KRLemmons African American History

April 5 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – April 5 *

1839 – Robert Smalls is born into slavery in Beaufort, South
Carolina. He will become a Civil War hero by sailing an
armed Confederate steamer out of Charleston Harbor and
presenting it to the Union Navy. He will later become a
three-term congressman from his state. He will join the
ancestors on February 23, 1915.

1856 – Booker Taliaferro Washington is born a slave near Hale’s
Ford, Virginia. He will become a world reknown educator,
founder of Tuskegee Institute. He will become one of the
most famous African American educators and leaders of the
19th century. His message of acquiring practical skills and
emphasizing self-help over political rights will be popular
among whites and segments of the African American community.
His 1901 autobiography, “Up From Slavery”, which details his
rise to success despite numerous obstacles, will become a
best-seller and further enhances his public image as a
self-made man. As popular as he will be in some circles,
Washington will be aggressively opposed by critics such as
W.E.B. Du Bois and William Monroe Trotter. He will join the
ancestors on November 14, 1915. He will become the first
African American to be honored on a U.S. postage stamp.

1879 – Charles W. Follis is born in Cloverdale, Virginia. He is the
first African American to play professional football. He
will play halfback for the Blues of Shelby, Ohio in 1904.
The Blues were part of the American Professional Football
League, a forerunner of the National Football League.

1915 – Jess Willard defeats Jack Johnson for the heavyweight boxing
crown in twenty three rounds.

1934 – Stanley Turrentine is born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He
will become a jazz saxophonist and in 1953, will replace the
famed John Coltrane in the popular big band of Earl Bostic.
After a three-year army stint, which affords him his only
formal musical training, Turrentine comes to prominence on
the New York Jazz scene as a member of Max Roach’s group
in 1959. Over the years, Turrentine’s recordings will
combine musical energies with friends such as Ron Carter,
Roland Hanna, Ray Charles, Freddie Hubbard, Jon Hendricks,
George Benson, Cedar Walton, Herbie Hancock, Kenny Burrell,
Milt Jackson, Joe Sample, Shirley Scott, Jimmy Smith, Grady
Tate, and many others. He will be nominated for the Grammy
Award four times. He will join the ancestors on September 12,
2000.

1937 – Colin Powell is born in New York City. He will become a
highly decorated Army officer, receiving the Bronze Star and
Purple Heart during the Vietnam War, and will be later
promoted to four-star general in 1988. He will become the
first African American to serve as the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff for the U.S. Armed Forces.

1956 – Booker T. Washington becomes the only African American
honored twice on a U.S. postage stamp. To commemorate the
centennial of his birth, the U.S. Postal Service issues a
stamp depicting the cabin where he was born.

1967 – Philadelphia ’76er Wilt Chamberlain sets a NBA record of 41
rebounds in a single game.

1976 – FBI documents, released in response to a freedom of
information suit, reveal that the government mounted an
intensive campaign against civil rights organizations in the
sixties. In a letter dated August 25, 1967, the FBI said
the government operation, called COINTELPRO, was designed
“to expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit or otherwise
neutralize the activities of Black nationalists, hate-type
groups, their leadership, spokesmen, membership and
supporters, and to counter their propensity for violence and
civil disorders.” A later telegram specifically named the
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference as organizations having
“radical and violence prone leaders, members and followers.”

1977 – Gertrude Downing receives a patent for the corner cleaner
attachment.

1984 – Kareem Abdul-Jabbar breaks Wilt Chamberlain’s all-time career
scoring record of 31,419 points (31,421).

1990 – Seven African American journalists are inducted into the
newly created Hall of Fame of the National Association of
Black Journalists in Washington, DC. Dubbed “pioneers of
mainstream journalism,” the inductees include Dorothy Butler
Gilliam of the Washington Post, Malvin R. Goode of ABC
News, Mal H. Johnson of Cox Broadcasting, Gordon Parks of
Life Magazine, Ted Poston of the New York Post, Norma
Quarles of Cable News Network, and Carl T. Rowan of King
Features Syndicate. Twelve Pulitzer Prize winners are also
honored at the awards ceremonies.

2000 – Ending a two-year investigation, an independent counsel clears
Labor Secretary Alexis Herman of allegations that she had
solicited $ 250,000 in illegal campaign contributions.

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

KRLemmons African American History

April 4 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – April 4 *

1915 – McKinley Morganfield is born in Rolling Fork, Mississippi. He
will be discovered in 1941 by two music archivists from the
Library of Congress, traveling the back roads of Mississippi
looking for the legendary Robert Johnson. They recorded two
of Morganfield’s songs and lit a fire in the ambitious young
man. He will leave Mississippi for Chicago two years later
to become a blues singer better known as “Muddy Waters.” He
will join the ancestors on April 30, 1983 in Chicago,
Illinois.

1928 – Marguerite Ann Johnson is born in St. Louis, Missouri. She
will become the first African American streetcar conductor
in San Francisco, a dancer, nightclub singer, editor, and
teacher of music and drama in Ghana and professor of
American Studies at Wake Forest University, better known as
Dr. Maya Angelou. She will also become noted as the author of
a multi-volume autobiographical series, as well as several
volumes of poetry. She will join the ancestors on May 28, 2014.

1938 – Vertamae (Vera Mae) Smart-Grosvenor is born in Hampton County,
South Carolina. She will become a culinary anthropologist/griot,
food writer, and broadcaster on public media. She will be known
for her cookbook-memoir, Vibration Cooking: or, The Travel
Notes of a Geechee Girl (1970). She will also appear in several
films, including “Daughters of the Dust” (1992), about a Gullah
family in 1902, at a time of transition on the Sea Islands; and
“Beloved” (1998), based on the Toni Morrison novel.

1939 – Hugh Masekela is born in Kwa-Guqa Township, Witbank, South Africa.
He will become a musician and band leader. He will be a major
force in South African Jazz, and will become known throughout
the world.

1948 – Richard Dean ‘Dick’ Parsons is born in Brooklyn, New York. In 1988,
he will be recruited to serve as chief operating officer of the
Dime Savings Bank of New York, becoming the first African American
CEO of a large, non-minority U.S. savings institution. In 1990, he
will become Chairman and CEO and will oversee a merger with Anchor
Savings Bank, gaining a substantial sum when the Dime Bank was
demutualized. In 1991, on the recommendation of Nelson Rockefeller’s
brother Laurance to the then CEO Steven Ross, he will be invited to
join Time Warner’s board. He will subsequently become president of
the company in 1995, recruited by Gerald Levin. He will help
negotiate the company’s merger with America Online in 2000, creating
a $165-billion media conglomerate. In December, 2001, it will be
announced that chief executive Gerald Levin would retire and he will
be selected as his successor. The announcement will surprise many
media watchers who expected chief operating officer Robert Pittman
to take the helm. In 2003, he will announce the name change from
AOL-Time Warner to simply Time Warner. He will become chairman
of Citigroup on February 23, 2009.

1959 – The Federation of Mali is formed, consisting of Senegal & the
territory of Mali in the French Sudan. It will dissolve in
1960.

1960 – Senegal and Mali gain separate independence.

1968 – Acknowledged leader of the U.S. civil rights movement, Martin
Luther King, Jr. joins the ancestors after being assassinated
in Memphis, Tennessee. His death will result in a national day
of mourning and the postponement of the beginning of the baseball
season. Over 30,000 people will form a funeral procession behind
his coffin, pulled by two Georgia mules. King’s death will also
set off racially motivated civil disturbances in 160 cities
leaving 82 people dead and causing $ 69 million in property
damage. President Lyndon B. Johnson declares Sunday, April 6, a
national day of mourning and orders all U.S. flags on government
buildings in all U.S. territories and possessions to fly at
half-mast.

1972 – Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., former congressman and civil rights
leader, joins the ancestors in Miami, Florida at the age of
63.

1974 – Hank Aaron ties the baseball career home run record set by
Babe Ruth, when he hits his 714th home run in Cincinnati,
Ohio.

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

KRLemmons African American History

April 3 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – April 3 *

1865 – The Fifth Massachusetts Colored Cavalry and units of the
Twenty-fifth Corps are in the vanguard of Union troops
entering Richmond. The Second Division of the Twenty-Fifth
Corps help to chase Robert E. Lee’s army from Petersburg to
Appomattox Court House, April 3-10. The African American
division and white Union soldiers are advancing on General
Lee’s trapped army with fixed bayonets when the Confederate
troops surrender.

1889 – The Savings Bank of the Order of True Reformers opens in
Richmond, Virginia.

1934 – Richard Mayhew is born in Amityville, New York. A student
at the Art Students League, Brooklyn Museum Art School, and
Columbia University, as well as the Academia in Florence,
Italy, Mayhew will be one of the most respected and
revolutionary landscape artists of the 20th century. He
will also form “Spiral,” a forum for artistic innovation
and exploration of African American artists’ relationships
to the civil rights movement, with fellow artists Romare
Bearden, Charles Alston, Hale Woodruff, and others.

1936 – James Harrell McGriff is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
He will be surrounded by music as a child, with both parents
playing piano and cousins Benny Golson and Harold Melvin,
who were pursuing their own musical talents. He will be
influenced to play the organ by neighbor Richard “Groove”
Holmes, with whom he will study privately. He will also
study organ at Philadelphia’s Combe College of Music and at
Julliard. In addition, he will study with Milt Buckner and
with classical organist Sonny Gatewood. His first hit will
be with his arrangement of “I Got A Woman”, on the Sue
label, which made it to the top five on both Billboard’s
Rhythm and Blues and Pop charts. There will be close to 100
albums with Jimmy McGriff’s name at the top as leader. He
will record for Sue, Solid State, United Artists, Blue Note,
Groove Merchant, Milestone, Headfirst and Telarc. Over his
prolific career, he will record with George Benson, Kenny
Burrell, Frank Foster, J.J. Johnson and a two-organ jam
affair with the late “Groove” Holmes. He will join the
ancestors on May 24, 2008, succumbing to complications of
multiple sclerosis.

1944 – The U.S. Supreme Court (Smith v. Allwright) said that “white
primaries” that exclude African Americans are unconstitutional.

1950 – Carter G. Woodson, “the father of black history,” joins the
ancestors in Washington, DC at the age of 74.

1961 – Edward “Eddie” Regan Murphy is born in Brooklyn, New York. A
stand-up comedian and star of “Saturday Night Live” before
pursuing a movie career, Murphy will become one of the
largest African American box office draws. Among his most
successful movies will be “48 Hours,” “Trading Places,”
“Beverly Hills Cop,” “Coming to America,” and “Harlem
Nights.”

1963 – Led by Martin Luther King, Jr., the Birmingham anti-
segregation campaign begins. Before it is over, more than
2,000 demonstrators, including King, will be arrested. The
Birmingham Manifesto, issued by Fred Shuttlesworth of the
Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights the morning of
the campaign, summarizes the frustration and hopes of the
protesters: “The patience of an oppressed people cannot
endure forever…. This is Birmingham’s moment of truth in
which every citizen can play his part in her larger
destiny.”

1964 – Malcolm X speaks at a CORE-sponsored meeting on “The Negro
Revolt What Comes Next?” In his speech “The Ballot or
Bullet,” Malcolm warns of a growing black nationalism that
will no longer tolerate patronizing white political action.

1968 – Less than 24 hours before he is assassinated in Memphis,
Tennessee, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
delivers his famous “mountaintop” speech to a rally of
striking sanitation workers.

1990 – Jazz singer Sarah Vaughan joins the ancestors in suburban
Los Angeles, California, at the age of 66.

1996 – Ron Brown will join the ancestors when an Air Force jetliner
carrying the Commerce Secretary and American business
executives crashes in Croatia, killing all 35 people aboard.

2007 – Eddie Robinson, the longtime Grambling University coach who
transformed a small, Black college into a football power
that sent hundreds of players to the NFL, joins the
ancestors at the age of 88. The soft-spoken coach spent 57
years at Grambling State University, where he set a
standard for victories with 408 and nearly every season
relished seeing his top players drafted by NFL teams.

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

KRLemmons African American History

April 2 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – April 2 *

1855 – John Mercer Langston is elected clerk of Brownhelm, Ohio,
township. He will be considered the first African American
elected to public office.

1918 – Charles Wilbert White is born in Chicago, Illinois. An artist
who will work with traditional materials (pen, ink, oil on
canvas and lithography), White will transform the image of
African Americans and earn praise from critics and artists
alike. White will receive dozens of awards and his work will
be collected by museums on three continents and major
corporations. He will be known for his WPA-era murals. He will
be briefly married to famed sculptor and printmaker Elizabeth
Catlett. His best known work will be “The Contribution of
the Negro to American Democracy,” a mural at Hampton University
depicting a number of notable blacks including Denmark Vesey,
Nat Turner, Peter Salem, George Washington Carver, Harriet
Tubman, Frederick Douglass, and Marian Anderson. He will teach
at the Otis Art Institute from 1965 until he joins the ancestors
on October 3, 1979.

1932 – Bill Pickett, a well-known cowboy who was acclaimed by
President Theodore Roosevelt as “one of the best trained
ropers and riders the West has produced,” joins the
ancestors. Pickett performed as a bulldogger in Europe,
Mexico, and the United States, where he was often assisted
by two relatively unknown white cowboys, Tom Mix and Will
Rogers.

1939 – Marvin Gaye, Jr. is born in Washington, DC. He will sign
with Motown in 1962 and begin a 22-year career that includes
hits “Pride and Joy,” duets with Mary Wells and Tammi
Terrell, as well as best-selling albums exploring his social
consciousness (“What’s Going On”) and sexuality (“Let’s Get
It On,” “Midnight Love, and “Sexual Healing”). He will join
the ancestors on April 1, 1984, succumbing to a gun shot
wound inflicted by his father.

1969 – The Milwaukee Bucks of the National Basketball Association
signs Lew Alcindor for a reported $1,400,000 five-year
contract. Alcindor will later change his name to Kareem
Abdul-Jabar and his team to the Los Angeles Lakers.

1984 – Coach John Thompson of Georgetown University becomes the
first African American coach to win the NCAA Division I
basketball championship. The team, led by Patrick Ewing,
wins over the University of Houston, 84-75.

2003 – Edwin Starr, Rhythm & Blues singer, joins the ancestors at
age 61 after succumbing to a heart attack. He recorded the
hits “War” and “Agent Double-O Soul.”

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

KRLemmons African American History

April 1 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – April 1 *

1867 – African Americans vote in a municipal election in Tuscumbia,
Alabama. Military officials set aside the election pending
clarification on electoral procedures.

1868 – Hampton Institute is founded in Hampton, Virginia, by General
Samuel Chapman Armstrong.

1895 – Alberta Hunter is born in Memphis, Tennessee. She will run
away from home at the age of twelve and go to Chicago,
Illinois to become a Blues singer. She will work in a
variety of clubs until the violence in the Chicago club
scene prompts her to move to New York City. There she will
record for a variety of blues labels. She will write a lot
of her own songs and songs for other performers. Her song
“Down Hearted Blues,” will become Bessie Smith’s first
record in 1923. She will perform in Europe and America
until 1956, when she will retire from performing. She will
work for more than twenty years as a nurse in a New York
hospital and in 1977, at the age of 82, surprisingly return
to the stage. She will perform until she joins the
ancestors on October 17, 1984.

1905 – The British East African Protectorate becomes the colony of
Kenya.

1917 – Scott Joplin joins the ancestors in New York City. One of
the early developers of ragtime and the author of “Maple
Leaf Rag,” Joplin also created several rag-time and grand
operas, the most noteworthy of which, “Treemonisha,”
consumed his later years in an attempt to have it published
and performed.

1924 – The British Crown takes over Northern Rhodesia from the
British South Africa Company.

1929 – Morehouse College, Spelman College and Atlanta University
are merged, creating a ‘new’ Atlanta University. Dr. John
Hope of Morehouse College, is named president.

1930 – Zawditu, the first reigning female monarch of Ethiopia,
joins the ancestors. She was the second daughter of Emperor
Menelik II. She had been Empress of Ethiopia since 1916.

1939 – Rudolph Bernard “Rudy” Isley is born in Cincinnati, Ohio.
He will become a singer at the age of six with his brothers
O’Kelly, Ronald and Vernon Isley and form the group, The
Isley Brothers. They will leave Cincinnati in 1956 and go
to New York City to pursue their musical career. Rudolph
and his brothers will obtain fame and success nationally
and internationally earning numerous platinum and gold
albums which contain such classic hits as “Shout,” “Twist
and Shout,” “It’s Your Thing,” “Who’s That Lady,” “Fight
the Power,” “For the Love of You,” “Harvest For The World,”
“Live It Up,” “Footsteps in the Dark,” “Work to Do,” “Don’t
Say Good Night” and many others.

1950 – Charles R. Drew, surgeon and developer of the blood bank
concept, joins the ancestors after an automobile accident
near Burlington, North Carolina at the age of 45.

1951 – Oscar Micheaux joins the ancestors in Charlotte, North
Carolina. Micheaux formed his own film production company,
Oscar Micheaux Corporation, to produce his novel “The
Homesteader” and over 30 other movies, notably “Birthright,”
which was adapted from a novel by Pulitzer Prize-winning
author T.S. Stribling, and “Body and Soul,” which marked the
film debut of Paul Robeson.

1966 – The first World Festival of Negro Arts opens in Dakar,
Senegal, with the U.S. African American delegation having
one of the largest number of representatives. First prizes
are won by poet Robert Hayden, engraver William Majors,
actors Ivan Dixon and Abbey Lincoln, gospel singer Mahalia
Jackson, jazz trumpeter Louis Armstrong, and sociologist
Kenneth Clark.

1984 – Marvin Gaye joins the ancestors after being shot to death by
his father, Marvin Gaye, Sr. in Los Angeles, California,
one day before his forty-fifth birthday. The elder Gaye
will plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter, and receive
probation. Marvin Gaye was one of the most talented soul
singers of all time. Unlike most soul greats, Gaye’s
artistic inclinations evolved over the course of three
decades, moving from hard-driving soul-pop to funk and
dance grooves.

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

KRLemmons African American History

March 31 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – March 31 *

1850 – The Massachusetts Supreme Court rejects the argument of
Charles Sumner in the Boston school integration suit and
established the “separate but equal” precedent.

1853 – At concert singer Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield’s New York
debut in Metropolitan Hall, African Americans are not
allowed to attend. Angered and embarrassed at the exclusion
of her race, Greenfield will perform in a separate concert
at the Broadway Tabernacle for five African American
congregations.

1871 – John Arthur “Jack” Johnson is born in Galveston, Texas. He
will become a professional boxer and will become the first
African American to be crowned world heavyweight boxing
champion. His championship reign will last from 1908 to 1915.
He will join the ancestors on June 10, 1946 after succumbing
to injuries from an automobile accident. He will be inducted
into the Boxing Hall of Fame in 1954, and is on the roster of
both the International Boxing Hall of Fame and the World
Boxing Hall of Fame. In 2005, the United States National Film
Preservation Board deemed the film of the 1910 Johnson-
Jeffries fight “historically significant” and will place it
in the National Film Registry.

1930 – President Hoover nominates Judge John J. Parker of North
Carolina for a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court. The NAACP
launches a national campaign against the appointment. Parker
is not confirmed by the Senate.

1948 – A. Phillip Randolph tells the Senate Armed Services Committee
that unless segregation and discrimination were banned in
draft programs he would urge African American youths to
resist induction by civil disobedience.

1949 – William Grant Still’s opera, “Troubled Island” receives its
world premiere at the New York City Opera. In addition to
marking Robert McFerrin’s debut as the first African American
male to sing with the company, the opera is the first ever
written by an African American to be produced by a major
opera company.

1967 – Jimi Hendrix begins the tradition of burning his guitar in
London, England.

1968 – The provisional government of the Republic of New Africa is
founded in Detroit, Michigan.

1973 – Ken Norton defeats Muhammad Ali in a 12 round split decision
in San Diego, California. Norton will break Ali’s jaw
during the bout.

1980 – Jesse Owens joins the ancestors in Tucson, Arizona at the age
of 66, and President Jimmy Carter adds his voice to the
tributes that pour in from around the world. Jesse won four
gold medals in track at the Berlin Olympics in 1936.

1980 – Larry Holmes wins the vacant world heavyweight title by
knocking out Leroy Jones in the eighth round.

1988 – Toni Morrison wins the Pulitzer Prize for “Beloved,” a
powerful novel of a runaway slave who murders her daughter
rather than see her raised in slavery.

1995 – President Bill Clinton briefly visits Haiti, where he
declares the U.S. mission to restore democracy there a
“remarkable success.”

1999 – Four New York City police officers are charged with murder
for killing Amadou Diallo, an unarmed African immigrant, in
a hail of bullets. They shot at him 41 times, hitting him
with 19 shots. The officers will later be acquitted of all
charges, even involuntary manslaughter.

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

KRLemmons African American History

March 30 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – March 30 *

1869 – The 15th Amendment to the Constitution is ratified, which
guarantees men, the right to vote regardless of “race, color
or previous condition of servitude.” Despite ratification
of the amendment, it will be almost 100 years before African
Americans become “universally” enfranchised. Editor’s Note:
The entire African American population of Washington DC
(approximately 300,000+ of the 550,000+ people who live
there) is still constitutionally denied any voting rights or
self-government in the United States. This is a gaping
exception to a so-called “universal” practice.

1923 – Zeta Phi Beta sorority is incorporated. It was founded on
January 16, 1920 at Howard University in Washington, DC.

1941 – The National Urban League presents a one-hour program over a
national radio network and urges equal participation for
blacks in the national defense program.

1946 – “St. Louis Woman” opens on Broadway. Based on a book by Arna
Bontemps and Countee Cullen from Bontemps’s novel “God Sends
Sunday,” the play brought wide attention to supporting
actress Pearl Bailey, who stopped the show nightly with her
renditions of “Legalize My Name” and “A Woman’s
Prerogative.”

1948 – Naomi Sims is born in Oxford, Mississippi. She will become a
trailblazing fashion model and founder of a beauty company
that will bear her name.

1960 – Eighteen students are suspended by Southern University for
participating in civil rights demonstrations. Southern
University students will rebel on March 31, boycotting
classes and requesting withdrawal slips. The rebellion will
collapse after the death of a professor from a heart attack.

1963 – Air Force Capt. Edward J. Dwight, Jr. is named to the fourth
class of aerospace research pilots at Edwards Air Force
Base, becoming the first African American candidate for
astronaut training. He will be dropped from the program in
1965.

1963 – Stanley Kirk Burrell is born in Oakland, California. He will
become a rapper known as “M.C. Hammer” and will come out in
1988 with the album, “Let’s Get It Started. He will be best
known for his hit, “U Can’t Touch This.”

1995 – Tens of thousands of Rwandan refugees, fleeing violence in
Burundi, begin a two-day trek to sanctuary in Tanzania.

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

KRLemmons African American History

March 29 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – March 29 *

1918 – Pearl Mae Bailey is born in Newport News, Virginia. She will
achieve tremendous success as a stage and film actress,
recording artist, nightclub headliner, and television
performer. Among her most notable movies will be “Porgy and
Bess” and “Carmen Jones” and she will receive a Tony Award
for her starring role in an all-African-American version of
“Hello Dolly.” Bailey will be widely honored, including
being named special advisor to the U.S. Mission to the
United Nations and receiving the Presidential Medal of
Freedom. She will join the ancestors on August 17, 1990.

1940 – Joe Louis knocks out Johnny Paycheck to retain his
heavyweight boxing title.

1945 – Walt Frazier is born in Atlanta, Georgia. He will become a
basketball player and, as a guard for the New York Knicks,
lead his team to NBA championships in 1970 and 1973. He
will also earn the nickname “Clyde” (from the movie Bonnie
and Clyde) for his stylish wardrobe and flamboyant lifestyle
off the court. Frazier will score 15,581 points (18.9 ppg)
during his career, lead the Knicks in scoring five times,
dish out 5,040 assists (6.1 apg), and lead the Knicks in
assists 10 straight years. He will be elected to the
Basketball Hall of Fame in 1987.

1955 – Earl Christian Campbell is born in Tyler, Texas. He will
become a star football player at the University of Texas and
will amass 4,444 rushing yards in his college career. He
will win the 1977 Heisman Trophy and will go on to become a
first player taken in the 1978 NFL draft. As a star running
back for the Houston Oilers, he will become NFL rushing
champion, Player of Year, All-Pro, Pro Bowl choice in 1978,
1979, and 1980. His career-high will be 1,934 yards rushing,
including four 200-yard rushing games in 1980. His career
statistics will be: 9,407 yards, 74 TDs rushing, 121
receptions for 806 yards and five Pro Bowls. He will retire
after nine seasons and will be enshrined in the Pro Football
Hall of Fame in 1991.

1959 – Barthelemy Boganda, president and founder of the Central
African Republic, joins the ancestors in a plane crash.

1968 – Students seize building on the campus of Bowie State College
in Bowie, Maryland.

1990 – Houston’s Hakeem Olajuwan scores the 3rd NBA quadruple double
consisting of 18 points, 16 rebounds, 10 assists & 11
blocked shots vs the Milwaukee Bucks.

2005 – Johnnie L. Cochran, whose legal career representing both
victims of police abuse and celebrities in peril reached its
peak under media scrutiny when he successfully defended O.J.
Simpson from murder charges, joins the ancestors after
succumbing to brain cancer, at the age of 67.

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

KRLemmons African American History

March 28 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – March 28 *

1870 – Jonathan S. Wright becomes the first African American State
Supreme Court Justice in South Carolina.

1925 – Sculptor Edward N. Wilson, Jr. is born in Baltimore,
Maryland. He will study at the University of Iowa,
receive sculpture awards from the Carnegie Foundation,
Howard University and the State University of New York, and
will have his work shown at “Two Centuries of Black
American Art,” and other exhibitions. Among his major works
will be “Cybele.” His stainless steel and bronze Portrait
of Ralph Ellison (1974-1975, Ralph Ellison Library,
Oklahoma) commemorates the author of “The Invisible Man”
(1952), who will inspire him during the civil rights
movement. He will join the ancestors on November 26, 1996
in Vestal, New York.

1939 – The Renaissance (Big 5) becomes the first African American
team on record to win a professional world championship
(basketball).

1958 – William Christopher (W.C.) Handy joins the ancestors in New
York City at the age of 85. In the same year, the movie of
his life, “St. Louis Blues” is released, starring Nat King
Cole as Handy.

1966 – Bill Russell is named head coach of the Boston Celtics and
becomes the first African American to coach an NBA team.

1984 – Educator and civil rights activist Benjamin Mays joins the
ancestors in Atlanta, Georgia. Mays had served as dean of
the School of Religion at Howard University and president of
Morehouse College, where he served as the mentor to the
young Martin Luther King, Jr.

1990 – Michael Jordan scores 69 points in a NBA game. This the 4th
time he scores 60 points or more in a game.

1990 – President Bush posthumously awards the Congressional Gold
Medal to Jesse Owens and presents it to his widow ten years
after he joins the ancestors. In 1936, Jesse Owens won four
Olympic Track and Field gold medals in a single day in
Berlin. The 1936 Berlin Olympics, the last Olympic Games
before the outbreak of WWII, were hosted by the Nazi
Germans, who intended the event as a showcase of their
racist theories of the superiority of the “Aryan” race.
But a 23-year-old African American named Jesse Owens
shattered their plans, along with several world records,
when he dashed to victory in the 100-meter and 200-meter
sprints, anchored the victorious 400-meter relay team, and
won the broad jump. President George Bush adds the
Congressional Gold Medal to Owens’s collection. Congress had
voted the award in recognition of Owens’s humanitarian
contributions. After his athletic career, he had devoted
his energy and his name to organizations providing
opportunities to underprivileged youth.

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

KRLemmons African American History

March 27 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – March 27 *

1867 – African American demonstrators in Charleston, South Carolina
stage ride-ins on streetcars. On May 1, the Charleston City
Railway Company will adopt a resolution guaranteeing the right
of all persons to ride in streetcars.

1872 – Cleveland Luca, a musician, member of the famous musical Luca
Family Quartet and composer of the Liberian National Anthem,
joins the ancestors in Liberia.

1924 – Sarah Vaughan is born in Newark, New Jersey. On a dare, she
will enter a 1943 amateur contest at the Apollo Theatre in
Harlem and be hired by Earl “Fatha” Hines as a result of her
performance. She will begin recording in 1945, be considered
one of the finest jazz vocalists, and earn the nickname “The
Divine One.” She will join the ancestors on April 3, 1990.

1934 – Arthur Mitchell is born in New York City. The first male
recipient of the dance award from the High School of
Performing Arts in 1951, he will be the first African American
dancer to become a principal artist in the New York City
Ballet Company and will found the highly influential Dance
Theatre of Harlem in 1969. He will be recognized as a MacArthur
Fellow and inducted into the National Museum of Dance’s Mr. &
Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney Hall of Fame. He will also
receive the United States National Medal of Arts and a Fletcher
Foundation fellowship.

1969 – The Black Academy of Arts and Letters is founded at a meeting
in Boston, Massachusetts. Dr. C. Eric Lincoln, professor of
religion and sociology at Union Theological Seminary, is
elected president of the organization.

1972 – Fleeta Drumgo and John Cluchette are acquitted by an all-white
jury of the murder of a white guard at Soledad prison. George
Jackson, the third “Soledad Brother,” is killed in the alleged
escape attempt.

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