Dorothy Cotton of Rock Island and many of her family have been selfless role models for their communities, for generations.
Cotton (who has no biological children of her own) has been a foster mom for 213 kids, and she has five cousins who are doctors of one kind of another.
Two years ago, she and Shellie Moore Guy of Rock Island started a Multi-Generational Community Building Speaker Series, inspired by an uncle of Cotton, who was a Freedom Rider, and a friend of his, another civil rights leader. Frank Smith, founder and executive director of the African-American Civil War Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., and McArthur Cotton were the first speakers in the series last year, to offer inspiration to students, build bridges across generations and create meaningful change.
The men last year spoke at Edison Junior High and Thurgood Marshall Learning Center in Rock Island, and a community event at the MLK Center, Rock Island.
Smith was so impressed with kids at Thurgood Marshall that he invited 15 of them to see the Civil War Museum in D.C. for Veterans Day last November, Cotton said.
This May 21-23, Cotton is helping to bring five successful African-American doctors from her family who have overcome adversity to pursue their lifelong dreams. This three-day program aims to foster intergenerational dialogue, inspire community engagement, and celebrate the ongoing pursuit of obtaining an education.
The speakers are:
- Dr. Lela Annette Bridges-Webb, Ed.D, a retired superintendent in Flossmoor, Ill.
- Dr. Charlie H. Bridges, MD, a urologist surgeon in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
- Dr. Carla Bridges, MD, an orthopedic surgeon in Dayton, Ohio.
- Dr. Jason Peary Bridges, MD, a urologist surgeon in New Orleans.
- Dr. Jeffery Dormu, MD, a heart and vascular surgeon in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Carla Bridges will be conducting hands-on workshops at Davenport North and Rock Island High School. Other activities will include:
● Educational Engagements:
Thursday, May 21 - 9:15 to 10:45 a.m., and Friday, May 22 – 9 to 11 a.m.: Speakers will engage with students, sharing their determination and journeys to become doctors. There will be stations set up at each school for hands-on workshops on orthopedic care led by orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Carla Bridges.
Friday, May 22 – 6 p.m.: Reception for speakers (invitation only) at Roosters Bar and Grill, 2130 3rd Avenue, Rock Island.
● Community Gathering:
Saturday, May 23 – 6 p.m.: A public event at Second Baptist Church, 919 6th Ave., Rock Island will provide a platform for community members to interact with these doctors, facilitating meaningful dialogue. Dinner will be served. The event is free and open to the public.
RSVP for the dinner to Dorothy at 309-721-5177 or Glenda Guster at 563-726-9226.
Cotton said her goal, through her cousin Jeff (who struggled as a child), and in general is: “Just because you start off bad, that doesn’t mean you have to end that way,” she said. “You have to make the right choices. He was in reformatory school, he always wanted to be a doctor, His father was killed when he was young; he was just angry.”
For the public, “I want them to come listen to doctors, they can help a child that needs help. It doesn’t have to be your own child," she said, noting she’s close to every one of her doctor relatives. They have a family reunion every two years that attracts over 100 relatives.
This August, it will be in Mississippi (where the original family was raised); the last one they had in Rock Island was 2018. Cotton said she hasn’t missed a family reunion since 1987; they plan to bring the reunion back to Rock Island in 2028.
Shellie Guy has known the Cotton family since she was a child in Rock Island.
“Our organization's mission and purpose include presenting topics and people who will inspire people of all ages and generations,” she said. Last year’s talks focused on civil rights, and dedication to pursuing equality, justice and education.
“This year's speakers, doctors who have worked hard to achieve their goals of becoming doctors, represent the perfect example and embodiment of Mr. Cotton and Dr. Smith's work,” Guy said. “They will be living examples of what we can achieve with hard work, perseverance, and goal setting.
“These five successful doctors from the same family who have overcome adversity to pursue and obtain their goals and careers, will encourage intergenerational dialogue, inspire community engagement and celebrate the ongoing pursuit of obtaining an education,” she added.
A Bridges life of education
Lela Bridges-Webb is a native of Mendenhall, Mississippi, and comes from a family of educators, following in the footsteps of her parents and grandfather. Her maternal grandfather, E.H. Cotton, started schools for Black children when they didn't have public schools, through the church and was funded from a Jewish man in Chicago who wanted to do something to help Black folks become educated, she said in a Wednesday interview, May 13.
Webb’s maternal grandmother died when her mother was 11, and her mom became an educator for 42 years. “And so I kind of feel like I've carried the torch -- we have other educators, don't get me wrong. But from E.H. and Lela (her grandmother) to my mama, I feel that I was destined for me to continue that journey.”
Webb dedicated 38 years to full-time education, serving as a teacher, dean, principal, district administrator, and superintendent. After 15 years as superintendent in Harvey, Ill. (south suburban Chicago), she retired in 2010 as the longest-serving African-American female superintendent in the state of Illinois at that time.
Throughout her career, she’s been known for her leadership, her commitment to students and families, and her ability to bring people together to strengthen schools and communities.
Webb (now 75 years old) began her teaching career in 1972 in Waukegan, Ill., and earned her master’s degree (1978) and doctorate in education (1994), both from Northern Illinois University.
Her first superintendent job was in 1995, in Harvey, and since 2010, she’s been an interim superintendent for eight Chicago-area districts (during their search for new leaders), including her current one in Country Club Hills, until July 1.’
Webb said it’s no coincidence there are many doctors of different kinds in her family.
“I think it’s also divine order. But I also believe it started with our family embracing education, encouraging us to explore all of our talents and our options,” she said. “That's all I heard growing up. And we all did. But then it spreads from the family to the community who embraced all of us and said, you know, you can do this whatever you choose to do, explore your talents.”
“It started with my grandparents on both sides. My grandmother could not read,” Webb said of her paternal grandma. “She said, you know, I didn't have a chance. You have a chance. And she was born probably right after slavery ended. My aunts, my uncles all around us, folks in the community all had us to springboard on. They told us, 'Look what we were able to do, working hard in the field without an education.'
“Just think what you can do with one,” she recalled her elders saying. “So we had this momentum that started from the ground up, and then they were paying it forward. And they always encouraged. You owe it not only to ask to yourself to do better to better than we have, but then we were able to do, able to accomplish.
“Then you pay it forward and you help others,” Webb said. “So my mother, for example, when she being the oldest, when her younger siblings went to school, she was there to support them. They could stay with her and go to school, you know, it was amazing. And now that's become generational where their cousins and the cousins now help the younger cousins coming up.”
Her mother died in 2009 and her family started a scholarship in her name, which helps Black high school students attend college.
“It touched so many lives. And so we just awarded $15,000 in scholarships to seven deserving students from the Simpson County area,” Webb said. “That's just how our legacy is. We're so proud of what we're able to do with continuing to not only receive, but pay it forward, which is all about what we do.”
“So we keep it going because this is how we keep not only our mom's memory alive, but that's what she would have wanted us to do,” she added of the Virgia Bridges Palmer Scholarship.
Virgia was a 65-year member of St. John Missionary Baptist Church in Simpson County, Miss., and its surrounding community. Her lifelong commitment to education included a 41-year teaching career, reaching four generations of Simpson County students.
The key to multi-generational support
Webb loves the concept of multi-generational building of community.
“In fact, I'm going to see if I cannot form an organization somehow. How can we not create but copy what they're doing in Rock Island?” she said. “It's amazing to be able to have these conversations not just one time, but how do you keep it up? How do you form those relationships? How do you support, encourage and challenge to not only be successful, but to explore your talents and work with your talents?
“Because we all have them. Some of us may not know where they are, but we look hard enough and try different things,” she said. “We'll find our talents. We all have them, we all have gifts.”
“You may make a mistake, we all do. But it's not the end,” Webb noted. “It's not a period on your life. It's a comma. How do you then continue and we're going to be here to support you.”
She said she learned something every day from her students and treasures when they return years later to tell her what she meant in their lives.
“I learned something new every single day just by being around the youth. They can teach you, show you things that you know,” Webb said. “I realized right now I have not learned it all. I can still learn. I can, in fact, still learn and I love it.”
“When I see my students come back to me and thank me, I may not even remember what,” she recalled. “Every now and then I'll run across -- I know you remember. You did this for me. You did this for me. And I want you to know it changed my life. That's the most rewarding sense of, yes, I made a difference.”
“But when you do get the feedback, it's the most rewarding experience I have ever had when I get that feedback,” Webb said. “And it comes. It's unsolicited and you just don't know when you're going to get it. But it comes.”
Dorothy Cotton noted her father’s parents were teachers. An Army veteran, he was a farmer in Mississippi, and came to Rock Island in the late 1940s to work as a machinist at Rock Island Arsenal, which he did 28 years, before becoming a construction worker.
She said one of her cousins (an Alleman grad) is going into another medical field, to become a dentist.
Cotton is already thinking of who to bring for 2027 speakers – part of her big family work as lawyers. “One of my cousins, she is an attorney for the U.S. government,” she said proudly.
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