the United Methodist Annual Conference and members of the Ebenezer United Methodist Church to fill a much-needed void of services provided to the local community.

Douglas Junior and Senior High School constructed in 1924 served the African-American community of Huntington during the era of segregation until it's closing in 1961. And now serves as the home of a variety of community organizations the school was the second in Huntington to be named after Frederick Douglass remained open until 1961 a reflection of both Huntington’s reluctance to integrate and the Black communities desire to maintain what had become an import institution for them. As an academic, social, and cultural center for Black families in honey to the school had a profound into during impact on the cities population Community over at 70 years notable graduates include Carter G. Woodson at Harvard trained scholar known as a father a Black history and NBA All-Star how Greer was the first African-American athlete at Marshall University the building which currently has is a community medical average in her was added to the national register of historic places in 1985.

Men’s Baseball Team

Mural #2

Artist Betsy Casañas is a Visual and Public Artist, an educator, a community activist and an organizer. She is the director of A Seed on Diamond Gallery (S.O.D.) and founder of Semilla Arts Initiative. Casañas has 28 years of experience in the arts and has created over 70 murals worldwide. In 2018 Casañas was featured in the Robb Report  as one of “5 Women Changing the Face of Street Art Around the Globe”. Her work is known for its use of pattern and color and for the dignified light that she represents humanity in marginalized communities. 

Creating safe spaces has been a vital part of her work. As a Latina artist who has been working in communities of color around the world she understands the importance of the people living in these communities to see themselves reflected in the artwork and in the leaders of the places they inhabit. She believes that artists have an obligation to reflect the times we are living in and to highlight the people’s story and change the narrative that has been created for us. By normalizing and humanizing our collective stories we create communities that are more tolerant.

Featured in Mural

Mr. Joe L. Williams Jr. was born on March 25, 1945, in Madison (Boone County), West Virginia. He received his BBA degree in finance from Marshall University in 1978, a graduate of Mayor’s Leadership Institute in 1984 and attended several WV & VA Banker’s Director College Seminars. He is Director of Energy Services of America Corp. He has been a Director since the inception. Mr. Williams is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Basic Supply Company, Inc., which he founded in 1977. Mr. Williams was one of the organizers and is a Director of First Sentry Bank, Huntington, West Virginia. Mr. Williams was Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Consolidated Bank & Trust Co., in Richmond, Virginia from 2007 until it merged with Premier Financial Bancorp, Inc. in 2009.

Mr. Williams is a former member of the West Virginia Governor’s Workforce Investment Council. He is a former Director of Unlimited Future, Inc. (a small business incubator) and a former Member of the National Advisory Council of the U.S. Small Business Administration. Mr. Williams is a former Mayor and City Councilman of the City of Huntington, West Virginia. He is a former member of Marshall University’s Institutional Board of Governors.

Mr. Williams is married to Shirley Ann (Johnson) Williams, has four children, eighteen grandchildren and step grandchildren, and three great grandchildren.

Pastor Samuel R. Moore is a native West Virginian, Pastor Moore is the third child of Clarence and the late Dora (Wilson) Moore. He was born and reared in the coal mining community of Gary, in McDowell County. After completing ninth grade in the McDowell County Public Schools System, he moved with his family to Bluefield, Virginia where he graduated from Graham High School.

Pastor Moore is married to the former Renna Leftwich and they are the proud parents of three children (Leland, Jakki, and Harrison), and three grandchildren, and one foster son.

Pastor Moore retired as an administrator with the Cabell County Public School System. In 2001 he was one of two teachers in the state of West Virginia selected to receive the prestigious National Classroom Teacher Award from the Milken Family Foundation. He is also actively involved in the community, serving on numerous boards and commissions.

Moore currently sits on the Board of Governors for the Mildred Mitchell-Bateman Hospital; Board of Directors for Goodwill Industries; Board of Directors for TEAM WV; Board Member of the Cabell County Sexual Assault Response Team; a member of the City of Huntington Civil Service Police Commission; Board of Directors for the CHH Hoops Family Hospital Foundation, and is secretary of the Huntington Black Pastors Ministerial Association. 

His efforts have gained him recognition in Who’s Who Among American Colleges and Universities; Who’s Who Among American Teachers; Outstanding Young Men in America; and Tri-Cities African-American Citizen of the Year.

Having virtually grown up in the church, Pastor served his home church in various capacities including, janitor, van driver, Sunday School teacher, musician, choir director, youth leader, Brotherhood president, and deacon. He is an ordained minister with the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, Inc. He is currently the pastor at Full Gospel Assembly in Huntington where he has served since 1983.

At the 2010 Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, Inc. international convention in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Suffragan Bishop Moore was elected to the organization’s 57 member Executive Board of Bishops. He was subsequently assigned as diocesan of Episcopal District 23—the West Virginia and East Tennessee Council of the P. A. of W., Inc. A former Junior High and high school basketball coach, he holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Education from Bluefield (WV) State College and a Masters of Arts degree in Educational Administration from Marshall University.

Michael Thomas is a lifelong trailblazer within the Huntington community, Michael Thomas has answered to many names over the course of his life: Michael, Mike, Michael T., Empty, Honey, Dad, and Poppy just to name a few. A native Huntingtonian, born and raised, Mr. Thomas has a litany of “firsts” on his resume’. The first African-American to integrate Guyandotte Elementary School; among the first to walk the halls of Enslow Junior High and Huntington East High School; the first African-American Foreman, General Manager, and Human Resources Director at Sement Solvay/Allied Chemical/Corondolet Coke, and the first Compliance Officer in the City of Huntington. A graduate and proud alumnus of Marshall University, Mr. Thomas has long been a tireless warrior for his community and his city. He is a former NAACP President, a founding member and Executive Board member of Unlimited Future, Inc., Board member of “Our Jobs, Our Children, Our Future”, and owner of both Tudor’s Biscuit World 20th Street and Poppy’s Bar & Grill.

Mr. Thomas is also well known for being the lead singer of the regionally renowned music group, The Explosive Dynamiks from 1963 thru the present. Additionally, he is a published poet and writer. His lifelong motto: Hard Work and Sacrifice. He’s touched and inspired countless people in the community and beyond.

Dr. Gunn

Mr. Leroy Nicholason is a trained tailor. He started his training in 1948 at A&T and was in training for 3 years. Mr. Nicholson moved to Huntington in 1954 to start a career in tailoring. He worked for George Wright's Clothing Store, Robert Hall's, and worked at Sears from 1956 to 1992. When he retired from Sears, they let him have a 1952 Singer Sewing Machine, Blind Stitch Machine with hundreds of spools of thread. To this day the machines still work.

Mr. Nicholson had his family home built in 1964 which was originally a playground. He says to this day, elders in the community forgive him for building on their playground. The biggest changes he has seen in his community are paved streets and the decline in population.Mr. Nicholson still enjoys tailoring, He likes to "be on the run", He is a member of the Marie Redd Center where he loves to play dominos and bingo. 

Mr. Nicholson belonged to The Owls & the Old Goats social club. To this day he is still a member of the Revelers Club. He has served as President of the Scott Community Center, Barnett Child Care Center and Action Inc. He also, has been a member of the Huntington Professional and Businessmen of Huntington. Mr. Nicholson has been a faithful member of Calvary Baptist Church for over 50 years. Mr. Nicholson also served in the Army and rose to the rank of Sargent. Mr. Nicholson was married to the love of his life Jessietta Kellsor Nicholason. They were married for 67 years. He is the father of 3, grandfather of 7, great-grandfather of 6. Mr. Nicholson will celebrate his 92nd Birthday in September.

Marion Elizabeth T. “Bunche” Gray was a long time Human/Civil Rights and Civic Activist known for repeating the quotes “I wonder why somebody didn’t do something then I realized that I am somebody” and “If not now then when? If not me then who?”

She was born November 3, 1917 in Powelton, WV to Chester A. and Beatrice West Thompson. She died January 23, 2004. Siblings: three brothers, Glenn(killed in Italy while serving in WWII), Arthur and Chester. One sister Antoinette Leace. Husband, Conkolene Mason Gray, Children: Olivia Gray Stewart and C. Michael Gray.

The family moved to Huntington when Marion was very young. Her father operated a service station on the corner of 8th street and 8th ave. As result of having a husband and three brothers who served in WWII, Marion always looked for the opportunity to assist service members and US Veterans. Marion attended Barnett Elementary, graduated from Douglass High School in 1937, and attended Marshall University. As a young adult, she became involved with the NAACP later serving as secretary under Mrs. Orissa Johnson Brown and served on the NAACP Board of Directors.

She was a very proud Douglass alum and especially proud she was taught by Lavinia Norman and Revella Hughes. Marion served as Chairperson of Douglass Reunion twice: 1973 Co-Chairperson(1st Reunion) and 1978 Chairperson. Especially proud that she and her children marched with MLK Jr twice: April 18,1959 Youth March For Integrated Schools, Washington DC and August 28,1963 March On Washington.

She was a member of WV Sliver Haired Legislature. Additionally, she served on the Boards of Directors of WV Mental Health Association, WV Colored PTA, Cabell County Auxiliary and Southwest Community Action. She was a full-time dedicated member of the WV Federation of Republican Women, Lady of Loyal Order of Bison. A staunch Republican back in the day when there was a liberal wing of the Republican Party.

 Marion was known as a regular attendee to the meetings of Huntington City Council, Cabell County Board of Education and PTA’s of her children. She referred to herself as a “volunteer professional.” Well known for passing out candy and inspirational written messages at meetings she attended. She took a special interest in the community youth inviting them into her home and sharing home cooked food and good reading material.

Accessed May 21st 2022. https://www.facebook.com/Huntington-WV-Black-History-552679858573406/.

Accessed May 21st 2022. https://commonweal.gallery/exhibitions/kara-mshinda-ernel-martinez.