Former U.S. Ambassador Peter Galbraith had only one question when Brattleboro Fourth of July parade organizers asked him in 2013 to chauffeur their annual big-finish personality, Alfred Hughes Jr.
Who?
Galbraith studied and served around the world before settling in Windham County, but he soon discovered Hughes ran circles around him in the category of hometown celebrities.
Alfred, as Brattleboro knows him on a first-name basis, embodies seemingly every morsel of the state’s melting pot: a free spirit yet faithful Roman Catholic, progressive yet pragmatic Phil Scott Republican, cultured yet child-friendly preschool educator whose Black skin — make that “dark chocolate,” he says — has shined in each of the anything-but-vanilla gowns he has donned over the past decade.
Galbraith said he wasn’t sure what to make of the combination as he steered his convertible onto the street. Then came the squeals from families at Hughes’ child care center. The whoops from burly drinking buddies at McNeill’s Brewery. The shout-outs from parishioners at St. Michael’s Church. The whistles from the Birkenstock set on its feet for both the sequins and the sky-high heels.
Galbraith, then a state senator with gubernatorial aspirations, quickly understood: his firecracker of a passenger is a rare common axis in an increasingly polarized world.
The Covid-19 pandemic has canceled Independence Day events statewide and nationally, including Brattleboro’s nearly half-century-old parade. But one thing the town won’t do without is Hughes, who’ll appear via Facebook July 4 to reveal his latest star-spangled outfit — complete with matching mask.
Hughes isn’t afraid to make a fashion statement, having sported pins supporting an array of social justice causes. But don’t look for him to wrap himself in a Black Lives Matter flag this year.
He has plenty to say about racism — including that he still sees and feels. But this Independence Day he’d rather embrace the full spectrum of his experience, from his birth in the U.S. Virgin Islands to the roller-coaster success and struggles that led to his rebirth in Vermont.
“People said it’s the whitest state,” Hughes says, “so I said I want to go there because it needs some color.”
‘On my own, with nothing’
Hughes rewinds back to growing up in the seeming splendor of the Caribbean shores of St. Thomas.
“I like to keep my age a mystery,” says the man whose gold facial glitter competes with a few silver hairs.
Hughes was one of 11 children raised in affordable housing. Spotted by a choreographer as a preteen, he received a scholarship to the St. Thomas School of Dance before boarding a plane to study at the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in the Berkshires of Massachusetts and the Harkness House for Ballet Arts in New York City.
“On my own, with nothing,” he recalls. “I was scared the first few moments. Just the first few.”
Hughes honed his signature style alongside several masters. He points to George Faison, Tony award-winning choreographer of the Broadway musical “The Wiz.”
“He liked my spunk, the fact that everybody wore black jazz shoes and I wore white.”
And Thelma Hill, founder of the New York Negro Ballet Company.
“Steroids couldn’t even come close to what my body looked like after Thelma Hill. She whipped you in shape.”
And Jack Cole, who choreographed Marilyn Monroe in the movie musical “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.”
“He called me ‘Crazy Alfred.’ That was a compliment.”
Hughes also studied with the renowned Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
“Mr. Ailey himself handpicked me from the lineup.”
Traveling by bicycle, Hughes shared his skills at public schools in some of New York’s toughest neighborhoods until he was mugged one evening in Central Park.
“One guy was holding me by the neck, one guy was pummeling my face, my eyes, my teeth, and one guy was just slashing my clothes, my pockets, my backpack,” he says. “It was night, it was dark, but I saw a flash like daylight. That’s when I stopped fighting. I just let go.”
Hughes came to, only to be toppled by a hit-and-run driver a few weeks later and tossed out of his Lower East Side apartment upon a rent hike several months after that.
“Not everybody who is on the streets has done something bad or is on drugs,” he says. “Economically, they can’t string it together.”
Hughes slept during the day and stayed awake all night, washing in restaurant restrooms and praying at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Then two joggers stopped to talk. They invited him to their nearby apartment and later their second home in Vermont, where he moved in 1994.
“I could hear birds, I could see that people actually do drive normal,” he recalls. “I got all my zest back. I got all my zeal back.”
Turning his street life into a selling point, Hughes found a job at a Brattleboro homeless shelter and later at a local preschool. At his workplace, he shows and tells children that being different makes one special. That “please” and “thank you” are good words to say. That he respects everybody and, other than his age, is willing to share most anything.
“I don’t worry about what people’s successes or bravado seems to be,” he says. “I always look for the child in someone.”
‘This is a big time in America’
Two decades ago, Hughes attended a downtown consignment shop’s Friday night fashion show.
“I didn’t think they were doing it right,” he recalls, “and if I don’t think something is right, I’m going to let you know.”
In response, the owner handed him the master of ceremonies’ microphone — and a little black dress. He tried on both. The next day, he spotted his photo on the local front page.
Society wrestles with what labels to put on people. Hughes doesn’t.
“I’m just a man with a dress,” he says.
That doesn’t stop others from offering their own thoughts. Hughes points to a Vermont Magazine reference to “the amazing Alfred Hughes, who wears a dress so well it hurts.” One local newspaper, for its part, deemed him “Brattleboro’s unofficial cruise director.”
“Unofficial?!” he replies.
Better to quote the French Canadian travel writer who, stopping by Hughes’ favorite pub, observed, “Alfred is very easily noticeable because he has a strong sense of the spectacle with his Tom Waits voice, his Mick Jagger mimics, and his Grace Jones personality.”
Hughes made news this May when the Brattleboro Reformer published a commentary titled “Let’s be more like Alfred,” which promoted his practice of walking rather than purchasing a car.
Then came the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd. People who never talked to Hughes about race suddenly are listening. He notes some locals still give him “the look” on the sidewalk or in the store where he once asked for a price.
“It’s $100, and you can’t afford it,” a clerk said.
“Thank you, I’ll go next door,” Hughes recalls replying. “I experience racism daily. It doesn’t affect me because I just take it for granted. Some people don’t see me as being Black, they see me as Alfred. Others just see a Black man first. They put me in a category, a box. And then they say, ‘Oh, it’s Alfred.’”
Brattleboro has hosted a series of Black Lives Matter events this past month that have spurred everyone from self-described abolitionist activists to the local police chief to kneel in support. Hughes hasn’t attended any of them.
“I try to stay out of the whole thing not because I don’t want to get into it, but I see a bunch of Caucasians leading it,” he says. “I’m not going to be front and center because now you need me for the cause.”
Hughes points to the National Football League, which reprimanded biracial quarterback Colin Kaepernick for years for protesting racial injustice and police brutality, only to change its stance last month under the weight of public pressure.
The Vermonter sees change coming, but slowly.
“We’re going to stay at this dance a little bit longer,” he says.
That’s why Hughes is happy for this weekend’s holiday from the 24/7 news cycle. First asked to act as the exclamation point of the annual “Brattleboro Goes Fourth” parade 10 years ago, he has capped the program (this year online) ever since.
“It’s not about me representing Blacks — I represent all the people,” he concludes. “It’s great to be a part of a community because everybody brings something and then you blend it. This is a big time in America — we need to work together. If this is the way that I make a difference, then I want to.”
