TRANSCRIPT KEY: All text in this transcript is in black size 11 font. All names of speakers are bolded. When the speaker ‘Angela’ is narrating, the bold text says, “Angela narration.” When she is speaking to another speaker, the bold text says, “Angela audio.” All other speakers say their name and “audio”.

SPEAKERS:

  • Angela: Angela is the creator and narrator of this audio documentary. She is the daughter of Jim and Leona Palumbo, and is on a quest to discover how external conversations of diversity and equity are making their way into the organization her parents met in.
  • Leona: Leona is the mother of Angela. She met her late husband in this organization. She explains what the SCA is and how it was and where it’s possibly going in the future.
  • Dale: Dale is a member of the SCA who has experienced racism while participating in the organization. He advocates for changes to the organization to make it more inclusive for everyone.
  • Jason: Jason is the diversity and equity officer of the Eastern Kingdom (Eastern part of where this org is located). His job is to educate and maintain an equitable environment for the people in the Eastern part of the SCA.

Angela Narration:

(Acoustic middle ages music in the background)

The year is 1989. Ronald Reagan steps down and George Bush steps up as President of the United States. Dick Cheney is sworn in as Defense Secretary, Tom Foley is elected as the US House of Representatives speaker, and in upstate New York, Sir Horic and Lea Gravagar are crowned as king and queen of the Eastern kingdom.

These days – you can find the former Queen, now living as a Countess on Long Island. She goes by Leona.

Leona audio:

(Acoustic middle ages music fades out)

My name is Leona Palumbo, I’m 58 years old. I live in Yaphank New York, which is on Long Island…

Angela Narration:

Leona – I mean former Queen Lea, is also my mom.

(Acoustic middle ages music in the background)

So yeah, my mother was a queen. She wasn’t in charge of an actual country! She and my father were longtime members of an organization called the Society of creative anachronisms, which is sometimes known as the SCA.

Essentially, this is a place where people can dress up in medieval garb and pretend to be somebody else around like minded people. My father, Jim Palumbo, I mean, Earl Sir Horic, was a fighter, and fought his way up to the rank of King all while falling in love with my mom along the way.

Angela audio:

So you got immersed in it? You got enthralled?

(Acoustic middle ages music fades out)

Leona audio:

Yeah. Well, then I met my husband.

Angela audio:

Do you wanna talk about that?

Leona audio:

Sure… I mean, he. If I was, I was about 18. He was 17. And – we just became really – we became really tight really quickly. And my husband became one of my best friends. And then a couple years later, we were more than friends – and he was literally my knight in shining armor.

Angela narration:

There are hundreds of pictures of my parents, but the ones I like to share the most are those where they’re wearing full medieval attire. My mother owned fabulous 14th century style gowns and my father wore handcrafted armor and plate male.

Angela audio:

So I want to go to pictures of dad… tell me about that. What is that?

Leona audio:

This is the tournament that dad won to become Prince and then King. So this is the beginning of the tourn- no, actually, this is near the end of the tournament. These are the quarterfinals.

Audio clip of Jim Palumbo and another man fighting at an event

Angela audio:

Is he wearing armor in this? No, right?

Leona audio:

Yes. He always wore very little armor and you got teased for it. He said, “just don’t get hit!”

(Both Leona and Angela laugh)

Angela narration:

I grew up flipping through photo albums full of these pictures. My parents loved showing them to me and telling me their stories. But my mom and I have struggled to look at them and the last four months.

News 12 anchor audio clip:

A fatal car accident Sunday has left a yap panke family and neighborhood in shock. And mourning.

James Palumbo lived about three and a half miles from the crash scene here, and his family says on Sunday afternoon, he was just out running errands, including dropping off donated clothing… for the needy.

Angela narration:

My dad’s only been gone for a few months now, but the longer I’ve spent without him, the more questions I have about this unique organization he was a part of.

(Acoustic middle ages music in the background)

My dad got really involved in this organization again recently, after taking 25 years off to raise our family, this organization started to experience a lot of changes in the last few years. My dad seemed to get caught in the middle.

This was a place he went to escape the normalcy of everyday life. He was able to pretend and be young again. But the world outside of his fantasy could not be escaped.

With uprisings around the world regarding a need for social justice and social change, the SCA had to question its place in the world. Being a place with the intention of living in the past started to realize some things in the present couldn’t be avoided, nor should they be.

Leona audio:

Knights wear a white belt and a gold chain and they swear fealty to the king.

(Acoustic middle ages music fades out)

So you can reach a level and choose to not swear fealty – not be obligated to swear fealty, and that would be a master of arms. So the term master is a tough word for people of color. Its role in history has been ugly.

Angela audio:

Talk to me about dads. I don’t wanna say ‘argument’ – but his beliefs, on terms such as master and this organization, or just things that kind of revolve around that.

Leona audio:

It is a historical, educational organization. So if you’re going to represent what happened, then you have to represent what happened, and this was the way it was.

I used to talk to him about – you have to open up your eyes and see things the way other people are seeing it. Which, which sounds so easy, but it’s not. And he had to learn that indeed, yeah, that’s the way it was, but we need to do a little better. And we can still be historical, without being unkind. And we have to respect the feelings that people have and the history that they carry with them. And he eventually got it, which was great. He grew, you know.

(Acoustic middle ages music in the background)

Angela narration:

But I had to know, are other people getting it? Are other people in this organization growing? Is change happening? What’s the pushback? To get these answers, I had to reach out to other members of the organization who are still active in it today, who have a lot more to gain from changing the way things have been.

(Acoustic middle ages music fades out)

Dale audio:

I am a husband, a father, a lawyer…

Angela narration:

That’s Dale Frederick. Dale is a lawyer from Queens, New York. He is the husband of Billy, father of Fiona and a Knight of the East kingdom. He joined the SCA in 1998, and has been an active member ever since.

Dale audio:

So growing up, Caribbean, gay, Black, there was never a particular group that I comfortably fit into, until I came to the SCA.

Angela audio:

You mentioned something so profound, that it’s a place for everybody – everybody has a place.

(Acoustic middle ages music in the background)

But you’ve also mentioned to me that you’ve had personal experiences that made you feel detached – that made you feel singled out. Talk to me about that.

Dale audio:

The first time I encountered real racism in the SCA was shocking to me. Like it was so shocking. I didn’t know what to say or do.

Angela narration:

Dale went to an SCA event in Maine, he remembers being the only Black male fighter at that particular event.

Dale audio:

I’m online in my armor – been inspected, just waiting to get my color sticker so I could go fight on my team. And the guy who was handing out the tape, pulled me out of the line and told me to just wait there. No reason. And I’m standing there. And he’s taping all the other white fighters, one after the other after the other. And after a few minutes of standing there, it starts to dawn on me that something’s wrong. I didn’t know what was going on, and I’m trying to put it together. And I didn’t jump to the conclusion of racism at first. But as I stood there and watched, I realized that the only difference between me and everybody else on that line was the color of my skin.

(Acoustic middle ages music fades out)

Angela narration:

The SCA has systems in place to prepare for these situations. Jason to Julio is the East Kingdom’s diversity and equity officer. He is specially trained to handle situations like this and find solutions for them and the organization.

Jason audio:

So I’m Jason’s Julio. I’m an academic doctor in educational leadership and I’m a high school principal.

I entered teaching after an army career as an armor officer, so I was a tank guy. And then I left the army under Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. That’s what caught me.

Angela narration:

Jason entered the SCA in 2006 under the name Tiberius Lulius Rufus Primus.

His work as the equity officer stems from his experience being kicked out of the army just for being gay. Now, Jason recognizes that there are inequities in the SCA he wants to see change to make this an organization that is compatible with everyone.

Dale argues that one of the main parts of the SCA that can change this imperfect organization for the better is to remove the term master altogether. But what does this term mean for the organization and why is it such a highly contested issue? I came to Jason for answers.

Jason audio:

You know, it’s a really interesting debate, right? There’s an implicit power dynamic in some of these conversations around master, mistress. And that’s a really difficult one, especially when the majority it seems of the population is not people of color, and so some people see it as mundane or real world politics or political correctness impeding on our medieval game, when really, if we purport to be equity minded and a big tent that everybody’s welcoming, then these perspectives have to be not only respected but sort of cultivated and make us examine who we are.

Angela narration:

Dale has heard this debate against removing the term master, but he doesn’t understand why it’s still an issue. To him, the answer is clear.

(Acoustic middle ages music in the background)

Dale audio:

So I’ve been on a roller coaster ride with the term master.

I came to realize that for a lot of people of color, we tolerate things. Because our ability to effectuate change of those structures is dramatically reduced to, ‘we have to get enough white people on board to agree with us so that we can do it’. We can’t just say, ‘Hey, this is a problem. This is why it’s a problem, and we needed it addressed’.

Angela narration:

In our conversation, Dale was reminded of an incident and the SCA when someone decided to use a swastika in their garb. Dale says he was struck by the immediate and of course, necessary outcry for immediate change of rules allowing for this kind of symbol in the organization. But, when it comes to the term Master, nothing has yet to be done.

Dale audio:

But the term master has such incredible deep rooted hate, and pain for the Black community that we shouldn’t have to explain. We all know that African Americans were forced to call their owners Master… There doesn’t really need to be any further explanation about how deeply rooted in our country, that term and it’s pain for the Black community is.

Angela narration:

It can be difficult to look outside of ourselves to understand issues that maybe don’t directly relate to us.

(Acoustic middle ages music fades out)

My dad never sat down with Dale to discuss why this issue was so important to him. To my dad, there was always a need to stick to tradition in this organization. And why was that? Well, the SCA meant everything to my dad. It’s where he met his best friends and my mom, it’s where he found his passion for sword fighting and worked his way up to the rank of King. The idea of changing the way this organization ran – the idea of challenging the traditional safety net for my parents – that was a tough pill to swallow for him… And it took him some time.

Leona audio:

The virtues of knighthood: Honor, chivalry, bravery, protection, were so vitally a part of Dad, they were latent in him even before he joined the organization, and this provided him an avenue to to present that openly.

Angela audio:

So how did those values come out in his inherent protection of this organization that had those same values?

Leona audio:

Well, I mean, because the organization is supposed to be a historical research, and then to reenact that research, the more contemporary values that we have now towards people who are different didn’t exist back then.

You know, when you speak specifically about the word Master, he always thought of it as it was intended originally; to master something – not to be a master. And he had to look to the experience of his friends – who he cared so deeply about, that that word bothered them. And he had to look at it through their point of view and then realize, Oh, you know, you’re right.

Angela audio:

It took empathizing and understanding…

Leona audio:

Or sympathizing, because he couldn’t empathize …

Angela audio:

Right.

Leona audio:

Because it wasn’t his experience. So he had to sympathize and realize that somebody’s experience is more important in this situation than his privilege.

Angela audio:

And that almost needs to be done in the entire organization to see change there.

Leona audio:

And in order for the organization to grow, because you don’t want it to remain stagnant and you don’t want to inadvertently have people turn away from it because of these things. You want people to come to you, you want them to feel welcome. And you want the organization to grow.

(Acoustic middle ages music in the background)

You can still keep your core values, you can still keep it, even more so I think if you have everyone represented and comfortable.

Angela narration:

The SCA is just one of many organizations in the US that has had to change from within to represent what’s going on outside of themselves. My parents’ story, and the story of 1000s of other members, are just small steps to a more inclusive future, for a place that prides itself on living in the past.

END TRANSCRIPT.