On Friday, July 15 at noon, Milwaukee Public Schools, along with a slate of city and state officials and community leaders, will honor former Mayor Marvin Pratt by renaming Silver Spring Elementary School, 5131 N. Green Bay Ave. after him.
Pratt was acting mayor of Milwaukee in 2004, and served as alderman from 1987 to 2004, including a run as Common Council president from 2000 to 2004. Pratt was also interim Milwaukee County Executive in 2011.
Former school board president Michael Bonds, Ph.D., School Board Director for District 3, introduced a resolution to rename the school in Pratt's honor and the board passed it in October 2015.
The current Silver Spring Elementary – a Head Start through fifth grade school – opened in 1971.
A reception will follow the program and the public is, of course, invited.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
