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Todd Baldwin Jr. slipped underneath the rope and waited at the top of the steps, near the orchestra pit, for the sharply dressed politician.

He was anxious, like before a football game. And over and over, he kept thinking about what his dad drilled into his head: "Give a firm handshake, and look him in the eye."

When the moment came, Todd Jr. stuck out his hand and looked up at the tall, thin man in the no-nonsense black suit. The man nodded, gave a tight-lipped smile, cuddled Todd Jr.'s head and drew him close.

Then, it was done.

The encounter lasted, maybe, two seconds. But that grip-and-grin moment, between a young boy and a young presidential candidate, got picked up by Web sites worldwide, newspapers nationwide and the April 14 issue of Jet, covering all of page 42.

Todd Jr.'s family missed the shot. But not an Associated Press photographer. He captured the image of Todd Jr., in his yellow tie, shaking the hand of Sen. Barack Obama during a March 26 campaign stop at Greensboro's War Memorial Auditorium.

Todd Jr. now has the photo preserved on a T-shirt. So does his family. Meanwhile, Todd Jr. keeps the button Obama signed for him on a bedroom shelf, right beside his 11 football and basketball trophies.

Two weekends ago, when Obama became the official Democratic nominee for president, that poignant moment - depicted on a family

T-shirt, frozen forever in their minds - became even more important.

An African American candidate is running for president; and an African American boy believes he can, too.

"I've never seen an African American man stand up like that,'' said Todd Jr., a rising fifth-grader at Erwin Montessori School. "It says that we people, African American people, can do stuff, too.''

It'll be a classic battle, this 2008 presidential campaign. Obama, 46, will go up against Republican John McCain, 71, a seasoned politician and a celebrated veteran from the Vietnam War, for the top spot in the free world.

It'll get nasty. That's politics in America.

Yet, strip all that away and listen to Todd Jr. and his family talk about the picture. It'll make you wonder whether we as a nation, divided as we may be, are beginning to turn the corner on how we deal with race.

The Rev. Robert Williams Jr. thinks so. He's Todd Jr.'s grandfather. He grew up in Winston-Salem, and as a youngster, coming of age in the segregated South, he knew the rules.

He couldn't drink water out of a fountain. He couldn't drink a soda at a store counter. He couldn't stop at any service station to use the bathroom on his way to see his extended family in South Carolina, at least three hours away.

All because of the color of his skin.

But on March 26, as he stood on stage, he watched his grandson shake Obama's hand. He didn't get the photo. Neither did his son-in-law. They were too slow; the moment too quick.

But it didn't matter. In his mind's eye, he'll see that exchange forever.

"What a moment in history,'' said Williams, 58, the longtime pastor for Williams Memorial CME Church in High Point. "The era I was born and raised in, we were trying to get equal rights and the right to vote and the right to be recognized. And to see my grandson, being able to shake hands with someone making history, that moment was precious."

"It meant some of the things I went through - the protests, the marches - it was all coming to light. I saw the fruit of some of my labors."

Todd Sr. calls his only son "Mr. President." And right now, "Mr. President'' is at football camp at Guilford College, working on his running-back skills and dreaming of becoming his hero: Steve Smith, the all-pro wide receiver with the Carolina Panthers.

Meanwhile, he'll keep his Super Obama button with his trophies, his Obama T-shirt in his drawer, and remember what that fleeting moment - a handshake, a smile, a nod - will mean for the rest of his life.

"That said to me that I'm going to be somebody big one day," Todd Jr. says, "and that felt good.''

Contact Jeri Rowe at 373-7374 or jeri.rowe@news-record.com