MUNIRAH CHRONICLE
******* Today in Black History – July
22, 2014 *******
1848
- Lester Walton is appointed minister too Liberia.
1861
- Abraham Lincoln reads the first draft of the Emancipation
Proclamation to his cabinet.
1933
- Caterina Jarboro becomes the first Afrrican American prima
donna of an United States opera
company. She will
perform "Aida" with the
Chicago Opera Company at the
Hippodrome in New York City. The New York Times music
editor will report: "The young
soprano brought a vivid
dramatic sense that kept her
impersonation vital without
overacting, and an Italian diction
remarkably pure and
distinct." Her fame, however, will
be shortlived. Once
the American opera establishment
realizes that she is not
Italian but African American, her career
will come to an
end. The newly founded New York
Metropolitan Opera
Association will refuse to accept her as
a member.
Nonetheless, her contribution to opera
will be powerful
and farreaching.
1937
- Chuck Jackson is born in Latta, South Carolina. He will
be raised in Pittsburgh and will become
a Rhythm & Blues
singer.
He will be discovered when he opens for soul
legend Jackie Wilson at the Apollo
Theater. He will sign a
recording contract with Scepter. His
first single,"I Don't
Want to Cry", which he co-wrote,
will be his first hit
(1961). The song will chart on both
Rhythm & Blues and pop
charts. In 1962, His recording of
"Any Day Now", the Burt
Bacharach-Bob Hilliard classic, will become
a huge hit. In
1967, he will move from Scepter to
Motown Records, where
he will record a number of successful
singles, including
"Are You Lonely for Me" and
"Honey Come Back."
1939
- Jane Matilda Bolin is appointed to thee New York City Court
of Domestic Relations by Mayor Fiorello
Laguardia, becoming
the first African American woman judge.
1939
- Quincy Thomas Troupe, Jr. is born in NNew York City. He will
become a poet, editor, journalist, and
college professor.
He will grow up in East St. Louis,
Illinois. He will attend
Grambling State University on a baseball
scholarship and
will subsequently join the United States
Army. In his free
time as a soldier, he will develop the
passion for writing
that would define his career. Upon his
return to civilian
life, he will move to Los Angeles, where
he will encounter
the Watts Writers Workshop and begin
working in a more
African American, jazz-based style. It
will be on a tour
with the Watts group that he first begin
his academic life.
In 1969, he will visit Ohio University
with the poetry tour
and will soon be offered a position as
writer-in-residence.
In 1971, he will move to Richmond
College on Staten Island
in New York City, where he will be a
lecturer. In 1976,
Richmond College will undergo a merger
and become the
College of Staten Island of the City
University of New York.
It will be during this transition, he
will later reveal,
that he adjusts his curriculum vitae to
include a
(fictitious) bachelor's degree he claims
to have earned in
1963 from Grambling. He will make the
addition in order to
possibly attain tenure, which he likely
could not have done
without an academic degree. This fiction
will go
unchallenged for nearly three decades.
The next few years
will see him become a celebrity in the
academic world,
winning an American Book Award for
1989's "Miles, the
Autobiography" (written with Miles
Davis) and earning
numerous other accolades. In 1990, he
will move to the
University of California, San Diego
(UCSD) as a professor
of literature, where he will continue to
gain acclaim. In
early 2002, he will be named
California's first Poet
Laureate, taking office on June 11,
2002. A background
check related to the new position will
reveal that he had,
in fact, never possessed a degree from
Grambling.
Confronted with the information, he will
resign the post.
After UCSD considers suspending him
without pay, he retires
from his academic position as well. His
other notable works
include "James Baldwin: The
Legacy" (1989) and "Miles and
Me: A Memoir of Miles Davis"
(2000). He will also edit
"Giant Talk: An Anthology of Third
World Writing" (1975)
and is a founding editor of
"Confrontation: A Journal of
Third World Literature and American
Rag." He will teach
creative writing for the Watts Writers’
Movement from 1966
to 1968 and serve as director of the
Malcolm X Center in
Los Angeles during the summers of 1969
and 1970. Among his
honors and awards will be fellowships
from the National
Foundation for the Arts, the New York
Foundation for the
Arts, and a grant from the New York
State Council on the
Arts.
1941
- George Clinton is born in Kannapolis, North Carolina. He
will grow up in Plainfield, New Jersey.
In Plainfield, he
will run a barber salon, where he
straightens hair, and
will soon formed a doo wop group,
inspired by Frankie Lymon
& the Teenagers, called The
Parliaments. The Parliaments
will eventually find success under the
names Parliament and
Funkadelic in the seventies. Parliament
Funkadelic will
record "Testify",
"Mothership Connection", "First Thangs",
"Up For The Down Stroke",
"Chocolate City", "The Clones of
Dr. Funkenstein," "Atomic
Dog," and many others. The
popularity of Clinton and his group will
last over thirty
years. He will be widely considered one
of the forefathers
of funk. Usually recording under the name George Clinton &
the P.Funk All-Stars, he will record
several solo albums. In
1982, he will sign to Capitol Records as
a solo artist and
as the P.Funk All-Stars, releasing
Computer Games that same
year. "Loopzilla" hit the Top
20 R&B charts, followed by
"Atomic Dog," which reached #1
R&B, but peaked at #101 on
the pop chart. In the next four years,
he will release
three more studio albums (You
Shouldn't-Nuf Bit Fish, Some
of My Best Jokes Are Friends and R&B
Skeletons in the
Closet) as well as a live album,
Mothership Connection
(Live from the Summit, Houston, Texas)
and charting three
singles in the R&B Top 30,
"Nubian Nut," "Last Dance," and
"Do Fries Go with that Shake."
His popularity will wane in
the mid 1980s, but revive by the rise of
rap music
(particularly, in the 1990s, G Funk), as
many rappers cited
him as an influence and began sampling
his songs. Alongside
James Brown, George Clinton will be
considered to be one
of the most sampled musicians ever. In
1989, he will release
The Cinderella Theory on Paisley Park, Prince's
record
label. This will be followed by Hey Man,
Smell My Finger.
He will then sign with Sony 550 and
release T.A.P.O.A.F.O.M.
(The Awesome Power Of A Fully
Operational Mothership) in
1996, having reunited with several old
members of Parliament
and Funkadelic. He will be known for his
flamboyant style.
In the 1990s, he will appear in films
such as Graffiti
Bridge (1990), Good Burger (1997) and
PCU (1994). He will
also appear as the voice of The
Funktipus, the DJ of the
Bounce FM station in the 2004 video
game, Grand Theft Auto:
San Andreas. Rapper Dr. Dre will sample
most of his beats to
create his G-Funk music era.
1947
- Daniel Lebern "Danny" Gloverr is born in San Francisco,
California. He will become an actor and
will star in the
"Lethal Weapon" movies,
"Operation Dumbo Drop", "Silverado",
"Escape from Alcatraz",
"Chiefs", "The Color Purple",
"Angels in the Outfield", and
"Places in the Heart". He will
serve as board chair of the TransAfrica
Forum, "a non-profit
organization dedicated to educating the
general public —
particularly African Americans — on the
economic, political
and moral ramifications of U.S. foreign
policy as it affects
Africa and the Diaspora in the Caribbean
and Latin America."
In March 1998, he will be appointed
ambassador to the United
Nations Development Program. He will
also serve on the
Advisory Council for TeleSUR,
"Television of the South", a
pan-Latin American television network
based in Caracas,
Venezuela. It will begin broadcasting on
July 24, 2005.
He is probably best known for his role
as Los Angeles police
Sgt. Roger Murtaugh in the Lethal Weapon
movie series, and
his role as the abusive husband to
Whoopi Goldberg's
character Celie in The Color Purple.
Among many awards, he
will win five NAACP Image Awards, for
his achievements as a
Black actor. He will join the ranks of
actors, such as
Humphrey Bogart, Elliott Gould, and
Robert Mitchum, who will
portray Raymond Chandler's private eye
detective Philip
Marlowe in the episode 'Red Wind' of the
Showtime network's
1995 series Fallen Angels. He will make
his directorial
debut with the Showtime channel short
film Override in 1994.
1961
- Milton A. Francis, the first African AAmerican specialist in
genitourinary diseases, joins the
ancestors.
1963
- World Heavyweight Champion, Sonny Listton, hangs on to his
boxing title, by knocking out
challenger, Floyd Patterson,
in the first round of a bout in Las
Vegas, Nevada.
*********************************************************
The source for these facts are "Encyclopedia Britannica,
"InfoBeat,"
"I, Too, Sing
Book of Days," "Before the Mayflower", "Black Firsts" and
independent research by Rene’ A. Perry.
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Last Updated Tuesday, July
22, 2014