Actor Louis Gossett Jr. finds family in Cincinnati
A glittery crowd thronged into the newly renovated Hyatt Regency Ballroom in Downtown Cincinnati on Friday night to celebrate a project that has been serving three impoverished communities in Tanzania for a decade.
The Village Outreach Project, which is improving the lives of thousands of residents of the Shirati Region of Tanzania, East Africa, toasted 10 years of good works during the Night on the Serengeti gala.
"Kindness in Cincinnati is making a profound difference in Tanzania," said Academy and Emmy Award-winning actor Louis Gossett Jr., who delivered the keynote address.
The project was founded by Dr. Christopher Lewis, who made his first trip to Tanzania in 2003. Then a resident in the University of Cincinnati's College of Medicine, his first delegation included a UC nurse, four medical students, two doctors from Cincinnati Children's Hospital, a UC geography professor and a handful of others. Since then, more than 400 Cincinnatians have volunteered, including 250 UC students.
Village Life is serving three remote communities of Burere, Nyambogo and Roche. The project has built a new health care center in Roche Village, offering basic health care to 25,000 villagers for the first time.
The scene: A glittery crowd of more than 400 was dressed in cocktail attire, with a few, such as gala co-chair Dr. Karen Bankston, in brilliant African colors. The electric sounds of African drumming could be heard throughout the hotel and in the Ballroom, courtesy of a virtuoso ensemble named Bala Charles Miller. People mingled around silent auction tables and some got up close and personal with a Ball Python and "Quilliam," the crested porcupine from Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden.
The celebs: Louis Gossett Jr. greeted family members he had not seen in 68 years, signed autographs and posed for pictures. Cincinnati Zoo director Thane Maynard brought along some African wildlife, and WLWT-TV anchor Courtis Fuller presided as Master of Ceremonies.
Is there a doctor in the house? Health professionals from across Greater Cincinnati, especially UC Health, were prominent in the crowd.
Double-booked: Dr. Santa J. Ono, UC president and gala co-chair, couldn't tear himself away from the UC Bearcats season-opening football game, two blocks away at Paul Brown Stadium.
Supersized check: Dr. Richard Lofgren, president and CEO of UC Health, presented a larger-than-life check of $1.05 million to Dr. Lewis to benefit the Village Life Outreach Project. Praising the endeavor for "working on some of the toughest problems in one of the poorest countries," Dr. Lofgren said, "We have to think not only locally, but globally, as well."
Engineers without Borders: UC engineering student Anton Smith (who won a Student of the Year Award) was among those who recently struck gold – or rather, water -- in a small village near Lake Victoria. They will now provide safe drinking water for 7,000 residents of the village of Nyambogo, Smith said.
Cincinnati ties: Gossett met his cousin, Bertha Haygood Browning, 81, of Silverton, who had brought very old family photos to share. "You can see the Cherokee Indian roots. That's family here," he said, of his cousin. "The last time I saw her, she was 14 and I was 12."
Saying he had a close-knit family, the Brooklyn native spoke about their great-grandmother, whose birth was not recorded in the family Bible, because births were not recorded during slavery, he said. He estimated that she lived to be about 115. Today, Gossett said he works to teach young people the values that his great-grandmother taught him – of cleanliness, belief in God and respect for elders.
The keynote: Gossett spoke about his profession as "such a powerful thing that we do." In "The Nurses," a TV show in the '60s, he played a juvenile delinquent who, in the end, dies. When he landed in Nairobi, which had just gotten television, people asked him to open his shirt to see his "scars." They couldn't believe he had come back to life, he said.
Biggest laugh: When the wrong video came up twice, Courtis Fuller quipped, "When we come on the news and say we're having technical difficulties, that really means we don't know what the hell is going on."
Most eloquent: Fuller ended the evening with a passage from Maya Angelou's poem "Still I Rise."
Five minutes with Louis Gossett Jr.:
Question: Have you ever visited Cincinnati before?
Gossett: Yes, I came the first time to see Oscar Robertson. After that, I came back to see my friend Sandy Koufax, who was at the University of Cincinnati. I went to NYU; he was at Cincinnati. He's a very old friend. Then, I became very close to Joe Morgan, and Frank Robinson, so I came here a few times. Most of the time I was the enemy. (Laughs.) In college, I was at NYU, playing against Cincinnati. But Joe Morgan is a really good friend. I miss him. And of course, Dusty Baker.
Q: What projects do you have coming out this year?
A: I have a mini-series, "The Book of Negroes," that will be out in February. I have a whole lot of movies. And I play Halle Berry's father in "Extant," and an episode of "Madame Secretary" that will be out this fall. And of course my foundation, the Eracism Foundation, most of my energy goes there.
Q: What's your favorite all-time role?
A: That's a tough question, because I think it's best not to rest on your laurels. But I would have to say Fiddler in (the TV series) "Roots." It was life-changing. We didn't think it was going to make it, but it did.