Day: September 3, 2012

Today in Black History – September 2           *

1766 – Abolitionist, inventor, and entrepreneur, James Forten is
born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1833 – Oberlin College, one of the first colleges to admit
African Americans, is founded in Oberlin, Ohio.

1864 – In series of battles around Chaffin’s Farm in the suburbs
of Richmond, Virginia, African American troops capture
entrenchments at New Market Heights, make a gallant but
unsuccessful assault on Fort Gilmer and help repulse a
Confederate counterattack on Fort Harrison.  The Thirty-
Ninth U.S. Colored Troops will win a Congressional Medal
of Honor in the engagements.

1902 – “In Dahomey” premieres at the Old Globe Theater in Boston,
Massachusetts.  With music by Will Marion Cook and lyrics
by poet Paul Laurence Dunbar, it is the most successful
musical of its day.

1911 – Romare Bearden is born in Charlotte, North Carolina. His
family will move to the village of Harlem in New York
City in 1914.  He will call New York his home for the
rest of his life. A student at New York University,  the
American Artists School, Columbia University, and the
Sorbonne, Bearden’s depiction of the rituals and social
customs of African American life will be imbued with an
eloquence and power that will earn him accolades as one
of the finest artists of the 20th century and a master
of collage. Among his honors will be election to the
American Academy of Arts and Letters and the National
Institute of Arts and Letters, and receiving the
President’s National Medal of Arts in 1987. He will join
the ancestors on March 12, 1988.

1928 – Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silva (later Silver) is born
in Norwalk, Connecticut. He will become a jazz pianist,
bandleader, and composer who will initially lead the Jazz
Messengers with drummer Art Blakey before forming his own
band in 1956.  A pioneer of the hard bop style, he will
attract to his band the talents of Art Farmer, Donald
Byrd, and Blue Mitchell, among others.

1945 – The end of World War II (V-J Day).  A total of 1,154,720
African Americans have been inducted or drafted into the
armed forces. Official records list 7,768 African
American commissioned officers on August 31, 1945. At
the height of the conflict,  3,902 African American women
(115 officers) were enrolled in the Women’s Army
Auxiliary Corps (WACS) and 68 were in the Navy auxiliary,
the WAVES. The highest ranking African American women
were Major Harriet M. West and Major Charity E. Adams.
Distinguished Unit Citations were awarded to the 969th
Field Artillery Battalion, the 614th Tank Destroyer
Battalion, and the 332nd Fighter Group (Tuskegee Airmen).

1946 – William Everett “Billy” Preston is born in Houston, Texas.
He will become a musician songwriter and singer. His hits
will include “Will It Go Round in Circles”, “Nothing from
Nothing”, “Outa-Space”, “Get Back” (with The Beatles),
and “With You I’m Born Again”(with Syreeta). He also will
appear in film: “St. Louis Blues” and play with Little
Richard’s Band. He will collaborate with some of the
greatest names in the music industry, including the
Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Little Richard, Ray Charles,
George Harrison, Elton John, Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, Sam
Cooke, King Curtis, Sammy Davis Jr., Sly Stone, Aretha
Franklin, the Jackson 5, Quincy Jones, Richie Sambora,
and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. He will play the electric
piano on the Get Back sessions in 1969 and is one of
several people sometimes credited as the “Fifth Beatle”.
He is one of only two non-Beatles to receive label
performance credit on any Beatles record.  He will join
the ancestors on June 6, 2006 in Scottsdale, Arizona.

1956 – The Tennessee National Guard is sent to Clinton, Tennessee,
to quell white mobs demonstrating against school
integration.

1960 – Eric Dickerson is born in Sealy, Texas. He will become a
professional football player and will become NFC Rookie
of the Year in 1983.  He will also set a NFL single-
season rushing record of 2,105 yards in 1984.

1963 – Alabama Governor George Wallace blocks the integration of
Tuskegee High School in Tuskegee, Alabama.

1965 – Lennox Claudius Lewis, former WBC boxing champ, is born
in West Ham, London, England.

1966 – Frank Robinson is named Most Valuable Player of the
American League.

1971 – Cheryl White becomes the first African American woman
jockey to win a sanctioned horse race.

1975 – Joseph W. Hatchett sworn in as first African American
state supreme court justice in the South (Florida) in
the twentieth century.

1978 – Reggie Jackson is 19th player to hit 20 home runs in 11
straight years.

1989 – Rev. Al Sharpton leads a civil rights march through the
Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn, New York.

Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.

Today in Black History – September 1         *

1867 – Robert T. Freeman becomes the first African American
to graduate from Harvard Dental School.

1875 – White Democrats attacked Republicans at Yazoo City,
Mississippi. One white and three African-Americans were
killed.

1912 – Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, English-born composer of Hiawatha’s
Wedding Feast and professor of music at Trinity College of
Music in London, joins the ancestors in Croyden, England.
Coleridge-Taylor was the most important Black composer of
his day and toured the United States three times, where he
played with Will Marion Cook, Clarence Cameron White, and
collaborated with Paul Laurence Dunbar in setting several
of his poems to music.

1925 – Rosa Cuthbert (later Guy) is born in Trinidad. She will leave
Trinidad with her parents for America in 1932. During World
War II she will join the American Negro Theatre. She will
study theatre and writing at the University of New York.
Most of her books are about the dependability of family
members that care and love each other. She will be one of
the founders of The Harlem Writers Guild (1950). Her works
will include: “Bird at My Window” (1966), “Children of
Longing” (1971), “The Friends” (1973), “Ruby” (1976),
“Edith Jackson” (1978), “The Disappearance” (1979), “Mirror
of Her Own” (1981), “A Measure of Time” (1983), and “New
Guys Around the Block” (1983), “Paris, Pee Wee and Big Dog”
(1984), “My Love, My Love, or the Peasant Girl” (1985), And
“I Heard a Bird Sing” (1987). She will join the ancestors on
June 3, 2012.

1937 – Ron O’Neal is born in Utica, New York.  He will become an
actor and will star in movies during the 1970’s and be
best known for his role in “Superfly.”

1948 – William T. Coleman is appointed by Justice Frankfurter as a
clerk to the U.S. Supreme Court, the first African
American to hold the position.  A Harvard Law School
graduate and Army Air Corps veteran, Coleman will again
enter public service, first as president of the NAACP
Legal Defense and Education Fund and, in 1975, as
Secretary of Transportation under President Gerald Ford.

1970 – Dr. Hugh S. Scott of Washington, DC, becomes the first
African American superintendent of schools in a major US.
city.

1971 – The Pittsburgh Pirates field an all African American team
in a baseball game against the Philadelphia Phillies.

1973 – George Foreman knocks out Jose Roman in the first round to
retain his heavyweight title.

1975 – General Daniel (“Chappie”) James Jr. is promoted to the
rank of four-star general and named commander-in-chief of
the North American Air Defense Command.  He is the first
African American to achieve this rank.

1977 – Ethel Waters, singer and actress, joins the ancestors in
Chatsworth, California at the age of 80.  She was the
first African American entertainer to move from vaudeville
to ‘white’ entertainment.  She starred in many movies such
as “Something Special” (1971), “Carib Gold” (1955), “The
Member of the Wedding” (1952), “Pinky” (1949), “Cabin in
the Sky” (1943), “Cairo” (1942), “Tales of Manhattan”
(1942), “Black Musical Featurettes, V. 1″ (1929),  Short
Subjects V. 1” (1929),  and “On With the Show” (1929).
She also was in the first network show to feature an
African American actress as the star (The Beulah Show-
1950).

1979 – Hazel W. Johnson becomes the first African American woman
to attain general officer rank in American military
history. Under her tenure as Chief, the Army Nurse Corps
continued to improve standards of education and training.
The Army Nurse Corps Standards of Nursing Practice were
published as an official Department of the Army Pamphlet
(DA PAM 40-5). She received the Distinguished Service
Medal, Legion Of Merit, Meritorious Service Medal, and
the Army Commendation Medal with Oak Leaf Cluster among
her awards and honors.

Information retreived from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.