Story by Eldredge McCready | Photos by Matt Odom
He was born and raised in Stockton, California, but Charles Richardson has spent most of his adult life in Macon. In that time, he’s become one of Macon-Bibb County’s most recognizable civic leaders in a variety of positions over his 44 years here. Currently, he works part-time as the Community Liaison for the Office of the President at Middle Georgia State College. He’s, where has worked with MGA for 18 years, previously as Artist in Residence. Richardson’s journalism career spanned print, radio, and television, most notably as the opinion page editor at the Macon Telegraph.
WHAT MAKES A HERO TO YOU?
“People who do something that generally costs them something. They do it because they’re motivated to do it, and generally they don’t get paid for it.,” Richardson said.
CAN YOU CITE ANY LOCAL EXAMPLES?
“To me, a local hero is someone like Roger Jackson, who runs the Motivating Youth Foundation., He doesn’t have to do it; nobody asked him to do it. He doesn’t get paid to do it, and it has affected many young people.
Some of those young people have gone on to do some great things.”
(Jackson runs an after-school program in East Macon and an Adult Readiness program for the past 17 years.)
He also just starts these things. When you drive by Central High School now, there’s a visual sign outside the school, and he spent his own money to do it. They didn’t have that before. He has opened up a premium clothes closet, where he’s received overstock merchandise from various manufacturers and corporations, like Nike. You can do your shopping, and it doesn’t cost you anything. He has even opened it up for teachers so you can get what you need.
(Jackson went to Central High and played football. He attended Bethune-Cookman College to play football. After graduation, he earned a defensive back position with the Denver Broncos of the NFL.).
Can you imagine? He came back home from the Denver Broncos, and he didn’t sit on his butt — he went to work. It’s something he likes to do and is motivated to do.
He did a day out for caregivers, where he paid for them to get their hair and nails done, and it didn’t cost them anything.
GIVE ME ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF MACON’S HEROISM
Dr. Christopher Blake, our President at Middle Georgia State, is a leader. You look around at these buildings now, most of them have happened under his watch.
You have to have some gumption to get the Board of Regents to approve those kinds of expenditures. We have a beautiful campus. We now have five campuses: Cochran, Eastman, Dublin, Warner Robins, and Macon. And if you want to say six campuses, [for] our aviation campus in Macon, we also operate at the Macon Regional Airport. Once our aviation students graduate, they are already FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) certified. They go to Delta and United Airlines, and they are on their way.
(Since 2014, Blake has led the institution through its transition from a state college to a regional university, transforming the campus aesthetically).
WHO READS LIKE A HERO TO YOU?
On a statewide level, one of my heroes is Michael Thurmond. The son of a sharecropper, he just lost the Democratic primary for governor. But I don’t think there is anybody in the race, on the Republican side or Democratic side, that can match his qualifications. He’s an attorney, has been a state representative, State Labor Commissioner, Chief Executive Officer of DeKalb County, DeKalb County Schools Superintendent, and he’s an author.
When he went into DeKalb County Schools, it was a wreck. He fixed it. When he went into DeKalb County Executive, it was a wreck. He fixed it. And that takes a certain leadership ability that I think exemplifies that you see something that’s broken, and you get it fixed. Thurmond’s father was a sharecropper.
IS THERE ANYONE ON A NATIONAL LEVEL THAT YOU THINK IMPACTS CENTRAL GEORGIA?
Bishop William J.Barber II in North Carolina. He’s fought the civil rights fight for a long time. To get church folk together, you’ve got to have some leadership ability. He stayed the course. Leaders don’t sign up for terms. They’re in it for the long haul, because that arch bends slowly toward justice.
Those are the people I admire. I wish I had more of their ability to collaborate. I tend to work independently and simply do my job, but bringing a team together requires an entirely different skill.”
(Richardson said his original hero was his mother. Another influential person was the band director at Thomas Alva Edison High School in Stockton, where he played trombone under the tutelage of Bud Behrens).
He introduced me to two things. He drove a PorschePorsche, and he was a session musician, and he upped our standards from what we thought we could do to what we could do. We were the first high school band to play “Carmina Burana” in competition. It’s a hideously difficult piece, written with many different clefs and time changes. [ One of the judges was so impressed, he approached Behrens and asked if he could conduct the band. He bowed and thanked us when he finished.
(Richardson graduated from the University of the Pacific in California. He remains humble, but is possibly considered a hero by many local people. He was the editorial page director and columnist at The Macon Telegraph for 23 years. Additionally, h I he was the Northeast High School’s football game announcer and also co-hosted a radio show. He has served as the president of the Downtown Macon Rotary Club. Professionally, he was the recipient of a Knight Foundation fellowship at Duke University in 2000. He also attended the University of Maryland’s Knight Center as a journalism fellow and attended Harvard University, where he studied governance. He has also been on the foundation boards of PAGE, the Professional Association of Georgia Educators, which sponsors the STAR students. He has also served as the master of ceremonies of the STAR awards, where most of the students are also musicians. He figures that music helps students “connect the dots,” because reading music helps to explain math. For this and many other community accomplishments, Richardson is this issue’s hero.