This memorial website was created in memory of our loved one, Dennis A Lane, 71, born on February 15, 1944 and passed away on July 4, 2015. We will remember him forever.
Dennis A Lane
Dennis A Lane, 71 of Bellingham, WA, passed away at 6:05 am, Saturday, July 04, 2015 at his home in Bellingham, WA. He was born February 15, 1944 in East Orange, NJ, to William and Alice Lane. His life partner and soulmate, Kay Sardo-Lane, of more than twenty years, she survives.
Also surviving are a number of nieces and nephews, great nieces and nephews and great great nieces and nephews as well as a host of cousins.
His father, mother, sisters Connie and Janice; and brothers Patrick Leon and William A. Lane Jr. preceded him in death.
Dennis grew up in Westfield, NJ where he attended and later graduated from Westfield High School after which he enrolled at Trenton Jr College and studied philosophy and economics. He later moved to New York City to pursue career opportunities in community development and public broadcasting. Some years later he moved to Bellingham, WA, where he continued his work in the community. Dennis was a writer, poet, musician, artist and philosopher.
He loved to eat good food and spend quality time with family and friends, he also enjoyed his long walks and getting in touch with nature and treasuring his friendships with the Lummi Tribe.
Memorials can be made in lieu of flowers to the Cancer Research Institute
http://www.cancerresearch.org/giving-to-cri/honor-memorial-giving
Tributes
Leave a tributeTate
We can see his vision of true community television programing through Native American and local programs now being shown. His great spirit continues through his loving gifts of wisdom and laughter to all who knew him and listened.
Love,
Tate
Tate
As you know, he was a great story teller who was continually in the midst of writing chapters of a series that was evolving from his deep research concerning northern Africa, the Middle passage and the men and women who made up a black regiment that fought in the American Revolution in Provincetown, MA. He called me his Aaron ("short for editor," I said) and emailed pieces to me to correct or comment on and send back to him for inclusion in his growing novel. The passage about water below was his last. His lungs were filled and he had stopped playing the flute and singing, but he never stopped creating. This piece was written to go into his descriptions of captives being chained together for months in the hold of the ship where no single language was spoken and no uniform religion practiced or prayers said . Nights are filled with the sounds of sharks which followed the slave trading ships bumping against the walls as they fed on bodies being dumped overboard. Terror and screaming filled the nights of panic in the deep cargo hold.
The captive Prince, who is protagonist in this section, has helped the cargo of captives to develop a rudimentary language among themselves and this description of being at sea precedes the mantra he taught them to breath in and out together. The breathing together to assuage panic through the nights led to another kind of panic for the ship’s crew when they went into the dark of the hold to be greeted by what sounded like a single huge beast breathing there.:
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The Great Water of Emptiness:
The Great Waters of Emptiness (The Atlantic Ocean) the day, the night, the Sun, the Moon the vastness of the of the water never stops. It is said that great rivers run under the water.
The rivers stir the waters and change the ways of the water. The water in a storm can be whipped by the wind and throw itself several hundred feet high. It can swallow up whole ships and carry them miles across the water. The water can then turn around and become as smooth as glass the next day. The men on the ship compare the moods of the ocean to the moods of a woman.
One Moonlight evening huge billowing clouds came rushing in. The clouds quickly surrounded the moon and the sea began to swell. The winds began to build and the ship began to heave to and fro. Lighting began crack and thunder rolled. In short order huge winds began to grow and the waves began to engulf the ship. In the lower crew decks all became quiet and the banter was replaced by fear. The crack of lighting added brief flashes of light and cascading of water began entering the hold of the ship. The fear, the darkness and the water began filling the ship.
Dennis Lane,
April 21, 2016
This huge dark figure rose in the balcony of the old Museum and posed the provocative kind of question Dennis soon became well known for here in Whatcom county and wherever he went in his lifelong discovery and teaching process.
He said he was here because of Love (you never know where loving a woman, Kay Sardo, will take you) and it was love of people and information he continued to give and push wherever he went. And he did travel, Dennis was a whirlwind of effort on behalf of people who had no voice, as television and technology grew more and more critical in people’s lives and less and less aveilable. He worked tirelessly on both coasts, locally and nationally to bring some conscience to every venue in which he operated. He mentored and called for student volunteers and lobbied endlessly. Kay tells me his last phone calls were to schools and Comcast folks to make sure their low income families get free surplus computers and hookups this year.
Kay and the Opportunity Council spoke to his passion for giving voice to people who have none, including many videos of their work, a 5 year-long radio program hosted by Colleen Berg and utilization of discarded gaming kiosks to provide touchscreen information for people who come looking for housing, food, childcare and assistance with getting and keeping heat in their homes .
Always playful and knowledgeable, Dennis escaped his New Jersey upbringing as part of a 60's Black family in Newark and Westfield, to Harlem streets and the New York Public library where he vowed he got his real education . However, he used the GI Bill and those of his cousins to attend Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania, Penn State and the University of Wisconsin to study communications and geology/paleontology.
In fact, he was a lifelong direct learner and facilitator of other’s learning. Even before volunteering to join the Marines, serving in Vietnam and Latin American embassy and undercover work, he went as a deckhand on a freighter to Mecca to learn what Islam really was. And learning Islam is many peaceful colors, he came back to confront the street preacher’s “White Devils” rhetoric against white people saying for the rest of his life that ” Hate is Love gone hungry.”
Dennis’ warm announcer’s voice, and musical talent as well his love of the martial arts took him through the many lives he enjoyed telling of. There was little mentioned of this mid century in our “brothers” conversations that he had not carefully researched or been part of. There is not time here to begin telling of his fascinating life which includes everything from pirate radio/ jazz of course/ out of Amsterdam to voice overs and Hollywood script work, to puppet theaters, to creation of Farmer’s Markets in New York City , his own NPR programs and Public access shows which Florence Rice still broadcast from Harlem, to flute playing with Yussef Lateef, to giving cameras to kids to make their own videos of their Harlem lives and Bullying and Exclusion in Seattle schools, to creation of public access television and low power radio stations here and around the country as well as serving on important volunteer Boards , nationally, statewide and locally, the early Whatcom Human Rights Task Force, The Farm Fund, Martin Luther King Day and organizing cross cultural events dedicated to inclusion through potlucks. Dennis did love food, in fact, one of his last radio shows in New York was “What’s to Eat?”
He felt truly honored when Catherine Talley and the seniors here at Lummi welcomed him to lunch to learn from them every time he had a question about ways he could use his technology and communication skills to be of help at Lummi. He played his flute at the Lummi graveyard to honor Catherine, Cha Da Skatum and those whose names may not yet be mentioned
I know Dennis and Kay feel honored and their lives incredibly enriched by having Darrell Hillaire of Lummi Nation as his brother of choice in this life.
The crossing over of Dennis Lane is a sea change for our community. He was a quiet yet strong leader that was so much about compassion and caring and so little about himself. Rooted in NYC but a happy transplant to our fair city always in the loving company of his bride and civic leader. They created so much good will and so many institutions in our community that it is hard to account for them all. But most of all Dennis was a man of integrity. A person that saw life for what it is but always held the highest ideals for himself and offered that perspective with kindness and respect. I was fortunate to be with him and Kay through the identification of the conditions that he suffered with, but so grateful that the suffering was not long lasting. I giant of a man in so many respects, yet private and quiet and always there for those of us that needed anything at all.
Thank you Dennis for your love and compassion for all of us. Kay Sardo our love is with you even from the other side of the planet.
Kay, I only knew him for my senior year. I cried when I read that he passed. My prayers and sincerest condolences are extended to you and the family.
I'm sorry that you are experiencing the mourning of losing a love one. Many if not all of us has experienced this, but I would like to share a brief scripture that will may just bring you comfort.
(Revelation 21:4) And he will wipe out every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more, neither will mourning nor outcry nor pain be anymore. The former things have passed away.” Thanks for reading.
He had great personal courage and profound inner serenity in any situation or interaction. His kindness to others was unparalleled.
We are all richer for having known him.
Dear Uncle Den,
I can remember when I was around five years old or so we would visit Nana and Papa almost every weekend, those were the good old days, Lester and I really looked forward to seeing the uncles, but at that time Uncle Bill and Uncle Leon were away, Uncle Bill was in the Marines serving his country over in Japan and I believe Uncle Leon was in California at that time and Uncle Den was at home, we were always so excited to spend time with uncle Den, we saw him as a pillar of strength, just his physical presence alone was so overwhelming to us kids. We would try to physically challenge him, of course to no avail, but we enjoyed it just the same, typically those events would turn out with him playing the part of a human tree and us kids climbing all over him. I guess what I’m trying to say is that I will remember Uncle Den for his strength, not only physically but emotionally as well as spiritually, I truly cherished what we had, he was my friend my Uncle and my big brother, after all we were only ten years apart. You’re already missed and missed by so many, but I know that we will always be spiritually connected.
Nephew Keith
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Tate
We can see his vision of true community television programing through Native American and local programs now being shown. His great spirit continues through his loving gifts of wisdom and laughter to all who knew him and listened.
Home Bar and Restaurant, NYC
Dennis Lane a great activist for causes we care about
We knew Dennis for many years and so appreciated his focus and concern for people and the planet. We worked with him on video projects, public access tv, and he was there at the beginning of KAVZ our low power FM station out in East Whatcom County. We did workshops with him at Lummi Tribe and Mt. Baker HS teaching kids about using media. He told me once that they were trying to hire him to be John Lennon's body guard but he had moved away from New York City by then so wasn't able to be there to project John when he was shot down.
Thank you Dennis for a life well lived. We love you!