Gerald E. Talbot, Democratic Party elder, Civil Rights leader, Legislator (1972-78) and co-founder of the African American Collection of Maine at the University of Southern Maine, will be honored by the Portland Democratic City Committee's Truman Dinner on May 3rd.
Jerry was born at Bangor in 1931, at time when the lives and careers of Maine African-Americans were circumscribed by racial custom and attitude. Though the Talbot family was able to trace its down east roots to the Black Revolutionary War veteran Abraham Talbett, its members were barred from certain jobs, organizations and unable to rent in certain neighborhoods. Throughout his life Jerry has struggled to change the situation and, in doing so, has improved the quality of life for all Mainers.
After graduating from Bangor High School, Jerry enlisted in the army, serving from 1953 to 56. In 1954 he wed Anita Cummings of Portland and eventually raised four daughters. Finding a job and housing in Portland proved difficult but the Talbot's' persevered with Jerry becoming a compositor with the Guy Gannett Publishing Company in 1966. He would make this his career for a quarter of a century.
However, it was as an activist that Gerald Talbot would become best known. Jerry involved himself in the local NAACP, and was one of a handful of down-easters to join the "March for Jobs and Freedom" in Washington, D.C. in 1963. He was elected President of the revitalized Portland NAACP in 1964, joined the voter registration drive in Mississippi and was a key figure in helping to pass Maine's 1966 "Fair Housing Bill." In 1972 Gerald E. Talbot became the first African American elected to the Maine State Legislature. There his bill to eliminate derogatory African-American place name usage from the Maine map passed. Also with the late Laurence E. Connolly, Jr., he co-sponsored the first "Sexual or Affectional Preference" (1977) amendment to the Maine Human Rights Act. As Representative Talbot wrote:
"To restrict a person or group from full respect and dignity of their human and civil rights as enjoyed by the rest of society is denying them the protection of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States."
Subsequently, he continued to speak out strongly on issues of civil rights and to make himself one of the leading researchers of African American and civil rights history in our State. With his wife Anita, he assembled a large collection of documents, photographs and objects which where presented to USM in 1995 as "The African American Collection of Maine." Currently he is working with Harriet H. Price on a history of Blacks in Maine. The website for this project (www.visibleblackhistory.com) has won accolades from scholars in Maine and New Hampshire.
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