KRLemmons African American History

December 26 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – December 26 *

***********************************************************************
* The Nguzo Saba – The seven principles of Kwanzaa – Principle for *
* Day #1 – Umoja (oo-MOE-jah) Unity: To strive for and maintain unity *
* in the family, community, nation and race. *
* *
***********************************************************************

1848 – William & Ellen Craft escape from slavery in Georgia. Mrs. Craft
impersonates a slave holder and her husband, William, assumes
the role of her servant, in one of the most dramatic of the
slave escapes.

1849 – David Ruggles joins the ancestors in Northampton, Massachusetts.
Often called the first African American bookseller (for his
bookstore established in 1834), Ruggles was an early
abolitionist, speaker, and writer as well as a “conductor” on
the Underground Railroad. He published the first African
American magazine, the “Mirror of Liberty in August of 1838. He
was a noted hydropathist, erecting the first building
constructed for hydropathic treatments in the United States and
was known as the “water cure doctor.”

1894 – Nathan Pinchback “Jean” Toomer is born in Washington, DC. The
grandson of P.B.S. Pinchback, he will become a poet and novelist
and an important figure of the Harlem Renaissance and modernism.
His first book “Cane,” published in 1923, is considered by many
to be his most significant. Of mixed race and majority European
ancestry, he will struggle to identify as “an American” and will
resist efforts to classify him as a black writer. He will
continue to write poetry, short stories and essays. After his
second marriage in 1934, he will move from New York to Doylestown,
Pennsylvania, where he will become a member of the Religious
Society of Friends (also known as Quakers) and will retire from
public life. His papers will be held by the Beinecke Rare Book
Library at Yale University. He will join the ancestors on March
30, 1967.

1908 – Jack Johnson wins the heavyweight title in Australia, defeating
Tommy Burns. After avoiding fighting Johnson for over a year,
Burns will say of his loss, “Race prejudice was rampant in my
mind. The idea of a black man challenging me was beyond
enduring. Hatred made me tense.”

1924 – DeFord Bailey, Sr., a harmonica player, becomes the first African
American to perform on the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville,
Tennessee.

1927 – Lonnie Elder III is born in Americus, Georgia, but will be raised
in Jersey City, New Jersey. He will begin his career as a
Broadway actor but soon will find his skills in playwriting. His
first and most well known play, “Ceremonies in Dark Old Men,”
will win him a Drama Desk Award for Most Promising Playwright.
The play, which was about a Harlem barber and his family, will be
produced by the Negro Ensemble Company in 1969, and this will
encourage him to study filmmaking at Yale. He will write the
screenplay for “Sounder” and he and Suzanne de Passe will become
the first African Americans to be nominated for an Academy Award
for screen writing. He will later write the sequel to “Sounder.”
He will be known for films that promote the cause of feminism for
African American women. His script for the television miniseries
“A Woman Called Moses” is an example of this. His play
“Ceremonies in Dark Old Men,” which will be produced for
television in 1975, will also be influential in depicting the
realities of a black family attempting to survive in New York
City. He will also co-write the screenplay for the Richard Pryor
comedy “Bustin’ Loose.” He will also star in the original
Broadway production of Lorraine Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun”
as the character Bobo. He will join the ancestors on June 11,
1996.

1937 – La Julia Rhea becomes the first African American to sing with the
Chicago Civic Opera Company during the regular season. She
opens in the title role of Verdi’s “Aida.”

1956 – African Americans in Birmingham, Alabama begin mass defiance of
Jim Crow bus laws.

1966 – Kwanzaa, originated by Dr. Maulana Karenga, is first celebrated
by a small number of African American families in Los Angeles,
California, to “restore and reaffirm our African heritage and
culture.” Kwanzaa, a Kiswahili word meaning first or first
fruit, will celebrate over the next seven days the Nguzo Saba,
or seven principles, of Umoja(Unity), Kujichagulia(self-
determination), Ujima(Collective Work and Responsibility),
Ujamaa(Cooperative Economics), Nia (Purpose), Kuumba
(Creativity), and Imani (Faith).

1999 – Prolific singer, songwriter & producer Curtis Mayfield joins
the ancestors at the age of 57 in North Fulton Regional Hospital
near Atlanta, Georgia. Mayfield introduced social
consciousness into African American music and continued to
record for a decade after an accident left him paralyzed. His
many hits included “People Get Ready,” “I’m So Proud,” and “Keep
On Pushing.” His soundtrack for the 1972 movie “Superfly” sold
over 4 million copies and produced two classic hit singles, the
title track and “Freddie’s Dead.” In addition to his wife, he
leaves behind his mother, 10 children, a brother, two sisters
and seven grandchildren to celebrate his life.

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

KRLemmons African American History

September 7 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – September 7 *

1800 – The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church is dedicated
in New York City.

1859 – John Merrick is born a slave in Clinton, North Carolina.
He will be raised by a single mother and will learn to
read and write in a Reconstruction School. He will later
become a brick mason in Raleigh, North Carolina and learn
the barber trade during a lull in construction.
Subsequently, he will move to Durham where he will own
several barber shops, some of which cater to wealthy
white men. He will become involved in real estate and the
Royal Knights of King David, a fraternal benefit society.
It will be there, that he will get the idea of life
insurance based on activities in these very popular mutual
benefit societies developing in the south. He will
eventually co-found not only the North Carolina Mutual Life
Insurance Company, but assist in establishing Durham’s first
African American bank and drug store. He will also serve as
president of Lincoln Hospital. He will join the ancestors on
August 6, 1919.

1914 – Jean Blackwell Hutson is born in Summerfield, Florida.
From 1948 until she retired in 1980, she will help build
the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in
Harlem into the world’s primary source for books, art,
historical documents and other materials on people of
African Descent. She will also help the center in 1981,
win a federal grant so the collection could move from its
cramped quarters to a more spacious $3.7 million, five-
story building in Harlem. By then, she will be retired as
the institution’s head and will take a job in the office
of library administration at the Public Library’s
headquarters in New York. She will join the ancestors on
February 4, 1998 in Harlem Hospital. At the time of her
death, the Schomburg Collection will hold about 150,000
volumes, 3.5 million manuscripts, the largest assemblage of
photographs documenting Black life, and rare artifacts –
including a 16th century manuscript, “Ad Catholicum” by Juan
Latino, believed to be the first book published by a person
of African descent.

1917 – Jacob Lawrence is born in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He
will become one of the leading painters in chronicling
African American history and urban life. Among his most
celebrated works will be the historical panels “The Life
of Toussaint L’ouverture” and “The Life of Harriet
Tubman.” He will join the ancestors on June 9, 2000.

1930 – Theodore Walter “Sonny” Rollins, jazz saxophonist, is
born in New York City. Rollins will grow up in a
neighborhood where Thelonious Monk, Coleman Hawkins (his
early idol), and Bud Powell were playing. After recording
with the latter in 1949, Rollins begins recording with
Miles Davis in 1951. During the next three years he
composes three of his best-known tunes, “Oleo,” “Doxy,”
and “Airegin,” and continues to work with Davis, Charlie
Parker, and others. Following his withdrawal from music
in 1954 to cure a heroin addiction, Rollins re-emerges
with the Clifford Brown-Max Roach quintet in 1955, and
the next four years prove to be his most fertile. He
will be awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1972. On
September 7th 2011, he is named as one of the honorees for
the 2011 Kennedy Center Honors. He will be celebrated for
his talent in improvisational saxophone.

1934 – James Milton Campbell, Jr. is born in Inverness,
Mississippi. He will becomes a blues guitar artist better
known as “Little Milton.” He started his career playing
in blues bands when he was a teenager. His first
recording was accompanying pianist Willie Love in the
early 50s. He then appeared under his own name on three
singles issued on Sam Phillips’ Sun label under the
guidance of Ike Turner. His vocal style will be in the
mould of Bobby “Blues” Bland and “T-Bone” Walker. His
hits will include “We’re Gonna Make It,” “Who’s Cheating
Who,” “Grits Ain’t Groceries,” and “That’s What Love
Will Do.” He will join the ancestors on August 4, 2005.

1937 – Olly Wilson is born in St. Louis, Missouri. He will
become a classical composer whose works will be played
by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Oakland City
Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and many
others.

1942 – Richard Roundtree is born in New Rochelle, New York. He
will attend college on a football scholarship but will
later give up athletics to pursue an acting career.
After touring as a model with the Ebony Fashion Fair, he
will join the Negro Ensemble Company’s acting workshop
program in 1967. He will make his film debut in 1970’s
“What Do You Say to a Naked Lady?,” but is still an
unknown when filmmaker Gordon Parks, Sr. cast him as
Shaft. The role will shoot Roundtree to instant fame,
launching the blaxploitation genre and proving so
successful at the box office that it helped save MGM
from the brink of bankruptcy. Thanks to the film’s
popularity — as well as its two sequels, 1972’s
“Shaft’s Big Score!” and the following year’s “Shaft in
Africa,” and even a short-lived television series. He
will also appear in films including the 1974 disaster
epic “Earthquake,” 1975’s “Man Friday” and the
blockbuster 1977 TV miniseries “Roots.”

1949 – Gloria Gaynor is born in Newark New Jersey. She will
become a singer and will be best known for her 1979
hit, “I Will Survive”. The hit tops the charts in both
the United Kingdom and the United States.

1954 – Integration of public schools begins in Washington, DC
and Baltimore, Maryland.

1972 – Curtis Mayfield earns a gold record for his album,
“Superfly”, from the movie of the same name. The LP
contained the hits, “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly” —
both songs were also million record sellers.

1980 – Bessie A. Buchanan, the first African American woman to
be elected to the New York State legislature, joins the
ancestors in New York City. Before her political career,
she was a Broadway star who had leading roles in
“Shuffle Along” and “Showboat.”

1986 – Bishop Desmond Tutu becomes the archbishop of Cape Town,
two years after winning the Nobel Peace Prize for his
nonviolent opposition to apartheid in South Africa. As
archbishop, he was the first Black to head South
Africa’s Anglican church. In 1948, South Africa’s white
minority government institutionalized its policy of
racial segregation and white supremacy known as
apartheid–Afrikaans for “apartness.” Eighty percent of
the country’s land was set aside for white use, and
black Africans entering this territory required special
passes. Blacks, who had no representation in the
government, were subjected to different labor laws and
educational standards than whites and lived in extreme
poverty while white South Africans prospered.

1987 – Dr. Benjamin S. Carson, a pediatric neurosurgeon at
Johns Hopkins University Hospital, leads a surgical
team that successfully separates Siamese twins who had
been joined at the head.

1994 – U.S. Marines begin training on a Puerto Rican island
amid talk in Washington of a U.S.-led intervention in
Haiti.

2011 – Sonny Rollins is named as one of the honorees for the 2011
Kennedy Center Honors. He will be celebrated for his
talent in improvisational saxophone.

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

KRLemmons African American History

June 3 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – June 3 *

1833 – The fourth national Black convention meets in Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania with sixty-two delegates from eight states.
Abraham D. Shadd of Pennsylvania is elected president.

1854 – Two thousand United States troops escort celebrated fugitive
slave, Anthony Burns through the streets of Boston.

1871 – Miles Vandehurst Lynk is born near Brownsville, Tennessee. A
physician at 19, he founds the first African American medical
journal, the “Medical and Surgical Observer,” and will be one
of the organizers of what will later become the National
Medical Association. He will join the ancestors on
December 29, 1956.

1887 – Roland Hayes is born in Curryville, Tennessee. A noted
concert artist, Hayes will be the first African American to
give a concert in Boston’s Symphony Hall. His career will
take him throughout the U.S. and to London for a command
performance before King George V. He will be awarded the
Spingarn Medal in 1924 for his musical accomplishments. He
will join the ancestors 0n January 1, 1977.

1904 – Charles R. Drew, creator of the plasma method of blood
preservation, is born in Washington, DC. He will receive
the NAACP’s Spingarn Medal for his contributions in 1944
and, in 1981, be posthumously honored by the U.S. Postal
Service with a commemorative stamp. He will join the
ancestors on April 1, 1950.

1906 – Freda McDonald is born in St. Louis, Missouri. She will
become a singer and entertainer known as Josephine Baker.
A chorus girl in the 1923 musical “Shuffle Along,” she will
travel to Paris, introduce “le jazz hot” in the show “La
Revue Negre,” and will cause a sensation with the Folies
Bergeres when she performs topless on a mirror, wearing a
rubber banana skirt. A World War II Red Cross volunteer,
Baker will perform for the Allied troops and in the 1950’s
she will tour the U.S., fighting for desegregated theaters
and restaurants. She will join the ancestors on April 12,
1975.

1919 – Liberty Life Insurance Company in Chicago, Illinois, the
first old-line legal reserve company organized by African
Americans in the North, is incorporated.

1930 – Dakota Staton is born in the Homewood neighborhood of Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. She will attend George Westinghouse High School
and study music at the Filion School of Music in Pittsburgh.
She will later perform regularly in the Hill District, a jazz
hotspot, as a vocalist with the Joe Westray Orchestra, a popular
Pittsburgh orchestra. She will spend the next several years in
the nightclub circuit in Detroit, Indianapolis, Cleveland and
St. Louis. While in New York, she will be noticed singing at a
Harlem nightclub called the ‘Baby Grand’, by Dave Cavanaugh, a
producer for Capitol Records. She will be signed and will
release several singles. Her success will lead her to win Down
Beat magazine’s “Most Promising New Comer” award in 1955. In
1958, She will wed Talib Ahmad Dawud, a Black Antiguan Ahmadi
Muslim trumpeter and noted critic of Elijah Muhammad. Shw will
be known by the Muslim name Aliyah Rabia for a time, due to her
conversion to Islam as interpreted by the Ahmadiyya Muslim
Community. She will release several critically acclaimed albums
in the late 1950s and early 1960s, including: ‘The Late, Late
Show’ (1957), whose title track will be her biggest hit, ‘In the
Night’ (1957), a collaboration with pianist George Shearing,
‘Dynamic!’ (1958) and ‘Dakota at Storyville’ (1961), a live
album recorded at the Storyville jazz club in Boston. She will
move to England in the mid-1960s. She will continue to record
semi-regularly, her recordings taking an increasingly strong
gospel and blues influence. She will join the ancestors on April
10, 2007 in New York City at the age of 76.

1942 – Curtis Mayfield is born in Chattanooga, Tennessee and will
be raised in Chicago, Illinois. He will become a singer,
songwriter, and producer. He will be a member of the group
The Impressions. He will write many hits for the group,
Jerry Butler and himself. He will start a successful solo
career in 1970. He will become paralyzed from the chest
down in 1990 when a stage lighting tower falls on him.
After recuperating, he will still continue to perform. He
will join the ancestors on Sunday, December 26, 1999.

1946 – In its “Morgan vs. Commonwealth of Virginia” ruling, the U.S.
Supreme Court bars segregation in interstate bus travel.

1949 – Wesley Anthony Brown becomes the first African American to
graduate from the U.S. Naval Academy.

1951 – Deniece Chandler is born in Gary, Indiana. She will become a
singer and will be known as Deniece Williams. She will get
her first break as a member of Stevie Wonder’s backup group
Wonderlove during 1972-75. She will grow into a successful
solo career in both secular and gospel music.

1997 – Harvey Johnson, who defeats the incumbent mayor in the
Democratic Primary, is elected Jackson, Mississippi’s first
African American mayor, defeating the Republican candidate
by more than two-to-one. Johnson, an urban planner and
former state tax commissioner, was making his second run to
head the city of about 200,000. He upset incumbent Kane
Ditto to earn the right to face GOP businesswoman Charlotte
Reeves in the general election.

1997 – Rene’ A. Perry, a.k.a. Bro. Mosi Hoj, issues the email that will
establish the beginning of the “Today in Black History” series
that will eventually be known as the “Munirah Chronicle.”

2009 – Cora Walton “KoKo” Taylor joins the ancestors at the age of 80,
after succumbing to complications from surgery for
gastrointestinal bleeding. She had been known as the “Queen
of the Blues,” over the course of her almost 50-year career.

2013 – David D. ‘Deacon’ Jones joins the ancestors at the age of 74.
He specialized in quarterback sacks, a term attributed to him.
Nicknamed the “Secretary of Defense”, He is considered one of
the greatest defensive players ever. The Los Angeles Times
called him “Most Valuable Ram of All Time,” and former Rams
head coach George Allen called him the “Greatest Defensive
End of Modern Football.”

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

KRLemmons African American History

December 26 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – December 26 *

***********************************************************************
* The Nguzo Saba – The seven principles of Kwanzaa – Principle for *
* Day #1 – Umoja (oo-MOE-jah) Unity: To strive for and maintain unity *
* in the family, community, nation and race. *
* http://www.endarkenment.com/kwanzaa/ *
* *
***********************************************************************

1848 – William & Ellen Craft escape from slavery in Georgia. Mrs. Craft
impersonates a slave holder and her husband, William, assumes
the role of her servant, in one of the most dramatic of the
slave escapes.

1849 – David Ruggles joins the ancestors in Northampton, Massachusetts.
Often called the first African American bookseller (for his
bookstore established in 1834), Ruggles was an early
abolitionist, speaker, and writer as well as a “conductor” on
the Underground Railroad. He published the first African
American magazine, the “Mirror of Liberty in August of 1838. He
was a noted hydropathist, erecting the first building
constructed for hydropathic treatments in the United States and
was known as the “water cure doctor.”

1894 – Jean Toomer is born in Washington, DC. The grandson of P.B.S.
Pinchback, Toomer will become the author of the influential
“Cane.”

1908 – Jack Johnson wins the heavyweight title in Australia, defeating
Tommy Burns. After avoiding fighting Johnson for over a year,
Burns will say of his loss, “Race prejudice was rampant in my
mind. The idea of a black man challenging me was beyond
enduring. Hatred made me tense.”

1924 – DeFord Bailey, Sr., a harmonica player, becomes the first African
American to perform on the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville,
Tennessee.

1931 – Lonnie Elder is born in Americus, Georgia. He will be known as
an author, playwright (“Ceremonies in Dark Old Men”), and
screenwriter (“Sounder,” “A Woman Called Moses”). He will become
the first African American to be nominated for an Academy Award
(Sounder – 1972). He will join the ancestors in 1996.

1937 – La Julia Rhea becomes the first African American to sing with the
Chicago Civic Opera Company during the regular season. She
opens in the title role of Verdi’s “Aida.”

1956 – African Americans in Birmingham, Alabama begin mass defiance of
Jim Crow bus laws.

1966 – Kwanzaa, originated by Dr. Maulana Karenga, is first celebrated
by a small number of African American families in Los Angeles,
California, to “restore and reaffirm our African heritage and
culture.” Kwanzaa, a Kiswahili word meaning first or first
fruit, will celebrate over the next seven days the Nguzo Saba,
or seven principles, of Umoja(Unity), Kujichagulia(self-
determination), Ujima(Collective Work and Responsibility),
Ujamaa(Cooperative Economics), Nia (Purpose), Kuumba
(Creativity), and Imani (Faith).

1999 – Prolific singer, songwriter & producer Curtis Mayfield joins
the ancestors at the age of 57 in North Fulton Regional Hospital
near Atlanta, Georgia. Mayfield introduced social
consciousness into African American music and continued to
record for a decade after an accident left him paralyzed. His
many hits included “People Get Ready,” “I’m So Proud,” and “Keep
On Pushing.” His soundtrack for the 1972 movie “Superfly” sold
over 4 million copies and produced two classic hit singles, the
title track and “Freddie’s Dead.” In addition to his wife, he
leaves behind his mother, 10 children, a brother, two sisters
and seven grandchildren to celebrate his life.

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

KRLemmons African American History

September 7 African American Historical Events

* Today in Black History – September 7 *

1800 – The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church is dedicated
in New York City.

1859 – John Merrick is born a slave in Clinton, North Carolina.
He will be raised by a single mother and will learn to
read and write in a Reconstruction School. He will later
become a brick mason in Raleigh, North Carolina and learn
the barber trade during a lull in construction.
Subsequently, he will move to Durham where he will own
several barber shops, some of which cater to wealthy
white men. He will become involved in real estate and the
Royal Knights of King David, a fraternal benefit society.
It will be there, that he will get the idea of life
insurance based on activities in these very popular mutual
benefit societies developing in the south. He will
eventually co-found not only the North Carolina Mutual Life
Insurance Company, but assist in establishing Durham’s first
African American bank and drug store. He will also serve as
president of Lincoln Hospital. He will join the ancestors on
August 6, 1919.

1914 – Jean Blackwell Hutson is born in Summerfield, Florida.
From 1948 until she retired in 1980, she will help build
the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in
Harlem into the world’s primary source for books, art,
historical documents and other materials on people of
African Descent. She will also help the center in 1981,
win a federal grant so the collection could move from its
cramped quarters to a more spacious $3.7 million, five-
story building in Harlem. By then, she will be retired as
the institution’s head and will take a job in the office
of library administration at the Public Library’s
headquarters in New York. She will join the ancestors on
February 4, 1998 in Harlem Hospital. At the time of her
death, the Schomburg Collection will hold about 150,000
volumes, 3.5 million manuscripts, the largest assemblage of
photographs documenting Black life, and rare artifacts –
including a 16th century manuscript, “Ad Catholicum” by Juan
Latino, believed to be the first book published by a person
of African descent.

1917 – Jacob Lawrence is born in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He
will become one of the leading painters in chronicling
African American history and urban life. Among his most
celebrated works will be the historical panels “The Life
of Toussaint L’ouverture” and “The Life of Harriet
Tubman.” He will join the ancestors on June 9, 2000.

1930 – Theodore Walter “Sonny” Rollins, jazz saxophonist, is
born in New York City. Rollins will grow up in a
neighborhood where Thelonious Monk, Coleman Hawkins (his
early idol), and Bud Powell were playing. After recording
with the latter in 1949, Rollins begins recording with
Miles Davis in 1951. During the next three years he
composes three of his best-known tunes, “Oleo,” “Doxy,”
and “Airegin,” and continues to work with Davis, Charlie
Parker, and others. Following his withdrawal from music
in 1954 to cure a heroin addiction, Rollins re-emerges
with the Clifford Brown-Max Roach quintet in 1955, and
the next four years prove to be his most fertile. He
will be awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1972. On
September 7th 2011, he is named as one of the honorees for
the 2011 Kennedy Center Honors. He will be celebrated for
his talent in improvisational saxophone.

1934 – James Milton Campbell, Jr. is born in Inverness,
Mississippi. He will becomes a blues guitar artist better
known as “Little Milton.” He started his career playing
in blues bands when he was a teenager. His first
recording was accompanying pianist Willie Love in the
early 50s. He then appeared under his own name on three
singles issued on Sam Phillips’ Sun label under the
guidance of Ike Turner. His vocal style will be in the
mould of Bobby “Blues” Bland and “T-Bone” Walker. His
hits will include “We’re Gonna Make It,” “Who’s Cheating
Who,” “Grits Ain’t Groceries,” and “That’s What Love
Will Do.” He will join the ancestors on August 4, 2005.

1937 – Olly Wilson is born in St. Louis, Missouri. He will
become a classical composer whose works will be played
by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Oakland City
Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and many
others.

1942 – Richard Roundtree is born in New Rochelle, New York. He
will attend college on a football scholarship but will
later give up athletics to pursue an acting career.
After touring as a model with the Ebony Fashion Fair, he
will join the Negro Ensemble Company’s acting workshop
program in 1967. He will make his film debut in 1970’s
“What Do You Say to a Naked Lady?,” but is still an
unknown when filmmaker Gordon Parks, Sr. cast him as
Shaft. The role will shoot Roundtree to instant fame,
launching the blaxploitation genre and proving so
successful at the box office that it helped save MGM
from the brink of bankruptcy. Thanks to the film’s
popularity — as well as its two sequels, 1972’s
“Shaft’s Big Score!” and the following year’s “Shaft in
Africa,” and even a short-lived television series. He
will also appear in films including the 1974 disaster
epic “Earthquake,” 1975’s “Man Friday” and the
blockbuster 1977 TV miniseries “Roots.”

1949 – Gloria Gaynor is born in Newark New Jersey. She will
become a singer and will be best known for her 1979
hit, “I Will Survive”. The hit tops the charts in both
the United Kingdom and the United States.

1954 – Integration of public schools begins in Washington, DC
and Baltimore, Maryland.

1972 – Curtis Mayfield earns a gold record for his album,
“Superfly”, from the movie of the same name. The LP
contained the hits, “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly” —
both songs were also million record sellers.

1980 – Bessie A. Buchanan, the first African American woman to
be elected to the New York State legislature, joins the
ancestors in New York City. Before her political career,
she was a Broadway star who had leading roles in
“Shuffle Along” and “Showboat.”

1986 – Bishop Desmond Tutu becomes the archbishop of Cape Town,
two years after winning the Nobel Peace Prize for his
nonviolent opposition to apartheid in South Africa. As
archbishop, he was the first Black to head South
Africa’s Anglican church. In 1948, South Africa’s white
minority government institutionalized its policy of
racial segregation and white supremacy known as
apartheid–Afrikaans for “apartness.” Eighty percent of
the country’s land was set aside for white use, and
black Africans entering this territory required special
passes. Blacks, who had no representation in the
government, were subjected to different labor laws and
educational standards than whites and lived in extreme
poverty while white South Africans prospered.

1987 – Dr. Benjamin S. Carson, a pediatric neurosurgeon at
Johns Hopkins University Hospital, leads a surgical
team that successfully separates Siamese twins who had
been joined at the head.

1994 – U.S. Marines begin training on a Puerto Rican island
amid talk in Washington of a U.S.-led intervention in
Haiti.

2011 – Sonny Rollins is named as one of the honorees for the 2011
Kennedy Center Honors. He will be celebrated for his
talent in improvisational saxophone.* Today in Black History – September 7 *

1800 – The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church is dedicated
in New York City.

1859 – John Merrick is born a slave in Clinton, North Carolina.
He will be raised by a single mother and will learn to
read and write in a Reconstruction School. He will later
become a brick mason in Raleigh, North Carolina and learn
the barber trade during a lull in construction.
Subsequently, he will move to Durham where he will own
several barber shops, some of which cater to wealthy
white men. He will become involved in real estate and the
Royal Knights of King David, a fraternal benefit society.
It will be there, that he will get the idea of life
insurance based on activities in these very popular mutual
benefit societies developing in the south. He will
eventually co-found not only the North Carolina Mutual Life
Insurance Company, but assist in establishing Durham’s first
African American bank and drug store. He will also serve as
president of Lincoln Hospital. He will join the ancestors on
August 6, 1919.

1914 – Jean Blackwell Hutson is born in Summerfield, Florida.
From 1948 until she retired in 1980, she will help build
the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in
Harlem into the world’s primary source for books, art,
historical documents and other materials on people of
African Descent. She will also help the center in 1981,
win a federal grant so the collection could move from its
cramped quarters to a more spacious $3.7 million, five-
story building in Harlem. By then, she will be retired as
the institution’s head and will take a job in the office
of library administration at the Public Library’s
headquarters in New York. She will join the ancestors on
February 4, 1998 in Harlem Hospital. At the time of her
death, the Schomburg Collection will hold about 150,000
volumes, 3.5 million manuscripts, the largest assemblage of
photographs documenting Black life, and rare artifacts –
including a 16th century manuscript, “Ad Catholicum” by Juan
Latino, believed to be the first book published by a person
of African descent.

1917 – Jacob Lawrence is born in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He
will become one of the leading painters in chronicling
African American history and urban life. Among his most
celebrated works will be the historical panels “The Life
of Toussaint L’ouverture” and “The Life of Harriet
Tubman.” He will join the ancestors on June 9, 2000.

1930 – Theodore Walter “Sonny” Rollins, jazz saxophonist, is
born in New York City. Rollins will grow up in a
neighborhood where Thelonious Monk, Coleman Hawkins (his
early idol), and Bud Powell were playing. After recording
with the latter in 1949, Rollins begins recording with
Miles Davis in 1951. During the next three years he
composes three of his best-known tunes, “Oleo,” “Doxy,”
and “Airegin,” and continues to work with Davis, Charlie
Parker, and others. Following his withdrawal from music
in 1954 to cure a heroin addiction, Rollins re-emerges
with the Clifford Brown-Max Roach quintet in 1955, and
the next four years prove to be his most fertile. He
will be awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1972. On
September 7th 2011, he is named as one of the honorees for
the 2011 Kennedy Center Honors. He will be celebrated for
his talent in improvisational saxophone.

1934 – James Milton Campbell, Jr. is born in Inverness,
Mississippi. He will becomes a blues guitar artist better
known as “Little Milton.” He started his career playing
in blues bands when he was a teenager. His first
recording was accompanying pianist Willie Love in the
early 50s. He then appeared under his own name on three
singles issued on Sam Phillips’ Sun label under the
guidance of Ike Turner. His vocal style will be in the
mould of Bobby “Blues” Bland and “T-Bone” Walker. His
hits will include “We’re Gonna Make It,” “Who’s Cheating
Who,” “Grits Ain’t Groceries,” and “That’s What Love
Will Do.” He will join the ancestors on August 4, 2005.

1937 – Olly Wilson is born in St. Louis, Missouri. He will
become a classical composer whose works will be played
by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Oakland City
Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and many
others.

1942 – Richard Roundtree is born in New Rochelle, New York. He
will attend college on a football scholarship but will
later give up athletics to pursue an acting career.
After touring as a model with the Ebony Fashion Fair, he
will join the Negro Ensemble Company’s acting workshop
program in 1967. He will make his film debut in 1970’s
“What Do You Say to a Naked Lady?,” but is still an
unknown when filmmaker Gordon Parks, Sr. cast him as
Shaft. The role will shoot Roundtree to instant fame,
launching the blaxploitation genre and proving so
successful at the box office that it helped save MGM
from the brink of bankruptcy. Thanks to the film’s
popularity — as well as its two sequels, 1972’s
“Shaft’s Big Score!” and the following year’s “Shaft in
Africa,” and even a short-lived television series. He
will also appear in films including the 1974 disaster
epic “Earthquake,” 1975’s “Man Friday” and the
blockbuster 1977 TV miniseries “Roots.”

1949 – Gloria Gaynor is born in Newark New Jersey. She will
become a singer and will be best known for her 1979
hit, “I Will Survive”. The hit tops the charts in both
the United Kingdom and the United States.

1954 – Integration of public schools begins in Washington, DC
and Baltimore, Maryland.

1972 – Curtis Mayfield earns a gold record for his album,
“Superfly”, from the movie of the same name. The LP
contained the hits, “Freddie’s Dead” and “Superfly” —
both songs were also million record sellers.

1980 – Bessie A. Buchanan, the first African American woman to
be elected to the New York State legislature, joins the
ancestors in New York City. Before her political career,
she was a Broadway star who had leading roles in
“Shuffle Along” and “Showboat.”

1986 – Bishop Desmond Tutu becomes the archbishop of Cape Town,
two years after winning the Nobel Peace Prize for his
nonviolent opposition to apartheid in South Africa. As
archbishop, he was the first Black to head South
Africa’s Anglican church. In 1948, South Africa’s white
minority government institutionalized its policy of
racial segregation and white supremacy known as
apartheid–Afrikaans for “apartness.” Eighty percent of
the country’s land was set aside for white use, and
black Africans entering this territory required special
passes. Blacks, who had no representation in the
government, were subjected to different labor laws and
educational standards than whites and lived in extreme
poverty while white South Africans prospered.

1987 – Dr. Benjamin S. Carson, a pediatric neurosurgeon at
Johns Hopkins University Hospital, leads a surgical
team that successfully separates Siamese twins who had
been joined at the head.

1994 – U.S. Marines begin training on a Puerto Rican island
amid talk in Washington of a U.S.-led intervention in
Haiti.

2011 – Sonny Rollins is named as one of the honorees for the 2011
Kennedy Center Honors. He will be celebrated for his
talent in improvisational saxophone.

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

KRLemmons African American History

June 3 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – June 3 *

1833 – The fourth national Black convention meets in Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania with sixty-two delegates from eight states.
Abraham D. Shadd of Pennsylvania is elected president.

1854 – Two thousand United States troops escort celebrated fugitive
slave, Anthony Burns through the streets of Boston.

1871 – Miles Vandehurst Lynk is born near Brownsville, Tennessee. A
physician at 19, he founds the first African American medical
journal, the “Medical and Surgical Observer,” and will be one
of the organizers of what will later become the National
Medical Association. He will join the ancestors on
December 29, 1956.

1887 – Roland Hayes is born in Curryville, Tennessee. A noted
concert artist, Hayes will be the first African American to
give a concert in Boston’s Symphony Hall. His career will
take him throughout the U.S. and to London for a command
performance before King George V. He will be awarded the
Spingarn Medal in 1924 for his musical accomplishments. He
will join the ancestors 0n January 1, 1977.

1904 – Charles R. Drew, creator of the plasma method of blood
preservation, is born in Washington, DC. He will receive
the NAACP’s Spingarn Medal for his contributions in 1944
and, in 1981, be posthumously honored by the U.S. Postal
Service with a commemorative stamp. He will join the
ancestors on April 1, 1950.

1906 – Freda McDonald is born in St. Louis, Missouri. She will
become a singer and entertainer known as Josephine Baker.
A chorus girl in the 1923 musical “Shuffle Along,” she will
travel to Paris, introduce “le jazz hot” in the show “La
Revue Negre,” and will cause a sensation with the Folies
Bergeres when she performs topless on a mirror, wearing a
rubber banana skirt. A World War II Red Cross volunteer,
Baker will perform for the Allied troops and in the 1950’s
she will tour the U.S., fighting for desegregated theaters
and restaurants. She will join the ancestors on April 12, 1975.

1919 – Liberty Life Insurance Company in Chicago, Illinois, the
first old-line legal reserve company organized by African
Americans in the North, is incorporated.

1932 – Dakota Staton

1942 – Curtis Mayfield is born in Chattanooga, Tennessee and will
be raised in Chicago, Illinois. He will become a singer,
songwriter, and producer. He will be a member of the group
The Impressions. He will write many hits for the group,
Jerry Butler and himself. He will start a successful solo
career in 1970. He will become paralyzed from the chest
down in 1990 when a stage lighting tower falls on him.
After recuperating, he will still continue to perform. He
will join the ancestors on Sunday, December 26, 1999.

1946 – In its “Morgan vs. Commonwealth of Virginia” ruling, the U.S.
Supreme Court bars segregation in interstate bus travel.

1949 – Wesley Anthony Brown becomes the first African American to
graduate from the U.S. Naval Academy.

1951 – Deniece Chandler is born in Gary, Indiana. She will become a
singer and will be known as Deniece Williams. She will get
her first break as a member of Stevie Wonder’s backup group
Wonderlove during 1972-75. She will grow into a successful
solo career in both secular and gospel music.

1997 – Harvey Johnson, who defeats the incumbent mayor in the
Democratic Primary, is elected Jackson, Mississippi’s first
African American mayor, defeating the Republican candidate
by more than two-to-one. Johnson, an urban planner and
former state tax commissioner, was making his second run to
head the city of about 200,000. He upset incumbent Kane
Ditto to earn the right to face GOP businesswoman Charlotte
Reeves in the general election.

1997 – Bro. Mosi Hoj issues the email that will establish the
beginning of the “Today in Black History” series that will
eventually be known as the “Munirah Chronicle.”

2009 – Cora Walton “KoKo” Taylor joins the ancestors at the age of 80,
after succumbing to complications from surgery for
gastrointestinal bleeding. She had been known as the “Queen
of the Blues,” over the course of her almost 50-year career.

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

KRLemmons African American History

December 26 African American Historical Events

Today in Black History – December 26 *

***********************************************************************
* The Nguzo Saba – The seven principles of Kwanzaa – Principle for *
* Day #1 – Umoja (oo-MOE-jah) Unity: To strive for and maintain unity *
* in the family, community, nation and race. *
* http://www.endarkenment.com/kwanzaa/ *
* *
***********************************************************************

1848 – William & Ellen Craft escape from slavery in Georgia. Mrs. Craft
impersonates a slave holder and her husband, William, assumes
the role of her servant, in one of the most dramatic of the
slave escapes.

1849 – David Ruggles joins the ancestors in Northampton, Massachusetts.
Often called the first African American bookseller (for his
bookstore established in 1834), Ruggles was an early
abolitionist, speaker, and writer as well as a “conductor” on
the Underground Railroad. He published the first African
American magazine, the “Mirror of Liberty in August of 1838. He
was a noted hydropathist, erecting the first building
constructed for hydropathic treatments in the United States and
was known as the “water cure doctor.”

1894 – Jean Toomer is born in Washington, DC. The grandson of P.B.S.
Pinchback, Toomer will become the author of the influential
“Cane.”

1908 – Jack Johnson wins the heavyweight title in Australia, defeating
Tommy Burns. After avoiding fighting Johnson for over a year,
Burns will say of his loss, “Race prejudice was rampant in my
mind. The idea of a black man challenging me was beyond
enduring. Hatred made me tense.”

1924 – DeFord Bailey, Sr., a harmonica player, becomes the first African
American to perform on the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville,
Tennessee.

1931 – Lonnie Elder is born in Americus, Georgia. He will be known as
an author, playwright (“Ceremonies in Dark Old Men”), and
screenwriter (“Sounder,” “A Woman Called Moses”). He will become
the first African American to be nominated for an Academy Award
(Sounder – 1972). He will join the ancestors in 1996.

1937 – La Julia Rhea becomes the first African American to sing with the
Chicago Civic Opera Company during the regular season. She
opens in the title role of Verdi’s “Aida.”

1956 – African Americans in Birmingham, Alabama begin mass defiance of
Jim Crow bus laws.

1966 – Kwanzaa, originated by Dr. Maulana Karenga, is first celebrated
by a small number of African American families in Los Angeles,
California, to “restore and reaffirm our African heritage and
culture.” Kwanzaa, a Kiswahili word meaning first or first
fruit, will celebrate over the next seven days the Nguzo Saba,
or seven principles, of Umoja(Unity), Kujichagulia(self-
determination), Ujima(Collective Work and Responsibility),
Ujamaa(Cooperative Economics), Nia (Purpose), Kuumba
(Creativity), and Imani (Faith).

1999 – Prolific singer, songwriter & producer Curtis Mayfield joins
the ancestors at the age of 57 in North Fulton Regional Hospital
near Atlanta, Georgia. Mayfield introduced social
consciousness into African American music and continued to
record for a decade after an accident left him paralyzed. His
many hits included “People Get Ready,” “I’m So Proud,” and “Keep
On Pushing.” His soundtrack for the 1972 movie “Superfly” sold
over 4 million copies and produced two classic hit singles, the
title track and “Freddie’s Dead.” In addition to his wife, he
leaves behind his mother, 10 children, a brother, two sisters
and seven grandchildren to celebrate his life.

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