Posted on Apr 19, 2006

Union College in Schenectady has been chosen as the site for the Capital Region appearance of Venus Williams, winner of five Grand Slam tennis titles.

Williams is scheduled to play a World TeamTennis match for the Philadelphia Freedoms against the Schenectady-based New York Buzz on Wednesday, July 19. The site will be Messa Rink at Achilles Center, an indoor facility used in season by the Union hockey team.

“I thought it would be nice for the fans,” Buzz owner Nitty Singh said Tuesday. “Most of our fans come from out of town. This way you don't have to worry about whether it's going to take place. You know how the weather can be around here in the summer.”

The Buzz's other six home matches will be played outdoors at Schenectady's Central Park.

The team considered several indoor venues for the Williams appearance.

“The county and the city wanted to keep it in Schenectady,” Singh said, “so we're in Schenectady.”

“We have always believed that professional tennis belongs in Schenectady,” Mayor Brian Stratton said in a statement. “We are very pleased that our united effort with the county has kept the entire New York Buzz summer season in Schenectady.”

Tickets for the July 19 event, expected to begin at $36, will go on sale May 1. Information can be obtained at http://nybuzzwtt.com or by calling 378-BUZZ.

The Buzz opens its season July 6 at home against Kansas City. The season ends July 23.

Posted on Apr 19, 2006

Looking for an indoor venue to play what team owner Nitty Singh called the biggest match in franchise history, the New York Buzz found one in Schenectady.

The Buzz will host three-time Wimbledon champion Venus Williams and the Philadelphia Freedom July 19 at the Frank L. Messa Rink at Achilles Center, on the campus of Union College.

Formerly the top-ranked women's singles player in the world, the appearance of Williams, 26, highlights the Buzz's home World TeamTennis schedule. Their other six home matches will be played outdoors at MVP Stadium in Central Park.

Singh sought to have the match scheduled inside to avoid potential weather problems. The refurbished 3,500-seat Washington Avenue Armory in Albany was among the first sites considered.

“For an important match like that, I felt it needed to be indoors so people don't have to worry. You know it's going to happen,” Singh said. “Plus, we needed a little more seating than we had at the park.

“This is probably the biggest match of our lives in the last 12 years, and I wanted it to be good.”

The Schenectady Racquet Club, Washington Avenue Armory and Union's Memorial Field House were also considered as possible sites, said Schenectady County legislator Gary Hughes.

“Really, the out-front best choice was the rink at Union . . . and the college was amazingly cooperative in helping us out,” said Hughes, chairman of the legislature's committee on economic development. “We looked at some others, but the ability to accommodate a large crowd and have an indoor space is a bit of a challenge.”

Built in 1975 and renovated in 2003, Messa Rink is home to the Union men's and women's ice hockey teams, with seats for 2,225 and a standing-room capacity of nearly 2,500.

A portable tennis court will be brought in, and seating for the match will be expanded to nearly 3,000, including floor seating. MVP Stadium seats 2,200.

Schenectady Mayor Brian U. Stratton said that it was important to keep the match in the city, where the team is based.

“It never made sense in my estimation to bring that match or any other match to Albany or any place outside of Schenectady,” he said. “Pro tennis belongs here. We wanted to make sure it stayed a Schenectady event.”

Singh said negotiations are under way to have the match televised to a national audience, and the Buzz is working on details of hosting a pre-match reception at the college.

The ice sheet is removed for the summer at Messa Rink, which has also played host to concerts, dances and commencements in past years.

College spokesman Bill Schwarz said chilling equipment used to maintain the ice will be turned on in the days leading up to the event to provide air-conditioned comfort.

“It's actually quite well-suited, because of the layout, for a tennis match,” Schwarz said. “It's a great, intimate setting.”

Of Williams' 33 career singles titles, five have come in two Grand Slam events: Wimbledon (2000, 2001, 2005) and the U.S. Open (2000, 2001). She is currently ranked 13 th in the world in women's singles.

The Buzz begin the 2006 season July 6 in Boston, and play their home opener July 9 against the New York Sportimes. Tickets for all home matches, including the July 19 date, go on sale May 1.

Posted on Apr 18, 2006

An exhibit titled “New Orleans: Katrina Relief Winter 2005: Photographs by Daniel Khasidy” will be on display in Union College's Wikoff Student Gallery, from April 25 to May 14.

The gallery is on the third floor of the Nott Memorial, which is free and open to the public every day, year round. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily.

The exhibit documents the experiences of the 29 Union College students and two staff members who traveled to New Orleans for an alternative winter break in November 2005. Students rebuilt schools in a district where families had moved back yet buildings were uninhabitable because of damage cause by Hurricane Katrina.

“We accomplished more than we first thought we could and have come away from the experience with the stronger desire to help. It was my assignment to photograph the experience; our own journey and that of New Orleans,” said Khasidy ‘06.

Khasidy's exhibit is in conjunction with a presentation that will be given during Union's annual Steinmetz Symposium entitled, “Issues in Representation: The Dilemma of Objectivity and Scope in Photojournalism.”

The gallery's aim is to exhibit works by students or exhibitions created by students. The third floor of the Nott Memorial is dedicated in honor of Frederick C. Wikoff, Jr. class of 1943. The area also provides informal gathering and study space for students.

For additional information, please call the Information Line: 388-6004 or the gallery offices: 388-6729 or visit the website at http://www.union.edu/gallery/Upcoming.htm

To learn more about the students' experiences rebuilding schools and churches in New Orleans go to: s=6015http://www.union.edu/N/DS/s.php?s=6015

Posted on Apr 18, 2006

Two-time Wimbledon tennis champion Venus Williams will play an indoor match at the College this summer as part of the World Team Tennis series featuring the New York Buzz.

The Buzz will host Williams and the Philadelphia Freedom on July 19 at the Frank L. Messa Rink at Achilles Center.

The Buzz wanted an indoor venue for the high-profile match to protect against inclement weather, and worked with Schenectady city and county leaders to find an appropriate site. The team will play six other home matches outdoors at Central Park in Schenectady.

The rink, which opened in 1975, is typically used by the College's hockey team. But it has also hosted commencements, student dances, concerts and even a play.

A portable tennis court will be placed over the hockey surface for the July 19 event.

“The World Team Tennis matches are a signature event for Schenectady County, and we are pleased to provide a first-class venue,” said Bill Schwarz, director of communications and public affairs at Union College. “This successful outcome is due to the strong collaborative effort among the College, city and county leadership.”

Both Gary Hughes, chairman of the County Legislature's Committee on Economic Development, and Schenectady Mayor Brian U. Stratton praised the effort to move the Williams match indoors at the College.

“We are very pleased that the New York Buzz will stay right here in Schenectady County for seven home matches including a new mid-summer classic to be held at Union College, '' Hughes said.

Nitty Singh, the owner of the Buzz, said the choice of Messa Rink, which can accommodate nearly 3,000 spectators, will give more people a chance to experience World Team Tennis.

“Sixty-five percent of our fans come from outside the county,'' Singh said. “This will be a great opportunity for them to enjoy fantastic tennis in a comfortable indoor setting.”

The 25-year-old Williams has won 33 career World Tennis Association singles titles and five Grand Slam tournament championships. She defeated Lindsay Davenport last July to win her second Wimbledon singles title.

The match featuring the Buzz is not the first time the College has converted a hockey rink into tennis courts and vice versa.  In the early 1920s, the College would flood four of its outdoor tennis courts to make ice for its hockey team, and in the winter of 1928/29, the team practiced on a rink created by flooding the tennis court at the home of H. Laurence Achilles, a longtime faculty member and benefactor to the College. In 1929, the College built a concrete hockey rink just west of Bailey Hall which could be converted to four tennis courts. The tennis courts were made permanent in 1934 after numerous problems with bad ice forced the cancellation of some hockey games.

Tickets for the July 19 match as well as the rest of the Buzz summer season go on sale May 1. For additional information, go to www.nybuzzwtt.com or call (518) 378-BUZZ.

Posted on Apr 17, 2006

Mark Naison, professor of African-American studies and history and director of urban studies at Fordham University, will give a multi-media presentation, “Crossing Racial and Cultural Boundaries Through Music: An Historian's Journey from Rock & Roll to Hip Hop.”

The event, set for 7 p.m. Wednesday in Arts 215, is co-sponsored by UNITAS, the Catholic Student Association, History Department, Africana Studies Program, Bronner House, Phi Iota Alpha Fraternity and several other groups. It is free and open to the public.

Naison is the author of “White Boy: A Memoir” (Temple University Press, 2002) and “Communists in Harlem During the Depression” (University of Illinois Press, 1983), and co-author of “The Tenant Movement in New York City, 1940-1984” (Rutgers University Press, 1986).

David Levering Lewis, the Martin Luther King, Jr., University Professor at Rutgers University and recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for Biography in 1994 and 2001, wrote the following about “White Boy”:

“… if a shade of doubt had ever existed about this white boy's qualifications to teach and write African American history, Naison's engrossing, tumultuous memoir ought assure the author a place of honor not only among his professional peers of color but in the front ranks of all those for whom differences based on ideas and ideals – not on color or gender or class – are the only ones that matter.”

Naison has written articles on African-American culture and contemporary urban issues, and his study of Buffalo's African-American community appeared in the Urban League's anthology, “African-Americans and the Rise of Buffalo's Post-Industrial City” (1990).

Currently, he is working on a collection of essays on Paul Robeson and the American political tradition, while serving on the advisory committee of the Paul Robeson centennial project at Rutgers University.

He is a founder of the Bronx Youth Employment Project, “Save a Generation,” and an organizer and fundraiser for the Bonnie Youth Club, the largest sandlot baseball league in Brooklyn and the only one that is predominantly African-American.

Naison's latest venture is the Bronx African-American History Project, which has conducted more than 100 interviews with African-American professionals, community activists, business leaders and musicians who grew up in the Bronx between the 1930s and the 1980s.