Benbow, a vendor and Anacostia's unsung hero

Jimmie Benbow, 62, held up a black T-shirt that read, "I ? Anacostia" in big, white letters. His oldest daughter, Edith LaVerne Grant, 44, of Moon Township, Pennsylvania, said DC means everything to him. She has been trying for years to get Benbow to visit her to no avail."He acts like D.C. is gonna close down if he goes to Pennsylvania," she said.

Raised in LeDroit Park, Benbow has lived in D.C. all his life. He is a vendor who sets up shop seven days a week selling oils, hats, thermals, and Black hair and skincare products on Martin Luther King Avenue, SE, across the Big Chair. His business cards read, "Jimmie Benbow Enterprise: A Cocoa Motion Company, featuring products to beautify the body."

Benbow has been vending for 42 years, and he uses it as a way to reach out and help Anacostia residents. He wants to bring back the "village" concept of community to Ward 8.

"What you need young brother?" Benbow asked a young man who stopped to check out the merchandise.

On a brisk, sunny February afternoon, a woman with three children came by, too. Neither had a hat on. Benbow pulled out a tote from underneath the table and asked, "Would you like a hat?" The entire family grabbed hats free of charge.

"It's not always all about making money. You have to give something back to the community," Benbow said. "They give to me; I give to them."

He makes sure that he has a full stock of winter apparel to donate to children, especially those coming from the public assistance office at 2100 Martin Luther King Ave.

Evangeline Cole-Thompson, also known as Mama Cole, owner of the Anacostia Restaurant & Catering at 1918 Martin Luther King Jr. Ave., has known Benbow for more than 10 years.

"He has always been supportive of me," Cole said. "He always has a shoulder to lean on, an ear to listen and a heart just as big as he is."

On numerous occasions, Cole said, Benbow has sent the homeless to eat at her restaurant on his dime. "He's that way all the time, not looking for nothing in return," Cole said. ''That makes him a good man."

On this day, Benbow sported a black and gold military cap, which read "Purple heart" and "Combat wounded" in gold letters with two military pins attached.

Benbow joined the army at 17, immediately following his graduation from Anacostia Senior High School. He served in Vietnam for 12 years as a national guard.

The military saved his life, he said. "Had I not gone in the military, the Whites would have hung me from a tree somewhere," Benbow said. "I was along with the Malcolms and the Martins. I believed in their philosophy of freedom."

Benbow has also worked in the D.C. public school system as an investigator of corporal punishment, theft and assault. That gave him opportunities to build relationships and provide advice to young people.

For example, he was there for professional basketball player Brian Chase when he needed a listening ear as a student at Dunbar High School. Chase played for the Miami Heat in 2007 and 2008. Now he plays for Le Mans Sarthe Basket, a Euroleague basketball team.

An advocate for education, Benbow urged his youngest daughter, Deven Benbow of Forestville, Md., to return to high school for a diploma. She plans to attend UDC. "He tries to be a role model for kids who don't have fathers," Deven said.

Willie "B.J." Smith, a hair stylist at Salon Exquisite on the same block, has known Benbow for three years.

When "unwanted traffic" would enter the salon, Benbow would check in on the situation and, if need be, escort them out, Smith said.

Now Benbow wants to do even more for the District. He's planning to run for the Ward 8 Council seat in 2012. One of his goals on the council would be to increase funding for DC public schools to support job skills programs for non-college bound students. He also wants to provide police officers in Ward 8 with quality equipment.

His other passion is to help parents without high school diplomas get GEDs. "If kids see that their parents are trying, the kids will try, too," he said.

Running for Council from a ward dominated by Councilman Marion Barry will not be easy, said James Bunn, executive director of Ward 8 Business Council.

"But, he would make a good candidate," Bunn said. "In his area, he knows many people but he'll have to reach out and touch others, including attending Advisory Neighborhood Commission meetings."

Grant summed up what her father thus: " An unsung hero, a true Washingtonian, whose community is everything.