KRLemmons African American History

June 21 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – June 21 *

1821 – The African Methodist Episcopal Zion (AMEZ) Church is
formally constituted in New York City at its first annual
conference. Nineteen clergymen were present, representing
six African American churches from New York City,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, New Haven, Connecticut and
Newark, New Jersey. They voted to separate from the
white-controlled Methodist Episcopal Church, which had
insisted on ultimate control of the church’s leadership and
property. To distinguish between the two African Methodist
Episcopal organizations, as well as to honor their original
congregation, in 1848 they will vote to add Zion to their
name.

1832 – Joseph Haynes Rainey is born in Georgetown, South Carolina.
He will become the first African American elected to the
U.S. House of Representatives, where he will serve five
terms. He will join the ancestors on August 1, 1887.

1859 – Henry Ossawa Tanner is born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Son
of AME bishop Benjamin Tanner, young Tanner will forgo the
ministry to take up painting. Constantly facing the tension
between racial stereotypes and his art, Tanner will
eventually emigrate to France to pursue his art, considered
by many the finest produced by an African American. He will
be known for his commanding use of light and color in his
seascapes, scenes of everyday life, and religious paintings.
He will join the ancestors in Paris, France on May 25, 1937.

1868 – John Hope is born in Augusta, Georgia. He will become the
first African American president of Atlanta Baptist (later
Morehouse) College in 1906. He will be a pioneer in the
field of education. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Brown
University, He will encourage an intellectual climate
comparable to what he had known at his alma mater and will
openly challenge Booker T. Washington’s view that education
for African Americans should emphasize vocational and
agricultural skills. He will join the ancestors on February
22, 1936.

1923 – Marcus Garvey is sentenced by the U.S. government to 5 years
in prison for using the U.S. mail to defraud. He is
railroaded by a government that is terrified by the control
that one magnificent orator had over African Americans.
They did not want their major source of cheap labor in
America to leave for Africa.

1927 – Carl B. Stokes, the first African American elected mayor of
a major American city is born. Stokes will be elected to
two terms as mayor of Cleveland, Ohio at a time of urban
riots and racial unrest in many major U.S. cities. Civil
rights leaders said his election was an advance, both
symbolic and genuine, for the cause of black political
empowerment. He is instrumental in getting through a law
requiring city contractors to have minority employment
programs. President Clinton will appoint him, in 1994, as
ambassador to the Seychelles, an island nation in the
Indian Ocean. He will join the ancestors on April 3, 1996.

1945 – Colonel Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. becomes the first African
American to command a U.S. Army Air Force base when he
takes command of the 477th Composite Group of Godman Field
in Kentucky.

1951 – PFC William H. Thompson is posthumously awarded the
Congressional Medal of Honor. He is the first African
American recipient since the Spanish-American War.

1964 – In Neshoba County in central Mississippi, three civil rights
field workers disappear after investigating the burning of
an African American church by the Ku Klux Klan. Michael
Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, both white New Yorkers, had
traveled to heavily segregated Mississippi in 1964 to help
organize civil rights efforts on behalf of the Congress of
Racial Equality (CORE). The third man, James Chaney, was a
local African American man who had joined CORE in 1963. The
disappearance of the three young men garnered national
attention and led to a massive FBI investigation that was
code-named MIBURN, for “Mississippi Burning.” They are later
found murdered.

1965 – Arthur Ashe leads UCLA to the NCAA tennis championship.

1990 – Little Richard gets a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame.

1997 – Patrice Rushen receives an NAACP Lifetime Achievement Award
for her contributions in the field of music.

2001 – Famed blues man John Lee Hooker joins the ancestors at the
age of 83 of natural causes in Los Altos, California. The
veteran blues singer from the Mississippi Delta estimated
that he recorded more than 100 albums over nearly seven
decades. He won a Grammy Award for a version of “I’m In The
Mood,” was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in
1991 and received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2000
Grammys. Through it all, Hooker’s music remained hypnotic
and unchanged — his rich and sonorous voice, full of
ancient hurt, coupled with a brooding, rhythmic guitar. He
sang of loneliness and confusion. Neither polished nor
urbane, his music was raw, primal emotion.

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

KRLemmons African American History

May 26 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – May 26 *

1799 – Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin is born in Moscow, Russia. His
maternal great grandfather, Abram Gannibal, will be brought over
as a slave from Africa and will rise to become an aristocrat. He
will publish his first poem in the journal, “The Messenger of
Europe” in 1814, at the age of fifteen, and will be widely
recognized by the literary establishment by the time of his
graduation from the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum. While under the strict
surveillance of the Tsar’s political police and unable to publish,
He will write his most famous play, the drama “Boris Godunov.” His
novel in verse, “Eugene Onegin,” will be serialized between 1825
and 1832. Easily offended about his honor, he will fight as many
as twenty-nine duels, and will be fatally wounded in such an
encounter with Georges-Charles de Heeckeren d’Anthès. He had
accused D’Anthès, a French officer serving with the Chevalier
Guard Regiment, of attempting to seduce the poet’s wife, Natalya
Pushkina. He will join the ancestors on January 29, 1837. Today,
he is regarded as the Father of Russian Literature.

1899 – Aaron Douglas is born in Topeka, Kansas. He will become a world-
renowned painter and muralist whose work will embrace the African
ancestral arts and express pride in the African American image at
a time when doing so was highly unpopular. His most famous works
will be “Aspects of Negro Life,” “Let My People Go,” “Judgment Day”
and “Building More Stately Mansions.” He will join the ancestors
on February 3, 1979.

1907 – Elizabeth Keckley, seamstress and confidante to Mary Todd Lincoln,
joins the ancestors after succumbing to a paralytic stroke in
Washington, DC. Keckley was the author of “Behind the Scenes or
Thirty Years a Slave,” and “Four Years in the White House” (1868),
one of the first insider accounts of a White House Presidency.

1926 – Miles (Dewey) Davis is born in Alton, Illinois. For over four decades,
he will be one of the most innovative and influential jazz trumpeters,
known for his hard bop and jazz and fusion accomplishments. Most
noted for the albums “Sketches of Spain,” “Miles Smiles,” and “Kind of
Blue,” he will also win three Grammy awards for his albums “We Want
Miles,” “Decoy,” and “Tutu” and be awarded the French Legion d’Honneur
in 1991. He will join the ancestors on September 28, 1991, but
his music, style, and collaborators all continue to influence not
only jazz music, but popular culture as well.

1943 – President Edwin Barclay of Liberia, becomes the first African president
to pay an official visit to an American president, arriving at the
White House.

1949 – Philip Michael Thomas is born in Columbus Ohio. He will become an
actor and will be best known for his role in the TV series, “Miami
Vice.” He also will have roles in the movies “Homeboy,” “Stigma,”
“Streetfight,” “Black Fist,” “Miami Vice-The Movie,” “Miami Vice 2 –
The Prodigal Son,” “A Fight For Jenny,” “Death Drug,” “A Little Piece
Of Sunshine,” “Sparkle,” and “The Wizard of Speed and Time.”

1949 – Pamela Suzette ‘Pam” Grier is born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
She will be raised on military bases in England and Germany. During her
teen years the family will settle in Denver, Colorado, where at the
age of 18, Grier entered the Miss Colorado Universe pageant.
Named first runner-up, she attracted the attention of Hollywood
agent David Baumgarten, who signed her to a contract. She will
move to Hollywood and after struggling for a few years will
become the reigning queen of the 1970s blaxploitation genre. She
will be best known for her 1974 role as “Foxy Brown.” She will
make a comeback in 1988 in the Steven Segal movie “Above the Law,”
and will star in a variety of major films through year 2000.

1961 – The Freedom Ride Coordinating Committee is established in Atlanta,
Georgia.

1968 – Ruth A. Lucas is promoted to Colonel in the U.S. Air Force, the first
African American woman to achieve this rank.

1968 – Arthur Ashe wins the National Men’s Singles in the U.S. Lawn Tennis
Association Open Tournament, becoming the first African American male
to win a major tennis title.

1969 – The National Black Economic Development Conference adopts a manifesto
in a Detroit meeting, calling for $500 Million in reparations from
white churches.

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

KRLemmons African American History

May 14 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – May 14 *

1867 – A riot occurs in Mobile, Alabama, after an African American
mass meeting. One African American and one white are
killed.

1885 – Erskine Henderson wins the Kentucky Derby riding Joe Cotton.
The horse’s trainer is another African-American, Alex
Perry.

1897 – Sidney Joseph Bechet is born in New Orleans, Louisiana. A
member of both Duke Ellington’s and Noble Sissle’s
orchestras, Bechet moved to France and there achieved the
greatest success of his career. He had been the greatest
jazz soloist of the 1920s along with Louis Armstrong. He
will join the ancestors on May 14, 1959.

1898 – Arthur James ‘Zutty’ Singleton is born in Bunkie, Louisiana.
He will become a percussion musician and bandleader. He
will start as a drummer at the age of 15 and will work in
a variety of bands until he forms his own in 1920. He will
eventually make his way to Chicago and will become part of
the “Chicago School of Jazz.” He will be primarily
remembered for introducing sock cymbals and wire brushes
as percussion accessories. These innovations will place
him in demand as an accompanist for jazz greats like Louis
Armstrong, Fats Waller, Dizzy Gillespie, Jelly Roll Morton,
and Charlie Parker. He will perform primarily in New York
City from 1953 until 1970. He will join the ancestors on
July 14, 1975.

1906 – Ngwazi Hastings Kamuzu Banda is born near Kasungu, British
Central African Protectorate. Even though his official
birthdate is cited as 1906, many sources show his birth
date as 1898. He will become Malawi’s first prime minister
after independence in 1963. In 1966, he will elected
Malawi’s president in 1966. He will lead Malawi until
1994. He will join the ancestors in Johannesburg, South
Africa on November 25, 1997.

1913 – Clara Stanton Jones is born in St. Louis, Missouri. She
will become the first African American director of the
Detroit Public Library and the first African American
president of the American Library Association. She will
join the ancestors on September 30, 2012.

1943 – Tania J. Leon is born in Havana, Cuba. She will become a
pianist, composer, and orchestral conductor. Her music
style will encompass Afro-Cuban rhythm and elements of
jazz and gospel. She will emigrate to the United States
in 1967 and in 1969 will join the Dance Theater of Harlem
as a pianist. She will later become the artistic director
of the troupe. Some her compositions for the Dance
Theater of Harlem will include “Tones,” “Beloved,” and
“Dougla.” She will debut as a conductor in 1971 and
starting in 1980 when she leaves the Dance Theater of
Harlem, will serve as guest conductor and composer with
orchestras in the United States and Europe. In 1993, she
will become an advisor to the New York Philharmonic
conductor, Kurt Masur on contemporary music.

1959 – Soprano saxophonist Sidney Joseph Bechet joins the
ancestors in Paris, France on his sixty second birthday
after succumbing to cancer.

1961 – A bus, with the first group of Freedom Riders, is bombed
and burned by segregationists outside Anniston, Alabama.
The group is attacked in Anniston and Birmingham.

1963 – Twenty-year-old Arthur Ashe becomes the first African
American to make the U.S. Davis Cup tennis team.

1966 – Georgia Douglas Johnson joins the ancestors in Washington,
DC at the age of 88. She was a poet and playwright. While
she never lived in Harlem, she is associated with the
Harlem Renaissance because her home was a regular oasis
for many of the writers of that literary movement. Her
home hosted writer workshops and discussion groups while
also being a place of lodging for those writers when they
visited Washington, DC. Her own poetry and plays were
very popular with African American audiences during the
1920s.

1969 – John B. McLendon becomes the first African American coach
in the ABA when he signs a two-year contract with the
Denver Nuggets.

1970 – Two students are killed by police officers in a major
racial disturbance at Jackson State University in
Jackson, Mississippi.

1986 – Reggie Jackson hits his 537th home run passing Mickey
Mantle into 6th place of all time home run hitters.

1989 – Kirby Puckett becomes the first professional baseball
player since 1948 to hit 6 consecutive doubles.

1995 – Myrlie Evers-Williams (widow of Medgar Evers) is sworn in
to head the NAACP, pledging to lead the civil rights group
away from its recent troubles and restore it as a
political and social force.

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

KRLemmons African American History

April 8 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – April 8 *

1922 – Carmen McRae is born in the village of Harlem in New York
City. She will study classical piano in her youth, even
though singing was her first love. She will win an
amateur contest at the Apollo Theater and begin her
singing career. She will be influenced by Billie
Holiday, who will become a lifelong friend and mentor.
She will devote her albums and the majority of her
nightclub acts to Lady Day’s memory. Her association
with jazz accordionist Matt Mathews will lead to her
first solo recordings in 1953-1954. In her later years,
McRae’s original style will influence singers Betty
Carter and Carol Sloane. Her best known recordings will
be “Skyliner” (1956) and “Take Five” with Dave Brubeck
(1961). She will also work in films and will appear in
“Hotel” (1967) and “Jo Jo Dancer Your Life is Calling”
(1986). She will receive six Grammy award nominations
and the National Endowment for the Arts’ National Jazz
Masters Fellowship Award in 1994. She will join the
ancestors on November 10, 1994.

1938 – Cornetist and bandleader Joe “King” Oliver joins the
ancestors in Savannah, Georgia. He was considered one
of the leading musicians of New Orleans-style jazz and
served as a mentor to Louis Armstrong, who played with
him in 1922 and 1923.

1953 – Louis “Sweet Lou” Dunbar is born in Houston, Texas. He will
become a professional basketball player (for 27 years) with
the Harlem Globetrotters. After his playing days, he will
become the Director of Player Personnel. He will be the 25th
person to receive the Globetrotter “Legends” Distinction,
awarded on February 9, 2007 at Houston’s Toyota Center. He
will also become a member of the National Basketball Retired
Players Association (Legends of Basketball).

1974 – Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves hits his 715th home run
against a pitch thrown by Los Angeles Dodger Al Downing
at a home game in Fulton County Stadium. Aaron’s home
run breaks the long-standing home run record of Babe
Ruth.

1975 – Frank Robinson, major league baseball’s first African
American manager, gets off to a winning start as his
team, the Cleveland Indians, defeat the New York
Yankees, 5-3.

1980 – State troopers are mobilized to stop racially motivated
civil disturbances in Wrightsville, Georgia. Racial
incidents are also reported in Chattanooga, Tennessee,
Oceanside, California, Kokomo, Indiana, Wichita, Kansas,
and Johnston County, North Carolina.

1987 – Los Angeles Dodgers general manager Al Campanis is fired
for alleged racially biased comments about the
managerial potential of African Americans.

1990 – Percy Julian, who helped create drugs to combat glaucoma
and methods to mass produce cortisone, and agricultural
scientist George Washington Carver are the first African
American inventors admitted into the National Inventors
Hall of Fame in the hall’s 17-year history.

1992 – Tennis great Arthur Ashe announces at a New York news
conference that he had AIDS. He contracted the virus
from a transfusion needed for an earlier heart surgery.
Ashe will join the ancestors in February 1993 of
AIDS-related pneumonia at age 49.

2001 – Tiger Woods becomes the first golfer to hold all four
major professional golf titles at one time when he wins
the 2001 Masters tournament.

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

KRLemmons African American History

February 9 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – February 9 *

1906 – Never fully recovering from a bout of pneumonia in 1899, poet
and author Paul Laurence Dunbar joins the ancestors in Dayton,
Ohio, at the age of 33. He nonetheless produced three novels
(including “The Sport of the Gods”), three books of verse,
three collections of short stories, two unpublished plays,
and lyric pieces set to music by Will Marion Cook.

1944 – Alice Walker is born In Eatonton, Georgia. Best known for “The
Color Purple,” which will win the American Book Award and the
Pulitzer Prize, she will also write a variety of other
critically praised and award-winning works including poetry
and children’s books and edit a book on Zora Neale Hurston,
whom she will credit as her role model.

1944 – John Rozelle is born in St. Louis, Missouri. He will become an
artist and professor at the Art Institute of Chicago. His
work reflects his self identification as an “African American
sentinel,” or visual historian, guide, and advocate of
contemporary African American culture.

1951 – Dennis “DT” Thomas is born in Jersey City, New Jersey. He will
become a rhythm and blues musician with the group, ‘Kool & the
Gang.’

1953 – Gary Franks is born in Waterbury, Connecticut. In 1990, he
will be elected to Congress from Connecticut’s 5th District
and become the first African American Republican congressman
since Oscar De Priest left office in 1934.

1962 – Jamaica signs an agreement with Great Britain to become
independent.

1964 – Arthur Ashe, Jr. becomes the first African American on a United
States Davis Cup Team.

1964 – A speech by U.S. Representative Martha Griffiths in Congress,
on sex discrimination, results in civil rights protection for
women being added to the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

1971 – Satchel Paige becomes the first African American elected to
professional baseball’s Hall of Fame for his career in the
Negro Leagues.

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

KRLemmons African American History

February 6 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – February 6 *

1810 – The Argentine national hero from Buenos Aires, Argentina,
Antonio Ruiz (El Negro Falucho), joins the ancestors, fighting
for his country.

1820 – The first organized emigration back to Africa begins when
86 free African Americans leave New York Harbor aboard the
Mayflower of Liberia. They are bound for the British colony
of Sierra Leone, which welcomes free African Americans as well
as fugitive slaves.

1867 – The Anglo-American merchant George Peabody, founds the $ 2
million Peabody Education Fund. It is the first philanthropy
established in the wake of the Civil War to promote free public
education in 12 Civil War devastated southern states for whites
and African Americans. The Peabody Fund will provide funding
for construction, endowments, scholarships, teacher and
industrial education for newly freed slaves.

1898 – Haywood Hall is born in South Omaha, Nebraska. After
relocating to Minneapolis, Minnesota with his family, he will
join the U.S. Army. He will serve with the 370th Infantry in
France during World War I. Returning to Chicago, Illinois after
the war, he will be active as a Black Nationalist, becoming a
member of the African Blood Brotherhood and the Communist Party
of the USA. In 1925, he will adopt the pseudonym, Harry
Haywood. He will be a leading proponent of Black Nationalism,
self-determination, and the idea that American Blacks are a
colonized people who should organize themselves into a nation.
From 1926 to 1930, he will study in the Soviet Union, where he
will meet several anti-colonial revolutionaries, including
Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh. On his return to the U.S. in 1931, he
will be chosen to lead the Communist Party’s Negro Department,
and in 1934 will be elected a member of its politburo. The
Spanish Civil War will take him to Spain in 1937, where he
will fight in a volunteer Communist brigade against General
Francisco Franco’s fascist regime. During World War II, his
belief in black self-determination and territorial autonomy
will put him at odds with Communist Party policy, which had
gravitated away from support for a Black nation in the American
south. His agitation on “The Negro Question” led to his
expulsion from the Party in 1959. He will remain in Chicago,
supporting Black Nationalist movements such as the Nation of
Islam. He will publish “Negro Liberation” (1948), a detailed
analysis of the national character of Black oppression,
particularly in the South. In his later years he will write
his memoirs, “Black Bolshevik: Autobiography of an Afro-
American Communist” (1978). Harry Haywood’s greatest
contribution will be his central role in developing a
theoretical understanding of the Black nation in the United
States. He will join the ancestors in January, 1985.

1898 – Melvin B. Tolson, author and educator, is born in Moberly,
Missouri. Educated at Fisk, Lincoln, and Columbia
Universities, his first volume of poetry, “Rendezvous with
America,” will be published in 1944. He will be best known
for “Libretto for the Republic of Liberia,” published in
1953.

1931 – The Harlem Experimental Theatre Group performs its first play
at St. Philips Parish House. The group’s advisory board
includes famed actress Rose McClendon, author Jesse Fauset,
and Grace Nail.

1933 – Walter E. Fauntroy is born in Washington, DC. He will become a
civil rights leader and minister. He will later become the
non-voting delegate to the United States Congress for the
District of Columbia from 1971 to 1991.

1945 – Robert Nesta Marley is born in St. Ann, Jamaica to Captain
Norval and Cedella Marley. He will become a successful singer
along with his group, The Wailers. Bob Marley and The Wailers
were among the earliest to sing Reggae, a blend of Jamaican
dance music and American Rhythm & Blues with a heavy dose of
Rastafarianism, the Jamaican religion that blends Christian and
African teachings. He will join the ancestors in 1981 at the
age of 36, succumbing to cancer. As a result of his
accomplishments, he will be awarded Jamaica’s Order Of Merit,
the nation’s third highest honor, (April, 1981) in recognition
of his outstanding contribution to the country’s culture. He
will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991.

1950 – Natalie Cole is born to Nat “King” and Maria Cole. She will
follow in her famous father’s footsteps and become a recording
star. She will become a Grammy Award-winning singer, and Best
New Artist in 1975.

1961 – The “jail-in” movement starts in Rock Hill, South Carolina,
when arrested students demand to be jailed rather than pay
fines.

1993 – Arthur Ashe, tennis champion, joins the ancestors at the age of
49. He succumbs from complications of AIDS, contracted from a
transfusion during a earlier heart surgery.

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

KRLemmons African American History

January 28 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – January 28 *

1858 – John Brown organizes the raid on the federal arsenal at
Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia. The raid was an attempt to
obtain arms and ammunition to free African Americans from
slavery by force.

1901 – James Richmond Barthe’ is born in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.
Educated at the Art Institute of Chicago, he will begin to
attain critical acclaim as a sculptor at 26. He will drop
the use of his first name when producing his works of art
and will be best known as Richmond Barthe. His first
commissions will be of Henry O. Tanner and Toussaint
L’Ouverture. He will also become the first African
American commissioned to produce a bust for the NYU Hall of
Fame (of Booker T. Washington). He wil join the ancestors
on March 5, 1989.

1938 – Crystal Byrd Fauset is elected to the Pennsylvania House of
Representatives, becoming the first African American woman
to be elected to a state legislature.

1944 – Matthew Henson is a recipient of a joint medal by Congress
for his role as co-discoverer of the North Pole. It is the
U.S. government’s first official recognition of the explorer
who accompanied Commander Robert Peary on his 1909
expedition.

1958 – Brooklyn Dodger catcher Roy Campanella’s career ends when he
loses control of his car on a slick highway. He will become
a paraplegic and be confined to a wheelchair the remainder
of his life. The accident ends his ten-year playing career
with the Dodgers, where he had been named the National
League’s MVP three times, but he will remain a part of the
Dodgers organization for many years. He will join the
ancestors on June 26, 1993.

1960 – Zora Neale Hurston joins the ancestors in Fort Pierce,
Florida at the age of 71. She had been a prominent figure
during the Harlem Renaissance.

1970 – Arthur Ashe is denied entry to compete on the U.S. Team for
the South African Open Tennis Championships due to Ashe’s
sentiments on South Africa’s racial policies.

1972 – Scott Joplin’s Opera “Treemonisha,” published 61 years
earlier, has its world premiere with Robert Shaw and
Katherine Dunham directing.

1986 – The space shuttle “Challenger” explodes 73 seconds after
lift-off at Cape Canaveral, Florida. One of the seven
crew members killed is physicist Dr. Ronald McNair, the
only African American aboard.

1997 – The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa
announces that as part of their petition for amnesty,
five Afrikaner police had admitted to killing Steve Biko.
The announcement confirms what his admirers and followers
had never doubted: Steve Biko was a martyr to the struggle
against the apartheid government. Steve Biko was one of
the major figures in the struggle against South Africa’s
system of apartheid. Founder and leader of the Black
Consciousness Movement, the charismatic Biko was the first
president of the all-black South African Students
Organization before organizing the Black People’s
Convention, a coalition of over 70 black organizations
committed to ending apartheid. In 1977, Biko was arrested.
While in custody in Port Elizabeth, on the Indian Ocean
coast, he was apparently severely beaten. He was denied
medical attention and driven in the back of a police van
nearly 700 miles to Pretoria, where he died, naked and
shackled in a police hospital at the age of 29. The police
first claimed that Biko starved himself to death, then that
he died of self-inflicted injuries.

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

KRLemmons African American History

December 12 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – December 12 *

1870 – Joseph Hayne Rainey is the first African American to serve
in Congress representing South Carolina. He is sworn in
to fill an unexpired term.

1872 – U.S. Attorney General George Williams sends a telegram to
“Acting Governor Pinchback,” saying that the African
American politician “was recognized by the President as
the lawful executive of Louisiana.”

1892 – Minnie Evans, visual artist and painter, is born in Pender
County, North Carolina. One of her more famous works will
be “Lion of Judah.” She will be inducted into the
Wilmington, NC “Walk of Fame.” She will join the ancestors
on December 16, 1987.

1899 – Boston native, dentist, and avid golfer, George F. Grant
receives a patent for a wooden golf tee. Prior to the
use of the tee, wet sand was used to make a small mound
to place the ball. Grant’s invention will revolutionize
the manner in which golfers swing at the ball.

1912 – Henry Melody Jackson, Jr. is born in Columbus, Mississippi.
He will move with his family to St. Louis, Missouri and
become a boxer known as Henry Armstrong. In 1938 he will
become the first boxer to hold three titles at the same
time after winning the lightweight boxing championship.
He will be inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame as well
as the International Boxing Hall of Fame. His boxing record
at the time of his retirement in 1945 will be 150 wins, 101
wins by knockout, 21 losses, and 10 draws. After retiring
from boxing, he will become a Baptist minister and will
teach young upcoming fighter how to box. He will join
the ancestors on October 22, 1988 in Los Angeles, California.

1913 – James Cleveland “Jesse” Owens is born in Oakville, Alabama.
He will become a world-class athlete in college, setting
world records in many events. He will go on to win 4 gold
medals in the 1936 Berlin Olympics, spoiling Hitler’s
plans to showcase Aryan sports supremacy. He will join the
ancestors on March 31, 1980.

1918 – Famed jazz singer Joe Williams is born in Cordele, Georgia.
Williams will sing for seven years in Count Basie’s band,
where he will record such hits as “Every Day I have the
Blues.” He will join the ancestors on March 29, 1980.

1929 – Vincent Dacosta Smith is born in New York City. He will
exhibit his works on four continents and be represented in
the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the National
Museum of American Art, and the National Museum of Afro-
American Artists in Boston. He will join the ancestors on
December 27, 2003.

1938 – The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Missouri that a state must
provide equal educational facilities for African Americans
within its boundaries. Lloyd Gaines, the plaintiff in the
case, disappears after the decision and is never seen
again.

1941 – Dionne Warwick is born in East Orange, New Jersey. Warwick
will sing in a gospel trio with her sister Dee Dee and
cousin Cissy Houston, and begin her solo career in 1960
singing the songs of Burt Bacharach and Hal David. She
will become a three-time Grammy winner.

1943 – Grover Washington, Jr. is born in Buffalo, New York. He
will become a renown jazz artist and famous for his
recording of “Mr. Magic.” He will join the ancestors on
December 17, 1999.

1961 – Martin Luther King Jr., along with over seven hundred
demonstrators is arrested in Albany, Ga., after five mass
marches on city hall to protest segregation. The arrests
trigger the militant Albany movement.

1963 – Kenya achieves its independence from Great Britain with
Jomo Kenyatta as its first prime minister.

1963 – Medgar Wiley Evers is awarded the Spingarn Medal
posthumously for his civil rights leadership.

1965 – Johnny Lee, an actor best known for his portrayal of
“Calhoun” on “The Amos ‘n’ Andy Show,” joins the ancestors
at the age of 67.

1965 – Gale Sayers, of the Chicago Bears, scores 6 touchdowns and
ties the NFL record.

1968 – Arthur Ashe becomes the first African American to be ranked
Number One in tennis.

1975 – The National Association of Black Journalists is formed in
Washington, DC. Among its founding members are Max
Robinson, who will become the first African American anchor
of a national network news program, and Acel Moore, a
future Pulitzer Prize winner.

1979 – Rhodesia becomes the independent nation of Zimbabwe.

1986 – Bone Crusher Smith knocks out WBA champion Tim Witherspoon
in Madison Square Garden in New York City.

2007 – Ike Turner, whose role as one of rock’s critical architects
was overshadowed by his ogre-like image as the man who
brutally abused former wife and rock icon Tina Turner,
joins the ancestors at his home in suburban San Diego at the
age of 76.

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

KRLemmons African American History

September 9 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – September 9 *

1739 – Led by a slave named Jemmy (Cato), a slave revolt occurs
in Stono, South Carolina. Twenty-five whites are killed
before the insurrection is put down.

1806 – Sarah Mapps Douglass is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
She is the daughter of renowned abolitionists Robert
Douglass, Sr. and Grace Bustill Douglass. As a child, she
enjoys life among Philadelphia’s elite and will be well
educated by a private tutor. She will become a teacher in
New York, but will return to Philadelphia where she will
operate a successful private school for Black women,
giving women of color the opportunity to receive a high
school education. As the daughter of one of the
Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society’s founding
members, she will become active in the abolitionist
movement at a young age. She will develop a distaste for
the prejudices of white Quakers early on and will devote
much of her life to combating slavery and racism. She
will develop a close friendship with white Quaker
abolitionists Sarah and Angelina Grimke. At the urgings
of the Grimke sisters, She will attend the Anti-Slavery
Convention of American Women, held in New York in
1837–the first national convention of American
antislavery women to integrate Black and white members–
and serve on the ten-member committee on arrangements for
the convention. Throughout her abolitionist career, she
will also serve as recording secretary, librarian, and
manager for the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society,
contribute to both the Liberator and the Anglo-African
Magazine, become a fundraiser for the Black press, give
numerous public lectures, and serve as vice-president of
the women’s branch of the Freedmen’s Aid Society. From
1853 to 1877, she will serve as a supervisor at the
Institute for Colored Youth, a Quaker-sponsored
establishment. During this time, she will also acquire
basic medical training at the Female Medical College of
Pennsylvania and at Pennsylvania Medical University,
where she will study female health and hygiene–subjects
on which she will lecture in evening classes and at
meetings of the Banneker Institute. In 1855, she will
marry African American Episcopal clergyman William
Douglass. She will join the ancestors on September 8, 1882.

1816 – Rev. John Gregg Fee, the son of white slaveholders, is
born in Bracken County, Kentucky. He will become member
of the American Missionary Association, and will found a
settlement called “Berea” on land donated to him by an
admirer, Cassius Marcellus Clay. It will be later that
he will be inspired to build a college, adjacent to the
donated land – Berea College, the first interracial
college in the state. During the American Civil War, He
will work at Camp Nelson to have facilities constructed
to support freedmen and their families, and to provide
them with education and preaching while the men were being
taught to be soldiers. He died on January 11, 1901.

1817 – Captain Paul Cuffe, entrepreneur and civil rights
activist, joins the ancestors at the age of 58, in Westport,
Masschusetts. Cuffe was a Massachusetts shipbuilder and
sea captain. He also was one of the most influential
African American freedmen of the eighteenth century. In
1780, Cuffe and six other African Americans refused to
pay taxes util they were granted citizenship.
Massachusetts gave African Americans who owned property
the vote three years later. Although Cuffe became
wealthy, he believed that most African Americans would
never be completely accepted in white society. In 1816,
Cuffe began one of the first experiments in colonizing
African Americans in Africa when he brought a group to
Sierra Leone. Cuffe’s experiment helped inspire the
founding of the American Colonization Society later
that year.

1823 – Alexander Lucius Twilight, becomes the first African
American to earn a baccalaureate degree in the United
States, when he graduates from Middlebury College with
a BA degree.

1915 – A group of visionary scholars (George Cleveland Hall,
W.B. Hartgrove, Alexander L. Jackson, and James E.
Stamps) led by Dr. Carter G. Woodson found the
Association for the Study of Negro Life and History
(ASNLH) in Chicago, Illinois. Dr. Woodson is convinced
that among scholars, the role of his own people in
American history and in the history of other cultures
was being either ignored or misrepresented. Dr. Woodson
realizes the need for special research into the
neglected past of the Negro. The association is the
only organization of its kind concerned with preserving
African American history.

1928 – Silvio Cator of Haiti, sets the then long jump record at
26′ 0″.

1934 – Sonia Sanchez is born in Birmingham, Alabama. She will
become a noted poet, playwright, short story writer, and
author of children’s books. She will be most noted for
her poetry volumes “We a BaddDDD People”, “A Blues Book
for Blue Black Magical Women”, and anthologies she will
edit including “We Be Word Sorcerers: 25 Stories by
Black Americans.”

1941 – Otis Redding is born in Dawson, Georgia, the son of a
Baptist minister. He will become a rhythm and blues
musician and singer and will be best known for his
recording of “[Sittin’ on] The Dock of the Bay,” which
will be released after he joins the ancestors (succumbs in
a small airplane crash) in December, 1967. Some of his
other hits were “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long”, “Respect”,
and “Try A Little Tenderness.” He will join the ancestors
on December 10, 1967 after his plane crashed while he was
en route to a concert in Madison, Wisconsin.

1942 – Inez Foxx is born in Greensboro, North Carolina. She will
become a rhythm and blues singer and will perform as
part of a duuo act with her brother, Charlie. Their
biggest hit will be “Mockingbird” in 1963. They will
record together until 1967.

1942 – Luther Simmons is born in New York City, New York. He
will become a rhythm and blues singer with the group
“The Main Ingredient.” They will be best known for
their hit, “Everybody Plays the Fool.”

1945 – Dione LaRue is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She
will become a rhythm and blues singer better known as
“Dee Dee Sharp.” Her first hit will be “It’s Mashed
Potato Time” in 1962. She will also record “Gravy” [For
My Mashed Potatoes], “Ride!”, “Do the Bird”, and “Slow
Twistin’ “(with Chubby Checker).

1957 – President Eisenhower signs the first civil rights bill
passed by Congress since Reconstruction.

1957 – Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth is mobbed when he attempts to
enroll his daughters in a “white” Birmingham school.

1957 – Nashville’s new Hattie Cotton Elementary School with
enrollment of one African American and 388 whites is
virtually destroyed by a dynamite blast.

1962 – Two churches are burned near Sasser, Georgia. African
American leaders ask the president to stop the “Nazi-
like reign of terror in southwest Georgia.”

1963 – Alabama Governor George Wallace is served a federal
injunction when he orders state police to bar African
American students from enrolling in white schools.

1968 – Arthur Ashe becomes the first (and first African
American) Men’s Singles Tennis Champion of the newly
established U.S. Open tennis championships at Forest
Hills, New York.

1971 – More than 1,200 inmates at the Attica Correctional
Facility in upstate New York gain control of the
facility in a well-planned takeover. During the initial
violence, 50 correctional officers and civilian
employees are beaten and taken hostage. Correctional
officer William Quinn receives the roughest beating and
is soon freed by the inmates due to the severity of his
injuries. Police handling of the takeover will result
in the deaths of many inmates and will turn the nation’s
interest toward the conditions in U.S. penal
institutions.

1979 – Robert Guillaume wins an Emmy award for ‘Best Actor in a
Comedy Series’ for his performances in “Soap”.

1981 – Vernon E. Jordan resigns as president of the National
Urban League and announces plans to join a Washington DC
legal firm. He will be succeeded by John E. Jacob,
executive vice president of the league.

1984 – Walter Payton, of the Chicago Bears, breaks Jim Brown’s
combined yardage record — by reaching 15,517 yards.

1985 – President Reagan orders sanctions against South Africa
because of that country’s apartheid policies.

1990 – Liberian President Samuel K. Doe is captured and joins
the ancestors after being killed by rebel forces. In
1985, he was elected president, but Charles Taylor and
followers overthrew his government in 1989, which will
spark a seven-year long civil war.

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

KRLemmons African American History

August 1 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – August 1 *

1619 – Twenty African “Negroes” became the first Blacks to land in
Protestant America at Jamestown, Virginia. Surviving
evidence suggests that the twenty Africans were accorded
the status of indentured servants.

1834 – Slavery is abolished in the British Empire by the royal
ascent of the King of England after having been voted by
Parliament the previous year.

1838 – British slaves in the Bahamas are emancipated.

1852 – San Francisco Methodists establish the first African
American Zion Methodist Church.

1867 – African Americans vote for the first time in a state
election, in Tennessee, helping the Republicans sweep the
election.

1867 – General Philip H. Sheridan dismisses the board of aldermen
in New Orleans and named new appointees, including several
African Americans.

1868 – Governor Henry C. Warmoth of Louisiana endorses a joint
resolution of the legislature calling for federal military
aid. Warmoth says there had been 150 political
assassinations in June and July.

1874 – Charles Clinton Spaulding is born in Columbus County, North
Carolina. He will become a businessman who will rise to the
presidency of the North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance
Company. His business acumen will help the company survive
the years of the Great Depression. Also active in the
Durham, North Carolina community where the corporation is
located, he will work to increase the numbers of registered
African American voters and convince the city to hire
African American police officers. He will lead the company
from 1900 until he joins the ancestors on August 1, 1952.

1879 – Mary Eliza Mahoney graduates from the nursing program at the
New England Hospital for Women and Children. She is the
first African American to graduate from a nursing school and
becomes the first African American in history to earn a
professional nursing license.

1894 – Benjamin Elijah Mays is born in Epworth, South Carolina. He
will become a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Bates College in
Maine. He will serve as pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church from
1921-1923 in Atlanta, Georgia. Recruited by Morehouse President
John Hope, Mays will join the faculty as a mathematics teacher
and debate coach. He will obtain a master’s degree in 1925 and
in 1935 a Ph.D. degree from the University of Chicago. In 1934,
he will be appointed dean of the School of Religion at Howard
University and serve until 1940. He will become president of
Morehouse College in 1940 and launch a 27-year tenure that
will shepherd the institution into international prominence. He
will upgrade the faculty, secure a Phi Beta Kappa chapter and
sustain enrollment during World War II. After retiring as the
president of Morehouse, he will be elected to the school board
of Atlanta, Georgia and later serve as its president. In
1982, he will be awarded the NAACP’s Spingarn Medal. He
will join the ancestors on March 28, 1984.

1914 – Marcus Garvey establishes the Universal Negro Movement
Improvement and Conservation Association and African
Communities’ League, later shortened to UNIA. In New York
City six years later to the day, the UNIA will meet in
Madison Square Garden as Garvey presents his “Back to
Africa” plan and a formal Declaration of Rights for Black
people worldwide.

1918 – Theodore Juson Jemison, Sr. is born in Selma, Alabama. He
will become a Baptist minister and will later be elected
president of the National Baptist Convention USA, serving
from 1982 to 1994. It is the largest African American
religious organization. He will oversee the construction of
the Baptist World Center in Nashville, Tennessee, the
headquarters for the Convention. In 1953, while minister of
a large church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he will help lead
the first civil rights boycott of bus service. The
organization of free rides, coordinated by churches, was a
model used later by the Montgomery Bus Boycott in Alabama,
which started in 1955. He will be one of the founders of
the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957. In
2003 the 50th anniversary of the Baton Rouge bus boycott will
be honored with three days of events, organized by a young
resident born two decades after the action.

1920 – The national convention of Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro
Improvement Association opens in Liberty Hall in Harlem.
The next night Garvey addresses twenty-five thousand Blacks
in Madison Square Garden. Garvey’s nationalist movement
reaches its height in 1920-21.

1925 – The National Bar Association, dedicated to “advance the
science of jurisprudence, uphold the honor of the legal
profession…and protect the civil and political rights of
all citizens of the several states of the United States,”
is formally organized in Des Moines, Iowa by 12 African
American legal pioneers including George H. Woodson, S.
Joe Brown, and Gertrude E. Rush.

1930 – Geoffrey Holder is born in Polrt of Spain, Trinidad. He will
become a Broadway dancer and actor and will be best known
for his performances in “Annie” and “The Wiz.” He will
teach at the Katherine Dunham School of Dance for two years.
He will be a principal dancer with the Metropolitan Opera
Ballet in New York from 1955 to 1956. In 1955, He will
marry dancer Carmen De Lavallade, whom he met when both
were in the cast of “House of Flowers,” a musical by Harold
Arlen (music and lyrics) and Truman Capote (lyrics and book).
They will be the subject of a 2004 film, “Carmen & Geoffrey.”
He will begin his movie career in the 1962 British film “All
Night Long,” a modern remake of Shakespeare’s Othello. He
will follow that with “Doctor Doolittle” (1967) as Willie
Shakespeare, leader of the natives of Sea-Star Island. This
will be a trying experience for him, as he had to contend
with casual racism from Rex Harrison’s then-wife, Rachel
Roberts, and his entourage. In 1972, he will be cast as the
Sorcerer in “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex*”
(*But Were Afraid to Ask). The following year he will be a
henchman – Baron Samedi – in the Bond movie “Live and Let Die,”
also contributing to the film’s choreography. In addition to
his movie appearances, he will become a spokesman for the 1970s
7 Up soft drink “uncola” advertising campaign. In 1975, he will
win two Tony Awards for direction and costume design of “The
Wiz,” the all-black musical version of The Wizard of Oz. He
will be the first black man to be nominated in either category.
He also win the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Costume Design.
The show will run for 1672 performances over a four-year period,
reviving in 1984. As a choreographer, he will create dance
pieces for many companies, including the Alvin Ailey American
Dance Theater, for which he will provide choreography, music
and costumes for “Prodigal Prince” (1967), and the Dance
Theatre of Harlem, for which he provided choreography, music
and costumes for “Dougla” (1974) and designed costumes for
“Firebird” (1982). In 1978, he will direct and choreograph the
Broadway musical “Timbuktu!” His 1957 piece “Bele” is also part
of the Dance Theater of Harlem repertory. In the 1982 film
version of the musical “Annie,” he will play the role of Punjab.
He will also be the voice of Ray in “Bear in the Big Blue House”
and provide narration for Tim Burton’s version of Roald Dahl’s
“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” He will reprise his role
as the 7 Up Spokesman in the 2011 season finale of The Celebrity
Apprentice, where he will appear as himself in a commercial for
“7 Up Retro” for Marlee Matlin’s team. He will also be a
prolific painter, ardent art collector, book author and music
composer. As a painter, he will win a Guggenheim Fellowship. A
book of his photography, “Adam,” was published by Viking Press
in 1986.

1940 – Benjamin E. Mays, who has been called “the greatest school
master of his generation,” is named president of Morehouse
College.

1941 – Ronald H. Brown is born in Washington, DC. He will become
the first African American chairman of the Democratic
National Committee and Secretary of Commerce. He will join
the ancestors on April 3, 1996 in Croatia when his plane crashes
while on an official tour of the Balkans for the Department
of Commerce.

1943 – Race-related rioting erupts in New York City’s village of
Harlem, resulting in several deaths.

1944 – Adam Clayton Powell is elected to congress and becomes the
first African American congressman from the East.

1950 – The American Bowling Congress ends its all-white-males rule.

1952 – Charles Clinton Spaulding joins the ancestors in Durham,
North Carolina at the age of 78.

1960 – Benin changes its name to Dahomey and proclaims its
independence from France.

1960 – Chubby Checker’s “The Twist” is released. The song
inspires the dance craze of the ’60s.

1961 – Whitney Young Jr. is named executive director of the
National Urban League.

1964 – Arthur Ashe becomes the first African American to be named
to the U.S. Davis Cup tennis team.

1970 – “Black Enterprise” magazine is first published.

1970 – Willie Stargell, of the Pittsburgh Pirates, ties the record
of 5 extra base hits in a game.

1973 – Tempestt Bledsoe, actress, “The Cosby Show’s” Vanessa
Huxtable, is born in Chicago, Illinois.

1977 – Benjamin L. Hooks becomes the Executive Director of the
NAACP.

1979 – James Patterson Lyke is installed as auxiliary bishop of
the Cleveland Diocese of the Roman Catholic Church.

1987 – Mike Tyson defeats Tony Tucker to become undisputed
Heavyweight Boxing Champion.

1992 – The Supreme Court permits the administration to continue
its special interdiction policy by which the U.S. Coast
Guard patrols international waters near Haiti to prevent
Haitian citizens from escaping from their country, and
Haiti is the only country in the world to receive such
treatment by the United States.

1992 – Gail Devers wins the women’s 100 meters at the Barcelona
Summer Games.

1993 – Ronald H. Brown, former chairman of the Democratic
National Committee, is appointed head of the Department
of Commerce by President Bill Clinton.

1994 – Supporters of Haiti’s military rulers declare their
intention to fight back in the face of a U.N. resolution
paving the way for a U.S.-led invasion.

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