Uploaded October 2014 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
This Memoriam to Carl Chatzki, who passed in the summer of 2014 was published in Bluegrass Today.
Carl Chatzki’s , also Chatsky, Chatski, untimely death on Thursday, July 24, 2014, was mourned by friends, family, musicians, and social activists all over the country. He was born Carl Bernard Chatzky on August 15, 1938, in Baltimore. Shortly thereafter, the family moved to the Bronx, NY. Carl graduated from Stuyvesant High School there and then earned a degree from Johns Hopkins University. He remained in the Baltimore area until moving to Seattle and had moved to Florida in the year preceding his passing. He is survived by his partner Dr. Shannon Murray of Port St. Lucie, FL; his sister Eleanor Eisenberg of Phoenix AZ/Santa Cruz, CA; and his daughter Heather Chaplin, son Jeremy Chatzky, and granddaughter Mariana Gertrude Chatzky, all of Brooklyn, NY.
Carl was a professional computer systems designer and a dedicated activist for social justice who donated his time and skills to many non-profit organizations beginning in the mid-1980s. A founder of the Baltimore Information Co-op, Carl set up computer banks for the National Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) in Washington, DC, and the Central America Solidarity Committee (CASC) in Baltimore. He also wrote a program, BIC, to computerize their mailing lists and print mailing labels (previously done manually). To assist the Alternative Press Center in Baltimore in library research, Carl developed a database to index progressive and radical periodicals.
Carl was essential to the founding of the National Security Archive, an independent non-governmental research institute, and library at The George Washington University in Washington, DC. He created its first database system to assist in systematically seeking the declassification of secret documents and then indexing them for use by journalists and scholars. “Without Carl’s help during the Iran Contra hearings, we would never have been able to produce a daily update of our massive chronology of events for the press,” said Archive founder Scott Armstrong.
Carl was the Director of Computer Programming for the General Instrument Corporation in Hunt Valley, Maryland, throughout the 1980s. Carl wrote the computer code for the Maryland State Lottery, New York City Welfare Distribution System, and a number of gaming systems. Carl had a futurist vision of how technology could be used in the interest of communities for two-way interactive communication at a time before the advent of the internet as we know it, and was considered a pioneer of the internet revolution. Carl envisioned that cable television could be used in that two-way communication process, and was also active in cable TV issues, advocating a community access channel and community ownership of cable. The latter idea came to fruition in the form of Community Media of Baltimore Channel 75, which broadcasts the Amy Goodman news program.
Carl visited Marshall Eddie Conway in prison and supported the efforts of the Black Panther Party to secure the release of this leader of the Baltimore branch of the Party. He was also helpful to the Baltimore Welfare Rights organization and designed the first Electronic Welfare Benefits card system for the State of New York. He helped street kids confront the Baltimore Police Department (see The Wire) and helped with a taxicab strike.
For several years, Carl and Shannon helped to organize a chapter of Food Not Bombs to distribute meals for the homeless in Baltimore. Carl also collaborated with Charlie Cook of the National Organization of the Blind to develop a computer-controlled Braille display, with pins that changed position to represent Braille characters based on computer signals.
A noted instrumentalist on banjo, guitar, bass, and most especially mandolin, Carl was steeped in the vocal and instrumental traditions and repertoire of folk and bluegrass music. He was for a time a housemate of the late Appalachian songwriter and musician Hazel Dickens (whose older brother Arnold named his son after Carl), and they remained close confreres for the rest of her life. Carl was a sideman with bluegrass greats Ralph and Carter Stanley during 1959-62, under the stage name Carl Hawkins, and appears with them on a number of recordings including the Smithsonian Folkways Recording Friends of old-time music: The folk arrival 1961-1965, released in 2006. Carl also played and performed with Peter Rowan, Mike Munford, John Glik, Del McCoury, Jack Cooke, Lamar Grier, and other well-known musicians.
Read more at bluegrasstoday.com/carl-chatski-computer-whiz-social-activist-musician
This Memoriam to Carl Chatzki, who passed in the summer of 2014 was published in Bluegrass Today.
Carl Chatzki’s , also Chatsky, Chatski, untimely death on Thursday, July 24, 2014, was mourned by friends, family, musicians, and social activists all over the country. He was born Carl Bernard Chatzky on August 15, 1938, in Baltimore. Shortly thereafter, the family moved to the Bronx, NY. Carl graduated from Stuyvesant High School there and then earned a degree from Johns Hopkins University. He remained in the Baltimore area until moving to Seattle and had moved to Florida in the year preceding his passing. He is survived by his partner Dr. Shannon Murray of Port St. Lucie, FL; his sister Eleanor Eisenberg of Phoenix AZ/Santa Cruz, CA; and his daughter Heather Chaplin, son Jeremy Chatzky, and granddaughter Mariana Gertrude Chatzky, all of Brooklyn, NY.
Carl was a professional computer systems designer and a dedicated activist for social justice who donated his time and skills to many non-profit organizations beginning in the mid-1980s. A founder of the Baltimore Information Co-op, Carl set up computer banks for the National Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) in Washington, DC, and the Central America Solidarity Committee (CASC) in Baltimore. He also wrote a program, BIC, to computerize their mailing lists and print mailing labels (previously done manually). To assist the Alternative Press Center in Baltimore in library research, Carl developed a database to index progressive and radical periodicals.
Carl was essential to the founding of the National Security Archive, an independent non-governmental research institute, and library at The George Washington University in Washington, DC. He created its first database system to assist in systematically seeking the declassification of secret documents and then indexing them for use by journalists and scholars. “Without Carl’s help during the Iran Contra hearings, we would never have been able to produce a daily update of our massive chronology of events for the press,” said Archive founder Scott Armstrong.
Carl was the Director of Computer Programming for the General Instrument Corporation in Hunt Valley, Maryland, throughout the 1980s. Carl wrote the computer code for the Maryland State Lottery, New York City Welfare Distribution System, and a number of gaming systems. Carl had a futurist vision of how technology could be used in the interest of communities for two-way interactive communication at a time before the advent of the internet as we know it, and was considered a pioneer of the internet revolution. Carl envisioned that cable television could be used in that two-way communication process, and was also active in cable TV issues, advocating a community access channel and community ownership of cable. The latter idea came to fruition in the form of Community Media of Baltimore Channel 75, which broadcasts the Amy Goodman news program.
Carl visited Marshall Eddie Conway in prison and supported the efforts of the Black Panther Party to secure the release of this leader of the Baltimore branch of the Party. He was also helpful to the Baltimore Welfare Rights organization and designed the first Electronic Welfare Benefits card system for the State of New York. He helped street kids confront the Baltimore Police Department (see The Wire) and helped with a taxicab strike.
For several years, Carl and Shannon helped to organize a chapter of Food Not Bombs to distribute meals for the homeless in Baltimore. Carl also collaborated with Charlie Cook of the National Organization of the Blind to develop a computer-controlled Braille display, with pins that changed position to represent Braille characters based on computer signals.
A noted instrumentalist on banjo, guitar, bass, and most especially mandolin, Carl was steeped in the vocal and instrumental traditions and repertoire of folk and bluegrass music. He was for a time a housemate of the late Appalachian songwriter and musician Hazel Dickens (whose older brother Arnold named his son after Carl), and they remained close confreres for the rest of her life. Carl was a sideman with bluegrass greats Ralph and Carter Stanley during 1959-62, under the stage name Carl Hawkins, and appears with them on a number of recordings including the Smithsonian Folkways Recording Friends of old-time music: The folk arrival 1961-1965, released in 2006. Carl also played and performed with Peter Rowan, Mike Munford, John Glik, Del McCoury, Jack Cooke, Lamar Grier, and other well-known musicians.
Read more at bluegrasstoday.com/carl-chatski-computer-whiz-social-activist-musician
