海角大神

Mel King sits on a bench on Columbus Avenue in Boston鈥檚 South End. A few feet away is the entrance to the busy South End Technology Center (SETC).

It鈥檚 a beautiful summer afternoon in one of Boston鈥檚 most vibrant neighborhoods. And it appears that Mr. King knows, and is known by, everyone.

People stop to shake his hand. Motorists slow down and yell out 鈥淢el!鈥� And King gives a friendly wave to virtually every passerby.

For more than 60 years, King has been 鈥� you name it 鈥� an activist, a fair-housing advocate, a politician, an educator, a writer, a fighter for urban neighborhoods and less-advantaged families. So perhaps it鈥檚 not surprising he鈥檚 met a few people.

His focus now is on the organization he started in 1997 with help from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was an adjunct professor. SETC enables young Bostonians to gain 21st-century computer skills.

鈥淚t seems to me there鈥檚 a gap in our culture. It has to do with access to tools and resources that allow you to move up educationally and economically,鈥� he says.

Xia Josiah-Faeduwor, a grateful young woman who has been taking classes at SETC for seven years and worked this summer as a college mentor, calls him a 鈥渧isionary.鈥�

SETC trains boys and girls, ages 7 to 13, from throughout the city. Some students later return to join other teens, as well as college students, in helping to train the next generation. King first used the idea of young people training even younger people in the 1960s when he was running a settlement house in league with Boston鈥檚 Northeastern University.

鈥淥ur youth are the most underutilized resource we have,鈥� King says. 鈥淭hey are creative. They are willing to work to make a difference in their lives and the lives of other children.鈥� King calls this a 鈥渞ole-models program鈥� and a place for 鈥渓eadership development.鈥�

Amon Millner, assistant professor of computing and innovation at Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering in Needham, Mass., provided help in developing SETC programs and continues to advise SETC.

鈥淪ETC staff realized that developing and celebrating the design, engineering, and inventing prowess of neighborhood teens would translate into early interest in [technology] among their younger peers,鈥� Dr. Millner says in an e-mail.

This summer SETC provided courses at 20 neighborhood organizations taught by 35 youth teachers. Along with dozens of computer work stations, SETC headquarters has a 鈥淔ab Lab鈥� 鈥� a cutting-edge invention area where young techies collaborate on designing and producing their own projects using computer-guided tools.

King himself faced a long and challenging road as he was growing up in Boston鈥檚 South End. Even now, as a distinguished community leader, his unwillingness to remain quiet when he sees what he perceives is an injustice can put him on a controversial collision course with local authorities or businesses.

Two years ago he was among those arrested, arms and legs shackled, for blocking the doors to Boston鈥檚 Municipal Court building. He and the others were protesting housing evictions. Also recently he butted heads with the Boston Redevelopment Authority 鈥� the city agency overseeing development 鈥� and Simon Property Group, a real estate developer, over details of a large project planned for Boston鈥檚 Copley Square area. King and others objected to the low number of affordable housing units to be built in tandem with the project.

Tito Jackson, who serves on the Boston City Council, says King is 鈥渨illing to stand up and to fight and to be arrested. He is willing to pay [the price] to advance what is right.... I don鈥檛 know anything that Mel King is afraid of.鈥�

In the early 1950s, when King was in his teens, city officials decided that a 24-acre area of the South End called New York Streets would face the wrecking ball. More than 800 families 鈥� including King鈥檚 鈥� would have to find someplace else to live.

A prominent Boston newspaper had labeled the area 鈥淏oston鈥檚 Skid Row,鈥� which King says 鈥渨as crazy. We called it home.鈥� He describes it as a friendly, diverse community filled with working-class people. Still, it was torn down by September 1957.

King never forgot how people in his old neighborhood 鈥� and in other neighborhoods 鈥� were unable to say 鈥渘o鈥� to various urban renewal projects, and how many residents were left to fend for themselves for housing. So a key part of his activism has centered on giving local residents a say in housing, education, and job policies.

To this end, King has helped start a number of neighborhood organizations aimed at empowering families. He also served for almost 10 years in the Massachusetts State legislature, during which time he helped pass laws to enable community-based development and to require the state to divest itself of investments in companies doing business in South Africa under apartheid.

Mr. Jackson and others who have followed King鈥檚 career say that his work has helped create hundreds of affordable housing units throughout Boston 鈥� most notably, in the Tent City Apartments complex in the South End.

In 1968 Tent City was a large parking lot, the city having torn down the brick apartment buildings where scores of people had lived. King led a protest that occupied the lot and denied commuters a place to park. Encampments were erected on the site 鈥� including tents. Before protests ended several days later, King had faced angry motorists and been arrested.

But the protests paid off. Plans for market-rate-only development were stopped; not till 18 years later did groundbreaking take place for a 269-unit mixed-income complex that now occupies the site.

Remarkably, it was the man who defeated King in a two-person runoff election for mayor of Boston 鈥� Raymond Flynn 鈥� who enabled Tent City to finally be built.

In 1983 Mr. Flynn, a city councilor, faced King, the first black finalist for mayor in city history. They came from very different neighborhoods 鈥� Flynn from largely Irish South Boston and King from the multiethnic South End. But both Flynn and King were advocates for communities.

Although hard fought, the election was not acrimonious. Instead, some believe it helped to unify the city. 鈥淚t was an election that no one lost,鈥� Flynn says. 鈥淭he debate was spirited, but completely on the issues.鈥� Flynn served as mayor 10 years before becoming US ambassador to the Vatican.

鈥淭hey changed the direction of the city,鈥� says Jim Vrabel, who worked in the Flynn administration and recently wrote a book called 鈥淎 People鈥檚 History of the New Boston.鈥� 鈥淣eighborhood interests [became] paramount.鈥� Flynn 鈥渨as more effective because Mel King was there to lay the groundwork,鈥� Mr. Vrabel says.

Today, it鈥檚 SETC that is changing Boston. And one reason SETC is effective, says Susan Klimczak, education organizer at the center, is because 鈥渆verything is ... shaped by the young people.鈥�

On a busy afternoon at SETC the rooms are filled with energetic young people working together on projects involving the newest technology. Some already are doing computer programming. But Dr. Klimczak says SETC doesn鈥檛 just work with technologically proficient kids; it recruits across the city and at schools where administrators say no students will be interested.

鈥淢el used to pick up pennies,鈥� Klimczak says. 鈥淚鈥檝e come to understand [what this symbolizes]: That no one is not worth picking up; no one should be thrown away.鈥� King, she says, treats children with as much respect as he does the prominent people who sometimes call or stop by to visit.

During a reflective moment on the bench in front of SETC, when no one is stopping to shake his hand, King is asked what has motivated him. 鈥淭he major piece is love,鈥� he says. 鈥淭he technology of the heart is love, the art of relationships with people.鈥�

Even after many years of often bruising battles with adversaries, King nonetheless adds: 鈥淭here is only one human family.鈥�

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