Ans168

Freshmen Seminar

Research Links

http://www.oralhistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/2008finalprogram.pdf

http://www.newpittsburghcourieronline.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2050:sala-reprises-82-role-in-jitney-overall-production-outstanding&carid=44:entertainment&Itemid=48

http://crdl.usg.edu/people/h/howze_samuel/?welcome&Welcome

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10127/1056192-325.stm

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/s_463590.html

http://www.augustwilsoncenter.org/about/boardbios.php

http://www.news.pitt.edu/news/sala-udin-lecture-pitt-challenges-race-poverty-and-sprawl

http://www.thehistorymakers.com/biography/biography.asp?bioindex=1929&category=Civicmakers&occupation=Politician%20%26%20Activist&name=Sala%20Udin

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/ae/theater/s_679674.html

http://www.pghplaywrights.com/history

http://www.augustwilsoncenter.org/aacc_pdfs/AugustWilsonBioSketch.pdf

http://postgazette.com/pg/10134/1058044-325.stm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jitney_(play)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_Richmond_High_School

Early Life

Sala Udin was originally born Samuel Wesley Howze to William and Mary Howze. He was born on February 20, 1943, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He is one of eleven children and was raised in the Hill District in Pittsburgh. During the urban renewal stages the Hill District suffered, the Howze family was forced out of their home on Fullterton Street and placed into public housing. Upon graduating in 1961 from Port Richmond High School in Staten Island, New York, Udin joined the Freedom Rider movement that same summer.

Udin also served for three years as the president for of the Staten Island chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. In 1964, Udin registered voters in Holmes County, Mississippi, for the Mississippi Freedom Summer Project. In 1965, Sala Udin, August Wilson, and Rob Penny co-founded the Centre Avenue Poets' Theatre Workshop in the Hill District, Pittsburgh. Along with this workshop, the three men also co-founded the Black Horizon Theater in 1968.

Theatrical Work

Udin's major theatrical work is that when he starred as Becker in the August Wilson play Jitney in 1982. The play is set in 1977 with Becker, an older man who is well established to the community, as a proprietor of a jitney stand. Jitney was Wilson's first play in his 10-cycle play , and it overlooks at least three generations. In May 2008, Sala Udin starred as Holloway in August Wilson's play Two Trains Running. In 2010, Jitney was re-created with actors such as Les Howard, Joshua Elijah Reese, Lonzo Green, Wali Jamal, Kevin Brown, Jonathan Berry, Genna Styles, and Sala Udin. In addition to these two plays, Udin also played in Wilson's plays Ma Rainey, Fences, and The Piano Lesson. Udin is now an August Wilson Center Board member.