Uncle Dale always taught me to look beyond my walls, to never be boxed in, to expand my horizons. One night after club hopping in Oakland on Lakeshore Ave. & Lake Park District at the 5th Amendment, the Serenader and other spots, Uncle Dale and I shot up Piedmont Ave. and landed in a biker bar for the purpose of shooting pool. We were the only two people of color that I recall, and I recall Uncle Dale saying to me something to the effect of, “You got to learn how to talk to ALL walks of life, to ALL colors, to ALL peoples, and not just Blacks.” By the time we rolled out of there we were honorary M/C members. They didn't want to see us leave. I could have never known that 20 years later, I would need this lesson taught to me by example by Uncle Dale when I would be called on to interview scores of virtually all white local, state & federal government & military personnel who responded to New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. It’s because of this vital lesson that I have the exclusives I have on the real story behind the largest “natural” disaster in American History. Okay, this was my inclusive lesson, now it was time for me we-in-this-together-right-or-wrong lesson. One evening in 1990, Marcia, Dale and I were house-party hopping in East Oakland. The new norms of [not] riding in cars with open containers had [not] really sunk in yet for Uncle Dale and I. Our designated drive Marcia, she understood it was time to change. Uncle Dale and I, not so much. So when the command came down from our pilot the Dear Marcia to pour out our plastic to-go cups so we could hit the next social spot (this was back in the days when we had to physically get to the next social spot and not swipe our thumbs); Uncle Dale said, “No.” Well, of course, I’m with Uncle Dale, and I said, “No.” No less than 5 minutes later, me and my uncle were on foot at around midnight, with our cups full of libations and Uncle Dale looks to me and says, “Well, looks like we got put out nephew.” And, we just walked (in a westerly direction), he talked, and I listened. Of course, we never broke the open container law again. The important thing to take away from this here story is my Uncle Dale planted seeds in me, in his family, in his community, in his nation, in his world.

Nephew Myk

Every time the word came down from mama that her baby brother was coming home to the Big O, the excitement building up to the arrival of Uncle Dale’s United Airlines flights was only surpassed by the anticipation of Santa Clause and his Reindeer Airways. On one of his trips he taught me the game of chess. Then, in 1975, my siblings, Cousin Kellie, Richard & Amanda, mama and myself got to vacation in Northern & Southern California. The highlight, hands down, was spending time with Uncle Dale in Oakland on Alice Street with wife Lisa. He took all the kids to the Lawrence Hall of Science in Berkeley, and Randy and I to our first NFL game. The BART tracks had not yet been competed so we caught the AC Transit East 14th bus to Oakland Alameda County Coliseum. The score was Dallas Cowboys 14, Oakland Raiders 17. From that evening on, I’d be a Raider fan for life. Back then we could stand on the field and talk to the players. Security, what security? I just remember Art Shell and Gene Upshaw looking like giants to a 12-year old.Uncle Dale also introduced us to his world of photography, with my siblings and I being his adoring subjects on a sunshiny Lake Merritt north end mid-1970s day. Yes, back then I said this Bay Area is the place to be. So much so that immediately after Omaha Northwest High School, I was on my own United Airlines flight to The Bay, staying with Uncle Dale on 1st Ave. off Lake Merritt Blvd, and Cousin Terry Anders off Seminary Ave.; with both up until the point it was time for me to enter the Navy, which I did from the Oakland AAFES Station, being sworn in in 1980.

Nephew Myk