10 days of great events during Harlem Week
BY EMILY DAVENPORT
It’s that time of year again — Harlem
Week is returning with a lineup of inperson
and virtual events.
From Aug. 6-15, Harlem Week will
host a reimagined experience celebrating
the people, arts, culture, entertainment,
and history that Harlem is known for
throughout the world.
For 47 years, Harlem Week has been a
celebration of the best of Harlem which
works to promote its rich African-American,
African, Caribbean, Hispanic, and
European history, as well as arts, culture,
religion, business, entertainment, and
sports. The event started as Harlem Day
in 1974, which served as a time of encouragement
and fellowship in Harlem, and
following the success of the day it was
expanded to showcase more of the community’s
rich history.
“Since the first Harlem Day 47 years
ago, Harlem Week’s mission has been to
embrace, inform, educate, and give hope
and direction to our community, the city
of New York, and the Harlems of the
world,” said Lloyd Williams, president of
The Greater Harlem Chamber of Commerce.
“We’re looking forward to coming
together and celebrating and honoring
those who have made Harlem as legendary
as it is today and energize New York
Janet Jackson at the 2018 Harlem Week festivities.
City as we continue to emerge from the
COVID-19 pandemic.”
Harlem Week will kick off on Aug. 6
with four virtual events, including Senior
Citizens Day, which aims to honor
our seniors by providing an array of live
and virtual summits and activities including
health services, vaccination stations,
cooking classes, and a one-of-a-kind senior
hat fashion show.
The first major public event will kick
off Sunday, Aug 8, with “A Great Day In
REUTERS
Harlem,” which will feature dance parties,
exhibitors and vendors, health fair and
COVID-19 vaccination stations, a salute
to our Asian Sisters & Brothers and live
performances. “A Great Day In Harlem”
will also host a tribute to the late legendary
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee
Lloyd Price, the Gospel Caravan, Ruben
Santiago-Hudson and the Lackawanna
Blues Band and the Harlem Music Festival
All-Star Band led by “Music Director
to the Stars,” Ray Chew.
Other events that will take place over
Harlem Week will include Great Jazz
on the Great Hill on Aug. 7, the Youth
Conference & Hackathon on Aug. 9, the
Charles B Rangel Systemic Racism Summit
on Aug. 10 and An Evening with H
Carl McCall & Congressman Charles
Rangel, also on Aug. 10.
Harlem week will also feature a series
of live and virtual performances by Lincoln
Center, Jazz at Lincoln Center, New
York City Center, the New York Metropolitan
Opera and from hit Broadway
shows including “Tina: The Musical,”
“Ain’t Too Proud,” “MJ The Musical,”
“Thoughts of Colored Man,” “Girl from
the North Country,” “Lackawanna Blues,”
and “Moulin Rouge.”
Throughout Harlem Week, there will
be salutes to late actors Chadwick Boseman
and Cecily Tyson; late fashion designer
and founder of the Black Fashion Museum
Lois K. Alexander; late game show
host and long-time GHCC member Alex
Trebek; singer the late legendary Rock &
Roll Hall of Fame inductee Lloyd Price;
Harlem Media Arts group Imagenation,
Harlem’s renowned summer dance party
Sundae Sermon, and the WNBA. Harlem
Week is also standing in solidarity with
the Asian community.
For a complete list of events, visit www.
harlemweek.com.
Manhattan doctor sexually abused 11-year-old
for months in hospital, lawsuit claims
BY DEAN JAMIESON
Taking advantage of his reputation
as an expert on child eating
disorders, left to his own devices
by New York-Presbyterian Hospital’s
negligence, a Manhattan doctor was
able to repeatedly sexually abuse an
11-year-old female patient, according
to a lawsuit.
Dr. Joseph A. Silverman was a premier
expert on child-eating disorders
when he recommended Susan Kryhoski
for in-patient treatment, and then, over
some two months, systematically isolated
and abused her without any intervention
from nurses or staff, said the lawsuit.
Now, thirty years later, Kryhoski is
stepping forward. She says that the decision
to file suit came when she recognized
that her daughter would soon turn
11-years-old, a realization that hit her like
a “gut punch.”
“Looking at my daughter was like
looking at the 11-year-old version of myself,”
Kryhoski said in a telephone interview.
“I was sick, I was devastated, but I
was also motivated to give myself a voice.
To fight.”
The abuse took place in 1991, the
lawsuit claims, and it’s taken thirty years
for Kryhoski to feel confident and stable
enough to pursue legal action. Much of
those thirty years were spent in and out
of hospitals, struggling with the mental
health issues that stemmed from Silverman’s
actions, she said.
“This absolutely could have killed me,
should have at times, but that would be
giving him the ultimate power,” said Kryhoski.
“And I decided that was not going
to happen on my watch.”
According to the lawsuit, Silverman
subjected Kryhoski to steadily escalating
abuse that was terrifying in its systematic
nature. After isolating Kryhoski
PHOTO VIA GETTY IMAGES
in a ward, and cutting off her contact
with the outside world, Silverman would
assault her weekly. Two months passed
before her parents, concerned about
her isolation, removed her. They did so
“against medical advice.”
Silverman died in 2012, a “beloved”
husband and father, according to his
obituary, and a “distinguished pediatrician”
for over forty years.
The lawsuit alleges that the hospital is
partially responsible for his actions. Signs
of abuse abounded: blood in Susan’s underwear;
her utter isolation; depictions of
Silverman, as a devil and monster, drawn
on the wall as cries for help. Yet nurses
did nothing, washing the underwear, taking
down the drawings, and even ending
Kryhoski’s calls with parents when she
started to cry.
The lawsuit has been filed under the
Child Victims Act, which extended the
statute of limitations on child sexual
abuse in New York State, as long as the
victim is under 55-years-old, and the lawsuit
is filed before August 14th.
While Kryhoski is the second victim of
Silverman’s abuse to step forward, such
was the systematic nature of his actions,
and the hospital’s negligence, that Susan’s
attorneys believe there could be many
more. “He had no concern or fear of getting
caught, which means, to us, that it’s
very likely that there could be hundreds
of victims,” said Karen Barth Menzies, a
partner at Gibbs Law Group, and Kryhoski’s
attorney. She urged them to come
forward before the August 14th deadline.
In addition to the hospital, Kryhoski
is also suing twenty individuals, nurses
and employees, as yet unnamed, who she
believes are partially responsible for the
abuse.
New York-Presbyterian Hospital did
not respond for comment at the time of
publication.
SScchhnneeppss MMeeddiiaa AAuugguusstt 55,, 22002211 33
/www.harlemweek.com
/www.harlemweek.com
/harlemweek.com