Marie Dutton Brown founded Marie Brown Associates literary agency. Ms. Brown is a part of the elite and small group of “black” literary agents, editorial and publishing consultants. She was an editor at Doubleday, their first senior Black editor. A 50+ year veteran of the book business, Brown acquired a thorough understanding of her “calling” working as an editorial assistant and book editor; bookseller and bookstore manager; editor-in-chief of a magazine; book marketing strategist and literary agent. Ms. Brown has been a bibliophile since her childhood years and currently lives and works in Harlem. Marie was Vertamae’s editor for Vibration Cooking.

Julie Dash is a New Yorker of Gullah Geechee heritage. She is an auteur filmmaker, music video and commercial director and author. Daughters of the Dust, (1991), her first feature was the first film by an African American woman to receive a general theatrical release in the United States; the Library of Congress named it to the National Film Registry in 2004. Dash returned to the film’s characters and their Gullah milieu in her novel of the same title, published in 1999. Julie is working on Travel Notes of a Geechee Girl, about Vertamae Grosvenor, among other features and documentary projects.

Sue Goodwin is an experienced and accomplished executive-level radio producer and live events producer with a focus on news and public affairs. She is a reporter and producer at WPFW-FM, Washington, D.C., and is the former executive producer for NPR's Talk of the Nation. Sue worked as a producer with Vertamae on NPR’s Hothouse series. 

Kali Grosvenor is the first born and eldest of Vertamae's children. She is an independent researcher, poet and legacy bearer. The same year that Doubleday and Company published Vertamae Smart Grosvenor's iconic cookbook, Vibration Cooking: The Travel Notes of a Geechee Girl, Doubleday also published ten-year old Kali's Poems by Kali. A child of the Black Arts Movement her poems address agency of youth, childhood and Black futurity as a firsthand witness to Civil Rights movement.

Dr. Jessica B. Harris is the author, editor, or translator of eighteen books including twelve cookbooks documenting the foods and foodways of the African Diaspora. She has lectured widely in the United States and abroad and has written extensively for scholarly and popular publications. Harris consults internationally, most recently for the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, the Culinary Institute of America, and the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. She holds degrees from Bryn Mawr College, Queens College/CUNY, The Université de Nancy, France, and New York University. Harris received an honorary doctorate of humane letters from Johnson & Wales University and holds lifetime achievement awards from the Southern Foodways Alliance, the Soul Summit, and the James Beard Foundation. Her cookbooks were also inducted into the James Beard Cookbook Hall of Fame. Dr. Harris was a professor at Queens College/CUNY in New York for five decades and is currently professor emerita at that institution.

Chandra Smart Weiland Brown is Vertamae’s youngest daughter.  She formally studied Fine Arts/Theatre and Dance.  She is an Actor/ Filmmaker/ Interior Painter/ Jeweler and Fine Artist.  She is also dedicated to keeping the Legacy of ‘Vertamae’ Alive.

Scott Alves Barton had a career as an executive chef, restaurant and product development consultant, and culinary educator prior to pursuing Ph.D. in Food Studies from NYU and teaching as an Assistant Adjunct Professor. His research and publications focus on the intersection of secular and sacred cuisine as a marker of women’s knowledge, identity politics, cultural heritage, political resistance, and self-determination in Northeastern Brazil.