Green-Byrd’s ‘Overcoming the Odds’ Relates Road to 60 Years of Community Service

Haverhill community activist Kalister Green-Byrd was a reluctant writer prodded to pen a memoir by friends.

The 91-year-old’s book, “Overcoming the Odds,” relates her experiences from being raised in segregated Decatur, Ala., and coming to Massachusetts at 18. Green-Byrd, 91, a recent guest on WHAV’s “Win for Breakfast” program, shared the experience of writing a memoir.

“I kept saying, ‘No, no I am not a writer. I don’t want to talk about it.’ I just played the hand that life dealt me. Just like playing cards whatever hand is dealt to you. They were just supportive, very helpful and said we will help you. And so I thought about it. I prayed on it. I cried about it and they kept encouraging me. That’s how it initially got started,” Green-Byrd said.

Friends found her story fascinating, Green-Byrd said. Upon coming to Massachusetts, she spent eight years on the Cape and migrated to Haverhill at the suggestion of a friend.

In Haverhill she discovered a challenging housing situation for her growing family. Her solution was to get involved with Community Action. She eventually became a member of the Community Action board of directors and then won an appointment to the Haverhill Housing Authority as its first African-American woman. She also served on the board of directors for the YWCA and Latino Coalition and was a founding member of the League of Women Voters of Haverhill. Green-Byrd also had a more than 20-year career as an administrator for Title 1 programs with the state Department of Education.

Green-Byrd’s book tells her story from her childhood through her adult life as an activist and mother of seven. She writes about her faith in God as a primary source of consolation and strength.

Green-Byrd said writing the book was an emotional rollercoaster as she had to relive events she would have preferred to forget.

“You have to tell it all, the good, the bad, indifferent. There are things that happen in life we can’t change that we’re not proud of but they did happen. So, if you are going to talk about it and tell the story, you have to tell it all,” she said.

Proceeds from the sale of the book, available from the publisher West Bow Press and elsewhere, will be split between the Riverside Church’s Kalister Green Education Fund and Calvary Baptist Church.

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