One visit to Minister Clemson Brown’s basement in his home in Brooklyn is the best introduction to his dedication and commitment to the Black struggle. For more than a half-century, he and his camera witnessed and recorded a veritable warehouse of Pan-African activism, which he later named Transatlantic Productions. His inexhaustible coverage of Black nationalism will be missed since he made his transition this past August 7. He was 83.
What most people in his political orbit remember about Brown is his face behind a camera, mainly as a videographer, and nowhere more present than at the House of Lord Church in Brooklyn. It was at the church that he was ordained in 1978, and where he served for more than 20 years.
Born Clemson Grover Brown in Lancaster County South Carolina, on August 25, 1939, he was the son of Clemson Brown and Lucille McDow Brown. He was educated at City College of New York, where he majored in fine arts and Afro-American studies, receiving his BA in 1973. Three years later, he and his family attended a bicentennial celebration with the Rev. Dr. Herbert Daughtry and many community activists. Thus began his long association with Daughtry, where he was present to record nearly all the intrepid reverend’s activities.
Documenting Daughtry’s tireless endeavors was the springboard into Brown’s general coverage of African American political and cultural events. Hardly a momentous occasion escaped his camera, which was soon indispensable to the movement.
At his funeral services, conducted by Reverend Charles Crockett and Reverend Andrew Teagle Jr. at the Camp Creek AME Zion Church in Lancaster, the program noted that Brown taught art, directed community activities and athletic programs, and served as a youth counselor.
His three-dimensional fine art, sculpture, and jewelry creations won him wide acclaim. “His poetry has been collected and published, leading to his inclusion in the ‘International Who’s Who in Poetry’ published by the International Biography Center of Cambridge, England,” according to the obituary.
During his energetic lifetime, Brown was honored by the NAACP for creating on-the-job training programs for young people in the construction industry when he served as president of ReCap Construction Inc. He applied his innovative vision to rebuilding neighborhoods, especially those occupied by marginalized residents.
Brown expressed a global interest in the diaspora, documenting the culture and lifestyle of people from the Caribbean, Africa, Central America, and Europe. One of his often-unmentioned preoccupations was promoting the ideas of physicist Gabriel Oyibo and his concepts that extended the work of Albert Einstein, asserting a theory of everything. In Ghana, a street has been named after him.
Those left to cherish his loving memory and continue his legacy are his wife of 62+ years, Lady Viola Brown; two children: Clemson Rupertis Brown (Margaret) and Herlinda Vaness Brown Thompson (Bobby); five grandchildren: LaToya LaShanté Fortson, Ashley Diandrea Aset Brown, Justin Gregory Thompson, Clemson Hannibal Brown, and Bobbi Imaneé Thompson; one great-grandson, Asar Jaydin White; and a host of special nieces, nephews, cousins, relatives, and friends.