Clabe Hangan – Singing from our hearts

The following is quoted from Living as Equals: How Three White Communities Struggled to Make Interracial Connections During the Civil Rights Era by Phyllis Palmer with the gracious permission of the Vanderbilt University Press.

“Camp leasers set a standard of general affection that inspired and authorized displays of affection. Clabe Hangan, music director for many of the Los Angeles camp sessions from the early 1960s through the early 1970s, expressed the optimistic purpose of the adult leaders and the adventurous delight that attracted young people. Hangan grew up in a black Baptist family in Redlands, near Los Angeles, and became a folk singer in college. In his teenage years, Clabe had tried out different religions. He had been attracted by the Quakers with whom his Redlands church held interracial services. When he had worked in a Jewish summer camp, he had been struck that Jewish people “seemed so African. They’re Arabic, they’re Africans… Somehow I had an emotional tie.” He had noticed the conversion to Judaism of the black entertainer Sammy Davis Jr., and had considered following that model. But then Clabe had married a woman he met at the Friends meeting and continued his spiritual search as he finished college, became a probation officer, and joined the NCCJ camp staff as a song leader. Like Chambers, Hangan wanted the young people to respond to other kids as interesting and attractive, not as “problems.” They didn’t let campers talk about “interracial and interreligious,” as if these represented a mixing of ineradicable differences, he remembers. “Those are just terms, just words for people getting together.”

Camp leaders created a set of living, playing, and debating structures that put campers on an equal level, and then encouraged them to talk about the differences in their daily lives. “We didn’t [deny] those differences. We said, ‘Those are real, they’re here. We’ve got this language situation, we’ve got education we’ve got income, we’ve got different levels of cultural things.’” But in the camp setting these and other differences were “walked about in the context of people talking to people” and learning, as Clabe Hangan explained, how to think about “what it’s like to be us.” The camp leaders’ acceptance of tampers’ affections for and attachments to each other was strikingly at odds with what most had experienced in their schools and families.”

Clabe was a good friend and a great musician. More than that he had that special gift for reaching out and touching others through his music and his words. It was an honor to have performed with him during a very special time in our countries history. The standing ovations “Grandmother’s Egg,” that’s what Clabe decided we should call ourselves, received at the Penny University, Redlands Bowl, Ice House, Troubadour and many schools and colleges were a testament to his special gifts and true love for all humanity. Once again the world has lost a truly great individual. For myself, Clabe was a tremendous teacher and mentor. I am still applying many of the ideas he taught me, the most important one and the one I most remember Clabe for; “when someone reaches out- be there for them.”
Thank you Clabe.

~Jim Chambers

“He was probably one of the most charismatic people you’ve ever known. He had a warmth that just emanated,” his daughter said.

The Claremont hometown newspaper has posted a rememberance.
You can read it here.

Please see the “Celebrating Clabe’s life” page for the complete notice, but to summerize:

The service will be Sunday, Sept. 14th @ 3 pm in Montclair at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation.

I had the pleasure and privilege of playing music with Clabe on numerous occasions – sometimes with The Hangan Brothers at live shows, on “Mars Market”, and at my Master of Music recital at CSULA, which focused on the blues. I asked him to play and he was simply glorious. People were talking about him for weeks. He brought grace and musicality to the whole concert, and especially to the set he was featured on. I will always remember that as a highlight among performances and one of my favorite evenings ever.

- Kim Diaz

Clabe Hangan w/ Roseann Aldrete (l) and Kim Diaz (r) - April 2004

On Saturday August 9th we lost a voice that was filled with love and hope, strength and laughter. Clabe, I hope you have internet access, because we love and miss you.