He made his way from Goldsboro, North Carolina to Delray Beach, Florida during segregation as part of the Traveling Black Waiters Circuit.
Submitted by Lori J. Durante
DELRAY BEACH, FL — Kenneth Durante was born into this world on February 8, 1935. He was born in Goldsboro, North Carolina as the 5th child of eight children of Clifford “Nick” Durant and his wife Annie Hunter Smith Durant. Yes, the last name of Kenneth’s parents does not have the ‘e’ at the end but for Kenneth and some (not all) of his siblings the ‘e’ began to be added by various official entities as they began to move to geographical areas outside of North Carolina beginning with their oldest brother wherein the ‘e’ was put on his name on the official documents prepared for him at the time of his oldest brother’s induction into the armed service in 1950.
Kenneth Durante attended State Street Elementary School and then Dillard High School in Goldsboro and graduated from high school in 1954.
Kenneth Durante has always been eager to work and was always determined to give top quality effort to whatever he did. Beginning at his age as early as of middle school and throughout high school, he was a business entrepreneur of a business venture with his younger brother wherein they would set up a shoeshine stand on Saturdays at the streetside of the front yard of their home in Goldsboro, North Carolina and people would come there to get their shoes shined. With the word having been spread around about the young Durant boys who had a shoeshine stand and did a great shoeshine, they had customers every week. Those were the days when shoe shining was a popular thing that people had done, and shoeshine stands were sought out.
During his high school years, during the summer months Kenneth’s high school would select some boys to go to Connecticut for summer work of picking tobacco in the tobacco fields. Kenneth, being eager to work anyway, considered spending a summer in Connecticut an interesting adventure and he was happy to be chosen each of the two times that he signed up to go. He has mentioned the fact that one summer Wilt Chamberlain was one of the boys that he met and worked with in the tobacco fields. That is the Wilt Chamberlain who became one of the greatest of all times basketball players.
While Kenneth Durante was in high school, he played on the school’s football team and was given the nickname ‘Rock’ because he was such a tough player on the team.
As a part of high school education in those days in all Black school, a class titled ‘Shop & Woodworks’ was taught. This class was hands-on training in how to do carpentry, bricklaying, etc. This class was a required class for the high-school boys. (There was always the Home Economics, sewing & typing classes that the girls were required to select at least one of those classes.) In that Shop & Woodworks class Kenneth got some basic knowledge and that was why throughout the rest of his life he was good at handyman type of repairs. He always did a lot of the repairs at home until the last few years of his life when his medical health and physical mobility began to decline and because he loved to do handyman work around his house and loved to do things to take care of his family & his home, he often lamented over the fact that he could no longer do any repairs at home, could no longer shampoo the carpet, could no longer do the lawn maintenance at his home, and could no longer wash the home windows and wash the family’s vehicles, etc.
As to Goldsboro as his hometown and also his being an alumnus of Dillard High School, Kenneth held fond memories and very often talked about his days of growing up in Goldsboro and about his classmates and friends from his days at Dillard High School. He had graduated from Dillard in year 1954 when a newer Dillard High School building was built in 1957. Then in 1969, when the desegregation of schools happened, the Dillard High School was phased out and the Dillard building that had been built in 1957 was renamed Dillard Middle School and the Black high school students in Goldsboro were assigned to merged with the white students at the existing white high school named Goldsboro High School. Because there was so much pride by the Black students in the Dillard High School, alumni of the school had organized an alumni association in 1955 which was before racial integration of schools or any thoughts that Dillard would be phased out as a high school and that association is named Dillard High School Alumni Association. This organization of the former Dillard High School students still exists and is still active today even though there has been no Dillard High School since 1969. Kenneth Durante had remained a steadfast and loyal member of the Class of 1954 of the Dillard High School Alumni Association and he once served a term as President of the association.
A few years after Kenneth Durante graduated from high school, he had a brief first marriage for about a year but both realizing that they were young for marriage, he and first his wife amicably divorced. During that brief marriage, they became the parents of one child whom they named Wynonia who was raised by her maternal grandmother in a very nurturing home environment. Kenneth’s daughter Wynonia, who is the child of his first marriage, is married and she and her husband have 3 children and 3 grandchildren.
As to career after graduation from high school, Kenneth Durante chose to become a waiter as his profession. Upon graduation from high school, Kenneth attended professional training at the Goldsboro Hotel to learn the art of service in fine dining restaurants and was thereafter given his first job there as a waiter. Shortly after this beginning in the waiter profession, Kenneth became a part of a group of highly sought after members of the Traveling Black Waiters Circuit and was in that group until 1970 for more than 15 years. This was during the days of racial segregation. As a part of the Traveling African American Waiters Circuit, Kenneth would work during the winter season in restaurants in upscale resorts in the Catskills area of New York and Long Island, New York and in resorts in Connecticut. For the summer seasons, Kenneth would work in then high-class restaurants in Delray Beach (one in Delray was The Patio which does not exist anymore) or Boca Raton (one in Boca Raton was the Bayou which does not exist anymore).
Whenever Kenneth would travel back-and-forth from Florida at the end of the Summer season and to the north for the winter season, he would routinely stop and spend a few days with his parents in his hometown of Goldsboro, North Carolina. He would always make sure that he was in Goldsboro every year on the weekend of Memorial Day because that is the weekend that the Dillard High School Alumni Association has, since its origin, been having alumni class reunions celebrations events during that entire weekend and those events include on that Friday night a formal dinner banquet wherein college scholarships are awarded to selected high school graduates of that particular year. Funds into the alumni organization come from annual membership dues plus the sizeable amounts of monies come in as donations for the scholarship fund during the year. Also, there are some types of fundraiser activities held during the year. In addition to the formal banquet and college scholarships awarded on that Friday evening of the Memorial Day weekend, the usual & typical Memorial Day weekend activities of the Dillard High School Alumni Association Reunion are: on that Saturday of the Memorial day weekend, a big picnic is held; for Saturday evening, various socialization activities may be arranged by the individual graduating class year; then on Sunday morning, worship service at the church of the individual’s choice or wherever would have been the Goldsboro church of the person’s membership and on Sunday evening, there are picnics/cookouts separated by and hosted by the different graduating class year.
During the Summer season in 1965, Kenneth Durante was working at a restaurant in an upscale resort area in Long Island, New York. It was that same summer that Charlotte Gilmore who was a college student at Tuskegee Institute (now University) of Tuskegee, Alabama who was on a college summer work assigned job in an upscale resort area in Long Island, New York nearby to the same area where Kenneth was. In another nearby area there were a few businesses that catered to the Black population in that area which had a number of Blacks who worked for the wealthy white population of the area. This was a time when there was definite racial segregation. The businesses that catered to the Black population in that Long Island area were those such as the barbershop and hair salon for Blacks, small neighborhood type grocery store and restaurant that offered the Black culture type foods, a small bar/nightclub/dancehall just for Blacks. At the beginning of that summer, Kenneth and Charlotte met each other one evening at the bar/nightclub/dancehall where the Blacks would go during the weekends to socialize. Charlotte says that she especially noticed that Kenneth was the only one that she saw at that place who was not drinking alcoholic beverage and one of a few who was not smoking cigarettes during the evening and since Charlotte had grown up as a non-alcoholic, non-smoking person, she liked that about him. As the summer continued, their friendship grew and on their once-a-week off-duty day, they got together on those evenings to socialize at that bar/nightclub/dancehall.
During that summer, Kenneth and Charlotte also learned from each other that they each had been involved in current ongoing 1960s Civil Rights Movement that was led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. among which activities that Kenneth had participated in was his attendance at the historic 1963 March on Washington. Charlotte had been heavily involved with student activities of the Civil Rights Movement in her home State of Alabama wherein she was among the Tuskegee college students at the rally at Montgomery, Alabama in March 1965 as a part of the historic Civil Rights March from Selma.
When that summer of 1965 ended, Charlotte went back to college for her senior year at Tuskegee and when the winter season came, Kenneth went to Delray Beach, Florida to work in the restaurant there. They knew that from that summer in Long Island, New York that they would keep in touch which they did. At the end of her senior year at Tuskegee which was in 1966, Charlotte went on to graduate school at Penn State University in State College, PA majoring in Public Health Nutrition which was a program designed that included one year at Penn State followed by a semester at the School of Public of the University of North Carolina and then a semester of field study assignment from which to write the graduate thesis for the Master of Science Degree.
Having been dating Charlotte since 1965, Kenneth & Charlotte got married in year 1967 while Charlotte was in graduate school.
After Charlotte finished her semester at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill) and it was time for her to do the graduate college semester of field study assignment in 1968, she asked her college of Penn State University to arrange for that field study assignment to be in Florida because it was then the winter season when her since 1967 husband Kenneth was in Delray Beach for his winter season restaurant work. Penn State University arranged for Charlotte’s field study assignment to be with the Department of Public Health in Florida wherein she was assigned to spend 5 consecutive work-weeks with the Public Health Department in a different county in Florida each of the weeks of that semester.
Kenneth was already in Delray Beach, Florida for the winter season work when Charlotte finished her semester at the University of North Carolina and he had selected a home in the Jefferson Manor neighborhood in Delray Beach for them ahead of the time of Charlotte’s arrival in January 1968. They decided to make Delray Beach their home because Kenneth already knew the area very well from having lived each winter season since the late 1950s in Delray Beach. They lived in that home in Jefferson Manor until April 1990. These were the times of racial segregation and, of course, Jefferson Manor was a 100% Black neighborhood.
Kenneth and Charlotte Gilmore Durante were blessed with the birth of two children. Their first born is their son Kenneth Anthony “Tony” Durante who has always been called by his nickname of “Tony” is now the pastor at Our Savior Lutheran Church in Plantation, Florida. Their second born is their daughter Lori J. Durante who is known for volunteer work with Museum history exhibits and narrated history tours by bus.
In 1972, the Kenneth Durante family of 4 joined Trinity Lutheran Church in Delray Beach. The church was established in 1904 and was the only Lutheran Church in the area. The Durante family was the 2nd Black members to join Trinity in the history of that church. Kenneth & Charlotte immediately became active volunteers in activities of the church and school.
For over 40 years, until his physical mobility and medical health began to wane, Kenneth was one of the ushers on a regular scheduled basis for the early worship service at Trinity Lutheran and when it was not his scheduled Sunday to be an usher, Kenneth was a greeter in the Narthex entrance of the church where he cheerfully greeted worshippers as they entered the church. In his characteristic friendly style of greeting the worshippers and their family members, he most often got to know the church attendees by name. In addition to being one of the ushers for the early service on a regular scheduled basis, Kenneth was always an usher for the Christian Church special worship services that included Lent, Easter, Advent & Christmas.
Kenneth was always willing and sometimes sought out to volunteer for helping with Trinity’s school activities including being one of the adult chaperones for the school 8th grade class trip to Washington, D.C.
Kenneth Durante also volunteered with a group of men members of Trinity Lutheran who named their group God’s Gardeners and who monthly on a Saturday morning did volunteer work of campus cleaning/lawn maintenance, etc. at the church. After which the men’s group had enjoyed the fellowship of doing chores together, they decided to continue to come together but instead as a work group but as Saturday morning men’s Bible study group and Kenneth continue to be a part of that men’s group as the Saturday morning Men’s Bible Study.
For church worship services, Kenneth was known for wearing sharp-look suits with tie and sometimes with a matching vest and always with that color matching kerchief in the upper pocket of his jacket. Also, that was his style of dressing whenever he attended formal events.
By the end of his 1969 summer season restaurant work in a northern State, Kenneth Durante had decided that he would no longer be a part of the traveling waiters circuit but would stay in Delray Beach year round to be with his family, therefore, he would consider some other line of work plus probably do winter season work as a waiter in the usual Delray Beach or Boca Raton restaurants. It was then that Kenneth had the thought of owning and operating his own business and because Kenneth loved to work, he and his wife Charlotte became owner operator of more than one business at the same time.
For that first business ownership that Kenneth decided with his wife Charlotte because they now had two children and realized a need for another childcare center in the area. Therefore, they decided to open an infant childcare and preschool and had a new facility designed and constructed which was ready for the grand opening in 1971 and they named it Kenland College for Tots. It was Palm Beach County’s first fully integrated (in teachers and a number of white students) African American owned preschool. It was known for the high quality of its program and received a business management certificate of recognition from the national office of the Small Business Administration (SBA) as a result of nomination by the Palm Beach County branch of the SBA. Kenneth and Charlotte sold that business in 1990. That preschool facility is still in operation but under a different name and owner.
Soon after opening the childcare and preschool, the next business venture, while they still owned the preschool, was that of Kenneth and Charlotte opening the Tony’s & Lori’s children’s clothing store at the former Delray Beach Mall which was the first Black-owned business in any mall in Palm Beach County. They closed that business after a few years.
Then in 1974, Kenneth Durante started an additional business in Delray Beach which is named Kenland Janitorial & Lawn Services. Among Kenneth’s proudest business accomplishments in the early years of this venture was some of the post-construction cleaning for the Delray Beach Community Hospital (now Delray Medical Center) when it was first built and opened in 1982.
Known for his friendly smile and affable personality, many of Kenneth’s clients thru the years of his janitorial business became his personal friends. The Kenland janitorial business has entered the second generation and still has some of the same clients and is now operated by his daughter Lori.
Fitness was important to Kenneth who ran 3 times in the 1990s in the annual Peachtree Road Race in Atlanta, Georgia. This accomplishment was one of the featured presentations in the 2023 Sports in Paradise exhibit at the Delray Beach Historical Society.
In 1996 a highlight of Kenneth’s volunteer work was when he was selected by the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG) to be one of the volunteers for the 1996 Summer Olympic Games that were held in Atlanta, Georgia. Kenneth was assigned as a volunteer at the Athletes’ Village which was the housing village for the Olympic athletes. At that village, he got a chance to meet some of the athletes. It was also a joy for Kenneth that his wife Charlotte and his daughter Lori also applied to be volunteers and were also selected and were assigned at other operations of the Olympic (Charlotte assigned to the Phone Call Center and Lori assigned to the Stadium).
One of Kenneth’s favorite past-times was playing dominoes, especially with the Lester brothers and in his later years, at the adult day center where he went during the weekdays. Because Kenneth was always determined to do his best at top quality performance in whatever he did, even in dominoes, Kenneth bragged that he was the best and unbeatable in playing dominoes but said that he would purposely let the other players win sometimes to give them encouragement!!!
Immediate family members who preceded Kenneth Durante in death are his parents Clifford “Nick” and Annie Durant, brother Leroy Durante (Minnie), sisters Elizabeth Swinson, Winnie Brewington and Gloria Mae Whitehead. Kenneth is survived by his wife Charlotte, son Tony (Junko), daughter Lori all of whom are in Delray Beach, and survived by his daughter Wynonia Durante Leak (Claude) from his first marriage. His surviving siblings are Clifford ‘Clip’ Durante (Montrose), Jimmy Durante (Montrose), Delores Bradley (Walter) and his niece Sandra Herbert (John) and nephew Linwood Doug Durante (Brenda) who were raised by his mother. His grandchildren are Aya Charlotte Durante, Mika Andrea Durante, Tae Marie Durante, Scott Leak, Corey Leak and Claudia Leak Romano (Jesus). His great grandchildren are Ava Romano, Aurora Romano and August Baker Leak. In Delray Beach, he is survived by his sister-in-law who to him was more like a sister Ola Vickers and her children Katie Gilmore and Myra Vickers and Ola’s grandchildren Lamech, Coriah and Wihl (pronounced Will). He is also survived by a host of loving nieces, nephews, cousins and many remarkable friends, plus the excellent Health Care Aids who for the past 4 years provided home health care for him up to 4 hours daily divided between morning & evening 7-days-a-week.
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