I like to call this section of the cafe The Promenade. Use your imagination a bit, and picture an enormous cathedral-style window looking out onto a promenade, where people soak up some sun and do some quality IR people watching over some cafes au laits.

Let’s start off with Mildred and Richard Loving, a Virginia couple who were criminally charged for violating the state’s anti-miscegenation laws. They appealed, enlisting the help of the ACLU. In 1967, the Supreme court ruled in their favor, striking down the ban on interracial marriages in the United States. I can think of no better couple to kick off this page. This picture says so much, including the fact that they lived in a very different era. There were no blogs and reality TV series back then, so they probably didn’t have much in the way of media savvy. The Lovings were ordinary people trying to go about their lives. He looks like he’s about to smack the photographer!

There, that’s better!

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ISN’T SHE LOVELY?

Mellody Hobson and George Lucas arrive at the Appollo Theater in New York City for the opening-night performance of “Dream Girls.” Where did she get those bracelets?

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ALL BETTS ARE OFF

You probably wouldn’t expect to find too many black Republicans roaming about. (Unless you start rooting through the immigrant Jamaican population.) But you’d probably get off to a good start if you socialized with Roland Betts, developer of Chelsea Piers and close friend of George Bush. Betts is on the right. His wife Lois is in center and their daughter Maggie is to her right. I love Lois’s natural ‘do and her down-to-earth style.

Lois and Roland have another daughter, Jessica, pictured here on the left.

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A MODEL CITIZEN

Model, entrepreneur and philanthropist Katie Rost is pictured on the left, with her mom Rynthia. Katie’s father, who passed away, was of German heritage. Katie seems to have gotten much of her beauty from her mother.

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LOVE FOR ALL

Boris Becker and heretofore girlfriend Sharley (or Lilly) Kerssenberg are pictured on a beach vacation, date unknown. They are now married.

There is also a short video of them attending Fashion Week in Berlin, wherein Boris talks about liking darker colors, and Sharley says she likes white. Too funny. This is what happens when you don’t go to bed on time, and end up prowling the internet for celebrity tidbits, of all things!

Update: Feb. 13, 2010

What you’ve been hearing about the tennis champion is true: He and wife Sharlely “Lilly” Kerssenberg have a new son. Amadeus Benedict Edley Luis Becker was born on Tuesday to ecstatic parents, according to what the news outlets are saying. Becker has three other kids from another marriage and relationship. We wish them all well.

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GIMME THAT DRESS!!

I don’t know for sure if Maggie Betts and Lyle Maltz are a couple, or if she’s romantically linked to anyone else for that matter. But I have to say I’m having a serious case of love for that Bill Blass gown she that she was photographed wearing at a ball at the Museum of Natural History. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to share it, so I’m breaking with the ‘program’ just this once, OK? This photo appeared on Style.com, where you can see her in a bunch of other show stoppers. I think my favorite in that series might be photo #7.

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I just caught a glimpse of Melissa (nee Howard) Beck somewhere on the Internet while looking up someone else. Beck lived in the New Orleans house for five months in 2000 as part of Season Nine. Before she got married, she worked on a television series called “Girls Behaving Badly,” in which an all-female cast went around the country pulling elaborate pranks on people on hidden cameras. Melissa is of mixed parentage. Her mother is Filipino (off to the right) while her father is African American. Melissa and her husband Justin welcomed a baby girl, Shalom Mazie, last March. The Real World: New Orleans, was my favorite season for three reasons. It was set in New Orleans, one of my favorite American cities, the furnishings were colorful and whimsical and prompted me to discover IKEA, and the cast took a trip overseas to South Africa. Jealous over here!

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A while back I signed up as a member of the BlackWives-WhiteHusbands group at Yahoo! That’s where I found some of these photos of these nice people. This is Alayho & Michael. I don’t know where they live, whether this shot was taken on vacation or in/near their hometown, but they seem to be enjoying themselves, in any case.

 

 

 

 

 

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