MUNIRAH CHRONICLE
******* Today in Black History – July 25, 2017 *******
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1916
- Garrett T. Morgan, inventor of the gas mask, rescues six
persons from a gas-filled tunnel, five
miles from shore
under Lake Erie, in Cleveland, Ohio.
1918
- A race riot occurs in Chester, Pennsylvania. Three
African Americans and 2 whites are
killed.
1921
- Liberty Life Insurance Company is founded by Frank L.
Gillespie. After a 1926 merger with
Supreme Life and
Casualty of Columbus, Ohio, and
Northeastern Life of
Newark, New Jersey, the resulting
company will be called
Supreme Life Insurance Company and be,
at one time, one
of the largest African American
insurance companies in
the nation.
1930
- Nineteen-year-old Josh Gibson is called out of the stands
to substitute for the regular catcher
for the Pittsburgh
Homestead Grays, one of the best-known
all-Negro
professional baseball teams. Gibson will
go on to play
15 years with a variety of teams in the
Negro leagues.
His lifetime batting average, .423, will
earn him
election to the Baseball Hall of Fame in
1972.
1941
- Nathaniel "Nate" Thurmond is born in Akron, Ohio. He will
become an all-star college basketball
player and Hall of
Fame NBA player. Agile and deceptively
strong, he will
hone his talents at Bowling Green State
University, where
he will average 17.8 ppg
and 17.0 rpg and be selected an
All-America his senior year. In 1963, he
will be drafted
third in the NBA draft by the San
Francisco Warriors and
will play the forward position because
Wilt Chamberlain
is the Warriors' pivot man. When San Francisco trades
Chamberlain to Philadelphia in 1965, he
will return to his
natural position and develop into one of
the NBA's truly
dominant centers. He will log 14 NBA
seasons with San
Francisco, Golden State, Chicago and Cleveland. He will be
selected to play in seven All-Star Games
and be named NBA
All-Defensive First Team twice and
Second Team three times.
He will first make NBA history when he
grabs 18 rebounds in
one quarter against the Baltimore
Bullets in 1965. Then on
opening night in 1974, he will make
history again as the
first player to ever record a quadruple
double-double
figures in four categories in one game
(22 points, 14
rebounds, 13 assists and 12 blocked
shots). When he retires,
he will have scored 14,437 points and
grabbed 14,464
rebounds (sixth all-time), both 15.0 per
game averages. He
will be enshrined in the Basketball Hall
of Fame on July 1,
1985.
1943
- The U.S. Navy launches the "Leonard Roy Harmon' in Quincy,
Massachusetts, the nation's first
warship named for an
African American. Harmon, a messman, was posthumously
awarded the Navy Cross for heroism.
1954
- Walter Jerry Payton is born in Columbia, Mississippi. He
will be the Chicago Bears' first-round
draft choice and the
fourth player selected in the 1975
National Football League
Draft and will develop into a superstar
of unusual
dimensions during his 13-season NFL
tenure from 1975 to
1987, all of which he will spend with
the Chicago Bears.
The 5-10, 200-pound running back who
will rush for 3,563
yards in four seasons at Jackson State
University will go
on to dominate the rushing section of
the NFL record book
during and long after his career will
end. The records he
will hold at the time of his retirement
include 16,726
total yards, 10 seasons with 1,000 or
more yards rushing,
275 yards rushing in one game against
the Minnesota Vikings
(1977), 77 games with more than 100
yards rushing, and 110
rushing touchdowns. He will have 4,368
combined net
attempts and account for 21,803 combined
net yards. He will
also score an impressive 750 points on
125 touchdowns. He
will win the NFC rushing title five
straight years from
1976 to 1980. He will also lead the NFC
with 96 points in
1977 and win the NFL kickoff return
championship in his
rookie 1975
campaign. He will be named both All-Pro and
All-NFC seven times and play in nine Pro
Bowl games. He
will be selected as the NFL's Most
Valuable Player in 1977
and 1985, the NFL Offensive Player of
the Year in 1977 and
1985 and the NFC Most Valuable Player in
1977. An amazing
runner, he will rush for more than 1,000
yards 10 of his
13 seasons. His best season will come in
1977, when he runs
for 1,852 yards, third best in history
at that time. His
492 career pass receptions for 4,538
yards and 15
touchdowns will contribute to his
exceptional combined net
yard totals. Extremely durable, he will
miss one game in
his rookie
campaign and then play in 186 consecutive games.
He will be a major factor in the Chicago
Bear's Super Bowl
XX win. He will be enshrined in the Pro
Football Hall of
Fame on July 31, 1993. He will join the
ancestors on
November 1, 1999 after succumbing to
cancer.
1964
- A racially motivated disturbance begins in Rochester, New
York. Subsequent to
this civil unrest, the major employers
in the metropolitan area (Kodak, Xerox,
Sybron, and Bausch
& Lomb) show marked improvements in
their hiring of
African Americans.
1966
- Constance B. Motley becomes the first African American
woman to be appointed a federal judge.
1972
- The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, where African Americans
were used as guinea pigs in syphilis
experiments for 40
years, is admitted to by U.S. government
health officials.
1981
- Walter Payton signs a contract to play with the Chicago
Bears of the NFL on his 27th birthday.
The famed running
back will earn almost $2 million over
his three years.
'Sweetness', as he is nicknamed (because
of his
disposition), becomes the highest paid
player in the
National Football League at the time.
1990
- "Black Enterprise" publisher Earl G. Graves and Los Angeles
Lakers star Magic Johnson become the
largest minority-
controlled franchise in the country when
they sign a $ 60
million agreement
to purchase Pepsi-Cola of Washington, DC.
1991
- Dennis Hightower is promoted to president of Disney Consumer
Products-Europe/Middle East. Hightower
will have operating
responsibility for all book and magazine
publishing,
merchandise licensing, children's
records and music, film
promotion and television sponsorship and
will manage the
company's eight subsidiaries and six
offices in Europe and
the Middle East.
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The source for these facts are "Encyclopedia Britannica,
"Before the Mayflower",
"Black Firsts" and independent
research by Mr. Rene’ A. Perry, Sr.
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Charles H. Wright Museum of African American
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Michigan
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Last Updated Tuesday, July 25, 2017