Tag: human rights

Image

Freedom House Ambulance Service.  They Built The System

Posted in Black History Month, faith, God, health, inspiration, relationships, selfhelpTagged , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

In the late 1960s, Pittsburgh’s Hill District was a historic Black neighborhood — culturally rich, economically battered.

Urban renewal had displaced families and shuttered businesses. Hospitals were distant. Emergency transport was often handled by funeral homes or police wagons with little medical training. In Black neighborhoods across America, ambulance service frequently meant delay without treatment.

People were dying not only from injury —
but from the absence of care.

In 1967, that absence met resistance.

Out of the Hill District came the Freedom House Ambulance Service — one of the first professionally trained paramedic units in the United States.

Under the medical vision of Peter Safar, a pioneer of CPR and modern resuscitation, and through the clinical leadership of Nancy Caroline, Freedom House became more than an experiment.

Nancy Caroline did not observe from a distance.
She wrote curriculum.
She rode in the ambulances.
She trained the men personally.
She demanded mastery.

She helped build one of the nation’s first structured paramedic training programs and later authored Emergency Care in the Streets, a foundational EMS textbook used across the country and internationally.

The standards were not lowered for the Hill District.
They were raised.

The men recruited into Freedom House were largely unemployed Black residents. Some were Vietnam veterans. Many had been labeled “untrainable.”

They became among the first paramedics in America.

Among the early paramedics were:

John Moon
Mitchell Brown
Timothy McCall
Wesley Lee
Walter Brown
Dennis Williams

And others whose names history is still restoring.

They mastered advanced cardiac life support, airway management, trauma stabilization, and mobile intensive care techniques. They responded to thousands of calls. Their survival rates were strong. Their professionalism undeniable.

They were not ambulance drivers.
They were architects of modern emergency medicine.

In 1975, the City of Pittsburgh dissolved Freedom House and created a new municipal EMS system.

The training model remained.
The protocols remained.
The infrastructure remained.

The leadership did not.

The new city EMS became predominantly white.
The Black paramedics who had proven the model were no longer centered in the system they built.

Their experiment became policy.
Their innovation became ordinance.
Their presence became history.

Public memory credited institutions.
The Hill District remembered who carried the stretchers.

Several Freedom House members continued careers in emergency medicine and public service. Others carried the quiet distinction of having transformed pre-hospital care long before the country was ready to credit them.

Modern EMS systems and structured 911 response protocols carry their fingerprints.

They were not a pilot program.
They were a foundation.

“The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” — Psalm 118:22


BREADCRUMB
Sometimes the rejected become the infrastructure.



We see you, Freedom House:
John Moon.
Mitchell Brown.
Timothy McCall.
Wesley Lee.
Walter Brown.
Dennis Williams.
And the others whose names deserve light.
You brought intensive care into neglected streets. You professionalized emergency response in America.


You turned crisis into curriculum.

Bread Crumbs — for those coming after us.
Victorious without reward.
Still here.

Image

Horace And Rose: A Civil Rights Love Story

Posted in Black History Month, faith, God, inspiration, love, Uncategorized, workTagged , , , , , , Leave a comment

( Condensed Excerpt)

Horace & Rose Gillison — A Civil Rights Love Story

For Black History Month, I want to honor two people whose legacy shaped not only my family, but the city of Richmond itself: Rev. Horace Gillison and Rose Gillison, my great-uncle and great-aunt. Their civil rights work did not always make headlines—but it changed systems.


Before they ever met, they came from very different worlds. Horace was a Virginia country boy with barely a sixth-grade formal education, big ideas, and—by most accounts—a big mouth. Others saw his limited schooling and dismissed him. Horace saw no limits at all. He believed doors were meant to be opened, systems challenged, and no one was qualified to tell him what could not be done.


Rose was polished and poised, barely grown, hailing from North Carolina before family loss dictated a move to Virginia to live with cousins. Where others saw Horace as rough around the edges, Rose became—for him—a beautiful princess of a challenge. And Horace loved a challenge.


Rose maintained a bail fund solely for Horace’s protests and sit-ins, understanding that resistance required preparation as much as courage. Horace challenged Richmond institutions like Thalhimers and Miller & Rhoads, demanding they hire college-educated Black women on their sales floors. He later took great joy in seeing that pressure bear fruit when I secured my first professional job in their credit offices—proof that justice delayed is not justice denied.


He rattled newspapers by insisting they run his ads—with his beautiful Black skin in all its glory—or face legal action. He was also arrested for earning a pilot’s license in Virginia and flying a plane to Culpeper so his mother could experience his joy of flight.

He was arrested again for attempting to sell a house to a Black family in the then all white neighborhood I now live in. He was rumored to have taken black families to house showings in rented limousines.

When Firestone Tire—a place where Black customers could barely purchase goods, let alone work—hired him as their first Black salesman, Horace did not simply succeed. He excelled.

Together, Horace and Rose ran soup kitchens, Christian charities, wig shops, and a modeling school that taught Black women poise, job readiness, and confidence—quietly fueling economic growth in local Black families. Rose’s porcelain beauty and charm made her the perfect choice to become one of the first Black spokespersons for Carnation Milk during the war. Horace ministered churches and broke corporate barriers as the first Black member of the Richfood board.

Their love story was just as intentional as their activism.

They met at a birthday party—for Horace’s then girlfriend. Upon seeing Rose, Horace declared, “That’s the woman I will marry.”

Rose did not make it easy. Before accepting his proposal, she handed him a list: get a good job, secure transportation, build a house. Each time Horace returned with a checkmark, she added another requirement—a lesson she later passed down to the women in our family: know your worth and make him work for it.

When Horace finally had enough, he arrived with friends, a new dress, and a pair of nylons—nearly impossible to find at the time—and dragged her to the courthouse.

They would reach their fiftieth wedding anniversary before Rose declared they finally had what she considered a proper wedding. Loving attended by 4 generations of the Gillison family

Though they never had biological children, Horace and Rose adopted two, fostered many more, and opened their lives wide enough to shape generations. Their influence rippled through the Gillison family and beyond—teaching love without limitation, legacy without bloodlines, and the quiet truth that family is often chosen, cultivated, and sustained by intention.

Lives, I believed patterned straight from the Bible;
“Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression.” — Isaiah 1:17
“Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.” — Amos 5:24
“Two are better than one… because they have a good reward for their labor.” — Ecclesiastes 4:9


Horace learned to do good and refused to wait for permission. Rose ensured that righteousness had structure and love behind it. Together, they made justice move.


BREADCRUMB
Justice does not roll on its own.
Someone has to push.
Someone has to prepare.
Someone has to stand side by side when the system pushes back.


Legacy does not always look like applause.
Sometimes it looks like a bail fund.
Sometimes it looks like insisting your image run in full color.
Sometimes it looks like flying anyway.


SALUTE
We see you, Rev. Horace Gillison and Rose Gillison — for seeking justice, correcting oppression, and laboring together so the stream would keep moving and building an extended family that walks in your shoes while still standing on your shoulders.

Bread Crumbs — for those coming after us.
Victorious without reward. Still here.



This is a condensed excerpt from the forthcoming work,

Horace and Rose: A Civil Rights Love Story.

Love,
Chelle
defygravitywithoutwings.com

Image

Fannie Lou Hamer: She Was Sick and Tired

Posted in Black History Month, faith, God, inspiration, UncategorizedTagged , , , , Leave a comment

Fannie Lou Hamer did not come to the movement polished, protected, or prepared.

She came poor.
She came uneducated by the world’s standards.
She came with a body already worn down by hard labor and injustice.

And still — she came.

Born in rural Mississippi in 1917, the youngest of twenty children, Fannie Lou Hamer spent her life working land she did not own, under a system designed to keep her dependent, invisible, and quiet. She began picking cotton as a child. Not for character. For survival.

When she attempted to register to vote in 1962 — after attending a voter education meeting — she failed the literacy test that was never meant to be passed. For that attempt alone, she was fired from the plantation where she had lived and worked for nearly two decades. Her family was later threatened at gunpoint for her decision to try again.

All for trying to do what should have been ordinary.

In 1963, while jailed in Winona, Mississippi, law enforcement ordered inmates to beat her. She was left with permanent injuries, chronic pain, and internal damage that followed her for the rest of her life.

She was not famous when she began.
She was not invited.
She was not protected.

But she was awake.

She helped form the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party because the state’s official party was all white — and called America to account for segregation hiding inside democracy itself. At the 1964 Democratic National Convention, she testified on national television about voter suppression and racial violence so plainly that the President of the United States attempted to interrupt the broadcast.

It didn’t work.

“I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired.”

Those words didn’t come from anger alone.
They came from truth-telling — the kind that costs something.

She refused token representation. She rejected symbolic seats. She demanded full dignity, not crumbs dressed up as compromise.

And when the nation listened, it did not immediately change.

She was heard, but not always heeded.
She was visible, but rarely protected.
She was victorious without reward.

Still, she kept going — organizing, feeding families, helping build Freedom Farms so people could eat, vote, and live with dignity. Her fight was never only about ballots. It was about daily bread.

“Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.” — Amos 5:24

She didn’t control the stream.
She didn’t shape the river.

She stood in it anyway.

Faith sometimes looks like prayer.
Sometimes it looks like protest.
And sometimes it looks like telling the truth even when your body is already tired.

If you have ever spoken up and paid a price,
felt worn down by doing the right thing,
told the truth without being spared the consequences,
or wondered if faithfulness was worth the cost —

Fannie Lou Hamer stands with you.

She reminds us that God often chooses voices the world underestimates — and uses them to shake foundations.

We see you, Fannie.
We honor your truth.

Bread Crumbs — for those coming after us.
Victorious without reward. Still here.


Love, Chelle

Image

Barbara Johns: She Was Fifteen and Would Not Wait

Posted in Black History Month, faith, God, health, inspiration, love, relationships, selfhelp, UncategorizedTagged , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Barbara Johns was fifteen years old when she decided that waiting politely for justice was no longer an option.


In 1951, in Prince Edward County, Virginia, Barbara was a student at Robert Russa Moton High School — a segregated Black school with no gym, no cafeteria, overcrowded classrooms, and tar-paper shacks used as makeshift buildings. Meanwhile, white students nearby learned in brick schools with resources and space.


Barbara saw it.
Barbara lived it.


And Barbara refused to accept it.


Without permission from adults, administrators, or movement leaders, she organized a student strike. She convinced her classmates to walk out, not knowing if anyone would listen — only knowing that staying silent was no longer an option.


Adults were furious.
Leaders were nervous.
Teachers were afraid they would lose their jobs.


Barbara’s name was almost removed from the complaint.
But the case moved forward anyway.
Her courage became part of Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, one of the five cases folded into Brown v. Board of Education.


History changed.
And Barbara Johns?
She received death threats.
She had to leave her hometown.
She lived the rest of her life quietly.
Her name was rarely spoken when Brown was celebrated.
She was victorious without reward.


Barbara Johns teaches us something uncomfortable and holy:
Sometimes the people who force history to move are the ones most quickly pushed out of the picture.
She was young.
She was female.
She was uncompromising.
And she was inconvenient.


“Let no one despise you for your youth.” — 1 Timothy 4:12


Barbara didn’t wait to be older.
She didn’t wait to be chosen.
She didn’t wait to be safe.
She acted — and the system scrambled to catch up.


If you have ever been told you were too young to understand, spoken truth that made adults uncomfortable, sparked change and then watched others take credit, or paid a personal cost for doing the right thing early — Barbara Johns stands with you.


She reminds us that courage does not require credentials — only conviction.
She lit the match.
The world tells the story without her name.
But God remembers.


We see you, Barbara.
We tell it right.


Bread Crumbs — for those coming after us.
Victorious without reward. Still here.


Love, Chelle

Image

Charles Hamilton Houston: He Built the Road

Posted in Black History Month, faith, God, inspiration, selfhelp, UncategorizedTagged , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Charles Hamilton Houston believed something radical for his time:

That the law — when disciplined, prepared, and forced to tell the truth — could be used to dismantle injustice.

He was not a march leader.
He was not a headline.
He was a builder.

Born in 1895, Houston became a lawyer and educator who saw segregation not just as wrong, but as structural. He believed it had to be taken apart piece by piece, case by case, classroom by classroom.

So he did the slow work.

As a professor at Howard University School of Law, Houston trained a generation of Black lawyers to be precise, relentless, and morally clear. Among them was a young man named Thurgood Marshall.

Houston taught his students that excellence was not optional — because lives depended on it.

“A lawyer is either a social engineer or a parasite on society.”

Houston chose to be a social engineer.

Long before Brown v. Board of Education reached the Supreme Court, Charles Hamilton Houston was already laying the groundwork.

He challenged unequal pay for Black teachers.
He dismantled segregation in graduate and professional schools.
He forced courts to confront the lie of “separate but equal.”

Case by case, brick by brick, he weakened the foundation of legalized segregation.

Others would stand in front of the nation when the walls finally fell.

Houston would not.

His health deteriorated under the strain of the work.
He died young.
And when history celebrated the victory, his name was often missing from the story.

He was victorious without reward.

Charles Hamilton Houston reminds us that some people are called to prepare the way, not walk through the door themselves.

“Prepare the way of the Lord; make straight paths for Him.” — Isaiah 40:3

Houston prepared paths others would walk — paths that led to justice, dignity, and opportunity for generations he would never meet.

If you have ever done work that made someone else visible,
labored behind the scenes while others stood at the microphone,
poured yourself into something you knew you might not live to see finished,
or believed faithfulness mattered more than credit,

Charles Hamilton Houston stands with you.

He built the road.
Others crossed it.

And God saw every stone he laid.

We see you, Charles.
We honor the work you did quietly.

Bread Crumbs — for those coming after us.
Victorious without reward. Still here.

Love, Chelle

Image

Cathay Williams: Known By God. Hidden By History

Posted in Black History Month, faith, God, inspiration, love, selfhelp, Uncategorized, workTagged , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Cathay Williams is one of my favorite Black history figures — not because she is well known, but because she is not.


I was first introduced to her by my nephew, Remmie, during one of the hardest seasons of my life — while I was going through breast cancer. He told me her story and then said something that stopped me cold.


He said I reminded him of her.


Like Cathay, I hid some of the pain I was really going through — not out of denial, but out of love.
Not because the fight wasn’t real, but because I wanted to encourage others who were fighting too.


Cathay Williams was born enslaved in Missouri around 1844. During the Civil War, she followed the Union Army as a cook and laundress. But when the war ended and the Army opened its ranks to Black men only, Cathay did something unthinkable.


She cut her hair,

wrapped her body,

changed her name to William Cathay

— and enlisted.


For nearly two years, she served as a soldier in the 38th U.S. Infantry, one of the original Buffalo Soldier regiments. She marched. She guarded. She endured brutal conditions — all while hiding her identity in a world that would not make space for who she truly was.


Eventually, illness exposed what society refused to imagine:
a Black woman had carried a rifle, worn the uniform, and served her country faithfully.


She was discharged — not for lack of courage, but for daring to exist outside the rules.


Cathay Williams lived a life where survival required disguise.
Not because she lacked strength — but because the world lacked vision.


There are seasons when God calls people to serve before the world is ready to name them correctly.
Cathay was known as William by the Army.
But she was known fully by God.
“The Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” — 1 Samuel 16:7


History overlooked her.
The Army dismissed her.
But heaven recorded her obedience.
Some call her story deception.
Others call it desperation.


But I call it courage under constraint.


And here is the part history often whispers instead of says out loud:
Cathay Williams never received military honors.
She never received a pension.
In 1891, after her health had been permanently damaged by her service, she applied for a military disability pension. It was denied. She died poor and largely forgotten.


She was victorious without reward.


Cathay Williams did everything she was asked to do — and more.
She served faithfully.
She endured quietly.
She finished her assignment.


Her story reminds us that victory and recognition are not the same thing.
“Well done” does not always come from the systems we serve — but it is always recorded by God.
She didn’t fight for history.
She fought through it.
And God did not waste a single step she took.


She did not live to see her story told.
But her life still speaks.


And for those who have ever given their strength, their hope, or their encouragement without guarantee of return:
You may be unrewarded by the world —
but you are not unseen by God.


We see you, Cathay.
We salute you.


Love, Chelle

About the History in Bread Crumbs
Bread Crumbs reflections are grounded in documented historical records, including archives from the U.S. National Archives, Library of Congress, court records, contemporaneous newspapers, and first-person accounts. Spiritual reflections and personal connections are clearly marked as such and are offered with respect for the historical record.

.

Image

Before Dawn Breaks

Posted in cancer, faith, God, inspiration, UncategorizedTagged , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment


Dear Martin,

Thank you for the courage it took
to love loudly
in a world fluent in hate.

Believing the long work could move
even when your hands were tired
from holding up the gate.

Our marching turned to sleepwalking.
Scars.
Stains.
Graves faded into parades.

Why teach us to love our crayoned brothers
when our sisters are heard passing
on streets made of rumor and rage.

We mastered resistance
only to trade it in
for the soft, comfy
quiet chairs of apathy.

Economic empowerments
became the next big sale,
freedom measured in discounts—
forgetting life ain’t free.

I wonder if you are proud us
I wonder if pride and grief
can do a sit-in
at the same table.

Laws need courage.
Platforms for voices.
Access breeds action.
Dream me not a fable.

I hope you see both things—
two things true at once
what we protected
and what we neglected.

The laws we guarded fiercely.
The people we forgot quietly.
What we defended,
then defected.

Still—
there are mornings when children march
without knowing your name
but carrying your dream
in their bones.

There are hands that reach back.
Feet that refuse silence.
Hearts that choose love—
to  let live  and to be left alone.

So if you are watching,
there are still some of us trying,
avoiding rose-colored glasses
and wide-angled scopes.

I hope you notice
some of us straining
to answer  the silence you were buried in
with shaking hands,
quiet prayers,
and stubborn hope.

Sincerely
a daughter of the dream
still learning how to keep it alive,
while  having it deemed woke.

Penned January 2026 – Michelle Gillison-Robinson

Image

A Meeting Place

Posted in cancer, faith, God, health, inspiration, love, relationships, selfhelpTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment


This may not sound like me.


I’m usually the one who finds the humor, the metaphor, the small spark of light tucked inside the ordinary. I believe in joy — deeply. I still do.

But today, joy feels quieter, and sorrow feels closer to the surface .
The world feels fractured.
Nation against nation.
Neighbor against neighbor.
Families strained.
Friendships reduced to likes, views, and fleeting affirmations.


And somewhere in the middle of all this noise, what seems to be slipping away is our sense of community — the kind where people are known, not curated. Where connection doesn’t require a platform or performance.


Yesterday, as I mourned world events ,  all of this along with a side of opinions still wrapped with faith, I was told I was hiding behind God and the Bible.


That stayed with me.


Not because it shook my faith, but because it revealed something deeper about the times we’re living in — a world so uncomfortable with lament that even sacred language is suspect when it refuses to harden into arguments or slogans.


But my faith has never been a hiding place.
It has always been a meeting place — where grief and hope are allowed to sit together without rushing one another out of the room.


Today, I find myself weeping.
Not because faith has failed, but because love is still very much alive.
“Jesus wept.” — John 11:35
He stood in the presence of grief and loss and did not rush to fix it, explain it, or weaponize it. He allowed tears to speak where words fell short. If tears were worthy of Him, they are not beneath us.
Scripture doesn’t ask us to bypass sorrow — it calls us to enter it together.
“Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.” — Romans 12:15


This isn’t a departure from who I am.
It’s a refusal to pretend.
I still believe in hope. I still believe in resurrection. I still believe God has not lost the plot. But I also believe sorrow has a place in the story — not as an ending, but as an honest chapter.


So today, I show up softer. Quieter. More tender. Trusting that God can hold my tears just as faithfully as He holds my hope.


And believing that even here — especially here — grace is present.
Love Chelle

Image

When Christmas Doesn’t Recognize Itself

Posted in cancer, christmas, faith, God, health, inspiration, love, money, relationships, selfhelp, UncategorizedTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

I’ll admit it—I chuckled at first.
I saw a video of a broke Hispanic father joking with his young son that ICE had taken Santa. It was meant to be humorous, a dark joke wrapped in the language of survival. I laughed… and then I stopped.


Because once the laughter faded, the weight of it settled in.


How awful to place that kind of fear on a child. How heartbreaking that this joke even works in our current climate. And then it hit me—harder than I expected.


Under the prevailing American mindset of 2025, the very figures we celebrate at Christmas wouldn’t be welcome here.
Santa would be questioned.
Mary and Joseph would be detained.
Jesus would be born into a system already suspicious of Him.
The wise men would be asked to self-deport.
The angels would be accused of violating airspace.
And the shepherds—unhoused, roaming, living off the land—would likely be jailed for existing outside the rules.


Yes, I know—it sounds like a stretch.


And yes, there must be laws. There must be order. There must be boundaries and systems and responsibility. Scripture never denies that.


But Scripture also never allows us to weaponize law against love.
Because the story of Christmas—the real one—is not clean, controlled, or credentialed. It is a story of displacement. Of vulnerability. Of outsiders. Of God choosing to arrive without papers, privilege, or protection.


Mary wasn’t prepared.
Joseph wasn’t powerful.
Jesus wasn’t safe.
And none of them fit the mold of who society typically makes room for.


Yet this is the story we retell every year with lights and carols and nativity scenes that have grown far too tidy.
Somewhere along the way, we learned to celebrate the symbols of Christmas while quietly opposing everything they stand for.
We sing about peace while nurturing fear.
We speak of joy while guarding our comfort.
We proclaim love while questioning who deserves it.


And that should sober us.
Because Jesus Himself said,
“I was a stranger, and you invited me in.”
Not you vetted me.
Not you verified my worth.
Not you made sure I belonged first.
He didn’t ask us to solve immigration policy.
He asked us to recognize people.


The question Christmas asks us—every year, relentlessly—is not whether we believe in Christ, but whether we resemble Him.
Would we make room for Him now?
Or would we ask Him to prove He belongs?
If the answer makes us uncomfortable, maybe that discomfort is holy. Maybe it’s an invitation to return—not to tradition, but to truth.
Because Christmas has always been about God crossing borders.
And love, by nature, refuses to stay contained.

Love Chelle

Love Chelle

Erase Not

Posted in cancer, God, inspiration, love, relationships, selfhelp, UncategorizedTagged , , Leave a comment

Virginia’s quest to erase the enslavement of human beings from memory will not make it cease to have existed. I don’t teach this to my children and to their children to foster hatred but rather to show them how incredible our people are to have survived and thrived despite circumstances forced on our ancestors by american greed. Yet no one asks my Jewish brothers to forget and water down the Holocaust. No one asks the american Japanese to deny the California concentration camps. No one asks my Indian heritage to dry the Trail of Tears.

We are watered down because whenever we choose to remember we become powerful. An attempt to drown us in engineered miseducation. Reminiscent of our bloodlines drowned in the Atlantic for being too strong to make passage.

Fearful folks discriminate and suppress what and whom they are intimidated by most. Black History Month is about strength and success against incredible odds. Slavery is american history dripping in greed, oppression and supposed superiority. No need to sugar coat it or pad it with cotton. My ancestors cultivated both of those.

Oddly, the State of Virginia worried about a recent governor in “black face.” Need to be more worried about the one who has no problem showing who he really is.