Lomax

It has become clear that Lomax has been ensnared by her own lies. It also has become clear that Lomax has a biased judgment toward Chief Daryl Gates. She has lost her credibility, and as a result become an ineffective commission member. She has no other recourse but to turn in her resignation. JORGE F. TORRES, Los Angeles

"Some time the hating has to stop," reads the last line of "The Railway Man," a moving tale of wartime torture and forgiveness by former British prisoner of war Eric Lomax. Lomax was a British army officer when he was captured by Japanese forces during the fall of Singapore in 1942. The Scotsman endured horrific conditions and savage beatings as he and thousands of others were forced to build the infamous Burma-to-Siam railroad, which formed the basis of the 1957 film "The Bridge on the River Kwai.

What Gregg Garrity failed to accomplish for the Philadelphia Eagles a year ago he made up for Sunday before the smallest non-strike crowd in St. Louis since 1983. "(Cedric) Mack wasn't going to drag me down this time," Garrity said of the St. Louis Cardinals cornerback he beat in the closing seconds to give Philadelphia a 28-23 victory. "It was right there, a perfect pass."

Alan Lomax The Man Who Recorded the World John Szwed Viking: 438 pp., $29.95 Alan Lomax was a titanic figure whose ambitions were even greater than his formidable energies. Beginning his career as a folklorist in the 1930s with field recordings of African American music in the rural South, he aspired by the 1960s to nothing less than the analysis and classification of folk songs from around the world. Yet even as he accumulated statistics and countless reels of tape for high-level, cross-cultural comparisons, Lomax held fast to his vision of folk music as a window into the experiences of the poor and dispossessed.

Here is my two cents regarding Karen Grigsby Bates' column "Spread Some Magic in the 'Hood" (Commentary, July 26). While I agree that blacks will not take to the streets even if O.J. Simpson is convicted, the Hall of Famer did invest in the African American community. He owned several Church's chicken franchises, many of which were burned down during the 1992 riots, excuse me, civil unrest. The issue of African American celebrities investing in the 'hood is a complex one that demands a full reading.

Neil Lomax, former quarterback for the Phoenix Cardinals, will undergo surgery to receive an artificial hip in the next four to six weeks, the team's orthopedic physician said Friday. Dr. Russell Chick said the surgery will be performed in Los Angeles by himself and Dr. Larry Dorr, a California hip replacement specialist. Lomax, 30, a Pro Bowl selection in 1984 and '87, retired last week after nine seasons with the Cardinals because of degenerative arthritis in his left hip.

Re the article titled "Bradley Nominates Lomax for DWP Post: Move Draws Criticism" (July 15): When Mayor Tom Bradley talked with me regarding my nomination to the Department of Water and Power Commission, he stressed his desire both to improve the agency's affirmative action profile and to continue the commission's environmental activism. I told him I would be a strong advocate in both of these areas. My record on civil rights is well known. But instead of asking for my position on environmental issues, a few members of the City Council appear to be dismissing, out of hand, my sensitivity to these issues.

The purpose of this letter is to point out certain errors and a misimpression which were created in your story on my appointment to the Los Angeles Police Commission ("Bradley Names Activist to Sit on Police Panel," Metro, Nov. 14). First of all, I did not "give" $27,000 to Mayor Tom Bradley between 1985 and the present time. I raised those funds by hosting fund-raisers, more than half of which came from many citizens who were very interested in Bradley's 1986 race for governor and believed in the viability of his candidacy.

Bess Lomax Hawes, a musician and folklorist who tapped into the legacy of her influential family of archivists and became a prominent anthropologist at what is now Cal State Northridge, has died. She was 88. Hawes, who directed folk and traditional arts programs at the National Endowment for the Arts from 1977 to 1992, died of natural causes Friday in Portland, Ore., where she had been living the last two years, her daughter Naomi Bishop said. CSUN houses the Bess Lomax Hawes Student Folklore Archive, a collection of student research projects that Hawes oversaw.

NASHVILLE -- When people say John Work III had "big ears," they are not being unkind. Work, who died in 1967 at age 65, had a gift for finding and collecting black folk music. He traveled the South recording blues singers, work songs, ballads, church choirs, dance tunes, whatever struck him as showing the evolution of black music. And yet what might be his greatest achievement went largely unnoticed for 60 years, stashed in a file cabinet at Hunter College in New York. Now, with the opening of a new exhibit on Work's life at Fisk University and a companion CD, some say Work is finally getting his due. "He was seeking out music that many African American academics at the time had no use for," said Evan Hatch, a professional folklorist who helped compile the Fisk exhibit, "The Beautiful Music That Surrounds You," which runs through May 11. A classically trained musician and composer, Work taught at Fisk University, directed the school's famed Jubilee Singers and ran its music department.

Melanie E. Lomax, a longtime civil rights lawyer and former head of the Los Angeles Police Commission, was killed late Sunday in a single-car accident near her Hollywood Hills home, police said Monday. Lomax, 56, was declared dead at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where she was taken by paramedics after the 2005 Jaguar she was driving rolled down her driveway and tumbled 20 feet down a steep embankment. Police sources said Lomax may have had a heart attack.

WHEN Alan Lomax died in July 2002 at age 87, his reputation as America's preeminent advocate of traditional music seemed above reproach. "His importance in the daily work of our profession cannot be adequately eulogized," folklorist Roger Abrahams wrote at the time. "Lomax was the person most responsible for the great explosion of interest in American folk song throughout the mid-twentieth century."

Alan Lomax recognized what Walt Whitman heard--America singing a distinctly American folk song. But what Lomax heard in the 1930s lacked popular support, critical acclaim and academic recognition. European traditions of classical music and popular song, and the emerging home-grown idioms of blues and jazz, were held in far greater esteem. For Lomax, however, folk music, handed down through generations and inspired by common experience, was the truest expression of America's character.

Alan Lomax, the celebrated folklorist and musicologist whose collections of thousands of recordings of folk, jazz and blues musicians since the 1930s helped preserve America's and the world's heritage, died Friday at a hospital in Safety Harbor, Fla. He was 87. The cause of death was not reported but Lomax suffered two strokes in 1995. He moved to the Tampa area in 1996 from his longtime home in New York. He was the son of folklorist John A.

Lisa Richardson struggled for a moment to find the right words to describe the effect Bess Lomax Hawes has had on folk arts in the United States. "Bess is probably the mother of any of us who do work in public folk arts," said Richardson, who manages the year-old folk and traditional arts program for the Los Angeles County Arts Commission. "She's like a Renaissance woman. She's an educator, she's a producer, she's been an advocate for the arts her whole life.

Reacting to reports that Police Chief Willie L. Williams asked an LAPD captain to gather information about gang activity for the chief's lawyer, Melanie Lomax, members of the city's Police Commission said Friday that they are concerned about how the matter was handled and intend to question Williams about it next week. The commission president, meanwhile, wrote to Lomax asking her not to make future requests through the Los Angeles Police Department chief.