Tag: African American History

* Today in Black History – July 18 *

1753 – Lemuel Haynes, colonial American Congregational clergyman,
is born in West Hartford, Connecticut. He will be
abandoned at five months old by his African father and
Anglo mother. He will be indentured to a white family in
Massachusetts. When he becomes a free man at age 21 in
1774, one of his first choices is to join freedom’s cause
and serve in a military unit from Connecticut. He will
not only fight on the battlefield, but will write about
freedom in poems and essays. He will be inspired by the
Declaration of Independence, and in 1776 will write an
essay about the need to extend freedom to Africans. His
essay is called, “Liberty Further Extended.” After the
American Revolutionary War, he will study Latin, Greek
and theology, and will be licensed to preach in 1780. In
1785, he will be ordained to a church in Torrington,
Connecticut, making him the first African American to
pastor a white congregation. He also will become the
first African American to receive an honorary degree
(M.A.) from a White college (Middlebury College), in 1804
at its second commencement. He will serve as pastor in
Bennington, Manchester, and Granville, New York, until he
joins the ancestors on September 28, 1833 at the age of
eighty.

1863 – The 54th Massachusetts Volunteers charge Fort Wagner in
Charleston, South Carolina. Although the Union forces
suffer great losses, Sergeant William H. Carney of Company
C exhibits bravery in battle by maintaining the colors
high despite three bullet wounds. Although cited for
bravery, it will take 37 years for Carney to receive the
Congressional Medal of Honor for his actions.

1899 – Patent number 629,286 is issued to L.C. Bailey for a
folding bed.

1905 – Granville T. Woods patents railway brakes.

1918 – Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela is born near Umtata in Transkei,
South Africa in the Eastern Cape, into the royal family
of the Tembu, a Xhosa-speaking tribe. His father is Chief
Henry Mandela. He will be educated at University College
of Fort Hare and the University of Witwatersrand and
qualifies to practice law in 1942. He will join the
African National Congress in 1944 and engage in resistance
against the ruling National Party’s apartheid policies
after 1948. He will go on trial for treason in 1956-1961
and be acquitted in 1961. After the banning of the ANC in
1960, he will argue for the setting up of a military wing
within the ANC. In June 1961, the ANC executive will
consider his proposal on the use of violent tactics and
agree that those members who wished to involve themselves
in his campaign would not be stopped from doing so by the
ANC. This will lead to the formation of Umkhonto we Sizwe.
He will be arrested in 1962 and sentenced to five years’
imprisonment with hard labor. In 1963, when many fellow
leaders of the ANC and the Umkhonto we Sizwe are arrested,
he will be brought to stand trial with them for plotting
to overthrow the government by violence. His statement
from the dock will receive considerable international
publicity. On June 12, 1964, he is among eight accused,
that will be sentenced to life imprisonment. From 1964 to
1982, he will be incarcerated at Robben Island Prison, off
the shore from Cape Town; thereafter, he will be at
Pollsmoor Prison, nearby on the mainland. He will be
released on February 11, 1990. After his release, he will
plunge himself wholeheartedly into his life’s work,
striving to attain the goals he and others had set out
almost four decades earlier. In 1991, at the first
national conference of the ANC held inside South Africa
after the organization had been banned in 1960, Mandela
will be elected President of the ANC while his lifelong
friend and colleague, Oliver Tambo, will become the
organization’s National Chairperson. He will become the
first Black African President of South Africa on May 10,
1994 (Inauguration Date) and serve until June 14, 1999.
He will join the ancestors on December 5, 2013.

1941 – Martha Reeves is born in Eufaula, Alabama. Her family will
move to Detroit, Michigan before her first birthday. As a
child, she will sing in her grandfather’s church and in
school, and continue her vocal training through high school.
After graduating in 1959, she will join a girl group called
the Fascinations, and the following year co-founds the
Del-Phis, whose membership will include the future
Vandellas. In 1961, she will win a talent contest as a solo
act and get a nightclub engagement performing as Martha
LaVaille. There she will be noticed by Motown executive
William “Mickey” Stevenson, who will invite her to stop by
the label’s offices. She will not land an audition right
away, but will parlay her visit into a secretarial job in
the A&R department. She will catch a lucky break when backup
singers are needed for a recording session, and the Del-Phis
will wind up supporting Marvin Gaye on his first hit, 1962’s
“Stubborn Kind of Fellow.” Stevenson will be impressed
enough to record a Del-Phis (renamed the Vels) single,
“You’ll Never Cherish a Love So True (‘Til You Lose It),”
and release it on Motown’s Mel-O-Dy subsidiary. One day,
Mary Wells fails to show up for a recording session, and
musicians’ union rules demand that a lead vocalist be
present on the microphone — so she will be hastily tapped
to sing “I’ll Have to Let Him Go.” That song will become
the first single credited to the newly renamed Martha & the
Vandellas in 1963. Their second single, the ballad “Come
and Get These Memories,” will reach the Rhythm & Blues Top
Five. Martha & the Vandellas will rack up an impressive
slate of Motown classics that will include the Top Five
smashes “(Love Is Like A) Heat Wave” and “Dancing in the
Street,” plus “Nowhere to Run,” “I’m Ready for Love,”
“Jimmy Mack,” and “Honey Chile,” all of which will make the
Rhythm & Blues Top Five. Martha & the Vandellas’ run of
success will continue through 1967. They will continue to
perform and record for several more years, but will never
match their past success and will disband in December 1972
after a farewell concert in Detroit. She will eventually
leave Motown and record for other labels with minimal
success. In 1989, she will reunite with original Vandellas
Annette Sterling and Rosalind Holmes and cut the single
“Step Into My Shoes” for British producer Ian Levine’s
Motor City label. However, she will continue to make her
primary living on the nostalgia circuit. She will be
inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995.

1951 – Jersey Joe Walcott, at age 37, becomes oldest boxer to date,
to win the World Heavyweight Championship knocking out
Ezzard Charles in five rounds.

1959 – William Wright becomes the first African American to win a
a USGA title, the U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship.
He is 23 and a senior at Western Washington University.

1964 – Racially motivated disturbances occur in Harlem in New York
City. The civil unrest will last until July 22 and will
spread into the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn.

1970 – Willie Mays gets his 3,000th base hit.

1998 – The “Spirit of Freedom Memorial” and “Theme Park” is
unveiled in Washington, DC to honor the U. S. Colored
Troops, who fought in the U.S. Civil War.walmart.com

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

* Today in Black History – July 14 *

1798 – The first direct federal tax on the states is enacted — on
dwellings, land & slaves.

1848 – Walter ‘Wiley’ Jones is born a slave in Madison county, Georgia.
He will become a barber after the Civil War. He will establish
the first streetcar system in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, the
Wiley Jones Street Car Line, in 1886. He will invest his
income wisely and by 1890, he will be estimated to be worth
$300,000. He will own real estate, a large general store, a
popular saloon, a race track, and a horse stable “of the
finest trotters in the South.” Each day, hundreds of Pine
Bluff residents will ride the six-mile-long Jones Street
Car Line. Conductors in neat uniforms with distinctive caps
will assist riders and collect fares. He will join the
ancestors on December 7, 1904 after succumbing to a heart
attack and Bright’s disease. At the time of his transition,
he will be the richest African American in Arkansas.

1876 – Sarah A. Dicket opens a seminary for African American girls
in Mississippi.

1888 – The “Indianapolis Freeman”, the nation’s first illustrated
African American newspaper, is founded by Edward Cooper. It
will be subsidized by the Republican Party for some of its
existence and will enjoy a large circulation because of its
news coverage’s variety and scope and its attention to
Black culture. In the 1890s, the Freeman will acquire a
reputation as the country’s leading black journal. Black
press historian, I. Penn Garland, will call it “The
Harper’s Weekly of the colored race.” During WWI, the
paper will editorialize on the hypocrisy of a nation
fighting a war to save democracy at the same time it
tolerates blatant racism in its laws and institutions. The
Freeman also will cover extensively the wartime
achievements of Black Hoosiers. In the 1920s, the Freeman
will experience economic problems and subsequently fold in
1927.

1891 – J. Standard is awarded a patent for the refrigerator.

1893 – Spencer Williams is born in Vidalia, Louisiana. After
serving in the U.S. Army, he will become a writer for a
series of African American films being produced by an
affiliate of Paramount Pictures. This will lead to a career
in Hollywood. He will appear in some of the early African
American talking movies including “The Lady Fare,” “Oft in
the Silly Night,” and Music Has Charms.” “He will produce
“Hot Biscuits,” “Bronze Buckaroo,” and “Harlem Rides the
Range.” He will write, direct, and star in “The Blood of
Jesus” and “Juke Joint. He will star as Andy in the
television production of “Amos ‘n’ Andy,” a role for which
he is best remembered. He will join the ancestors on
December 13, 1969.

1895 – J.B. Allen receives a patent for a clothes line support.

1914 – Dr. Kenneth Bancroft Clark is born in the Canal Zone, Panama.
He will become a noted psychologist who will co-found the
Northside Center for Child Development in New York City in
March, 1946 with his wife, Dr. Mamie Phipps Clark. Their
pioneering research on the psychological damage to African
American children caused by segregation will be used as
part of the basis for the “Brown vs. Board of Education”
school desegregation decision of the Supreme Court. In
1996, exactly fifty years after its founding, a history of
Northside Center will be published by The University Press
of Virginia. “Children, Race, and Power, Kenneth and Mamie
Clark’s Northside Center,” by Gerald Markowitz and David
Rosner, will tell the fascinating story of how Northside
began, survived, and exerted its influence, during a
formative time in our country’s history. He will join the
ancestors on May 1, 2005. The Northside Center will
celebrate sixty years of excellence in June, 2006.

1932 – Roosevelt “Rosey” Grier is born in Cuthbert, Georgia. He
will become a professional football player and will play
for the New York Giants and Los Angeles Rams. After
retiring from football in 1968, he will become an movie
actor. His film credits will include “Roots-The Next
Generations,” “Reggie’s Prayers,” “The Sophisticated
Gents,” “The Glove,” “The Seekers,” “The Timber Tramps,”
“The Treasure of Jamaica Reef,” “The Thing with Two
Heads,” “The Desperate Mission,” “Black Brigade,” “The Big
Push,” and “A Second Chance.” He will also become a singer
who will perform in Carnegie Hall, the author of “Needle-
Point for Men” and “Rosey: The Gentle Giant” and an
ordained minister. He will enter history when he apprehends
Sirhan Sirhan after the assassin shoots Bobby Kennedy.

1934 – Robert Lee Elder is born in Dallas, Texas. He will be
introduced to the game of golf as a caddie when he was a
teenager in southern California. After serving in the Army
on a golf team, he will become an active player on the
United Golf Association Tour. He will dominate the tour,
capturing titles in 1963, 1964, 1966, and 1967. In 1967,
he will become the second African American to qualify and
play in the previously whites-only Professional Golfer’s
Association (PGA). His achievements will include being the
first African American to be invited and play in the South
African Open (1971), the first African American to qualify
for the Ryder Cup Team (1979) and the first African
American to play in the Masters Tournament (1975). Among
his victories will be The Monsanto Open (1974) and The
Houston Open (1976). He will join the Senior PGA Tour in
1984 and retire from golf in 2005.

1943 – Julius Bledsoe joins the ancestors in Hollywood, California.
He was an important stage and film actor whose roles in
“Deep River”, “In Abraham’s Bosom”, and the stage and film
versions of “Showboat” won him wide acclaim.

1951 – The George W. Carver National Monument is dedicated in
Joplin, Missouri. This is the first national monument to
honor an African American.

1968 – Hank Aaron hit his 500th career home run in Atlanta, Georgia
leading the Braves to a 4-2 win over the San Francisco
Giants. (In April of 1974, Hammerin’ Hank will eclipse the
old home run mark of 714 held by Babe Ruth.)

1972 – Former New York State Senator Basil A. Paterson is elected
vice-chairman of the Democratic National Committee, the
first African American to hold a leadership position in a
national political party.

1990 – Ernie Singleton is named president of MCA Records’ Black
Music Division. As president, Singleton oversees the
day-to-day activities of the division and the company’s
artist roster that includes Bobby Brown, Heavy D. & the
Boyz, Gladys Knight, and Patti LaBelle. He, along with
Jheryl Busby, president of Motown Records Company, Sylvia
Rhone, president of Atco EastWest Records, and Ed Eckstine,
president of Mercury Records, are the highest ranking
African Americans in the mainstream record business.

1994 – A tidal wave of Hutu refugees from Rwanda’s civil war floods
across the border into Zaire, swamping relief organizations.

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

* Today in Black History – July 13 *

1787 – The Continental Congress passes the Northwest Ordinance,
which, in addition to providing for a government and
civil liberties for the new territory, excludes slavery
northwest of the Ohio River except as punishment for a
crime.

1863 – Over 1,200 people, mostly African Americans, are killed in
anti-draft rioting in New York City. Rioting begins, in
part, when poor whites revolt against military service
exemptions that allow for a payment of $ 300 in lieu of
being drafted, a price that they cannot afford. The
“Draft Riots” also reflect a growing hostility toward
African Americans, who are seen as the cause of the war.

1868 – Oscar J. Dunn, a former slave, is installed as Lieutenant
Governor of Louisiana.

1919 – Race riots break out in Longview & Gregg counties in Texas.

1928 – Robert N.C. Nix, Jr. is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
In 1971, he will be the first African American to serve on
the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and, in 1984, the first
African American chief justice of a state supreme court.
Chief Justice Nix will be further honored when he is named
president of the Conference of Chief Justices, a national
organization of judges and justices in the U.S. He will
join the ancestors on August 23, 2003.

1948 – Daphne Maxwell (later Reid) is born in Manhattan, New York.
While pursuing a major in Interior Design and Architecture
at Northwestern University, an English teacher from her
high school will submit her photograph to a magazine editor
and friend who was preparing an article on college women.
The result will be a trip to New York and her first full-
page photograph in Seventeen magazine. Quickly signed by
the Eileen Ford Agency, she will appear in many magazines,
and will also become the first Afican American woman to
grace the cover of Glamour magazine. She will transition
into the acting field. She will have the opportunity to
audition for a part in the series “The Duke” starring
Robert Conrad, who will promise her a continuing role, and
keep his word. In 1979, she will go to Los Angeles where
she will continue to work with Robert Conrad, who enlists
her as the villainess in his series, “A Man Called Sloane,”
and subsequently her first movie of the week, “The Coach of
the Year.” She will meet her husband, Tim Reid, who she had
previously known in Chicago. She is most widely recognized
for her role as Aunt Viv on NBC’s hit comedy “The Fresh
Prince of Bel Air.” She is also known for her role on the
CBS comedy series “Frank’s Place,” in which she co-starred
with her husband, Tim. The couple will team up again when
she stars as Mickie Dennis on CBS’ “Snoops,” and also on
the King World syndicated talk show, “The Tim and Daphne
Show” for 76 1-hour episodes. She will also star as Eartha
on the Showtime series, “Linc’s.” She and Tim will
establish New Millennium Studios in Petersburg, Virginia
in 1997. It will be Virginia’s only full-service film
production studio.

1954 – David Thompson is born in Boiling Springs, North Carolina.
He will become a college and professional all-star
basketball player. At North Carolina State in the mid-1970s,
he will be a three-time All-American and two-time College
Player of the Year. It was he who popularized the
“alley-oop.” He will bring his explosive game to the
professional level in 1975 when he is drafted by both the
NBA’s Atlanta Hawks and the ABA’s Virginia Squires. He will
opt for the ABA with the Denver Nuggets, who acquire his
rights in a trade with the Virginia Squires. In the first of
nine professional seasons (Denver Nuggets 1975-82, Seattle
Supersonics 1982-84), he will average 26.0 points per game,
be chosen MVP in the ABA All-Star Game and the ABA’s Rookie
of the Year. He will enjoy similar success in the NBA. He
will be a four-time NBA All-Star and win the MVP Award in
the 1979 All-Star Game. A two-time First Team All-NBA
selection in 1977 and 1978, he will average 22.1 ppg in the
regular season and 22.9 ppg in the playoffs during his NBA
career. His prolific scoring career will be remembered most
for the 73-point outburst he had in the final game of the
1978 season. In what will be the closest race for the NBA
scoring title, his outburst (third highest in NBA history)
will leave him just .06 points behind George Gervin. The
Denver Nuggets will honor him for his career achievements
when they retire his number 33 jersey on Nov. 12, 1992.

1963 – Anthony Jerome “Spud” Webb is born in Dallas, Texas. He will
become one of the shortest players in NBA history but with
a vertical jump of 44″ (112 cm). Webb is most famous for
his performance in the 1986 NBA Slam Dunk Contest. He will
surprise teammate and defending dunk champion Dominique
Wilkins by entering the contest. He made history that day
not only because of his size, but also because he will win
by defeating Wilkins with 2 perfect 50 scores in the final
round. He is the shortest player ever to have competed in
the NBA Slam Dunk competition. He will play most of his NBA
career with the Atlanta Hawks, but will also have stints
with the Sacramento Kings, Minnesota Timberwolves and
Orlando Magic. He will retire from basketball in 1998 with a
9.9 points per game average over his 12 year NBA career. He,
along with Greg Grant and Keith Jennings, is the third-
shortest player in NBA history. Only Earl Boykins (5’5″) and
Muggsy Bogues (5’3″) are shorter.

1965 – Thurgood Marshall, an Appeals Court judge for three years,
is appointed Solicitor General of the United States, the
first African American to hold the office.

1985 – Arthur Ashe, the first African American male to win
Wimbledon, is inducted into the International Tennis Hall
of Fame.

1985 – The first “Live Aid”, an international rock concert in
London, Philadelphia, Moscow and Sydney, takes place to
raise money for Africa’s starving people. Over $70
million is collected for African famine relief.

1998 – A jury in Poughkeepsie, New York, rules that the Rev. Al
Sharpton and two others had defamed a former prosecutor
by accusing him of raping Tawana Brawley.

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

* Today in Black History – July 12 *

1864 – George Washington Carver, African American botanist is born
in Diamond Grove, Missouri. He will receive a B.S. from
the Iowa Agricultural College in 1894 and a M.S. in 1896.
He will become a member of the faculty of Iowa State
College of Agriculture and Mechanics in charge of the
school’s bacterial laboratory work in the Systematic Botany
department. His work with agricultural products develops
industrial applications from farm products, called chemurgy
in technical literature in the early 1900s. His research
will develop 325 products from peanuts, 108 applications
for sweet potatoes, and 75 products derived from pecans. He
will move to Tuskegee, Alabama in 1896 to accept a position
as an instructor at the Tuskegee Institute of Technology
and remain on the faculty until he joins the ancestors on
January 5, 1943. His work in developing industrial
applications from agricultural products will derive 118
products, including a rubber substitute and over 500 dyes
and pigments from 28 different plants. He will receive the
Spingarn Medal from the NAACP in 1923. He will be
responsible for the invention in 1927 of a process for
producing paints and stains from soybeans, for which three
separate patents were issued. George Washington Carver will
be bestowed with an honorary doctorate from Simpson College
in 1928. He will be made a member of the Royal Society of
Arts in London, England. Dr. Carver will be honored by U.S.
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt on July 14, 1943 when
$30,000 is committed for a national monument to be
dedicated to his accomplishments. The area of Carver’s
childhood near Diamond Grove, Missouri will be preserved as
a park, with a bust of the agricultural researcher,
instructor, and chemical investigator. This park will be
the first national monument dedicated to an African
American in the United States. He will be inducted
posthumously into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in
1990.

1887 – Mound Bayou, an all African American town in Mississippi, is
founded by Isaiah Montgomery.

1936 – Actress Rose McClendon joins the ancestors after succumbing
to pneumonia in New York City. A student at the American
Academy of Dramatic Art in Carnegie Hall, McClendon won
fame for her roles in the plays “Deep River”, “In Abraham’s
Bosom”, and “Porgy.” She also founded, with Dick Campbell,
the Negro People’s Theater and with Campbell and Muriel
Rahn, the Rose McClendon Players.

1936 – Cornelius Johnson sets the world record in the high jump.

1937 – William Henry “Bill” Cosby is born in Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania. He will become one of the most popular African
American entertainers, first in comedy, where his albums
will earn him five Grammy awards, then in Las Vegas and
elsewhere. He will later star in the television series “I
Spy”, which will be the first of several successful
television series. These series will include “The Bill Cosby
Show,” “The New Bill Cosby Show,” and “The Cosby Show.” “The
Cosby Show” will hold the number one rating for three years.
He will also author numerous books, including “Fatherhood,”
and “Love and Marriage.” His successes will reward him with
financial success and he will become a leading
philanthropist.

1944 – Donna Denise Nicholas is born in Detroit, Michigan. After
graduating from the University of Michigan, she will become
an actress starring in “Room 222” as Liz McIntyre, “In the
Heat of the Night” as Harriet DeLong, “Baby, I’m Back”, and
“Ghost Dad.” After appearing in a variety of televion shows
from the 1960s through the 2000s, she will write her first
novel, “Freshwater Road,” published by Agate Publishing in
August, 2005.

1949 – Frederick M. Jones patents an air conditioning unit.

1951 – Governor Adlai Stevenson, calls out the Illinois National
Guard to stop rioting in Cicero, Illinois. A mob of 3,500
racists try to keep an African American family from moving
into the all-white city.

1958 – “Yakety Yak”, by The Coasters, becomes the number one song
in the country, according to “Billboard” magazine. It is
the first stereo record to reach the top of the chart.

1959 – Rolonda Watts is born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She
will become an African American actress and television
talk show host. She will be the host of “The Rolonda Show,”
a syndicated talk show that will run for four seasons
during the 1990s.

1960 – Congo, Chad & The Central African Republic declare their
independence.

1963 – Maryland National Guard troops impose limited martial law in
Cambridge, Maryland after open confrontations between civil
rights demonstrators and white segregationists.

1966 – A racially motivated disturbance begins in the city of
Chicago, prompting the governor to call in the Illinois
National Guard.

1967 – Five days of racially motivated disturbances begin in Newark,
New Jersey. Over twenty three persons are killed. The
racial uprising involves ten of the city’s twenty-three
square miles. More than 1,500 persons are injured and 1,300
are arrested. Police report 300 fires. The Newark
rebellion, the worst outbreak of racial violence since the
Watts riots (in Los Angeles), spread to other New Jersey
communities, including New Brunswick, Englewood, Paterson,
Elizabeth, Palmyra, Passaic, and Plainfield. The New Jersey
National Guard is mobilized.

1975 – São Tomé and Príncipe declare independence from Portugal.

1979 – Minnie Ripperton, a singer best known for her recording of
“Lovin’ You,” joins the ancestors after succumbing to breast
cancer at the age of 32.

1980 – John W. Davis, civil rights activist and former president of
West Virginia State College, joins the ancestors in
Englewood, New Jersey at the age of 92.

1991 – “Boyz in the Hood”, a film written and directed by John
Singleton, premieres. A coming-of-age film set in gang-and-
violence-ridden South Central Los Angeles, its positive
message will earn Singleton critical acclaim and two Academy
Award nominations.

1992 – In an emotional farewell speech, Benjamin Hooks, outgoing
executive director of the NAACP, urges the group’s
convention in Nashville, Tennessee, to show the world that
it remains vital.

2001 – Abner Louima, the Haitian immigrant tortured in a New York
City police station, agrees to an $8.7 million settlement.

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

* Today in Black History – July 11 *

1836 – Antônio Carlos Gomes is born in Campinas, Brazil. He will
become the most distinguished nineteenth-century
Brazilian opera composer, who will also achieve
considerable success in Europe. Gomes will be the second
son of Fabiana Maria J. Cardoso and Manuel José Gomes, a
composer and bandleader born to a black freedwoman and
an unknown father. Manuel José also taught piano and
violin in Campinas and will introduce his two young sons
to the rudiments of music. Antônio Carlos will debut
publicly at the age of 11, playing the triangle in his
father’s orchestra in a ceremony honoring Emperor Pedro
II. He will study clarinet, violin, and piano, for which
he will compose his first pieces. His brother José Pedro
de Santana Gomes will study violin and viola and later
became Brazil’s most important late-nineteenth-century
violinist. In 1859 Antônio Carlos Gomes will enroll in
the Rio de Janeiro Conservatory of Music. He had already
composed his first mass (1854) and will soon be
commissioned to write a cantata by the conservatory’s
director, Francisco Manuel da Silva.The reigning master of
Brazilian opera, Antônio Carlos Gomes will achieve world
renown in 1870 when his opera Il Guarany premiers at La
Scala in Milan, Italy. Although he will adhere to the
conventions of mid-nineteenth-century Italian opera, he
will look to Afro-Brazilian themes for some of his operas
and instrumental works. Following the premiere of his
cantata The Last Hour at Calvary (1859), Gomes will be
appointed conductor at the Imperial Academy of Music and
National Opera. Gomes will write two operas Il Guarany
(1870) and Lo Schiavo (1889) which drew on Brazilian
subjects. In 1893 Gomes will tour the United States, where
he will conduct some of his works at Chicago’s Columbia
Universal Exhibition. Appointed to head the Conservatory
of Music in Belém, he will return to Brazil in 1895, but
will succumb to cancer three months after assuming the
directorship on September 16, 1896 in Belém, Brazil.

1905 – Niagara Movement meetings begin in Buffalo, New York.
Started by 29 intellectuals including W.E.B. Du Bois, the
Niagara Movement will renounce Booker T. Washington’s
accommodation policies set forth in his famed “Atlanta
Compromise” speech ten years earlier. The Niagara
Movement’s manifesto is, in the words of Du Bois, “We want
full manhood suffrage and we want it now….We are men!
We want to be treated as men. And we shall win.” The
movement will be a forerunner of the NAACP.

1915 – Mifflin Wistar Gibbs, a multitalented lawyer, politician,
and entrepreneur, joins the ancestors in Little Rock,
Arkansas. Active in the Underground Railroad, he worked
with Frederick Douglass and after success as a clothing
retailer, became the publisher and editor of “Mirror of
the Times,” the first African American newspaper in
California. The first African American elected a
municipal judge, Gibbs was also active in Republican
politics, serving as a delegate to national conventions
and as U.S. consul to Madagascar.

1925 – Mattiwilda Dobbs is born in Atlanta, Georgia. She will
become a coloratura (a soprano specializing in florid
ornamental trills & runs) in the 1950’s, making her
operatic debut at La Scala in Milan in 1953 and her U.S.
debut with the San Francisco Opera in 1955. She will
become the first African American to sing at La Scala and
the second African American woman to sing at the
Metropolitan Opera House in New York. Although Marian
Anderson, a Black opera singer from Pennsylvania, will
precede her to that stage in 1955, Dobbs will be the first
African American woman to be offered a long-term contract
by the Met. She will sing twenty-nine performances, in
six roles, over eight seasons. Following the example set
by African American performer and activist Paul Robeson,
she will refuse to perform for segregated audiences. In
Atlanta, she could perform in African American churches or
colleges, but she will not be able to perform for a large
integrated audience until the Atlanta City Auditorium is
desegregated in 1962, when she will be joined onstage and
given a key to the city by Mayor Ivan Allen Jr. It will be
the first of many performances in her home city. Before
the organization of the Atlanta Opera in 1985, she will
perform in operas produced and directed by the acclaimed
opera singer Blanche Thebom, and in 1974, she will sing at
the gala marking the inauguration of her nephew, Maynard
Jackson, as mayor of Atlanta. After retiring from the
stage, she will begin a teaching career at the University
of Texas, where she will be the first African American
artist on the faculty. She will spend the 1974-75 school
year as artist-in-residence at Spelman College, giving
recitals and teaching master classes. In 1979, Spelman
will award honorary doctorate degrees to both Dobbs and
Marian Anderson. She will continue her teaching career as
professor of voice at Howard University, in Washington,
D.C. She will serve on the board of the Metropolitan Opera
and on the National Endowment of the Arts Solo Recital
Panel. She will continue to give recitals until as late as
1990 before retiring to Arlington, Virginia. She will move
to a retirement center in Atlanta in 2013.

1931 – Thurston Theodore Harris is born in Indianapolis, Indiana.
He will become a rhythm and blues vocalist. He will be
best known for his recordings of “Little Bitty Pretty One,”
and “Over and Over.” He will join the ancestors in Pomona,
California after succumbing to a heart attack on April 14,
1990.

1948 – Earnest Lee “Ernie” Holmes is born in Jamestown, Texas. He
will become a professional football player and will be a
defensive tackle for the Pittsburgh Steelers. He will be
part of the “Steel Curtain” front four and help Pittsburgh
in winning Super Bowls IX and X. He will join the ancestors
after being killed in an automobile accident on January 17,
2008.

1950 – Patricia Eva “Bonnie” Pointer is born in Oakland, California.
She will become a singer and member of the vocal group,
The Pointer Sisters. The four sisters will begin their
career singing gospel music and will eventually debut in
1973 as a secular group recording for ABC/Blue Thumb
Records. In 1974, the Pointer Sisters will perform at the
Grand Ole Opry, becoming the first African American female
group to do so. They also will become the first African
American female group to be number one on Billboard’s
country and western chart. They will change to a trio in
1977 when sister Bonnie signs as a solo act with Motown
Records. The group will be best known for their hits
“Slow Hand” (1981), “What a Surprise” (1981), “Excited”
(1982), “I Need You” (1983), and the Grammy Award-winning
“Jump” (1983) and “Automatic” (1984).

1953 – Leon Spinks is born in St. Louis, Missouri. He will win the
Olympic Light Heavyweight Gold Medal in 1976 and go on to
become a professional boxer. He will win his first nine
professional bouts, becoming the World Heavyweight Champion,
defeating Muhammad Ali. After losing to Ali in a rematch,
his career will decline and he will not be able to duplicate
his earlier successes.

1954 – The first White Citizens Council organizes in Indianola,
Mississippi. Reminiscent of the end of Reconstruction, the
Klan, the White Citizens’ Council, and other White
supremacist groups will attempt to prevent any further
progress in the civil rights movement.

1958 – Daisy Bates and the Little Rock Nine, African-American youths
who desegregated Central High School in Little Rock,
Arkansas, receive the Spingarn Medal for their “heroism and
pioneering roles in upholding the basic ideals of American
democracy in the face of continuing harassment and constant
threats of bodily injury.”

1960 – Ivory Coast, Dahomey, Upper Volta & Niger declare
independence from their European colonial rulers.

1977 – The Medal of Freedom is awarded posthumously to Rev. Martin
Luther King, Jr. in a White House ceremony.

1987 – Bo Jackson signs a $7.4 million contract to play football
for the Los Angeles Raiders for five years. Jackson becomes
a two-sport player as he continues to play baseball with
the Kansas City Royals.

1992 – Undeclared presidential hopeful Ross Perot, addressing the
NAACP convention in Nashville, Tennessee, startles and
offends his listeners by referring to the predominantly
African American audience as “you people.”

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

* Today in Black History – July 10 *

1775 – General Horatio Gates, George Washington’s adjutant
general issues an order excluding African Americans from
serving in the Continental Army.

1875 – Mary McLeod Bethune is born in Mayesville, South Carolina.
She will become a noted educator and founder of Daytona
Normal and Industrial Institute in Daytona Beach, Florida
in 1904 (now Bethune-Cookman College). With the help of
benefactors, she will attend college hoping to become a
missionary in Africa. When that did not materialize, she
will establish a school for African American girls in
Daytona Beach, Florida. From six students it will grow
and merge with an institute for African American boys and
eventually became the Bethune-Cookman School. Its quality
far surpassed the standards of education for African
American students, and rivaled those of schools for white
students. She will work tirelessly to ensure funding for
the school, and use it as a showcase for tourists and
donors, to exhibit what educated African Americans could
do. She will be president of the college from 1923 to 1942
and 1946 to 1947, one of the few women in the world who
will serve as a college president at that time. She will
also be active in women’s clubs, and her leadership in
them will allow her to become nationally prominent. She
will work for the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt in
1932, and become a member of Roosevelt’s “Black Cabinet,”
sharing the concerns of Black people with the Roosevelt
administration while spreading Roosevelt’s message to
Blacks, who had been traditionally Republican voters. Upon
her ascension to the ancestors on May 18, 1955, columnist
Louis E. Martin will say, “She gave out faith and hope as
if they were pills and she some sort of doctor.” Her home
in Daytona Beach will become a National Historic Landmark,
and her house in Washington, D.C., in Logan Circle, will
be preserved by the National Park Service as a National
Historic Site. A stature will be placed in Lincoln Park
in Washington, D.C.

1927 – David Norman Dinkins is born in Trenton, New Jersey. He
will move as a child to Harlem. He will serve as a marine
during World War II and will attend and graduate from
Howard University after the war. He will receive his law
degree from Brooklyn Law School in 1956. He was in private
practice until 1975, even though he was active in politics
and held some office. He began full time elective office
in New York City that year and held the offices of City
Clerk and Manhattan Borough President. In 1989 he will be
elected as the first African American mayor of the city of
New York, defeating three-time mayor Ed Koch. He will
serve one term, being defeated in 1993 by Rudolph Giuliani.

1936 – Billie Holiday records “Billie’s Blues” for Okeh Records in
New York. Bunny Berigan, Artie Shaw and Cozy Cole supported
Holiday, instrumentally, on the track.

1941 – Ferdinand “Jelly Roll” Morton joins the ancestors in Los
Angeles, California at age 56. The innovative piano
soloist, composer, and arranger claims to have invented
jazz and makes a series of recordings for the Library of
Congress that immortalizes his style. Fifty years after
his death, playwright George C. Wolfe will present a well-
regarded play on Morton’s life, “Jelly’s Last Jam.”

1943 – Arthur Ashe is born in Richmond, Virginia. He will become a
professional tennis player winning 33 career titles. In
winning his titles, he will become the first African
American male to win Wimbledon (1975) and the U.S. Open
(1968) and will be the first African American enshrined in
the International Tennis Hall of Fame. He will also be the
author of “A Hard Road to Glory: A History of the African-
American Athlete,” and “Days of Grace.” During a second
heart surgery in 1983, it is likely that he was given blood
tainted with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which
causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). After
acknowledging his disease, he became an active fundraiser
and speaker on behalf of AIDS research. He will join the
ancestors on February 6, 1993.

1945 – Ronald E. ‘Ron’ Glass is born in Evansville, Indiana. He will
graduate from the University of Evansville with a major in
Drama and Literature. His acting career will begin at the
Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He will move to
Hollywood after four years in Minneapolis. He will be best
known for his television role as Sgt. Harris on the long-
running series, “Barney Miller.” His other television credits
will be roles in “The New Odd Couple,” “Rhythm & Blues,” “All
in the Family,” “Sanford & Sons,” “Streets of San Francisco,”
“Family Matters,” and “Murder, She Wrote.” His feature film
credits include “It’s My Party” and “House Guest.”

1949 – Frederick M. Jones patents a starter generator.

1951 – Sugar Ray Robinson is defeated for only the second time in
133 fights as Randy Turpin takes the middleweight crown.

1960 – Roger Timothy Craig is born in Davenport, Iowa. He will
become a professional football player, being drafted in the
second round of the 1983 NFL Draft out of the University of
Nebraska by the San Francisco 49ers. He will play for the
49ers eight years, claiming three Super Bowl titles and
selected for the Pro Bowl four times. In 1985, he will
become the first player to surpass 1,000 yards rushing and
receiving in the same season. By the end of his career, he
will become the 49ers’ second leading rusher all-time with
7,064 yards. He will also become co-Super Bowl record holder
for Most Points Per Game (18 vs. Miami, 1985) and Most TDs
Per Game (3).

1962 – Martin Luther King Jr. is arrested during a civil rights
demonstration in Albany, Georgia.

1966 – Martin Luther King, Jr. begins a Chicago campaign for fair
housing. It is his first foray into a northern city for
desegregation activities.

1972 – The Democratic convention opens in Miami Beach, Florida.
African Americans constitute 15 per cent of the delegates.
Representative Shirley Chisholm receives 151.95 of 2,000-
plus ballots on the first roll call.

1973 – The Bahamas attain full independence within the British
Commonwealth having been a British colony almost
uninterruptedly since 1718.

1984 – Dwight ‘Doc’ Gooden of the New York Mets becomes the youngest
player to appear in an All-Star Game as a pitcher. Gooden is
19 years, 7 months and 24 days old. He leads the National
League to a 3-1 win at Candlestick Park in San Francisco,
California.

1993 – Kenyan runner Yobes Ondieki becomes the first human to run 10
km (6.25 miles) in less than 27 minutes. Ondieki, known for
his extremely arduous training sessions, will say after
setting his world record, “My world-record race actually felt
easier than my tough interval workouts.”

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

* Today in Black History – July 8 *

1753 – Lemuel Haynes is born in West Hartford, Connecticut. He is
born to a African American father he never knew and a
white mother who refused to acknowledge him. As a child,
he will be made an indentured servant to a white family in
Granville, Massachusetts, who will treat him as one of
their children. His indenture will end in 1774, when he
will become a Minuteman in the Continental Army. During
the Revolutionary War, he will fight at the siege of Boston
and Fort Ticonderoga. After the war, he will study Latin and
Greek with local ministers and be ordained by the
Congregationalists, becoming the first African American
ordained by a mainstream white denomination. Throughout the
next five decades he ministered to white congregations in
New England and New York. Haynes also received considerable
attention for a sermon he preached rebutting Hosea Ballou’s
theory of universal salvation from a Calvinist perspective.
Haynes’s book “Universal Salvation, A Very Ancient Doctrine”,
ran some 70 editions. In 1804, Middlebury College awarded
Haynes an honorary master’s degree becoming the first
African American to receive that honor from any institution.
He will join the ancestors on September 28, 1833.

1876 – White terrorists attack African American Republicans in
Hamburg, South Carolina, killing five.

1910 – Govan Archibald Munyelwa Mbeki is born in Nqamakwe, Transkei,
South Africa. He will become a political activist, leading
member of the African National Congress (ANC) and a member
of the South African Communist Party (SACP). After attending
a mission school, he will attend the University of Fort Hare,
in Alice, and will obtain his bachelor of arts degree in
1937. He will join the ANC while a student in 1935. While
teaching at Adams College, he will be dismissed for political
activity. He will then manage a cooperative store and edit
the Territorial Magazine from 1938 to 1944. In 1943 he will
be elected to the United Transkeian General Council, or
Bunga. In the same year, Mbeki will assist the ANC prepare a
document called African Claims, which will be a response to
the Atlantic Charter, the declaration of human rights issued
during World War II (1939-1945) by the United States and
Great Britain. African Claims became the basis for the ANC
Freedom Charter of 1955. After returning to teaching, Mbeki
will be dismissed again for political activity, and will
become the Port Elizabeth editor of New Age, a left-wing
paper, in 1955 and will make no secret of his left-wing
sympathies. Mbeki will become deeply involved in ANC politics
and stand trial with Nelson Mandela and others for treason,
charged with conspiring to overthrow the government. In 1964,
he will be sentenced to life imprisonment on Robben Island.
The same year, his book “The Peasants’ Revolt” is published
in Great Britain and banned in South Africa. In 1977, while
on Robben Island, Mbeki will have an honorary doctorate of
social sciences conferred on him by the University of
Amsterdam for the publication. After being released on
November 5, 1987 by the South African government, he will
continue to be a member of both the ANC and the SACP. He will
resume his place on the executive committee of the ANC in
1990. In May, 1994, Mbeki will be elected deputy president of
the Senate. His son Thabo Mbeki, the future president of
South Africa, will be elected deputy president of South
Africa. He will join the ancestors on August 30, 2001.

1914 – William Clarence (“Billy”) Eckstine is born in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. He will become famous in the 1950s as the
smooth-voiced baritone singer of such hits as “Fools Rush In”
and “Skylark,” but music critics and serious jazz fans know
him as the man whose big-band launched such renowned
performers as Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Charlie Parker,
Dexter Gordon, and Sarah Vaughan. He will begin his musical
career on a piano his father had bought for his two sisters.
After attending Howard University, he will begin singing with
various groups, touring in the Midwest before settling in
Chicago in 1939, where he will join the band led by Earl
“Fatha” Hines. It was with Hines that he will have his first
hit, the blues song “Jelly Jelly,” which he will write and
sing. In 1944, he will form his own big-band. The band,
always a favorite with other musicians, will help to pioneer
the then-new bebop sound. Its avant-garde musicianship often
overshadowed his more traditional vocals, and the band
suffered from being badly recorded. His solo career will take
off after the band dissolves in 1947. With his deep, romantic
voice, elegant presence, and matinee-idol good looks, he
becomes a popular performer. Often referred to as “Mr. B,” he
will also garner several film roles in the following decades,
and many will refer to him as the first Black sex symbol. He
will join the ancestors on March 8, 1993.

1938 – Julia Mae Porter (later Carson) is born in Louisville,
Kentucky. She will be raised in Indianapolis, Indiana. In 1965,
while working as a secretary for the United Auto Workers union,
she will be hired by Indiana congressman Andrew Jacobs Jr. She
will work on his staff for eight years. In 1972, she will be
elected to the Indiana House of Representatives, and in 1976,
she will be elected to the Indiana Senate, where she will serve
on the Finance Committee and the Health Committee. In 1990, she
will be elected trustee of Center Township and direct an agency
that provides assistance to the needy. After congressman Jacobs
retires in 1996, Carson will run successfully for his position.
She will win 52 percent of the vote and become the first African
American to represent Indianapolis. She will represent Indiana’s
Tenth Congressional District. It is located in the city of
Indianapolis and includes a mixture of African American and
white neighborhoods. In 1997, Carson will be assigned seats on
the Banking and Financial Services Committee and the Veterans’
Affairs Committee. She will also be a member of the
Congressional Black Caucus. She will be a member of the United
States House of Representatives for Indiana’s 7th congressional
district from 1997 until she joins the ancestors on December 15,
2007.

1943 – Alyce Faye Wattleton is born in St. Louis, Missouri. She will
become the youngest and first African American president of
Planned Parent Federation of America in 1978 and be known for
almost 14 years as an outspoken champion of women’s
reproductive rights. She will use her position in Planned
Parenthood to advocate reproductive rights. Along with other
abortion-rights groups, she will fight to secure federal
funding for birth control and prenatal programs; to forbid
states from restricting abortions; and to legalize the sale
in the United States of RU-486, the French-made pill that
induces abortions. Her efforts and the efforts of others
encounter a number of setbacks, including the Supreme Court’s
1989 decision in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services to
allow states to restrict abortions. She will use such defeats
to further mobilize activists and donors. She will leave
Planned Parenthood in 1992 to develop her own talk show, in
Chicago, Illinois, devoted to discussions of women’s issues.
She will be a 1993 inductee into the National Women’s Hall of
Fame. In 1996, she will publish her autobiography, Life on the
Line. She will later serve as the President of the Center for
the Advancement of Women. At this time, she is the managing
director at an international consulting firm.

1943 – Nebraska’s first African American newspaper, “The Omaha Star”,
is founded by Mildred Brown.

1966 – King Mwambutsa IV Bangiriceng of Burundi is deposed by his son
Prince Charles Ndizi.

1966 – John H. Johnson wins the Spingarn Medal for his “contributions
to the enhancement of the Negro’s self-image” through his
publications including “Negro Digest”, “Ebony”, and “Jet”
magazines, and books such as “Before the Mayflower”, written
by historian Lerone Bennett, Jr.

1982 – Senegalese Trotskyist political party LCT is legally recognized.

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

* Today in Black History – July 7 *

1781 – James Armistead, an American slave, infiltrates the
headquarters of General Cornwallis and becomes a servant
hired to spy on the Americans. In reality, Armistead is
a cunning double agent working for the French ally
General Lafayette and reports on the movements and troop
strength of the British. His reports are critical to the
surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.

1791 – The nondenominational African Church is founded by Richard
Allen, Absalom Jones, and Benjamin Rush.

1851 – Charles Albert Tindley, African American Methodist preacher
and songwriter is born in Berlin, Maryland. He will be
is known as one of the “founding fathers of American
Gospel music.” The son of slaves, he will teach himself to
read and write at the age of 17. He will be a driven young
man, working as a janitor while attending night school,
and earning his divinity degree through a correspondence
course. In 1902, he will become pastor of the Calvary
Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,
the church where he had earlier been the janitor.
Tindley’s “I’ll Overcome Some Day” was the basis for the
American civil rights anthem “We Shall Overcome,”
popularized in the 1960’s. His most enduring gospel hymns
include ‘Stand By Me,’ ‘Nothing Between,’ ‘Leave It There’
and ‘By and By.’ He will compose over 47 gospel standards.
At the time he joins the ancestors in Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania on July 26, 1933, his church will have 12,500
members. The Tindley Temple United Methodist Church in
Philadelphia will be named after him.

1906 – Leroy Robert “Satchel” Paige, baseball pitcher, (Negro
League and American League) is born in Mobile, Alabama.
(His birth year is an estimate) He will become a right-handed
pitcher, first playing for the semi-professional Mobile
Tigers from 1924 to 1926. He will begin his professional
baseball career in 1926 with the Chattanooga Black Lookouts
of the Negro Southern League and become one of the most
famous and successful players from the Negro leagues. At the
age of 42 in 1948, he will become the oldest major league
rookie while playing for the Cleveland Indians. He will play
with the St. Louis Browns until age 47, and represent them in
the All-Star Game in 1952 and 1953. He will be the first
player from the Negro leagues to pitch in the World Series
(1948). In 1965, 59 years after his birthday, he will take the
mound for the last time in the big leagues, throwing three
shut-out innings for the Kansas City Athletics. He will play
his last professional game on June 21, 1966, for the Peninsula
Grays of the Carolina League. He will be the first player from
the Negro leagues to be inducted into the National Baseball
Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York in 1971. He will join
the ancestors on June 8, 1982 in Kansas City, Missouri.

1915 – Margaret Abigail Walker (later Alexander) is born in
Birmingham, Alabama. In 1935, She will receive her
Bachelors of Arts Degree from Northwestern University and
in 1936 she will begin work with the Federal Writers’
Project under the Works Progress Administration. In 1942,
she will receive her master’s degree in creative writing
from the University of Iowa. Encouraged by Langston Hughes
and others, Walker will become a writer best known for her
volume of poetry ‘For My People,’ her novel ‘Jubilee,’ and
a biography of novelist Richard Wright. In 1965, she will
return to the University of Iowa to earn her Ph.D. She will
serve for a time as a professor at Jackson State College
(now University). She will join the ancestors on November
30, 1998 after succumbing to breast cancer.

1921 – Ezzard Mack Charles is born in Cincinnati, Ohio. He will
become a boxer and will be undefeated as an amateur,
winning the 1939 AAU National middleweight title before
turning professional in 1940. After military service during
World War II, he will defeat Hall-of-Famer Archie Moore and
avenge losses to Lloyd Marshall and Jimmy Bivins to earn a
No. 2 ranking at light heavyweight in 1946. He will fight
five light heavyweight champions, beating four of them, but
will never challenge for the light heavyweight crown. He
will finally win the vacant NBA heavyweight title by
defeating Jersey Joe Walcott in 1949. He will earn worldwide
recognition as heavyweight king the next year by decisioning
an aged Joe Louis. After three successful defenses of the
undisputed crown, he will lose the title in a third battle
with Walcott. Charles will announce his retirement from the
ring on December 1, 1956. He will join the ancestors on May
28, 1975 after succumbing to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
(ALS) also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. He will be
enshrined in the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1990.

1941 – Vernard R. Gray is born in Washington, DC. He will become a
pioneer in the Black Arts Movement. He will begin in the
1960’s as a photographer/videographer documenting African
American culture in the Washington, DC metropolitan area
and around the world. He will found the Miya Gallery in
downtown DC in 1976, introducing the community to various
manifestations of African culture over twenty-five years
and from 1996 will serve as an Internet developer for many
artists, small businesses and non-profit organizations at
Vernard Gray Technology Services at :
http://www.connectdc.com.

1945 – Fern Logan is born in Jamaica (Queens), New York. A graduate
of Pratt Institute, she will study photography in the mid
1970’s with master photographer Paul Caponigro. She will
also receive a Bachelor’s Degree fro State University of
New York and a Masters in Fine Arts Degree from the School
of the Art Institute of Chicago. Among her best-known works
will be the renowned “Artists Portrait Series” of African
American artists such as Romare Bearden, Roy deCarava, and
Jacob Lawrence as well as commanding landscapes and scenes
of nature. She is currently retired (Emerita) from
Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois and
resides in the Greater St. Louis, MO area.

1948 – The Cleveland Indians sign Leroy “Satchel” Paige at the age
of 42. He will become the American League ‘Rookie of the Year’.

1948 – Edna Griffin, her infant daughter Phyllis, John Bibbs and
Leonard Hudson, will enter the Katz Drug Store in downtown
Des Moines, Iowa, sit at the lunch counter and order ice
cream. They will be refused service and Griffin will soon
organize a protest against the drugstore’s policy of
refusing service to blacks. Criminal charges will be filed
against Katz for violating Iowa’s 1884 Civil Rights Act.
The law prohibits discrimination in public accommodation.
Katz will be found guilty and will appeal the verdict to
the Iowa Supreme Court, which affirms the decision a year
later. The case will be settled with Griffin receiving a
one dollar settlement and the drugstore forced to change
its ways.

1960 – Ralph Lee Sampson is born in Harrisonburg, Virginia. He
will become arguably the most heavily recruited (for both
college and the NBA) basketball prospect of his generation.
Playing for the University of Virginia, he will become one
of only two male players in the history of college
basketball to receive the Naismith Award as the National
Player of the Year three times. He will be the only player
to win the Wooden award twice. He will become a
professional basketball player with the Houston Rockets. In
the 1985-86 NBA season, Sampson will (in his third season
with the Rockets) lift the Rockets from 14-68 in the
1982-83 season before his arrival to one of the best in the
NBA. In Game 5 of the 1986 NBA Western Conference Finals,
his last second tip-in at the buzzer will beat the Los
Angeles Lakers and send the Rockets to only their 2nd NBA
Finals appearance in franchise history. His NBA career will
quickly deteriorate as he becomes burdened with numerous
knee injuries. In 1988, by the time he is traded to the
Golden State Warriors, the rest of his career will become
very limited. In 1989, he will be traded to the Sacramento
Kings where he will basically be a third-string player. He
will average 4.2 points per game and 3.0 points per game
for the 1989-90 and 1990-91 seasons respectively. He will
play one final season with the Washington Bullets in
1991-92 where he averages two points per game. He will
win numerous individual awards in the short period of time
he was healthy, but will never win a national or NBA
championship.

1975 – “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the
Rainbow is Not Enuf,” a play by 26-year-old Ntozake Shange,
premieres in New York City.

1994 – Panama withdraws its offer to the United States to accept
thousands of Haitian refugees.

1997 – Harvey Johnson is sworn in as the first African American
mayor in Jackson, Mississippi.

1998 – Imprisoned Nigerian opposition leader Moshood Abiola joins
the ancestors before he can be released from his political
imprisonment. The government indicates that he succumbed
from an apparent heart attack.

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