WASHINGTON, D.C. – Oprah Winfrey received the Uncommon Height Award during a gala celebrating Dr. Dorothy Height’s birthday at the Hilton Washington Hotel in Washington, D.C. The star-studded event included Maya Angelou, Michael Eric Dyson, Cicely Tyson and “Access Hollywood” host Shaun Robinson, who gathered to pay tribute to civil rights icon Dr. Height, who is 97.
Height, the legendary leader of the National Council of Negro Women (NCNW) was the sole female among the “Big 6” civil rights leaders in the 1960s, which included Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Roy Wilkins, Whitney Young, James Farmer and Ralph Abernathy.
Winfrey, absolutely unfazed by being unseated as Forbes magazine’s most powerful celebrity, eloquently articulated the reasons she must pay the ultimate homage to Dr. Height and the rest of her African American civil rights predecessors. Winfrey recently gave $2.5 million towards the National Council of Negro Women building, which sits between the White House and the U.S. Capitol Building.
“So many African American women, they are so much a part of me and where I was trying to go. I have carried you, Dr. Height, and all of them in my heart. They [legendary black women] were the seed of the tree for me. I have never forgotten where I have come from and that is who I am,” Winfrey said.
“And so, through the spirit and power of all the black women and men who came before me, I move forward every day, trying to honor the calling from somebody bigger than I. … I am who I am and where I am, not because of my own doing, but because I am obedient to that call. Every one of us has a calling on our life. And it’s up to us to listen. And it doesn’t come from the listening like Moses in the burning bush, but the feeling of being led in the direction of your greatest strength,” added Winfrey. –terry shropshire
