In April, local immigration advocate Fred Gilbert passed away at the age of 78 Gilbert spent most of his life working with and helping to create space for immigrants and refugees in Allen County. Some of the people who knew and worked with Gilbert spoke about his motivation and the hole he leaves behind.
Irene Paxia has worked with Imani Family Services, the American Red Cross and the City of Fort Wayne, working with and advocating for migrants. She spent many years working collaboratively with Gilbert.
"I first met him, I think when a group of community stakeholders were putting together, basically the beginning the foundation of the Multicultural Council. I was new to the US, and he was so adamant that the community needed a council of immigrants and refugees, where the immigrants and refugees would actually be part of the decision making, and actually they would be the decision makers for the council. And so I was very impressed with him and how he was so, so passionate about it, and also so passionate about the importance of having the voices of immigrants and refugees.
The fact that he had lived in Turkey, that was very important for him. He remembered his work overseas with the military, and he worked for decades for FSSA and meeting so many families or refugees that were struggling with making ends meet and just having access to public benefits. There, I was working for the American Red Cross, and I remember that he would either call in or just simply step in to discuss how we were going to collaboratively support a family that had a particularly complicated situation of access, and how he wanted those families to have the best options possible, to not just solve immediate problems, but just like to connect them to long term opportunities, whether it was trainings or classes or more simply, food access and medical access and stuff like that. So we we troubleshot many, many situations together.
He did something that nobody else did. When I changed jobs and I went from working for the Red Cross for city government, I arrived in my office, and before I even got there, they had received a call to let him know that the office was about to receive a very special employee, and then they were going to be so lucky to have me. I... he didn't tell me anything. He didn't talk to me about it. I just got there, and I said, who called? Who was it? Oh, his name was, oh, Fred Gilbert, and he had no preference. He loved everybody. So I think he had a special place somehow for me. I don't know exactly why, why he was so kind to me, but I can tell you that he was."
Kun Yekha is a member of the Mon community and works with various Burmese organizations around Fort Wayne. He knew Gilbert for 22 years, since he first came to the US in 2003 and worked with him for five years at the Family and Social Services Administration.
"He always asks us our well being. What about the community? What about your community members, how are they doing, how's their education, what about their job? Is there anything difficult? He asks all the times that really shows he loves people and we respect him a lot. Usually, the refugees and immigrants, when they first came here, they don't have friends or they don't have relatives here, so that we need someone who, like Fred Gilbert, who know what it is they're feeling and how they need to adjust to the new culture, new location and new country here. So that is why we need people, someone like him who care a lot.
One time, we do like gatherings at the Mon Buddhist temples, and he came late about 30 minutes, and he told me that 'Now, I've become like your people,' because in our culture, if you're late 20 minutes, it's okay. If you're late 30 minutes, that is fine. So he like becomes a part of our community. So that's always in my mind. He did really good job, like advocate for the rights of refugees in this county. I know that he is a great man who tries to help a lot, a lot of refugees in Fort Wayne.
He leaves behind something like that advocacy work, lobbying for the refugee. So it is hard we can find someone like him."
Ellie Bogue is a former journalist at the News-Sentinel, where she covered the refugee community in Fort Wayne. Gilbert acted as a contact for the community to help make sure their voices were being included in coverage.
"Primarily, my dealings with Fred had to do with event type things and calling him for background information on different parts of the community which he had dealt with. He didn't just deal with the Burmese community. He was interested in all refugees within Fort Wayne. So when I became the reporter, I needed sources, as we all do when we get into reporting, and Fred was one of my first sources. In this day and age, at least at the newspaper, as we were downsizing, we had less and less time to go out and really seek out stories, sadly. And so if somebody called up and said, 'Hey, this is going on,' you were like, hmm, maybe this might, you know, make a story. So for me, it was very, very helpful. And so I think it did have a big impact. So yeah, I do think that he's left kind of a hole in, you know, definitely bridging that gap between what's going on in the community and getting it out there to the public.
And, you know, I stayed at the News Sentinel for about 10 years after I started reporting and I got out and then a few years ago, I was attending an event that was a dance troupe out of Chicago called the Whirling Dervishes. And the Whirling Dervishes actually is something that is a dance done in Turkey. And Fred was in the Air Force in Turkey for a number of years when he was a younger man, and he showed up at the event dressed up in full Turkish regalia, which was not uncommon for Fred. There are many Burmese events I would attend where Fred would come striding in wearing - it's called a longyi. Fred adopted wearing this when he would attend these events, I think just to kind of possibly out of respect, you know, for everybody else who was dressed that way.
He was one of these people who was interested in all sorts of different types of cultures. I mean, I can remember showing up, we had Tibetan monks here doing a sand mandala a few years back, and there was Fred. He didn't have to do these things, you know, but he went out of his way to do those things and to try and make people feel welcome who were from countries, you know, halfway around the world from here. I think that having someone like him was a good example for the rest of us."
