KRLemmons African American History

November 5 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – November 5            *

1828 – Theodore Sedgwick Wright becomes the first African
American person to get a Theology Degree in the United
States, when he graduates from Princeton Theological
Seminary.

1867 – First Reconstruction constitutional convention opens in
Montgomery, Alabama.  It has eighteen African Americans
and ninety whites in attendance.

1901 – Etta Moten (later Barnett) is born in San Antonio, Texas.
She will become an actress starring in “Porgy and Bess”
and have a successful career on Broadway.  She will
appear in the movie “Flying Down to Rio”(1933), singing
and dancing the Carioca, and as a singer in “The Gold
Diggers of 1933″(1933). In her later years, she will be
active as an Advisory Board Member of The Black Academy
of Arts and Letters.

1917 – The Supreme Court (Buchanan vs Warley) rules that a
Louisville, Kentucky, ordinance mandating blacks and
whites live in separate areas is unconstitutional.

1926 – Negro History Week is initiated by Carter G. Woodson.

1931 – Ike Wister Turner is born in Clarksdale, Mississippi.  He
will become a singer, songwriter/pianist, bandleader,
record producer and talent scout. In a career that will
last for more than a half century, his repertoire will
include blues, soul, rock, and funk. He will be most
popularly known for his 1960s work with his then wife,
Tina Turner in the Ike & Tina Turner revue. Throughout his
career, he will win two Grammy Awards and be nominated for
three others. Alongside his former wife, Turner will be
inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991 and
in 2001 be inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame. He
will join the ancestors on December 12, 2007.

1935 – The Maryland Court of Appeals orders the University of
Maryland to admit African American student, Donald
Murray.

1956 – Art Tatum, joins the ancestors at age 46 in Los Angeles,
California.  Despite impaired vision, he received formal
training in music and developed a unique improvisational
style. He was an accomplished jazz pianist who impressed
even classicist Vladimir Horowitz.  Perhaps the most
gifted technician of all jazzmen, Tatum had other assets
as well, among them an harmonic sense so acute as to make
him an almost infallible improviser. This aspect of his
style, as well as his great rhythmic freedom, influenced
the young players who became the founders of a new style
called bebop.

1956 – The Nat King Cole Show premiers. The 15-minute show
starring the popular singer will run until June 1957 and
reappear in July in a half-hour format. The first network
variety series hosted by an African American star, it was
cancelled due to lack of support by advertisers.

1968 – Eight African American males and the first African American
female, Shirley Chisholm, are elected to the U.S. Congress.
Including previously elected Massachusetts senator Edward
Brooke, it is the largest number of African American
representatives to serve in Congress since the 44th
Congress of 1875-1877.

1970 – The National Guard is mobilized in Henderson, North
Carolina, as a result of racially motivated civil
disturbances.

1974 – George Brown of Colorado and Mervyn Dymally of California
are the first African American lieutenant governors elected
in the 20th century, while Walter Washington becomes the
first African American to be elected mayor of the District
of Columbia, and Harold Ford is elected to Congress from
Tennessee, the first African American from the state.

1974 – The Spingarn Medal is awarded to Damon J. Keith “in tribute
to his steadfast defense of constitutional principles as
revealed in a series of memorable decisions he handed down
as a United States District Court judge.”

1989 – The first memorial to the civil rights movement in the
United States is dedicated at a ceremony in Montgomery,
Alabama.  The memorial was commissioned by the Southern
Poverty Law Center, a legal and educational organization
located in Montgomery.

1994 – George Foreman, 45, becomes boxing’s oldest heavyweight
champion by knocking out Michael Moorer in the 10th round
of their WBA fight in Las Vegas, Nevada.

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

KRLemmons African American History

November 4 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – November 4            *

1872 – Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback is elected as a U.S.
congressman from Louisiana.

1872 – Three African Americans are elected to major offices in
Louisiana elections: C.C Antoine, lieutenant governor;
P.G. Deslonde, secretary of state; W.B. Brown,
superintendent of public education.

1879 – T. Elkins receives a patent on the refrigeration
apparatus.

1953 – Hulan Jack becomes first African American Manhattan
Borough President in New York City.

1958 – World renowned opera singer, Shirley Verrett, makes her
debut in New York City.

1959 – Ernie Banks, Chicago Cubs shortstop, wins the National
League MVP.

1969 – Howard N. Lee and Charles Evers are elected the first
African American mayors of Chapel Hill, North Carolina,
and Fayette, Mississippi respectively.

1971 – Elgin Baylor announces his retirement from the Los
Angeles Lakers.  After 14 years in the NBA, Baylor had
scored 23,149 points, the third highest in the league,
and was the fifth-highest career rebounder.

1978 – William Howard Jr. is elected president of the National
Council of Churches, at the age of 32.

1982 – Rayford Logan joins the ancestors in Washington, DC.  He
was an educator, historian, and author of numerous books
on African Americans, including the “Dictionary of
American Negro Biography.” Among his honors was a 1980
NAACP Spingarn Medal.

1988 – Bill and Camille Cosby make a $20 million gift to Spelman
College.  In his remarks to newly inaugurated President
Johnetta B. Cole, Cosby states, “I want Johnetta Cole to
understand the love that Camille and I have for this
college, the love we have for women who, in spite of odds
against them, come to this school to challenge themselves,
to challenge the school, then to challenge what we call
‘the outside world.'”

1988 – The Martin L. King, Jr. Federal Building is dedicated in
Atlanta, Georgia. It is the first federal building in the
nation to bear the name of the slain civil rights leader.

1999 – Daisy Bates, who is best known for counseling the “Little
Rock Nine,” joins the ancestors at the age of 84.  The
“Little Rock Nine” were the students who broke the color
barrier at all-white Central High School in Little Rock,
Arkansas in 1957,   Her leadership helped to inch America
toward desegregated schools. She had dedicated her entire
life to service in the civil rights struggle.

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

KRLemmons African American History

November 3 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – November 3             *

1868 – John W. Menard, of Louisiana, is elected as the African
American representative to Congress.  Menard defeats a
white candidate, 5,107 to 2,833, in an election in
Louisiana’s Second Congressional District to fill an
unexpired term in the Fortieth Congress.

1874 – James Theodore Holly, an African American who emigrated
to Haiti in 1861, is elected bishop of Haiti.

1883 – Race riots occur in Danville, Virginia, resulting in the
death of four African Americans.

1896 – South Carolina State College is established.

1905 – Artist Lois Mailou Jones is born in Boston, Massachusetts.
She will win her first award in 1926 and have major
exhibitions at the Harmon Foundation, the Salon des
Artistes Francais in Paris, the National Academy of
Design, and many others.  Despite her long career, she
will not have a major retrospective of her work until
the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston mounts a show in her
honor in 1973. She will join the ancestors on June 9,
1998.

1920 – “Emperor Jones” opens at the Provincetown Theater with
Charles Gilpin in the title role.

1933 – Louis Wade Sullivan is born in Atlanta, Georgia.  He will
become the founder and first dean of the Morehouse
School of Medicine and Secretary of Health and Human
Services, the highest-ranking African American in the
Bush Administration.

1942 – William L. Dawson is elected to Congress from Chicago.

1942 – Black and white advocates of direct, nonviolent action
organized the Congress of Racial Equality in Chicago.
Three CORE members stage a sit-in at Stoner’s Restaurant
in Chicago’s Loop.

1942 – The Spingarn Medal is presented to Asa Philip Randolph
“for organizing the Sleeping Car Porters under the
Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters and securing
recognition for them; and because of his fearless,
determined mobilization of mass opinion that resulted
in… Executive Order No. 8802, which banned racial
discrimination in defense industries and government work.”

1945 – Irving C. Mollison, a Chicago Republican, is sworn in as
U.S. Customs Court judge in New York City.

1945 – The NAACP’s Spingarn Medal is presented to Paul Robeson
“for his outstanding achievement in the theater, on the
concert stage, and in the general field of racial
welfare.”

1949 – Larry Holmes is born in Easton, Pennsylvania.  He will
become a professional boxer and world heavyweight
champion from 1978 to 1985.  During his reign, he will
defend his title more times than any other heavyweight
in history, with the exception of Joe Louis.

1953 – Jeffrey Banks is born in Washington, DC.  He will become
an influential fashion designer and the youngest designer
to win the prestigious Coty Award, for his outstanding
fur designs.

1962 – Wilt Chamberlain of the NBA San Francisco Warriors, scores
72 points vs the Los Angeles Lakers.

1964 – John Conyers, Jr. is elected to the House of
Representatives from Detroit, Michigan.

1970 – Twelve African Americans are elected to the Ninety-second
Congress, including five new congressmen: Ralph H.
Metcalfe (Illinois), George Collins (Illinois), Charles
Rangel (New York), Ronald Dellums (California), and
Parren Mitchell (Maryland).

1970 – Wilson Riles is elected as the first African American
superintendent of Public Instruction in California.

1970 – Richard Austin is elected as the first African American
secretary of state in Michigan.

1974 – Harold G. Ford is elected U.S. Congressman from Tennessee.

1978 – Dominica is granted its independence by Great Britain.

1979 – Klansmen fire on an anti-Klan rally in Greensboro, North
Carolina, and kill five persons.

1981 – Coleman Young is re-elected mayor of Detroit. Thurman L.
Milner is elected mayor of Hartford, Connecticut.  James
Chase is elected mayor of Spokane, Washington.

1983 – Reverend Jesse Jackson announces his candidacy for
President of the United States.  Although unsuccessful in
this and a later 1988 campaign, Jackson will win many
Democratic state primaries. His candidacy will win him
national attention and a platform for increased
representation by African Americans in the Democratic
Party.

1992 – Carol Moseley Braun is the first African American woman to
be elected to the U.S. Senate.

1992 – James Clyburn is the first African American to represent
South Carolina since Reconstruction.  He had previously
served for 18 years as South Carolina’s Human Affairs
Commissioner.

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

KRLemmons African American History

November 2 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – November 2            *

1875 – Democrats suppress the African American vote by fraud
and violence and carry Mississippi elections. “The
Mississippi Plan” staged riots, political
assassinations, massacres and social and economic
intimidation will be used later to overthrow
Reconstruction governments in South Carolina and
Louisiana.

1903 – Business and civic leader, Maggie Lena Walker, opens
the St. Luke Penny Savings Bank in Richmond, Virginia,
becoming the first female bank president in the United
States.

1930 – Ras Tafari Makonnen is crowned Negus of Ethiopia, taking
the name Haile Selassie I, 225th Emperor of Solomonic
Dynasty. His coronation will signify to thousands of
Jamaicans and Garveyites in the United States, the
fulfillment of the prophecy of their leader, Marcus
Garvey.

1954 – Charles C. Diggs becomes the first African American
representative to Congress from Michigan.  He, along
with William Dawson of Illinois and Adam Clayton Powell,
Jr. of New York, comprise the largest number of African
Americans to date in Congress in the 20th century. Diggs
will leave Congress in 1980 after being convicted of
mail fraud and being censured by Congress.

1954 – NAACP’s Spingarn Medal is presented to Dr. Theodore K.
Lawles for his research on skin-related diseases.

1958 – Willie McGee, baseball player (St. Louis Cardinals and
1985 National League MVP), is born.

1979 – Black activist Joanne Chesimard escapes from a New Jersey
prison, where she was serving a life sentence for the
1973 slaying of a New Jersey state trooper.  Chesimard,
who takes the name Assata Shakur successfully flees the
United States to Cuba.

1982 – Katie B. Hall is elected the first African American
congressional representative from Indiana.

1983 – President Ronald Reagan signs a bill to establish a
federal holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King,
Jr.’s birthday on the third Monday in January.  It is
the culmination of the efforts by many civil rights
organizations and entertainers to name King’s birthday
as a national holiday.
Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.