caterpillar was just the beginning for
the butterfly I was born in 1946 in the
northeast section of Washington DC right
across the district line at Maryland a
little town called family Heights
Maryland which was really a subdivision
because it was close to third world
it was houses dead I didn’t have indoor
plumbing people had to use outhouses a
lot of people had to draw water from the
wells we live modestly at 7:09 59th
Avenue Family Heights Maryland my mother
worked for the Department of Interior
federal government my father come from a
two-parent family my father worked at
the naval gun Factory and he had a
part-time job in a liquor store and from
that liquor store it really impacted our
family because we were exposed to a lot
of abuse at an early age and I was
getting good grades in school but there
was always comments on my report cards
where my parents had to come up to see
about me because I had a bad attitude I
had to behavior problem but one thing I
remember has a kid born in 1946 around
1956 66 46 56 there were guys in our
neighborhood that drove Cadillacs had
the pretty women
and on surgeries they just go to the
Elks home and we used to see their cars
coming through the neighborhood and we’d
be playing calling hot skies to get to
their car doors would be the first one
to open it and whoever got there first
they would throw a corner up in the air
and grab it out
and one day Weesa play that’s my car and
I claimed a Cadillac probably in 1957
but one thing
that caught me the driver had a diamond
ring over and looked like that Sparkle
burst right in my psychic and I was
consumed the power of fascination we
moved from that community because my
parents had hit my father had hit a
street lottery number they call it
hitting it never hit the lottery and we
moved to a subdivision and Fort DuPont
Southeast Washington DC it was a
somewhat middle-class neighborhood and I
went to an elementary school I got put
back from them the 7th grade to the 6th
grade because leaving Maryland going to
the district with the test out to I
wasn’t really qualified for the 7th
grade so I had to repeat the 6th grade
and I was the only black
african-american Negro at that time in
my classroom one thing I didn’t suffer
was from the pins of inferiority because
the school teaches that I came up with
most of my siblings I was the youngest
of four kids and most of us went through
elementary school with most of the same
teachers and they didn’t just teach
Negro History once a week back then it
was only for a week they taught it all
year long so when I went to this
predominantly white school I kind of
knew who I was and from there but the
same thing that I found out and I looked
back and noticed about those people that
used to have the wells what’s in the
well will come up in the bucket and we
carried ourselves with uh when we moved
to that new location same behavior same
morals same values nothing changed only
thing change locate one of the fun
things that struck me was the fact when
we left that house we had moved like
clothes all that week and on the last
movement they asked my mother I said
where’s the truck for the furniture she
said we’re getting a car we leaving that
junk here
and so going through sixth grade went
through the seventh grade and when I
went to the seventh grade the same thing
a bad attitude behavior problem I went
through a social adjustment class the
day I think they would call that that
social adjustment class or alternative
school and one of the things about in
one of the things about that social
adjustment class all of us suffer from
this and this is what this new study has
revealed in the last couple of years
Harvard doctors have calling the term
hood disease to describe a complex form
of post-traumatic stress syndrome
threatening the well-being of inner-city
youth report the root the center of
Disease Control and Prevention estimated
at nearly three percent of the u.s. in a
city you 550 by this disorder which
makes it difficult for them to learn
those who exhibit this disorder often
live in virtual war zones the city
center of Disease Control said the
doctors at Harvard recently coined in
the name hood disease a term for a more
complex form of PhD the new sites report
and since the youthful really escaped
their communities unlike soldiers who
officially returned leave a war zone
they are repeatedly exposed to trauma
and I say that because when we hit a
term hood itself coupled with for who a
disease and I’m so real estate I’ll get
back to that part what do you think
happens to the property value there so
I’m in a social adjustment class all of
us had the same commonality of
experiences behavior problems bad
attitude and not long after that I start
going into juvenile institutions and in
my ninth grade year I didn’t manage to
graduate with my my dress to my class
because my academics was never that far
off and one thing another thing that
happen you know my father was an
alcoholic he was a functionary halt
it was still a lot of love there and
I’ll never forget he changed the course
of my life he asked me he said what do
you want to be when you grow up and I
told him I said I want to be a barber he
said why do you want to be a barber I
said because I think barbers are some
real cool guys I mean they got their
white jack is
and they hang out washing their car and
they ladies men so about two weeks later
he brought home a home barbering kit he
asked me to cut his hair I said alright
I could he said here to go to plays I’m
going to show you how to do it and what
blades is used and I cut his head and he
looked in the mirror and like I said
with his incongruent behavior I was kind
of frightened he looked back at me he
said boy you can’t cut hair he said
we’ll make you my bob and if I was you I
end up making all my friends all your
friends and customers and I went on to
do that and end up going to a vocational
high school fellow catching the high
school enter into the barbering class
the next year all that guys was driving
pretty cars and their families cars and
their fathers I asked my father and said
him I said dad let me use your car so
you can’t use my car I said why not
he said no dude he said I’ll tell you
what if you pass your barbers test I’ll
sign for you a car and right today I
knew that had Anatomy under all the
nervous system when I took that book
home and I became the youngest licensed
barber in Washington DC and now so now
you’re looking at a behavior problem a
so the crimes escalated from petty
larceny through larceny to grand larceny
to checks to all way it mentally ended
up – I entered a bank with a note and
stuff to tell up screaming about $3,500
in 1969
I’m a born decision the district Jail
was so crowded that they were you know
people with they didn’t even consider it
a non-violent crime at that time because
it wasn’t a weapon never shown so I
ended up making bond but I had to go to
a halfway house I end up leaving a
halfway house and went on the road I
took my show on the road ended up in
Paterson New Jersey in a street robbery
and I got sentenced to seven years there
and I came back to the district for
citizen so the Fotolia I had over 20
years sentence and my Barber’s license
was an escort because when I got to
Trenton state prison I ended up with a
job in quarantine where all who ever
came into that prison at the time had to
get a ball head and all of the facial
hair cut off of him and I was the
Barbara that for years that cut
everyone’s head a step cross that
threshold in Trenton state prison I’m
talking about corrupt mare’s he had
mafia guys and not only was the barber’s
license and my barbers trade my escort
it allowed me to get around the prison
and one day I was up trading books with
some friends on 7up 7up is a wing where
all of the real gangster type guys I
mean this is just 7up you just if you
don’t know nobody up there you don’t
even go up did 7up is where hurricane
group and caught it locked I came from I
was arrested in the same town that he
came out of so I’m trading books and on
my way down and tear
I see a guy having and looking at a guy
cell because I thought I heard someone
called me and I looked in his cell and
he had three chest boys set up and I’m
staring looking in the cell and he must
have heard me and he turned around he
said well you kind of problem looking in
a guy’s cell in prison is like home
invasion I said brother forgive me I
said I’m just wondering why you need
three chess boards set up he said do you
play I said yes yes I play he said well
what opening do you use I said not just
playing so he kind of looked at me he
said he said no the reason why I got
three chess boards set up is because
what I’m doing is I’m going through my
chest and repertoire you know he said
see one thing you got to understand
about chess that it has a lot to do with
life the parallels life
he said he’s three chess boys he said
chess is a game of three stages there’s
an opening there’s a middle and there’s
the endgame he said the best players see
their endgame while they’re in the open
air he said the same thing about kids
that see they’re in game while they’re
in their young age some kids already
know that they’re gonna take over their
printers business that errore you very
seldom see them kids get off track he
said what you need to understand is just
as a game that can’t be look you don’t
win or lose and chess all you do is
learn lessons or you’re teasing us he
turned that cell into a classroom that
brother embraced me he gave me so much
knowledge and understanding about the
game that it changed my whole worldview
and before I left that prison he was my
mentor I end up from from Trenton I
ain’t up going to Lewisburg federal
prison to federal prison they finished
the sentence for the bank robbery I was
probably the best chess player there
everybody that came in that we could
even think about playing they sent them
to me I want a lot of cigarettes for the
DC guys so what happened when I came
home
I ended up really getting my life
together I had a one thing to happen and
I’m gonna go back over this real fence
well I was in the barber shop here’s
what a lot of people don’t understand
while I was in that barber shop during
the civil rights movement which was a
big time in african-american community
no one never thought about what happened
to the barbers when everybody was trying
to grow afro this was one of the bad
decisions that I made instead of going
instead of taking the knowledge wisdom
understanding I had about passing tests
because the barbers test was one of the
most difficult tests you could pay I
could have went to the fire department I
could have went to Amtrak I could have
passed about any test there was but I
chose to go to the street I’ve made a
bad decision that caused me a lot of
time so when I when I end up leaving
Lewisburg and at that time that’s when
drugs and alcohol that was a gateway for
the drugs and alcohol and over 30 years
of addiction when I came out I end up
going to a 12-step program and I kind of
really got my life together to the point
where I became responsible and one of
the things that really helped me was
this guy in prison he told me he asked
me he said who are you
I said I’m Eugene brown the bottom one
right he said no but who are you I said
what do you mean he held up a king he
said I’m gonna tell you something you’ll
be king
until you accept your kingship you won’t
keep coming back your prison and that
was a startling statement that echoed in
my mind for years and years and years a
lot of things a lot of decision that I
thought I was making them please other
people I felt like that I learned
responsibility from that one statement
so from the statement that he made and
from the parallels that I’ve been able
to put together I have a program now
Raleigh Central Prison North Carolina on
death row
these guys said that if chess can help
them in the position that they’re in it
could it should be everywhere they said
why don’t you take this message and take
it to men in prison as you can and this
is what I’ve been doing for the last
couple of years I’ve taught kids from in
juvenile institutions Central Prison
have program now and full federal prison
with a curriculum that’s usually chess
as one of the main modules for decision
making this is the chess house that I
have invested in when I came home I got
put out of the school system because
after we won a full year City champion
and they was trying to give me a job and
I put have you ever been arrested I said
no and finally when they wanted to pay
me and I went downtown they took my
fingerprints they fell on a habit every
day escorted me out and as a direct
result of that they say well no longer
work here and I ended up buying this
house I was a real estate agent I was
gonna flip it but the parents wouldn’t
let me they said mr. Brown these kids
depending on you what are you going to
do I said I’ll tell you what we won’t
make this out of their chest house I
would direct result of that chest house
we want full year City champions took
kids to the Nationals five times and
these kids right today some of them we
started in 1991-92 some of these kids
right today are in college out of
college one of the things that I use for
a paradigm shift is to let them know say
you could be anything that you want to
be ask me say what do you want to be
much
right mr. burr I said well how I can
sell drugs what living they say what I
said yeah I can sell hook we talking
about a paradigm shift they said how can
you do that mr. Brown I said let me tell
you one thing you can go to school and
be a pharmacist and sell drugs all day
long and that was the first time they
ever heard anything like that they think
before you move comes from a brother no
that’s a leading port in Washington and
he’s seeing what I was doing and he saw
that motto and I heard his model with me
everywhere I go and he gave me a pawn
that I embellished and it makes so much
sense that I put it to memory and it
goes like this this is the story of a
chess club found it for inner-city youth
is different from most is distinguished
in both of not just teaching chess but
Ruth it teaches young children to reason
to rationalize to use good sense and
intelligence against deception treachery
and lies so at the big chair chess club
we’re on a mission to save the lives of
our children to teach the unteachable
reach the unreachable and always think
before you move thank you
[Applause] you