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T My Introduction by Kip Lornell The horrific nature and senseless brutality of the crime leapt off the page of the Washington Post, riveting me to everyword. My close attention to the newspaper almost caused me to miss the sight of actor Kevin Costner strolling down the sidewalk about 15 feet from where I sat. Costner was in Washington, D.C., filming 13 Days, a movie about the Cuban missile crisis . I was down at the end of the Mall on a sunny, 75-degree day—October 30, 1999—playing volleyball on the courts next to the Potomac River— only about a quarter of a mile from The George Washington University, where I teach courses in American music. The film crew had closed off a quarter-mile stretch of Rock Creek Parkway, filled the parking spots with automobiles (all built prior to 1963), changed the light fixtures to reflect the era, and were filming a scene with Costner and a small group of extras. The crew set up at noon and remained until about 4:00P.M., when almost everyone, including me and my two daughters (MaxC, age four, and Cady, age six), left to go home, up on Capitol Hill, near Union Station. Even after I returned home, the newspaper article remained etched in my brain. The headline, "'KDY': Gang Symbol or Block Pride?—Mark Carved on Slain Toddler Focuses Unwanted Attention on Kennedy Street NW," reminded me that the mean streets of Washington, D.C., are not too far from the world that I usually inhabit. Kennedy Street NW is less than one mile from one of the oldest and most prestigious Historically Black Universities and Colleges (HBUC), Howard University, and only about three miles from the Kennedy Center, outdoor volleyball, the White House, the Smithsonian Institution and the numerous memorials that annually attract millions of tourists to Washington, D.C. The Anacostia section of the District—a large neighborhood full of rolling hills and lovely detached single family homes, as well as some of the city's most dangerous (and most heavily African American) neighborhoods—lies a few miles down and across the Potomac River from where played that Saturday afternoon. The newspaper article, a follow-up piece about the recent murder of two-year-old Julio Guy Thomas, who had been found beaten to death in his own home with "4KDY" carved on his back, got me thinking about D.C. and go-go. That mark refers to the intersection of Kennedy Street and Fourth Street in Northwest Washington, D.C., and appears scrawled 2 The B e a t on walls throughout the immediate neighborhood. The legitimate and frightening question is whether these letters symbolize a gang or a crew. A gang holds clear negative connotations and is often associated with criminal activity, while a crew is a looser group of kids (many in their teens) who hang out together and "represent" their neighborhood. As their members age, some of these crews have evolved into gangs that have been closely allied with violence and illegal activity. The First and Kennedy Crew, for example, was associated with 10 murders in the early 1990s and was decimated in 1995 when federal racketeering charges brought down about a dozen of its key members. The controversy that always arises in the local press is whether all of these groups are gangs or merely crews that reflect neighborhood pride and hold similar tastes in clothing, language, and go-go music. Youths at D.C. clubs often identify with their block or neighborhood, holding up signs or wearing T-shirts bearing their names. On its 1997 live compact disc, Skillet, the local go-go band Backyard's performance of "Life, Money, Struggle, Crime" announces "I'd like to thank the KDY." In another song, "It's the Bomb," the band hollers out, "Ninth, Seventh, First, KDY." Terrance "Coop" Cooper, the band's manager, was quoted in the Post article as saying that the songs don't recognize gangs but rather neighborhoods. By mentioning Ninth, Seventh, and First, he said, the band spans the entirety of Kennedy Street NW. "People come to the show. They have signs [of neighborhoods]. We call them out," he added. Chris Burch, a promoter for the Icebox, was quoted as saying: "It's not seen as any type of gang thing. I think more than anything, it's more pride." This newspaper piece once more reminded me why Charles and I were writing this book. When most...

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