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In this file photo from Oct. 16, 1995, the view from the Washington Monument toward the Capitol shows the participants in the Million Man March in Washington.Steve Helber, AP

After the long ride from Jackson, Mississippi, Kenneth Stokes stepped off the bus wearing his favorite brown cowboy boots and a two-piece suit,much like the civil rights activists of the 1960s dressedin their Sunday best.

Kenneth StokesJOE ELLIS/THE CLARION-LEDGER

He shivered in the chilly autumn morning, wishing hed brought a coat as he joined thousands of men heading down the streets of Washington, D.C.This trek turned out to behismarchtwo miles through low-income housing and million-dollar row houses until, up ahead, a majestic view: theU.S.Capitol,seat of American power, largely built by slaveswhen the nation was a few decades old.

Stokes looked out over the National Mall, amazed at this ocean ofBlack men. Most were elbow to elbow.Some perched on monuments or in trees. Kids sat on dadsshoulders. All there for an event called the Million Man March.

It was packed, packed,packed, Stokes recalls. There were people everywherefrom everywhere.

Charles HicksDEBORAH BERRY, USA TODAY

Charles Hicks reached inside his suit jacket and pulled out a folded paper scrawled with his handwriting. A union leader in Washington nicknamed the Chocolate Citybecause it was mostly African American Hicks studied the speech hed written the night before.

From his vantage on stage at the west front of the Capitol, Hicks took in the audience he was about to address, Black faces stretching a mile to the Washington Monument. This was the heart of America, home of the brave, land of the free. And they were repeating his chant: We are here!

Hicks watched as moreand moremen pouredonto the Mall.He told themnot to believe the myth thatAfricanAmericanmen are lazy.All my life I have seen Black men work and take care of their family,Hicks declared.All my life I have seen men in unions fighting for better jobs.

Anthony RuffProvided by Anthony Ruff

Anthony Ruff, then anArmy reservist in New York City, remembers speeches that day about Black families and kids without dads.

The message resonated with the 34-year-old, who was raised in a home with foster siblings. Especially when Maya Angelou stood up and read her Million Man March Poem, witha verse that says, I look through the posture and past your disguise and see your love for family in your big brown eyes.

Back in the crowd, Ruff vowed to one day adopt a child.

Virgil KillebrewKERRI PANG FOR USA TODAY

Virgil Killebrew, a street poet from Chicago, arrived early enough to stand directly in front of the stage. But the amplifiers were so loud, and the crowd so suffocating, he retreated to the fringes.

There were signs and flags. Music blared between speeches.Black hands clenched together in prayer against a blue sky, clouds scudding overhead.

I lost my mind, recalls Killebrew, now71. It wasnt the speeches. It was the excitement. ...You felt the truth of all these people saying,Black Power.

Herealized,This is bigger than us.

KokayiNosakherePHOTO PROVIDED BY KOKAYI NOSAKHERE

A chantarose with theintroductionof Rosa Parks,a diminutiveBlack woman who in1955refusedto sit atthe back of an Alabamabus.

Rosa!Rosa!echoed froma corner of thesprawlingcrowd.Asshestepped tothemicrophone,hundreds of thousands more voiceschimed in. Rosa! Rosa! Rosa!

ForKokayiNosakhere, then a 21-year-old college student from Anchorage, it wasthe apexofa sublime experience.He and 15other Alaskans had traveledmore than4,000 milesto join the Million Man March, which occurred 25 years ago Friday.

I didnt hear a word of her speech,Nosakhere says. We were doing the wave. ... Rosa! Rosa!I had to come back home and watch C-SPAN to get the outside perspective.

Now a community organizer for social justice, Nosakhere's online bio sayshis attendance at the Million Man Marchset the course of his life.

An activist. Asoldier.A union leader.A city councilman. Apoet.

That day in October 1995 has stayed with these fivemen, though not necessarily as an inflectionpoint. Life is more complicated than that.

To celebrate the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. this year, Nosakhere cut up a cardboard box and used markers to createa message he hoped would resonate with people no matter their skin color: If justice means revenge, there will never be peace.

He started walking through downtown Medford, Oregon, waving the sign a one-man parade in a city that is 89 percent white. There were no haters, he says, just lots of positive honks.

The Million Man March was Nosakheresfirst political demonstration. Twenty-five years later, hes still at it.

KokayiNosakhere holds a sign he made for the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. He said he hoped his message would resonate with people no matter their skin color.Photo courtesy of KokayiNosakhere

After returning to Alaska, he became a community worker for the NAACP, staged a hunger strike for school nutrition funding and played politics to achieve social justice.

A few years ago, he started a campaign to put anonymous love letters on car windshields handwritten messages meantto encourage positive feelings.

After George Zimmerman was acquitted of murder in the slaying of Black teenager Trayvon Martin, Nosakhere helped organize a demonstration. When Black Lives Matter marched through Eugene, Oregon, this summer to protest police brutality, he was there.

Those who think the Million Man March was supposed to change America got it wrong, Nosakhere says: The goal was to change us. I raised my hand on Oct. 16, 1995, and I have not taken it down. Ive fulfilled my oath to go back to my community and make it a better place.

Im still here,he says. I dont back down from white supremacy.

In overhead photos, they were five pixels in a panoply of AfricanAmerican men. Fivevantage points on a single day, andonthe quarter-century since.

There were 837,000 in all, or 400,000,or 1.9 million.Even the number of attendeesremains in dispute, like so many things about one of the largest demonstrations ever to hit Americas capital.

They chanted,laughed, danced,listened tospeeches, sang, cried and made vows. Despitestereotypes and predictions, there wasnoviolence, looting or arrests.Just an outpouring ofheartand an intaking of hope.

The crowd at the Million Man March has been portrayedas a singular organism. By all accounts, there was anaura ofunity, an abiding bond of pigmentation and gender.

But the event, as recorded by history andpetrifiedin the minds of those whoattended,always held distinct and subjective meanings.

The goals and leadership were controversial and divisivenot just to white Americans, but to AfricanAmericans watchingontelevision andeven there.

Some did not want to be affiliated with theNation of Islamor itsleader, Louis Farrakhan, whose preaching includes Black nationalism and anti-Semitism.

Some saw the stated purposeADayof Atonementas an acceptance of guilt by Black men for conditions that are a legacy of slavery, discrimination and white supremacy.

Some believed it was an affront, or politically shortsighted,not to invite women and non-Black sympathizers.

And yetthe idea ofuniting inadeclaration of African American pain, power andhumanitycaught fire, spreading from churches to Black businesses to union halls. After a year of planning and scraping together dollars, folks from sea to shining sea boarded trains, bought airline tickets, crowded into church vans and chartered buses to spend one day, together, making a statementforthemselves and to America.

Therewere manydeclarationsthat day,and perhaps a million takeaways.And then, after a long speechby Farrakhan, it was over.

Themall emptied.Menwent home, full of energy and ideas.

In the 25 years since, America haselectedan AfricanAmerican president, seendiversity become a workplace buzzword andwatchedNBA players wear jerseys emblazoned with Black Lives Matter.

Wevealsowitnessedvideos ofpolice killing unarmedBlack men, demonstrationsveering into riotingand a president whourgedwhite supremacists to standbackand stand by.

Hicks,75,whohas fought injusticemost of hislife,saysnationwideprotests againstpolice abusesare a new birth of the spirit of the Million Man March and the civil rights movement.

If I was 30 years younger, Id be out there, hesays.Im not young enough to run and to dodge tear gas.

Killebrewstarted writing poetry long after thedrugs, lost jobs andprison terms.He wasin Chicago,asking for a bed in a Salvation Army shelter. The gatekeeperwanted him to fill out a form explaininghis circumstances.

Killebrew couldhave written about his dad, whodividedtime between a wife and kids in Illinois and a second family in Tennessee.

Hecouldhave mentionedgoing to a nearly all-whitehigh school where fighting the Black kids was a way to prove something. Fights every day,he says. I began to feel myBlackage.

Street poet Virgil Killebrew looks back on the Million Man March 25 years later

Street poet Virgil Killebrew talks about his poetry and experience at the Million Man March on it's 25th anniversary.

USA TODAY

Hecouldhavedescribedplaying hoops at a neighborhood school when somebody broke into it.I didnt know you were supposed to run when the police came, Killebrew recalls. Helandedin juvenile hall, so embittered bytheinjustice that hewent backtwice for real crimes.

He couldhavetold aboutthe time hegotfired from a good job after a fightwith a whitedudeoverwhetherthe radioshould be tuned tocountry or blues.

Instead, when Killebrew filled out the Salvation Army form,he impulsivelywrotea poemthe first of his life.He titled it,Powerlessand Insane,the wayhefelt after a woman introduced him to heroin.

The shelter folks likedhisrhymessomuch they made copiesfor their guests. Killebrewbelieved they had no right to do that it washispoem so he raised a stink and lost his bed because of it.

But he foundavocation.He wrote moreverses,made copiesat Kinkos,and started selling them on the street for whatever peoplewanted to pay.One poem, Shopping Spree, urged African Americans to buy from Black businesses: If youre shopping with others who are not Sistahs or Brothas, Black people will never be free.

Killebrew was living in atransient hotelin 1995whenalocal radio host heard about hispoetryand invited him on the show.LuPalmer, considered the godfather of Black activismin Chicago, askedtheguestto recitea poem titled,True Black Man.

Call-in lines wereringingand lights were blinking, Killebrew recalls. Palmer acted like his guest had won a prize, declaring, Youre going to the Million Man March! Killebrew chuckles at the memory: I said, I dont have any money....My head was spinning like someone who has drank a pint of Richards (Wild Irish Rose).

When Ruff learned about the march, he started calling homeboys in Long Island,guys hed known since he was 13. Farrakhans role wasnt a spoiler; their agenda was more personal than political. This day was about them and people who looked like them, restoring dignity and pride.

The fact that it was on a weekday, when they had to take off work and maybe lose pay or get in trouble with the boss, made it even more valuable. People were willing to sacrifice something of themselves, Ruff recalls. We really felt it would be a historic event.

Nosakheresdad, an NAACP leader in Alaska, presided overKwanzaa and Juneteenth celebrations and had brought Farrakhanto Anchorage.So the young manwas steeped inBlackpoliticsandculture.

I grew upBlackety-Black-Black,Nosakheresays.

Still,it is one thing for a boy to inherit views, another toadoptthem.During hissenior yearinhigh school,Nosakherespent $5.99 at Waldenbooksfor a copy ofTheAutobiography of Malcolm X.

Herewas a civil rights leadertelling Blackstofight back against white supremacy.Thinking of the message,Nosakhere paraphrasesapassage that hit home:You have a right to kill a four-legged dog,or a two-legged dog who is threatening you.

Nosakherefoundsimilarmessagesin theRastafarian-inspiredmusicof Bob Marley. Thehit,I Shot the Sheriff, was about standing up to police brutality.Another song, No Woman, No Cry,gave himthepsychological armor nottofear white supremacy.

Nosakhereabandoned his birthnameand adoptedaSwahilimonikerthat he says means,Summon the people,old messenger, becauseGod is on his way. Whenhelearned aboutFarrakhans call forBlack males to convergeon the nations capital, he was all in.

Stokes, now 65, wason the JacksonCity Councilthen, asnow,and felt a duty to join the march. He and Charles Tisdale, publisher of theJackson Advocate, aBlack newspaper, started scroungingfor money to charter buses.

They went to funeral homes and other Black businesses.Wegot out there and started begging, he recalls. We had to represent.

Hicks, the union leader in Washington,had a legacy to considerwhen hewas asked to join a news conferenceaboutthe march.He hailed from Bogalusa, Louisiana, wherehisfather, Robert,foundedachapter of Deacons for Defense and Justice,an armed group of Black men who defended themselves and civil rights workers against attacks by the Ku Klux Klan in the 1960s.

Charles Hicks (third from left) and his late father, Robert Hicks (third from right), gather with fellow union members during the Million Man March in 1995. Charles Hicks spoke at the march.Photo courtesy of Charles Hicks

Hicks remembersone night in 1965, when friendsshowed up to protect his family after the sheriff warned that alynch mobplanned to burn down their home.Police wouldnthelp,Hicksrecalls.If we didnt protect ourselves, we were sitting ducks.

Ben Chavis, one of the march organizers, attended that news conference. ChavisaskedHickswho his father was and, inanod to the legendary civil rights activist, invited Hicks to speak on the big day.

Monthsbefore themarch,Killebrewstartedgoing toMonday night meetings in Chicago churches.

At first they were small meetings, not exciting. Folks talked about fundraising, the speakers list anda manifesto.

As the date neared,themeetings got bigger and livelier. Killebrew attended one at a Chicago mosque with Farrakhan, Chavis and Jesse Jackson. Itturned into apeprally, and Killebrewcaughtthe spirit.There was asense of history in the making, he recalls.

Days later,buses outside a church were loaded in the pre-dawn darkness.The Rev. Al Sampson,a march organizer,boarded with Killebrew and used the 20-hour ride toreviewa speech he would deliver titled, A Declaration of Purpose.

The buses formed a convoy and, with horns honking, paraded through the sleepingSouthSide of Chicago.

Most passengers brought pillows, blankets, food and drink. Not Killebrew. His stomach started grumbling as the bus filled with smells of homemade meals. He accepted some food from his seatmate,E-Rod, who spent much of the tripdistractinga 12-year-old boy whodidnt seem to get along with his dad.

Stokes saysfear was palpable as they boarded the bus inJackson. There was talk of possible violence.You didnt know if youd make it back home,he says. Thats one reason people didnt bring their wives.

They prayedwhen the bus took off,when it stoppedin Atlanta, andatevery otherstop along thenearly 1,000-mile ride.The only way these trips are going to be successful,Stokes says, is youve got to put God first.

Nosakheresflight from Anchorage landed in Boston, where he spent a few days at the home of a family friend,Brother Ray, before driving to Washington.

Church vans and buses were literally rocking down the interstate, Nosakhere recalls, full of brotherscharged with anticipation andwithfearofan attack by law enforcement orhaters.All of emwere singing, he says.We were fortifying ourselves. We thought we were going to die that day.

Farrakhans original idea was essentially religious.Black men of all faiths wouldgatherfor preaching, prayers and promises.Butamid the publicity of ayearlong run-up,politics elbowed itswayonto the agendaand the Million Man March morphed into different things for different people.

Even the title was a misnomer; there was nomarch, just agathering.And becauseofthename,counting heads provedcontroversial.

The Million Man March of 1995 carried a multitude of message and missions, some of them reflected in a handmade sign displayed by one of the participants.Photo courtesy of Rod Terry

Organizersput thecrowd sizebetween1.5 millionand1.9million.The National Park Service came up with 400,000, prompting the Nation of Islam to sue.That was the last time the Park Service estimated attendance at a demonstration in Washington.

A Boston University researchereventually usedphotos and computers tocalculate there werebetween 655,000 and1.1million people there.

For the men who showed, those were just numbers.

Ata unionhall in downtown Washington,Hicks and others munched on doughnutsand sipped juice provided by wives and mothers. The men wore black and whiteunionball caps;the women,who stayed behind, wore gold ones.

As Hicks and his family members got within blocks of the National Mall, he didn't see a swelling crowd at first. Its okay,his fathersoothed.If itaintnobody there but me, Charles and Farrakhan,weregoing to be there.

Nosakheresawpoliceon horsebackwith nothing to do. We toldthem, You arent needed today, homey.There was not one fight, no weed being smoked, no liquor. … It was one of the few times in my lifeI actually felt safe.

There were foodtents,first-aid centers andvoter registrationbooths. Eight hours of speechifyingand preachingwithmusical interludes.

On stage, thecomedian-activist Dick Gregory kept shouting into the microphone, I love you!Justabout everyonesangLiftEvery Voice and Sing, known as theBlacknationalanthem.

Read more:
25 years ago, Black men united in their pain and power. This is what the Million Man March meant to participants. - USA TODAY