Ourstory

[True Father Sankofa]

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1667 - In Williamsburg, Virginia, a law was passed, barring
       slaves from obtaining their freedom by converting to
       Christianity.

1862 - A draft of Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation is
       published in Northern Newspapers.

1863 - Mary Church (later Terrell) is born in Memphis,
       Tennessee. She will become an educator, civil and
       woman's rights advocate, and U.S. delegate to the
       International Peace Conference.  She will also be the
       first African American to serve on the school board in
       the District of Columbia.

1926 - John Coltrane, brilliant jazz saxophonist and composer who
       will be considered the father of avant-garde jazz, is
       born in Hamlet, North Carolina.

1930 - Ray Charles (Robinson) is born in Albany, Georgia. Blind
       by the age of six, he will study music and form his own
       band at the age of 24. A recorded performance at the
       Newport Jazz Festival in 1958 will establish his career
       as one of the premier soul singers in the United States.
       Among Charles's achievements will be three Grammys and
       Kennedy Center honors in 1986. He will join the ancestors
       on June 10, 2004 after succumbing to liver disease.

1954 - Playwright George C. Wolfe is born in Frankfort, Kentucky.
       He will become critically acclaimed for the controversial plays, "The Colored Museum", "Jelly's Last Jam", and "Spunk".

1957 - Nine African American students, who had entered Little
       Rock Central High School in Arkansas, are forced to leave
       because of a white mob outside.

1961 - President Kennedy names Thurgood Marshall to the United
       States Circuit Court of Appeals.

1993 – South Africa’s parliament creates a multiracial body to oversee the end of exclusive white control of the nation

[True Father Sankofa]

Republic Day (Trinidad)

1825 - Frances Ellen Watkins Harper is born free in Baltimore,
       Maryland. She will grow up to be one of the most famous
       African American poets. Harper's mother will join the
       ancestors before she is three years old, leaving her an
       orphan. Harper will be raised by her uncle, William
       Watkins, a teacher at the Academy for Negro Youth and a
       radical political figure in civil rights. Watkins will
       be a major influence on Harper's political, religious,
       and social views. Harper will attend the Academy for
       Negro Youth and the rigorous education she will receive,
       along with the political activism of her uncle, will
       affect and influence her poetry. In 1850, she will
       become the first female to teach at Union Seminary in
       Wilberforce, Ohio. After new laws pass in 1854, state
       that African Americans entering through Maryland's
       northern border could be sold into slavery, Harper will
       become an active abolitionist and writer. She will be
       known for her writings, "Forest Leaves," "Poems on
       Miscellaneous Subjects," "Moses: A Story of the Nile,"
       "Achan's Sin," "Sketches of Southern Life," "Light
       Beyond the Darkness," "Iola Leroy: Or Shadows Uplifted,"
       "The Martyr of Alabama and Other Poems," "Atlanta
       Offering Poems," and "Idylls of the Bible." She will join
       the ancestors on February 22, 1911.

1883 - The National Black convention meets in Louisville,
       Kentucky.

1894 - Sociologist and professor at Morehouse College, Fisk
       University, and Howard University, E.(Edward) Franklin
       Frazier is born in Baltimore, Maryland. He will organize
       the Atlanta University School of Social Work (for African
       Americans), later becoming its director. He will write
       the controversial publication (1927) "The Pathology of
       Race Prejudice" in Forum Magazine. His writings will
       include "The Negro Family in the United States" (1939),
       among the first sociological works on African Americans
       researched and written by an African American. He will
       also write "Negro Youth at the Crossways" (1940) and
       "Race and Culture Contacts in the Modern World" (1957),
       which deals with African studies. Frazier will have a
       distinguished career at Howard University as chairman of
       its sociology department as well as serving as the first
       African American president of the American Sociological
       Society. He will join the ancestors on May 17, 1962.

1923 – Nancy Green, the world’s first living trademark (Aunt Jemima) is struck and killed by an automobile in Chicago

1931 - Cardiss Robertson (later Collins) is born in St. Louis,
       Missouri. Elected to the House of Representatives in 1973
       after the death of her husband, George, she will serve in
       a leadership capacity often in her Congressional career,
       most notably as chairman of the Energy and Commerce
       Subcommittee on Commerce, Consumer Protection, and
       Competitiveness.

1935 - World Heavyweight Champion, Joe Louis, becomes the first
       African American boxer to draw a million dollar gate.

1953 - "Take a Giant Step", a drama by playwright Louis Peterson,
       opens on Broadway.

1954 - Patrick Kelly is born in Vicksburg, Mississippi.  A
       fashion design student, Kelly will move to Paris, where
       his innovative and outrageous women's fashion designs,
       featuring multiple buttons, bows and African American
       baby dolls, will win him wide acclaim and make him the
       first and only American designer admitted to an
       exclusive organization of French fashion designers.

1957 - President Eisenhower makes an address on nationwide TV and
       radio to explain why troops are being sent to Little Rock,
       Arkansas. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, earlier in the
       day sends 1,000 U.S. government paratroopers to Little
       Rock to aid in the desegregation of the public schools.
       The troops will escort nine school children to Central
       High School in the first federally supported effort to
       integrate the nation's public schools. The nine Black
       students who had entered Little Rock Central High School
       in Arkansas were forced to withdraw because of a white
       mob outside.

1962 - United States Circuit Court of Appeals orders the
       Mississippi Board of Higher Education to admit James
       Meredith to the University of Mississippi or be held in
       contempt of court.

1965 - Executive Order 11246 enforces affirmative action for the first time Issued by President Johnson, the executive order requires government contractors to "take affirmative action" toward prospective minority employees in all aspects of hiring and employment. Contractors must take specific measures to ensure equality in hiring and must document these efforts.

1973 - Leaders of the African Party for the Independence of Guinea
       and Cape Verde (PAIGC) declare the independence of
       Guinea-Bissau from Portugal.  Portugal will recognize this
       independence the following year. The PAIGC was formed by
       Amilcar Cabral and Raphael Barbosa in 1956. Luis Cabral,
       Amilcar's half-brother, will become Guinea-Bissau's first
       president.

1986 - Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone said the United States "intelligence levels are lower than those in Japan because of African Americans, Hispanics and Puerto Ricans." Nakasone later apologized saying his remarks were misinterpreted.

1991 - Sept.24th – A Tribe Called Quest release their sophomore album “The Low End Theory” on Jive Records. The album considered one of hip-hop’s finest ever is also considered one of the fore-runners of the hip-hop/jazz fusion movement although most of the samples used are from 1970’s funk records. Legendary jazz bassist Ron Carter however does appear on the album , setting a be-bop tone. The album spawns some of hip-hop’s classic cuts like “Jazz”(We’ve Got) , Check The Rime” and the ultimate posse track “Scenario” featuring Leaders Of The New School.

[True Father Sankofa]

Referendum Day (Rwanda)

1861 - The Secretary of the Navy authorizes the enlistment of
       African Americans in the Union Navy. The enlistees could
       achieve no rank higher than "boys" and receive pay of
       one ration per day and $10 per month.

1911 - Dr. Eric Eustace Williams, the first Prime Minister of
       Trinidad and Tobago, is born in Port of Spain, Trindad
       and Tobago. He will make a shift from American academia
       to the public arena in 1944. In 1948, he will decide to
       return to his native country and become involved in
       politics. On January 15, 1956 he will inaugurate his
       own political party, the People's National Movement,
       which will take Trinidad and Tobago into independence
       in 1962, and dominate its postcolonial politics. Until
       this time his lectures will be carried out under the
       auspices of the Political Education Movement (PEM), a
       branch of the Teachers Education and Cultural
       Association, a group which had been founded in the
       1940s as an alternative to the official teachers’
       union. The PNM’s first document will be its
       constitution. Unlike the other political parties of
       the time, the PNM will be a highly organized,
       hierarchical body. Its second document was The People’s
       Charter, in which the party will strive to separate
       itself from the transitory political assemblages which
       had beeb the norm in Trinidadian politics. He will lead
       the newly independent country in 1962 until he joins
       the ancestors on March 29, 1981.

1924 - In a letter to his friend Alain Locke, Langston Hughes
       writes "I've done a couple of new poems. I have no more
       paper, so I'm sending you one on the back of this
       letter."  The poem, "I, Too", will be published two years
       later and be among his most famous.

1957 - With 300 U.S. Army troops standing guard, nine African
       American children forced to withdraw the previous day
       from Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas,
       because of unruly white crowds, are escorted back to
       class.

1962 - An African American church is destroyed by fire in Macon,
       Georgia. This is the eighth African American church
       burned in Georgia in one month.

1962 - Governor Ross Barnett again defies court orders and
       personally denies James Meredith admission to the
       University of Mississippi.

1968 - Willard Christopher "Will" Smith is born in Philadelphia,
       Pennsylvania.  He will become a rapper at the age of 12
       and will be known for his hits Nightmare on My Street, Parents Just Don't Understand and Summertime.  In 1990 he will start his acting career with a six-year run as the Fresh Prince of Bel Air.  He will go on to become a major motion picture box office attraction, starring in Independence Day, Men In Black 1 and 2, Bad Boys 1 and 2, Ali (Oscar Nomination), I Robot, Hancock, Pursuit of Happyness (Oscar Nomination), Enemy of the State, 7 Pounds and I Am Legend just to name a few.
     
1991 - Pioneer filmmaker Spencer Williams's 1942 movie "Blood
       of Jesus", a story of the African American religious
       experience, is among the third group of twenty-five
       films added to the Library of Congress's National Film
       Registry.  Williams, best known for his role of Andy in
       the television series "Amos 'n' Andy", was more
       importantly, an innovative film director and a
       contemporary of Oscar Micheaux. Williams's film joins
       other classics like "Lawrence of Arabia" and "2001: A
       Space Odyssey".

[True Father Sankofa]

1867 - Maggie Lena Walker is born in Richmond, Virginia.  She
       will become a noted businesswoman, civil leader, and
       founder and president of Saint Luke Penny Savings Bank.
       As a result, she will be the first female president of a
       bank in America. She will join the ancestors on December
       15, 1934.

1907 - The People's Savings Bank is incorporated in Philadelphia,
       Pennsylvania. Founded by former African American
       congressman George H. White, of North Carolina, the bank
       will help hundreds of African Americans buy homes and
       start businesses until the illness of its founder forces
       its closure in 1918.

1937 - Bessie Smith joins the ancestors in Clarksville,
       Mississippi, after succumbing to injuries sustained in
       an automobile accident. She was one of the nation's
       greatest blues singers and was nicknamed "the Empress of
       the Blues." In 1925, Smith and Louis Armstrong made the
       definitive rendition of W.C. Handy's "St. Louis Blues,"
       and in 1929 she made her only movie appearance in the
       movie of the same name.

1957 - The order alerting regular army units for possible riot
       duty in other Southern cities is cancelled by Army
       Secretary Wilbur M. Brucker.

1962 - A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr., becomes the first African
       American member of the Federal Trade Commission.  It is
       one of the Trenton, New Jersey, native's many
       accomplishments, including appointment as a federal
       district judge and U.S. Circuit Judge of the Third
       Circuit.

1962 - Mississippi bars James Meredith for the third time. Lt.
       Gov. Paul Johnson and a blockade of state patrolmen turn
       back Meredith and federal marshals about four hundred
       yards from the gate of the school.

1968 - The Studio Museum of Harlem opens in New York City.
       Conceived by Frank Donnelly and Carter Burden, the
       Studio Museum will become an influential venue for
       exhibitions of African American artists in all media.

1994 - Addressing the U.N. General Assembly, President Clinton
       announces that he has lifted most U.S. sanctions against
       Haiti and urges other nations to follow suit.

1994 - Jury selection begins in Los Angeles for the murder trial
       of O.J. Simpson.

1998 - Grammy-winning jazz singer Betty Carter joins the
       ancestors in New York City at age 69.

[True Father Sankofa]

1785 - David Walker, who will become an abolitionist and write
       the famous "Walker's Appeal," is born free in Wilmington,
       North Carolina. He will join the ancestors on June 28, 1830.

1822 - Hiram R. Revels, is born free in Fayetteville, North
       Carolina. He will become the first African American U.S.
       Senator, elected from Mississippi.

1862 - The First Louisiana Native Guards, the first African
       American regiment to receive official recognition, is
       mustered into the Union army. The Regiment is composed of
       free African Americans from the New Orleans area.

1867 - Louisiana voters endorse the constitutional convention and
       elect delegates in the first election under The
       Reconstruction Acts. The vote was 75,000 for the
       convention and 4,000 against.

1875 - Branch Normal College opens in Pine Bluff, Arkansas.  A
       segregated unit of the state university, the college is
       established by Joseph C. Corbin.

1876 - Edward Mitchell Bannister wins a bronze medal for his
       painting "Under the Oaks" at the American Centennial
       Exposition in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  The award to
       Bannister will cause controversy among whites who think
       African Americans incapable of artistic excellence.

1877 - John Mercer Langston is named Minister to Haiti.

1936 - Don Cornelius is born.  He will become the creator,
       producer, and host of the TV show, "Soul Train" in 1970.
       The show will become the longest running program
       originally produced for first-run syndication in the
       entire history of television. The show’s resounding
       success will position it as the cornerstone of the Soul
       Train franchise which includes the annual specials: "Soul
       Train Music Awards," the "Soul Train Lady of Soul Awards"
       and the "Soul Train Christmas Starfest."

1940 - African American leaders protest discrimination in the U.S.
       Armed Forces and war industries at a White House meeting
       with President Roosevelt.

1944 - Stephanie Pogue is born in Shelby, North Carolina.  She
       will become an artist and art professor whose works will
       be collected by New York City's Whitney Museum of American
       Art and the Studio Museum of Harlem while she will exhibit
       widely in the United States, Europe, Japan, and South
       America.

1953 - Diane Abbott is born in the working-class neighborhood of
       Paddington in London, England.  Her mother (a nurse) and
       father (a welder) had moved there in 1951 from Jamaica. A
       graduate of Cambridge University, she will make history on
       June 11, 1987, becoming the first female of African
       descent to be a member of the British Parliament. Her
       outspoken criticism of racism and her commitment to
       progressive politics will make her a controversial figure
       in Great Britain's Labour Party.

1954 - Public school integration begins in Washington, DC and
       Baltimore, Maryland.

1961 - Sierre Leone becomes the 100th member of the United Nations.

1967 - Washington, DC's Anacostia Museum, dedicated to informing
       the community of the contributions of African Americans to
       United States social, political and cultural history,
       opens its doors to the public.

[True Father Sankofa]

1829 - "Walker's Appeal (To the Coloured Citizens of the World),"
       a racial antislavery pamphlet, is published in Boston,
       Massachusetts, by David Walker. He was a freeborn black. The pamphlet was very provocative calling for slaves worldwide to revolt against their white masters. Walker despised slavery. His manifesto is the most boldest call for violent revolution ever issued and one of the most widely read books written by a Black person.

1833 - Lemuel Haynes, Revolutionary War veteran and first African
       American to be ordained by the Congregational Church,
       joins the ancestors at the age of 80.

1912 - W.C. Handy's ground-breaking "Memphis Blues" is published
       in Memphis, Tennessee. The composition was originally
       entitled "Mr. Crump" and was written for the 1909
       political campaign of Edward H. "Boss" Crump.

1938 - Benjamin Earl "Ben E." King is born in Henderson, North
       Carolina.  He will become a rhythm and blues singer and
       will be best known for his song, "Stand By Me."

1945 - Todd Duncan debuts with the New York City Opera as Tonio
       in Il Pagliacci.  He is the first African American to
       sing a leading role with a major American company, almost
       ten years before Marian Anderson sings with the
       Metropolitan Opera.

1961 - Ossie Davis's "Purlie Victorious" opens on Broadway.  The
       play stars Davis, Ruby Dee, Godfrey Cambridge, Alan Alda,
       and Beah Richards.

1961 - Atlanta's segregated restaurants and other public
       facilities are peacefully integrated, part of a plan
       adopted by city officials earlier in the year.

1967 - Walter Washington takes office as the first mayor of the
       District of Columbia.

1972 - The Secretary of the Army repeals the dishonorable
       discharges of 167 soldiers involved in the Brownsville
       (Texas) Raid. The soldiers, members of the 25th Infantry
       who were involved in a riot with the city's police and
       merchants, were dishonorably discharged by President
       Theodore Roosevelt without a trial.

1981 - Joseph Paul Franklin, avowed racist, is sentenced to life
       in prison for killing 2 African American joggers in Salt
       Lake City, Utah.

1987 - The National Museum of African Art, now a part of the
       Smithsonian Institution, opens on the National Mall in
       Washington, DC. Founded by Warren M. Robbins in 1964 as
       a private educational institution, it is the only museum
       in the United States devoted exclusively to the
       collection, study, and exhibition of the art of sub-
       Saharan Africa.

1990 - Marvin Gaye gets a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.

1991 - Miles Davis, jazz musician, joins the ancestors at the age
       of 65 from pneumonia.

[True Father Sankofa]

1864 - At the Battle of New Market Heights, Sergeant Major
       Christian Fleetwood and 12 other African Americans
       fight valiantly for the Union’s cause. They will
       receive the Congressional Medal of Honor for their
       action the following year.

1916 - Henry Green Parks, Jr. is born in Atlanta, Georgia.
       He will be raised in Dayton, Ohio, attend public
       schools, and enroll in Ohio State University in
       Columbus, graduating with honors from the University
       College of Commerce in 1939 with a B.S. degree in
       Marketing.  He will also become the first African
       American on Ohio State University’s swim team. After
       graduation, he will begin working with Pabst Brewing
       Company as a sales representative, targeting the
       African American market.  He will become one of their
       leading salesmen, but in 1942 will be given the
       opportunity to join W.B. Graham and Associates, a New
       York City public relations firm.  He will explore the
       ideas of many different enterprises and work at W.B.
       Graham and Associates for seven years. In 1949, he will
       leave W.B. Graham and Associates for Crayton’s Southern
       Sausage Company, which creates sausages appealing to
       the southern taste.  He will be unsuccessful with
       Crayton’s Sausage Company, but after learning from his
       experiences and coming across southern recipes, 35-year
       -old Henry Parks will found Parks Sausage Company in
       1951 in Baltimore, Maryland.  Parks Sausage Company will
       start with only two employees, but rapidly grow to 240
       employees with annual sales in the mid-1960s exceeding
       $14 million. He will use his marketing and public
       relations background to craft a radio commercial which
       features a little boy saying, “More Parks Sausage, Mom,
       please.” The radio ad will be enormously popular and
       helps spur the company's growth.  By 1955 it will be the
       largest Black-owned business in Baltimore and later will
       become a publicly traded company.  Parks Sausage will
       also become the first African American firm to advertise
       in a World Series, when its ads appear at one of the
       seven games between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New
       York Yankees in 1955.  His company will also have the
       distinction of being the first publicly traded Black-
       owned firm on the NASDAQ stock exchange. In 1977, he will
       sell the company to a conglomerate for $1.5 million
       dollars, but will stay on the board until 1980.  He will
       serve on the corporate boards of Magnavox, Warner Lambert,
       and W.R. Grace.  He will be a trustee of Goucher College
       in Baltimore. He will suffer from Parkinson’s disease in
       the last years of his life, and will join the ancestors in
       Towson, Maryland on April 14, 1989.

1931 - Dr. Lenora Moragne is born in Evanston, Illinois. She will
       become one of the leading nutrition scientist in the United
       States. She will become head of nutrition education and
       training for the Food and Nutrition Service of the U.S.
       Department of Agriculture. She will also co-author a junior
       high school textbook on nutrition for McGraw-Hill Publishing
       Company in New York named "Focus on Food." She will also be
       appointed to the Future Development Committee of the
       American Home Economics Association. She will also be elected
       to the Board of Directors of the Chicago-based American
       Dietetic Association. She will also become the founding editor
       and publisher of the Black Congressional Monitor.

1940 - The first United States merchant ship to be commanded
       by an African American captain (Hugh Mulzac), is
       launched at Wilmington, Delaware.

1947 - Dizzy Gillespie presented his first Carnegie Hall
       concert in New York City, adding a sophisticated jazz
       touch to the famous concert emporium.  Dizzy will
       become one of the jazz greats of all time.  His
       trademark: Two cheeks pushed out until it looked like
       his face would explode.

1948 - Bryant Gumbel is born in New Orleans, Louisiana.  He
       will become the editor of Black Sports magazine and a
       successful sportscaster before joining NBC’s Today Show
       as the first African American anchor of a national
       network morning news entertainment program.

1962 - President John F. Kennedy sends federal troops to
       enforce integration of the University of Mississippi.

1962 - Lt. Governor Paul Johnson of Mississippi is found guilty
       of civil contempt for blocking the entrance of James
       Meredith to the University of Mississippi.

1975 - The first African American owned television station in
       the United States, WGPR-TV in Detroit, begins
       broadcasting.

1977 - In the most-watched prize fight in history to date,
       Muhammad Ali beats Ernie Shavers (in a fifteen round
       decision) to claim the heavyweight championship boxing
       crown.  The bout was televised from New York City's
       Madison Square Garden and was officiated by the first
       woman official of a heavyweight title boxing match
       before an estimated 70 million viewers.

1979 - Sir William Arthur Lewis, Professor of Economics at
       Princeton University, becomes the first person of
       African descent to receive the Nobel Prize in Economics.

1980 – The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture opens a new $3.8 million building in New York City.

1980 - Kurtis Blow releases his Self-Entitled debut album on Mercury Records , on this day in 1980.  The album contained one of hip-hop’s 1st smash its “The Breaks” which has been sampled by dozens of rap artists over the years.  When Blow was signed to Mercury Records the year before , he became the 1st hip-hop artist to be signed to a major label.

1997 – Brazil mercifully agrees to accept thousands of African refugees fleeing war in Angola

1998 - Former Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley joins the ancestors
       at the age of 80.

[True Father Sankofa]

1935 - John Royce "Johnny" Mathis is born in San Francisco,
       California. He will become a romantic pop singer who will
       amass more than 50 gold and platinum records for such hits
       as "Misty".  He will also have the distinction of having
       an album on the Billboard pop charts for the longest
       period, 560 weeks.

1935 - "Porgy and Bess," a folk opera by composer George Gershwin,
       has its premiere in Boston at the Colonial Theatre.  It
       was a flop! It was revived in 1942 and ran longer than any
       revival in the history of American musical theater.

1942 - Franklin Joseph "Frankie" Lymon is born in New York City.
       He will become the lead singer of Frankie Lymon and the
       Teenagers and will record his signature song, "Why Do Fools
       Fall in Love?," at age fourteen. He will develop a serious
       drug problem before he turns twenty and will join the
       ancestors after succumbing to a drug overdose on the
       bathroom floor of his grandmother's apartment at age 25,
       on February 27, 1968.

1943 - Marilyn McCoo (Davis) is born in Jersey City, New Jersey.
       She will become a singer with the group, "The Fifth
       Dimensions". Some of the hits with the group will be "Up,
       Up and Away," and "Aquarius." She will have a solo hit,
       "One Less Bell to Answer," and will record "You Don't
       Have to be a Star" with her husband, Billy Davis, Jr. She
       will later become a TV hostess for "Solid Gold" from
       1981-1984, and from 1986-88.  She will also be a TV music
       reporter for "Preview."

1962 - A large force of federal marshals escorts James H. Meredith
       to the campus of the University of Mississippi.  President
       Kennedy federalizes the Mississippi National Guard.
       University of Mississippi students and adults from Oxford,
       Mississippi, and other southern communities riot on the
       university campus.  Two persons are killed and one hundred
       or more are wounded.

1966 - Bechuanaland becomes the independent Republic of Botswana
       with Sir Seretse Khama as its first President.

1976 - Two Centuries of Black American Art opens at the Los Angeles
       County Museum of Art.  The exhibit features over 60
       lithographers, painters, and sculptors including 19th
       century masters Joshua Johnston, Edward Bannister, and
       Henry O. Tanner as well as modern artists Charles White,
       Romare Bearden, and Elizabeth Catlett.  The introduction
       to the exhibit's catalog asserts that the assembled
       artists' work proves that the human creative impulse can
       triumph in the face of impossible odds, and at times even
       because of them.

1991 - President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Haiti's first freely
       elected president, is overthrown by a military junta.
       The three-member junta that takes over begins a campaign
       of terror and violence that in a three-year period will
       cause the deaths of over 5000 Haitians and force tens of
       thousands to flee the island by boat. Jean-Bertrand
       Aristide sat in the presidency for only seven months.

[True Father Sankofa]

Nigeria Independence Day

1799 – John Russwurm, founder of the first African American newspaper “Freedom’s Journal” and leader in Liberia was born

1851 - William "Jerry" Henry, a runaway slave and craftsman who
had settled in Syracuse, New York, is arrested by a United
States Marshal and scheduled to be returned to slavery.
Ten thousand citizens of the city will storm the sheriff's
office and courthouse, free Henry, and aid his escape to
Canada via the underground railroad.

1872 - Morgan State College (now University) is founded in
Baltimore, Maryland.

1886 - Kentucky State College (now University) is founded in
Frankfort, Kentucky.

1897 - Virginia Proctor Powell, first female African American
librarian is born in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania. She will
follow in her mother's footsteps and continue her education
at Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio. In 1919, She will earn
her Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature from Oberlin.
She will move back to Pittsburgh where, although having
adequate training and experience, she was unable to pursue her
desired goal of teaching and spent some time working at her
aunt's salon as a beautician. Aware of her passion for children
and books, Charles Wilbur Florence, her future husband, will
encourage her to pursue a career in librarianship. During a
time when African Americans were rarely considered for
admission into predominantly white universities, she will be
considered for admission into the Pittsburgh Carnegie Library
School (now the University of Pittsburgh School of Information
Sciences). There is much debate about allowing a Black person
into the program. School officials were concerned with how
white students might react to having a Black peer and the
likelihood that she would not find work upon completion of the
program. She will finish the program in 1923. OVer time she
would work as a librarian in Richmond, Virginia and Washington,
D.C. She will join the ancestors in Richmond, Virginia in 1991.

1937 - The Pullman Company formally recognizes the Brotherhood of
Sleeping Car Porters.

1937 - The Spingarn Medal is awarded to Walter White, NAACP
secretary, for his leadership and work in the anti-
lynching movement.

1945 - Donny Hathaway is born in Chicago, Illinois. He will be
an influential pop and Rhythm & Blues singer of the 1970s
whose hit songs will include "The Ghetto" and "The Closer
I Get to You" (with Roberta Flack). His collaborations with
Roberta Flack will score high on the charts and win him the
Grammy Award for "Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with
Vocal" for the duet, "Where Is the Love" in 1973. He will join
the ancestors, after commiting suicide, on January 13, 1979.

1947 - United States' control of Haitian Custom Service and
governmental revenue ends.

1948 - The California Supreme Court voids state statute banning
interracial marriages.

1948 - Edward Dudley is named Ambassador to Liberia.

1951 - The 24th Infantry Regiment, last of the all African
American military units authorized by Congress in 1866,
is deactivated in Korea.

1954 - The British colony of Nigeria becomes a federation.

1955 - Howard Hewitt is born in Akron, Ohio. He will move to Los
Angeles where he would eventually meet Soul Train dancer
and future first wife Rainey Riley-Cunningham, then a
secretary of the show's creator and original host Don
Cornelius. It was Cornelius who introduced him to fellow
Soul Train dancers Jody Watley and Jeffrey Daniel, and
their group, Shalamar, was born. The trio is best known
for songs such as "Second Time Around", "A Night to
Remember", "Dancing in the Sheets" and the ballad "This Is
For The Lover In You". He will be the group's lead singer
from 1979 until 1985. When Shalamar breaks up in the mid
1980s, he will go on to pursue a solo career. In 1986 he
will be arrested and indicted in Miami with his fiance Mori
Molina for possession with an intent to distribute cocaine.
He subsequently married Molina who will be convicted and
serve prison time. He will then be acquitted of the charges.
He will sign with Elektra Records and record 1986's I Commit
To Love (R&B #12), a relatively solid urban album that will
yielded two R&B hits, "I’m For Real" (R&B #2) and "Stay"
(R&B #8). The album will also include "Say Amen", a gospel
tune that became a surprise hit on the Gospel charts and is
his signature song. He will contribute vocals to La Toya
Jackson's Hot 100 hit single "Heart Don't Lie" in 1984.

1960 - Nigeria proclaims its independence from Great Britain.

1961 - East & West Cameroon merge and become the Federal
Republic of Cameroon.

1962 - Some twelve thousand federal soldiers restored order on the University of Mississippi campus. James H. Meredith, escorted by federal marshals, registered at the University of Mississippi. Edwin A. Walker, former major general in the U.S. Army, was arrested and charged with inciting insurrection and seditious conspiracy. Walker, who led federal troops during the Little Rock integration crisis, had call for "Volunteers" to oppose federal forces in Mississippi. Witnesses said he led students in charges against federal marshals during the campus riot.

1963 - Nigeria becomes a republic within the British
Commonwealth.

1966 - The Black Panther party is founded in Oakland, California
by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale.

1991 - Dr. Mary Schmidt Campbell assumes her duties as dean of
New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. A noted
art historian, Schmidt had previously served as
commissioner of cultural affairs, director of the
Studio of Harlem, and chair of the Smithsonian
Institution's Advisory Committee that recommended
creation of a national African American museum.

1996 – Lt. Gen Joe Ballard becomes the first African American to head the Army Corps of Engineers

[True Father Sankofa]

Republic of Guinea Independence Day

1800 – TRUE REVOLUTIONARY Nat Turner is born in Southampton, Virginia. Believing
       himself called by God to free his fellow bondsmen,
       Turner will become a freedom fighter leader of one of
       the most famous slave revolts, resulting in the death
       of scores of whites and involving 60 to 80 slaves. He
       will join the ancestors on November 11, 1831 after being
       executed for his part in the rebellion. It is important to understand Nat Turner wasn’t alone. We hear about him often cause he was caught and killed. There were over 250 slave revolts in the U.S. not including those in Mexico, the Carribbean, South America, and along the Middle Passage.

1833 - The New York Anti-Slavery Society is organized.

1898 - Otis J. Rene' is born in New Orleans, Louisiana. With
       his younger brother Leon, he will move to Los Angeles,
       California, and establish Exclusive and Excelsior
       Records in the 1930's. By the mid-1940's, the brothers
       will be leading independent record producers whose
       artists will include Nat King Cole, Herb Jeffries, and
       Johnny Otis. He will join the ancestors on April 5, 1970.

1929 - Moses Gunn is born in St. Louis, Missouri. He will become
       an Obie Award-winning stage player, and co-found the Negro
       Ensemble Company in the 1960s. His 1962 Broadway debut was
       in Jean Genet's "The Blacks." He will be nominated for a
       1976 Tony Award as Best Actor (Play) for "The Poison Tree"
       and will play Othello on Broadway in 1970. He will also
       appear in "Amityville II," "Shaft," and "Good Times." He
       will join the ancestors on December 17, 1993 after
       succumbing to complications from asthma,

1936 - Johnnie Cochran is born in Shreveport, Louisiana.  He
       will become a criminal defense attorney and will be
       best known for his defense of Black Panther Party
       member Geronimo Pratt and ex-NFL superstar O.J.
       Simpson. He will join the ancestors on March 29, 2005.

1958 - The Republic of Guinea gains independence from France under the
       leadership of Sekou Toure.

1967 - Thurgood Marshall becomes the first African American
       member of the United States Supreme Court when he is
       sworn in by Chief Justice Earl Warren. As chief
       counsel for the National Association for the
       Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in the 1940s
       and '50s, Marshall was the architect and executor of
       the legal strategy that ended the era of official
       racial segregation. The great-grandson of a slave,
       Marshall was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1908.
       After being rejected from the University of Maryland
       Law School on account of his race, he was accepted at
       all-black Howard University in Washington, DC. At
       Howard, he studied under the tutelage of civil
       liberties lawyer Charles H. Houston and in 1933
       graduated first in his class. In 1936, he joined the
       legal division of the NAACP, of which Houston was
       director, and two years later succeeded his mentor
       in the organization's top legal post.

1967 - Robert H. Lawrence, who was named the first African
       American astronaut, joins the ancestors after being
       killed in a plane crash before his first mission.

1981 - Hazel Scott, renown jazz singer and pianist, joins
       the ancestors at the age of 61 (succumbed to pancreatic
       cancer).
1986 - The United States Senate overrides President Ronald
       Reagan's veto of legislation imposing economic
       sanctions against South Africa. The override is seen
       as the culmination of efforts by Trans-Africa's
       Randall Robinson, Rep. Mickey Leland, and others
       begun almost two years earlier with Robinson's
       arrest before the South African Embassy in
       Washington, DC. On this date, President Ronald Reagan also appointed Edward J. Perkins ambassador to South Africa.

1989 - "Jump Start" premiers in 40 newspapers in the United
       States. The comic strip is the creation of 26-year-
       old Robb Armstrong, the youngest African American to
       have a syndicated comic strip. He follows in the
       footsteps of Morrie Turner, the creator of "Wee Pals,"
       the first African American syndicated comic strip.

[True Father Sankofa]

1856 - T. (Timothy) Thomas Fortune is born a slave in Marianna,
       Florida. In Chicago on January 25, 1890, he will
       co-found the militant National Afro-American League to
       right wrongs against African Americans authorized by law
       and sanctioned or tolerated by public opinion. The league
       will fall apart after four years. When it is revived in
       Rochester, New York on September 15, 1898, it will have
       the new name of the "National Afro-American Council",
       with him as President. Those two organizations will play
       a vital role in setting the stage for the Niagara Movement,
       NAACP and other civil rights organizations to follow. He
       will also be the leading advocate of using "Afro-American"
       to identify his people. Since they are "African in origin
       and American in birth", it is his argument that it most
       accurately defines them. With himself at the helm as co-
       owner with Emanuel Fortune, Jr. and Jerome B. Peterson, the
       New York Age will become the most widely read of all Black
       newspapers. It will stand at the forefront as a voice
       agitating against the evils of discrimination, lynching,
       mob violence, and disenfranchisement. Its popularity is due
       to his editorials which condemn all forms of discrimination
       and demand full justice for all African Americans. Ida B.
       Wells's newspaper "Memphis Free Speech and Headlight" will
       have its printing press destroyed and building burned as
       the result of an article published in it on May 25, 1892. He
       will then give her a job and a new platform from which to
       detail and condemn lynching. His book, "The Kind of Education
       the Afro-American Most Needs" is published in 1898. He will
       publish "Dreams of Life: Miscellaneous Poems" in 1905. After
       a nervous breakdown, he will sell the New York Age to Fred R.
       Moore in 1907, who will continue publishing it until 1960.
       He will publish another book, "The New York Negro in
       Journalism" in 1915. He will join the ancestors on June 2,
       1928 in Philadephia, Pennsylvania.

1904 - The Daytona Normal and Industrial School opens in Daytona
       Beach, Florida. In 1923, the school merges with Cookman
       Institute and becomes Bethune-Cookman College.  One of
       the leading institutions for training teachers, founder
       Mary McLeod Bethune will later say the college was
       started on "faith and a dollar and a half."

1935 - Ethiopia is invaded by Italy, despite Emperor Haile
       Selasse's pleas for help to the League of Nations.

1941 - Ernest Evans is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Later
       adopting the name "Chubby Checker" after the renowned
       Fats Domino, his best-known recording will be the
       1960's "The Twist," which will spark the biggest dance
       craze since the Charleston in the 1920's.

1949 - The first African American owned radio station, WERD-AM
       in Atlanta, Georgia, is founded by Jesse Blanton, Sr.

1979 - Artist Charles White, joins the ancestors at the age of
       61 in Los Angeles, California.

1990 – Rio de Janeiro’s first black congresswoman, Benedita da Silva, sweeps the first round of the city’s mayoral race.

1991 - Public Enemy released their platinum-selling 4th album “Apocalypse ‘91” – The Enemy Strikes Black on Def Jam Records , on this day in 1991. Classics tracks like “Shut ‘Em Down” , “Nighttrain” and a remake of “Bring The Noise” with heavy metal bad Anthrax , prompted hip-hop heads to call this set the “birth of hardcore rap”. Album cuts like “Lost At Birth” , “Rebirth” and “Move” would bring underground hip-hop to a whole other level. The album produced the hit single “Can’t Truss It”. Pete Rock’s remixes to singles like “Nighttrain” and “Shut ‘Em Down” also ushered in the era of “the hip-hop remix”, which would see rap singles flipped entirely from their original versions which is common place in the industry until this day. "By the Time I Get to Arizona" is a classic example of how hip hop music could have an influence on spreading awareness and sparking change when it comes to politics. “Apocalypse ‘91” also saw Gary “G” Wiz Rinaldo come to the forefront of The Bomb Squad production sound in regards to P.E. records , bringing in a heavy drum influence as well as meshing it with melodic horn lines while all the while keeping P.E.’s explosive sound.

1994 - U.S. soldiers in Haiti raid the headquarters of a pro-
       army militia that is despised by the general Haitian
       population.

1994 - Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy announces his
       resignation because of questions about gifts he had
       received.

1994 - South African President Nelson Mandela addresses the
       United Nations, urging the world to support his
       country's economy.

1995 - Ex-football star O.J. Simpson is cleared today of murdering his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and                 her friend Ronald Goldman.

[True Father Sankofa]

1864 - The National Black Convention meets in Syracuse, New York.

1864 - The New Orleans Tribune, the first African American daily
newspaper, is founded by Dr. Louis C. Roudanez. The
newspaper, published in both English and French, starts
as a tri-weekly, but soon becomes an influential daily.

1934 - Malvin Gray Johnson joins the ancestors in New York City.
His deceptively simple paintings, with their warm colors
and serene, sensuous charm, had earned him a large and
loyal group of admirers during the Harlem Renaissance.

1937 - Lee Patrick Brown is born in Wewoka, Oklahoma. He will
become one of the top-ranking law-enforcement executives
in the United States, first as Public Safety Commissioner
in Atlanta, Georgia, then as the first African American
police chief in Houston, Texas, the second African
American police commissioner for New York City, and the
first African American mayor of Houston.

1943 - Hubert Gerold Brown is born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
He will be better known as H. Rap Brown, become a Black
nationalist and chairman of the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee in the 1960s, and later the
Justice Minister of the Black Panther Party. He will be
most famous for his proclamation during that period that
"violence is as American as cherry pie", as well as once
stating that "If America don't come around, we're gonna
burn it down". He is also known for his autobiography "Die
Nigger Die!". He will spend five years (1971-1976) in
New York's Attica Prison after a robbery conviction. While
in prison, he will convert to Islam and change his name to
Jamil Abdullah al-Amin. After his release, he will open a
grocery store in Atlanta, Georgia and become a Muslim
spiritual leader and community activist, preaching against
drugs and gambling in Atlanta's West End neighborhood. He
will be sentenced to life in prison, without the possibility of
parole, for the 2000 shooting of two Fulton County Sheriff's
deputies, one of whom joins the ancestors.

1944 - Dancer Pearl Primus makes her Broadway debut at the
Belasco Theater. She will become widely known for
blending the African and American dance traditions.

1944 - Patricia Holt is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She
will become a singer known as Patti LaBelle and will be
a lead with the Ordettes, the Bluebells, and LaBelle.
She will eventually debut a solo career performing over
90 concerts a year. She will publish her life story,
"Don't Block The Blessings: Revelations of a Lifetime."

1945 - Clifton Davis is born in Chicago, Illinois. He will
become an actor and singer, performing in "That's My
Mama," and "Amen" on television. He will also become a
minister in the Seventh Day Adventist Church.

1966 - Lesotho (Basutoland) gains its independence from Great
Britain.

1976 - Secretary of Agriculture Earl Butz resigns in the wake
of a controversy over a joke he had made about Blacks.

1982 - Rayford Logan, educator, historian, author, dies

1988 - The Martin L. King, Jr. Federal Building is dedicated in Atlanta, Ga. It is the first federal building in the nation to bear the name of the slain civil rights leader.

1991 - The Harold Washington Library in Chicago, Illinois is
dedicated in the memory of its beloved former mayor.

1994 - Exiled Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide vows in
an address to the U.N. General Assembly, to return to
Haiti in 11 days.

1994 - President Clinton welcomes South African President Nelson
Mandela to the White House.

1996 - Congress passes a bill authorizing the creation of 500,000 Black Revolutionary War Patriots Commemorative coins.

[True Father Sankofa]

1867 - Monroe Baker, a well-to-do African American businessman,
       is named mayor of St. Martin, Louisiana.  He is probably
       the first African American to serve as mayor of a town.

1869 - First Reconstruction legislature (27 Blacks, 150 whites) met in Richmond, Virginia.

1872 - Booker T. Washington leaves Malden, West Virginia to enter
       Hampton Institute.

1878 - George B. Vashion joins the ancestors after succumbing to
       yellow fever in Rodney, Mississippi. He was the first
       African American lawyer in the state of New York and an
       educator and poet whose most famous work was "Victor Oge"
       (1854), the first narrative, nonlyrical poem by an
       African American writer.

1929 - Autherine Lucy (later Foster) is born in Shiloh, Alabama.
       She will be the first African American student to enroll
       at the University of Alabama (1956).

1932 - Perle Yvonne Watson is born in Los Angeles, California. As
       Yvonne Braithwaite, she will serve as staff attorney on
       the McCone Commission investigating the causes of the
       Watts riots and will become the first African American
       woman elected to the California state assembly, as well
       as the first African American woman elected to the House
       of Representatives.  She also will be the first woman to
       sit on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors as a
       result of an appointment by Governor Brown.  Some years
       later, she will become the first woman elected to the Los
       Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

1992 - Eddie Kendrick, one of the original members of the Motown
       group, The Temptations, joins the ancestors after
       succumbing to lung cancer.

[True Father Sankofa]

Ourstory 10/6

1776 - Henri Christophe is born a slave in Grenada. He will
become a Haitian revolutionist and ruler and also become
provisional chief of northern Haiti. He will establish
himself as King Henri I in the north and build Citadelle
Laferriere.

1847 - National Black convention meets in Troy, New York, with
more than sixty delegates from nine states. Nathan
Johnson of Massachusetts is elected president.

1868 - An African American state convention at Macon, Georgia,
protests expulsion of African American politicians from
the Georgia legislature.

1871 - The Fisk Jubilee Singers begin their tour to raise money
for the school. Soon they will become one of the most
popular African American folk-singing groups of the late
19th century, performing throughout the U.S. and Europe
and raising large sums for Fisk's building program.

1917 - Fannie Lou Hamer is born near Ruleville, Mississippi. She
will become a leader of the civil rights movement during
the 1960's and founder of the Mississippi Freedom
Democratic Party in Montgomery County, Mississippi.

1921 - Joseph Echols Lowery is born in Huntsville, Alabama. An
early civil rights activist, he will become a founder,
chairman of the board, and president of the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference. He will lead SCLC to
great levels of civil rights activism including a 2,700
mile pilgrimage to extend and strengthen the Voting
Rights Act, protesting toxic waste sites in African
American communities, and actions against United States'
corporations doing business in apartheid South Africa.

1949 – Lonnie Johnson, creator of the Super Soaker water gun and owner of over 40 patents was born in Mobile, AL

1965 - Patricia Harris takes the post as U.S. Ambassador to
Belgium, becoming the first African American U.S.
ambassador.

1971 - John A. Wilkinson's marriage to Lorraine Mary Turner was the first legalized interracial marriage in North Carolina. Wilkinson was black and Turner was white.

1981 - Anwar Sadat, president of Egypt, is assassinated by
extremists while reviewing a military parade.

1985 - W.D. Davis patented an improved riding saddle.

1986 - Abram Hill joins the ancestors in New York City. He was
the founder of the city's American Negro Theatre in 1940,
where the careers of Harry Belafonte, Ruby Dee, and
Sidney Poitier were launched. Hill's adaptation of the
play "Anna Lucasta" premiered on Broadway in 1944 and
ran successfully for 900 performances.

1991 - Williams College's exhibit of African American photography
- "Black Photographers Bear Witness: 100 Years of Social
Protest" opens. The exhibit includes photography by C.M.
Battey, James Van Der Zee, Marvin and Morgan Smith,
Moneta Sleet, Carrie Mae Weems, and others.

1991 - Anita Hill, a former personal assistant to Supreme Court
justice nominee Clarence Thomas, accuses Thomas of sexual
harassment (from 1981-83) during his confirmation
hearings.

1994 - South African President, Nelson Mandela, addresses a joint
session of Congress. He will warn against the lure of
isolationism, saying the U.S. post-Cold War focus should
be on eliminating "tyranny, instability and poverty"
across the globe.

[True Father Sankofa]

1800 – Gabriel Prosser was hung for leading a slave revolt in Virginia. A similar plot was discovered in 1722. About 200 slaves had armed themselves with plans to kill the town’s whites while they attended church.

1821 - William Still is born in Burlington County, New Jersey.
He will become an abolitionist and will be involved in
the anti-slavery movement working for the Pennsylvania
Society for the Abolition of Slavery. After the Civil
War, he will chronicle the personal accounts of former
runaway slaves, who had traveled on the Underground
Railroad. His publication, "Underground Railroad,"
published in 1872, will provide a revealing look into
the activities of the flight of fugitive slaves. Still
will be a civil rights activist, researcher and writer,
until he joins the ancestors on July 14, 1902.

1873 - Henry E. Hayne, secretary of state, is accepted as a
student at the University of South Carolina. Scores of
African Americans will attend the university in 1874 and
1875.

1886 - Spain abolishes slavery in Cuba.

1888 - Sargent C. Johnson is born in Boston, Massachusetts. He
will be a pioneering artist of the Harlem Renaissance,
known for his wood, cast stone, and ceramic sculptures.
Among his most famous works will be "Forever Free" and
"Mask.

1891 - Archibald John Motley, Jr. is born in New Orleans,
Louisiana. He will become one of the more renowned
painters of the 1920's and 1930's. He will join the
ancestors on January 16, 1981.

1897 - Elijah Poole is born in Sandersville, Georgia. He will
become better known as The Honorable Elijah Muhammad,
one of the most influential leaders in the Nation of
Islam. Poole will be trained by Master Wallace Fard
Muhammad, founder of the Nation of Islam, and will lead
the organization to become the largest African American
movement since Garveyism until he joins the ancestors
on February 25, 1975.

1931 - Desmond Mpilo Tutu is born in Klerksdorp, South Africa.
He will become the Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1984, and
Archbishop of the Anglican Church (First Anglican bishop
of African descent) of Johannesburg, South Africa.

1934 - LeRoi Jones is born in Newark, New Jersey. He will be
better known as Amiri Baraka, influential playwright,
author, and critic of the African American experience.

1981 - Egypt's parliament names Vice President Hosni Mubarak to
succeed the assassinated Anwar Sadat.