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August 18 African American Historical Events
Today in Black History – August 18 *
1791 – Benjamin Banneker publishes his first Almanac.
1909 – Howard Swanson is born in Atlanta, Georgia. He will become
a classical composer who will study in the United States
and Paris, France, and will write music for orchestra,
solo voice, piano, and chamber ensembles. His initial
training will be at the Cleveland Institute of Music. After
studying with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, France (1938), He
will spend two intensive periods studying and traveling in
New York. He will finally settle in New York City in 1966.
Thanks to Marian Anderson’s 1949 performance of his song
“The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” his music will begin to gain
national attention. He will win several awards, including
the Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Academy of Arts
and Letters grant. His neo-classical compositional method
will be appealing to a wide range of listeners, with
graceful melodies and a touch of jazz and idioms of black
American folk music. He will join the ancestors on November
12, 1978.
1934 – Roberto Clemente is born in Carolina, Puerto Rico. He will
win the Gold Glove award TWELVE consecutive years and play
in twelve All-Star games. He will be the National League’s
Most Valuable Player (MVP) in 1966, the MVP in the 1971
World Series, win four separate National League batting
titles, post a .317 career batting average, and play
eighteen seasons, amassing 3,000 hits and hammering 240
home runs. He will join the ancestors at the age of 38, on
a mercy mission to deliver relief supplies to the victims
of a Nicaraguan earthquake. Tragically, his plane,
carrying food, clothing and medical supplies, will crash
moments after takeoff from San Juan, Puerto Rico on
December 31, 1972.
1935 – Rafer Lewis Johnson is born in Hillsboro, Texas. He will
become a decathlete, winning gold in the 1955 Pan-American
Games, a silver medal in the 1956 Olympics and a gold medal
in the in the 1960 Summer Games in Rome. He will light the
torch in the 1984 Games in Los Angeles.
1941 – Matt Snell is born in Garfield, Georgia. He will become a
professional football player (running back for the New York
Jets). He will be one of the key players in the Jets
victory in Super Bowl III over the Baltimore Colts.
1954 – James E. Wilkins becomes the first African American to
attend a U.S. presidential cabinet meeting. He is
Assistant Secretary of Labor and attends because the
Secretary and Under-Secretary are away.
1963 – James Meredith becomes the first African American to
graduate from the University of Mississippi.
1964 – South Africa is banned from the Olympic Games because of
its apartheid policies.
1970 – Malcolm-Jamal Warner is born in Jersey City, New Jersey.
He will become an child actor and will star on the “The
Cosby Show” as Theodore “Theo” Huxtable. He will also star
as “Here and Now’s” Alexander James and “Malcolm and
Eddie’s” Malcolm.
1976 – Vice Admiral Samuel L. Gravely Jr. assumes command of the
U.S. Third Fleet.
1977 – Steven Biko, one of the most influential Black student
leaders in South Africa, is arrested in Port Elizabeth
on charges of fomenting unrest among blacks in the city
through his writings. Biko will join the ancestors in
police detention less than a month later, as a result of
a beating by the police.
1981 – Football running back, Herschel Walker, of the University
of Georgia, takes out an insurance policy with Lloyd’s of
London. The All-American is insured for one million
dollars.
1986 – Earl Campbell, the ‘Tyler Rose’, announces his retirement
from professional football. Campbell, the 1977 Heisman
Trophy winner, played eight seasons in the National
Football League — and was a star for the Houston Oilers.
He will be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on
July 27, 1991.
Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.
August 17 African American Historical Events
Today in Black History – August 17 *
1847 – Archibald Henry Grimke’ is born into slavery on a
plantation near Charleston, South Carolina. His white
father, Henry Grimke’, was of the famous Grimke’ family
which included abolitionist sisters Sarah and Angelina.
After being freed in 1852, Archibald will have a
distinguished career as a lawyer (Harvard Law, 1874),
political delegate, newspaper publisher (“The Hub” in
Boston), and author.
1887 – Marcus Mosiah Garvey is born in St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica.
He will become a charismatic black nationalist and
founder of the UNIA, an organization dedicated to
education, racial pride, and African development. He
will also found the Black Star Line, an African American
owned steamship company established to link new-world
Blacks with their African motherland. Garvey and several
associates will be railroaded by the U.S. government for
“mail fraud” in connection with the sale of Black Star
stock. Garvey will be convicted and serve five years in
federal prison. The U.S. government trumps up these
charges against Marcus Garvey because he was a threat to
the status quo of the “Negro people” of America. That is
why he is deported instead of being forced to serve his
complete sentence here. The U.S. government simply wanted
to get rid of him. He will join the ancestors on June 10,
1940 in London, England.
1920 – Isaiah Boyd Perry is born in Money Point (Norfolk), Virginia.
He will grow up in Hampton, Virginia and will become the
first faculty member of Hampton Institute to graduate from
the Hampton Institute Laboratory High School (George P.
Phenix), graduate from the Hampton Institute Trade School,
graduate with a Bachelor of Science Degree, and a Master of
Science Degree and join the “Quarter of the Century Club”
as a faculty member with twenty five years of service. He
will join the ancestors in 1971.
1931 – A’Lelia Walker Robinson joins the ancestors and residents of
Harlem and New York City mourn her death. The daughter of
Madame C.J. Walker, she had distinguished herself as hostess
of the “Dark Tower” on Harlem’s West 136th Street, a meeting
place for Harlem Renaissance poets, philosophers, and
artists such as W.E.B. DuBois, Langston Hughes, and Aaron
Douglas, as well as European nobility and members of New
York’s social register.
1939 – Luther Allison is born in Widener, Arkansas. He will become
a blues guitarist. Allison will spend his formative musical
years in Chicago jamming with the West Side’s best,
including Magic Sam, Otis Rush, and Freddie King. His first
recording, “Love Me Mama” (Delmark, 1969), is considered a
blues classic. Allison will come to national prominence
with blistering performances at the 1969 and 1970 Ann Arbor
Blues Festivals, wowing young rock fans with his scorching
guitar solos and soulful vocals. He will become the first
blues act to sign with Motown Records in 1971, subsequently
releasing three records for the label. He will tour
nationally throughout the 1970s before relocating to Paris
in the early 1980s where he will continue to release albums
(many issued only in Europe) and tour incessantly,
eventually becoming a European blues superstar. He will join
the ancestors on August 12, 1997.
1960 – Gabon declares its independence from France.
1984 – Roberto Clemente becomes the second baseball player to be
featured on a U.S. postage stamp.
1988 – Butch Reynolds of the United States sets the 400 meter
record (43.29) in Zurich, Switzerland.
1990 – Pearl Bailey, Broadway actress and singer, joins the
ancestors at the age of 72 after succumbing to a heart
attack in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.
August 16 African American Historical Events
Today in Black History – August 16 *
1890 – Alexander Clark, journalist and lawyer, is named minister
to Liberia.
1922 – Louis Lomax is born in Valdosta, Georgia. He will become
an author and journalist. He will be the editor of “When
the Word is Given,” a collection of early speeches by
Malcolm X, and the author of “To Kill a Black Man,” “The
Negro Revolt,” and “The Reluctant African.” He will begin
his career as a reporter for the Baltimore Afro-American
and, at the time of his first interview with Malcolm X,
was the first Black television newsman at WNTA-TV. He will
meet Malcolm in 1959 and work with him on the early
editions of “Muhammad Speaks.” He will make a point of
covering stories that have a direct impact on the Black
community and will himself be a devout supporter of civil
rights organizations such as CORE (for which he will help
organize a telethon that will raise $50,000 for the
Freedom Rides), SNCC, and the SCLC. He will join the
ancestors on July 30, 1970 after being involved in an
automobile accident in Santa Rosa, New Mexico.
1938 – Revolutionary blues singer Robert L. Johnson joins the
ancestors after a mysterious death in Greenwood,
Mississippi. A revival of interest in his music will
occur in the 1990’s when a boxed set of 41 of his
recordings is issued to critical and popular acclaim.
1952 – Reginald VelJohnson is born in Queens, New York. He will
become an actor and will be best known for his role as
Carl Winslow in the TV series “Family Matters” and his
role as a policeman in the movie “Die Hard.”
1958 – Angela Evelyn Bassett is born in New York City, New York.
She will become an actress. She will attend Yale
University and receive her B.A. in African American
studies in 1980. In 1983, she will earn a Master of Fine
Arts Degree from the Yale School of Drama. At Yale, she
will meet her future husband Courtney B. Vance, a 1986
graduate of the drama school. Her acting career will
begin in the theater in 1985, when she will appear in
J.E. Franklin’s “Black Girl” at Second Stage Theatre. She
will appear in two August Wilson plays at the Yale
Repertory Theatre under the direction of her long-time
instructor, Lloyd Richards. The Wilson plays featuring
her were “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” (1984) and “Joe
Turner’s Come and Gone” (1986). She will star in the
movies “Boyz n The Hood,” “Malcolm X,” “What’s Love Got
to Do With It,” “Waiting To Exhale,” and “How Stella Got
Her Groove Back.”
1961 – Christian Emeka Okoye is born in Enugu, Nigeria. He will
become a professional football player with the Kansas City
Chiefs, as a running back. He will amass 4,897 yards from
1987-1992. He will be UPI’s AFL offensive player of the
year in 1989.
1963 – Independence is restored to the Dominican Republic.
1970 – Activist Angela Davis is named in a federal warrant
issued in connection with George Jackson’s attempted
escape from San Quentin prison.
1972 – A Methodist clergyman of African descent from Dominica,
West Indies, Rev. Philip A. Potter, 51, is named General
Secretary of the World Council of Churches. Serving
until 1984, Potter will give strong spiritual guidance
to the work of the WCC.
1987 – Charles Wesley joins the ancestors in Washington, DC at
the age of 95. Noted historian and African American
college president, he authored over a dozen books on
African American life, including “The Negro in the
Americas,” “The Quest for Equality,” “Negro Labor in the
U.S. 1850-1925,” “Richard Allen, Apostle of Freedom,”
and “The History of the National Association of Colored
Women’s Clubs, published when he was 92 years old.
1988 – Jailed Black South African nationalist Nelson Mandela,
is stricken with tuberculosis.
2003 – Idi Amin, former Ugandan dictator, joins the ancestors
in Saudi Arabia at the age of 80, after succumbing to
multiple organ failure.
Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.
August 15 African American Historical Events
* Today in Black History – August 15 *
1824 – Freed American slaves establish a settlement in West Africa
that will eventually become the country of Liberia.
1843 – The National Black Convention meets at Buffalo, New York,
with some seventy delegates from twelve states. The
highlight of the convention will be a stirring address by
Henry Highland Garnet, a twenty seven-year-old Presbyterian
pastor who calls for a slave revolt and a general slave
strike. Amos G. Beman of New Haven, Connecticut, is
elected president of the convention.
1900 – Riots erupt in New York City as a white plainclothes
policeman is killed in a fight with an African American man.
It is the fourth racial riot in the city’s history.
1906 – At the second meeting of the Niagara Movement at Harpers
Ferry, West Virginia, W.E.B. DuBois demands equal
citizenship rights for African Americans, saying, “We will
not be satisfied to take one jot or title less than our full
manhood rights…”
1925 – Oscar Peterson is born in Montreal (Quebec), Canada.
Classically trained in the piano, he will work with top
Canadian jazz bands until 1949, when he will first appear in
New York City’s Carnegie hall. He will be recognized as a
jazz innovator who forges a synthesis of bop and swing into
his own unique style. He will join the ancestors on
December 23, 2007.
1931 – Roy Wilkins joins the NAACP as assistant secretary.
1931 – The Spingarn Medal is awarded to Richard B. Harrison for his
Portrayal of “De Lawd” in “The Green Pastures.”
1935 – Vernon Eulion Jordan, Jr, is born. He will become a civil
rights activist and the head of the National Urban League.
1938 – Maxine Waters is born in St. Louis, Missouri. A longtime
California state legislator, in 1990, she will be the
second African American woman from California elected to
the United States Congress.
1945 – Gene Upshaw is born in Robstown, Texas. He will become a
professional football player and a guard for the Oakland
Raiders. After retirement from football, he will become the
longtime president of the NFL Players Association. He will
join the ancestors on August 20, 2008.
1960 – The Republic of the Congo gains independence from France.
1962 – The Shady Grove Baptist Church is burned in Leesburg,
Georgia.
1964 – A racially motivated disturbance occurs in Dixmoor, (a
Chicago suburb) Illinois.
1964 – Ralph Boston of the United States, sets the then long jump
record at 27′ 3″.
1975 – Joanne Little is acquitted of murder charges in the August
27, 1974, killing of a white jailer. The defense said she
stabbed the jailer with an ice pick after he made sexual
advances.
1979 – Andrew Young resigns under pressure as U.N. ambassador
after unauthorized meeting with representatives of the
Palestine Liberation Organization. His resignation creates
a storm of controversy and divides the African American
and Jewish communities.
1999 – Tiger Woods wins the PGA Championship, becoming the youngest
player to win two majors since Seve Ballesteros.
Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.
August 14 African American Historical Events
Today in Black History – August 14 *
1862 – President Lincoln receives the first group of African
Americans to confer with a U.S. president on a matter of
public policy. He urges African Americans to emigrate to
Africa or Central America and is bitterly criticized by
northern African Americans.
1876 – Prairie View State University is founded.
1883 – Ernest Everett Just is born in Charleston, South Carolina.
After graduating magna cum laude from Dartmouth College
in 1907, he will become a teacher at Howard University.
He will spend summers working as a research assistant at
the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole,
Massachusetts. He will receive his Ph.D. from the
University of Chicago in 1916. He will become a noted
marine biologist and the head of the physiology
department at Howard. He will be awarded the NAACP’s
first Spingarn Medal (1915) for his research in biology.
In his early days at Howard University, he will be one
of the founders of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity and faculty
advisor. He will join the ancestors in October, 1941.
1908 – A race riot occurs in Springfield Illinois and will last
for five days. Army troops are called out. This riot
will stir the conscience of American civil rights leaders
and will lead to the founding of the NAACP.
1929 – Richard “Dick Tiger” Ihetu is born in Nkwerre Orlu, Imo
State, Nigeria. He will become a professional boxer and a
world champion middleweight from 1962-63 and 1964. He
will be the world lightweight champion from 1965 to 1968.
He will join the ancestors on December 14, 1971 after
succumbing to liver cancer. He will be inducted into to
the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1991.
1938 – Niara Sudarkasa is born in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. She
will be an anthropologist and groundbreaking educator,
becoming the first African American professor to receive
tenure at the University of Michigan, and the first woman
president of Lincoln University, a traditionally male
African American college.
1946 – Larry Graham is born. He will become a musician (bassist)
and singer. He will perform with Sly and the Family
Stone and Graham Central Station. He will leave Graham
Central Station, start a solo career, and will be known
for his songs, “One in a Million” and “I Never Forgot
Your Eyes.”
1946 – Antonio Juan Fargas is born in the Bronx in New York City.
He will become an actor and will be best known for his role
as “Huggy Bear” in the TV series, “Starsky & Hutch.”
1956 – Jackee Harry is born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
She will become an actress and will star as “Sandra” in
the television series “227” and the adoptive mother of
one of a pair of twins in the television series “Sister,
Sister.”
1959 – Earvin Johnson is born in Lansing, Michigan. Better known
as “Magic,” he will lead Michigan State University to the
NCAA championship in 1979. After two years of college, he
will enter the NBA and be picked first in the draft by the
Los Angeles Lakers. He will become one of the best point
guards in NBA history. After retiring from basketball, he
will concentrate on his business ventures and will have
success developing stadium-style movie theaters in inner
city underserved areas.
1968 – Halle Maria Berry is born in Cleveland, Ohio. She will
become Miss World USA in 1986 and will have a successful
acting career, starring in the mini-series “Queen” and the
movie “Boomerang.” In 2002, she will win the Best Actress
Oscar for her role in “Monster’s Ball.”
1970 – City University of New York (CUNY) inaugurates its open
admissions policy designed to increase the number of poor
and minority students.
1971 – Bob Gibson, of the St. Louis Cardinals, pitches a no-hitter
against the Pittsburgh Pirates. It is the first no-hitter
against the Pirates since 1955.
1992 – The White House announces that the Pentagon will begin
emergency airlifts of food to Somalia to alleviate mass
deaths by starvation.
2010 – Abbey Lincoln (born Anna Marie Wooldridge), renown jazz
vocalist, songwriter and actress, joins the ancestors i
Manhattan, New York. She had been suffering deteriorating
health for years following open heart surgery in 2007.
Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.
August 13 African American Historical Events
Today in Black History – August 13 *
1881 – The first African American nursing school opens at Spelman
College in Atlanta, Georgia.
1892 – The first issue of the Baltimore Afro-American is
published.
1906 – African American soldiers raid Brownsville, Texas in
retaliation for racial insults. One white man is killed,
two are wounded.
1911 – James B. Parsons is born in Kansas City, Missouri. After
an early career in music, he will become an attorney,
superior court judge in Cook County, Illinois, and
assistant U.S. Attorney, and in 1961, the first African
American appointed to a lifetime federal judgeship in the
continental United States. He will join the ancestors on
June 19, 1993.
1917 – Claudia McNeil is born in Baltimore, Maryland. She will
start her career as a singer and tour with Katherine
Dunham before finding fame as an actress. Among her most
notable roles will be as Lena Younger in both the play
and movie versions of “A Raisin in the Sun.” She will join
the ancestors on November 25, 1993.
1948 – Kathleen Battle is born in Portsmouth, Ohio. She will
become an operatic soprano, winner of Grammy awards in
1987 and 1988, and will be considered by many to be one
of the finest modern opera singers.
1948 – Cleveland Indians rookie pitcher, Satchel Paige, throws
his first complete game in the major leagues at the age
of 42. He allows the Chicago White Sox only five hits in
the 5-0 shutout.
1953 – President Eisenhower establishes the Government Contract
Compliance Committee to supervise anti-discrimination
regulations in government contracts.
1963 – Noted civil rights and labor leader, A. Philip Randolph
strongly protests the AFL-CIO Executive Council’s failure
to endorse the August 28 March on Washington.
1979 – Lou Brock, of the St. Louis Cardinals, gets his 3,000th
career hit while leading the Cardinals past the Chicago
Cubs, 3-2.
1983 – Daley Thompson of Britain wins the decathlon championship
at the World Track and Field Championship in Helsinki,
Finland.
1989 – Searchers in Ethiopia find the wreckage of a plane which
had disappeared almost a week earlier while carrying
Texas Congressman Mickey Leland and 15 other people.
There are no survivors.
Information retrieved from the Munirah Chronicle and is edited by Rene’ A. Perry.
The CamaraIfe Maktaba 