Regarding Dwayne, and Milestone… By Whitney Farmer – Un Pop Culture

February 24, 2011 Whitney Farmer 6 Comments

Whitney runs a rock music venue on the beach in L.A. She has an M.B.A, and feels the loss today.

I called Michael D. on Tuesday to talk through some troubles I was having on a troubled project. He seemed distracted for a moment and told me that he was battling a migraine. Then he told me that Dwayne McDuffie had died. Before that moment, I hadn’t known.

I’m not one who can claim to have been a close friend of Dwayne’s. I was just an acquaintance. I’ve been in meetings with him and others to discuss projects. And I’ve been to karaoke with him. I think that he once came across something I wrote on a project, and he thought that I did a good job. But he might not have recognized me if we had come face-to-face again unless he was reminded who I was. I don’t even think I was blonde the last time I saw him.

But I would have known him. He was a true friend of my friends. And he had done something worthy of the life he was given.

I was reading his website to see what he would have wanted to be known about him. He said that he would be signing at Golden Apple today…

I shifted to his bio. There was a comment written there that struck me. In discussing the accomplishments of Milestone Media – of all the things he could have said – he had written that the company he co-founded had the highest on-time delivery rate in the industry for four years running. They were, in other words, pros at the top of their game – or any other’s.

The founders of Milestone were true fans of comics. Growing up, Dwayne remarked that he knew of two African American characters. Twenty years later as their collaboration was beginning, the number was the same. Milestone changed that, unleashing without permission a new universe of creativity into the sector. Eventually, Milestone would be sold to Time-Warner in the largest sale of a Black-owned media entity up until that time in the history of the U.S. economy. If the quotation of the stats is wrong, correct ‘em. But the accomplishment was astonishing.

The founders of Milestone didn’t earn the success, and it wasn’t granted to them. They took it. They realized that there was no panel or power that needed to grant permission before they began to run their race. They acted upon a truth that is sometimes forgotten even now: Invade a territory, occupy it, and you become king. Creators are built to rule.

A creative gift is an instrument that can be used in different ways. It can be used as a tool to build or as a weapon to defend, or – as in music or art – it can give a voice and face to the human soul.  This is what happened through Milestone. They flexed and stretched and fed and bled while they walked into the new land and declared, ‘This is mine.’ Others might have done it, but none ever had before. Rightly, the territory and dominion were handed over to the new conquerors.

As a conqueror, Dwayne was a nice guy. He just didn’t move out of the way if you wanted him to. He occupied his territory, and thrived in his new land.

And the king slept with his fathers.

Quote of the Blog, from Rob Farmer, my dad: “History happens FAST, Whitney! In an instant.”