GENE NOVOGROSKY, MENTOR, HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST, DIES

Special to El Rrun-Rrun

In 2015, Planned Parenthood of South Texas was turning 76, and so was Brownsville resident Gene Novogrodsky.

To mark the two occasions, Novogrodsky embarked on a 300-mile bike ride from Brownsville to San Antonio. The ride, which he called the "Spirit of 76," raised more than $10,000 in donations for the Planned Parenthood clinics in Brownsville and Harlingen, two underserved areas in the Rio Grande Valley.

Novogrodsky, a longtime civil rights advocate and instructor at the local college and university, told a reporter from the was riding to raise awareness of dwindling women's healthcare access in Texas. His wife, Ruth, worked at the Brownsville Planned Parenthood health center.

"I don't feel that this is heroic," Novogrodsky told The Huffington Post. "I'd rather be doing something else. I can't believe we're talking about women's reproductive rights in 2015 in Texas."

Novogrodsky said that the 300-mile bike ride represented the distance that some women now have to travel to get to the nearest abortion clinic.

He said the fight was personal for him. "I have daughters, I have a wife," he said. "These issues are important to me because I care about the health and well-being of my family." 

(That's Gene with with his life mate Ruth at the Farmers' Market in Brownsville.)

And locally, you could sen Gene – a bicycle enthusiast – glide though every part of town, whether it was along the expressway frontage roads in north Brownsville, or chatting it up with the homeless and poor in the city's inner core.

No subject was too esoteric: Imperialism, the plight of the immigrant, the dying art of civility toward each other. He didn't impose his views on the other, but rather instructed and accommodated their views toward peaceful  dialogue.

Novogrodsky was a founder of the Narciso Martinez Cultural Arts Center Writers Forum in San Benito and part-time English instructor for several University of Texas-Brownsville and Texas Southmost College programs.

A published writer and poet, Gene was also a prolific contributor to the letters section of the Brownsville Herald, and in fact, there was a letter published just this Friday chastising local subdivision developer and heir of the Hudson stores empire Bill Hudson for downplaying the January 6 insurrection. 

"The combination almost worked," Gene said about the Trump-planned insurrection. "Next time it might, minus a mob, voter suppression only doing the evil trick. Careful with words, Mr. Hudson."

We received news of his passing Saturday and now we have no words to express our sorrow at the passing of this defender of human rights and champion of the little man everywhere.

Our condolences to his wife Ruth and we pray that peace is with him, with her, and his friends and family. He was a good one and we're the poorer that he is no longer with us. 

Writer Stares

“Why are you staring, no emotion?”

I think.

I want to write about:

Thick beet green leaves.

Baseball-size avocados falling to dry ground,

She bending to gather them.

The blood red and buttery white sunsets over northern Tamaulipas.

But these durable natural joys slip past,

And I blurt:

“Can’t get the horrible Texas Legislature’s attacks on women’s health

Out of mind.

Fucking god-damn white men, mostly old, some young.”

There, I explained my stony face.