MUNIRAH CHRONICLE
******* Today in Black History – February
1, 2015 *******
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When we all learn about our history, about how much we've *
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1810
- Charles Lenox Remond is born in Salem, Massachusetts to free
parents. He will become one of the most prominent of the
African American abolitionist crusaders.
Charles Remond will
begin his activism in opposition to
slavery while in his
twenties as an orator speaking at public
gatherings and
conferences in Massachusetts, Rhode
Island, Maine, New York
and Pennsylvania. In 1838 the Massachusetts
Anti-Slavery
Society, will choose him as one of its
agents. As a delegate
from the American Anti-Slavery Society,
he will go with William
Lloyd Garrison to the World's
Anti-Slavery Convention in London
in 1840. He will have a reputation as an
eloquent lecturer and
reported to be the first Black public
speaker on abolition.
He will recruit Black soldiers in
Massachusetts for the Union
Army during the Civil War, particularly
for the famed 54th and
55th Massachusetts Infantry. He will also
be active in recruiting
for the U.S. Colored Troops. After the
Civil War ends, he will
work as a clerk in the Boston Customs
House, and as a street lamp
inspector. He will later purchase a farm
in South Reading (now
Wakefield), Massachusetts. He will join
the ancestors on December
22, 1873.
1810
- The first insurance company managed by African Americans, the
American Insurance Company of
Philadelphia, is established.
1833
- Henry McNeal Turner is born in Newberry Courthouse, South Carolina.
He will become one of the first Bishops
in the African American
Episcopal Church. He will also be an army chaplain, political
organizer, magazine editor, and college
chancellor. He will be
inspired by a Methodist revival and
swear to become a pastor. In
1858, he will transfer his membership to
the African Methodist
Church and study the classics, Hebrew
and divinity at Trinity
College. In 1880, he will become a
bishop in the African Methodist
Episcopal Church. During the American
Civil War, he will be
appointed a Chaplain to one of the first
Federal regiments of Black
troops (Company B of the First United
States Colored Troops). He
will be the first of only 14 Black
Chaplains to be appointed during
the Civil War. This appointment will
come directly from President
Abraham Lincoln in 1863. He will also be
appointed by President
Andrew Johnson to work with the
Freedman's Bureau in Georgia during
Reconstruction. Following the Civil War,
he will become steadily
more disenchanted with the lack of
progress in the status of the
country's African Americans. During this
time, he will move to the
state of Georgia. It is here that he
will become involved in Radical
Republican politics. He will help found
the Republican Party of
Georgia. After attempts to overcome
certain Supreme Court decisions,
he will become disgusted and end his
attempts to bring equality to
the United States. Instead, he will
become a proponent of the "back
to Africa" and "African
American colonization" movements. He will
travel to Africa and be impressed by the
differences in the attitude
of Africans who have never known the
degradation of slavery. He will
organize four annual conferences in
Africa. He will write extensively
about the Civil war and about the
condition of his parishioners. He
will join the ancestors while visiting
Windsor, Ontario on May 15, 1915.
He will be highly regarded in the Afro-American
and the Afro-Canadian
community and a large number of churches
will be named in his honor.
He will join the ancestors on May 8,
1915 while visiting Windsor,
Ontario, Canada.
1865
- John S. Rock becomes the first African American attorney
allowed to
practice before the United States Supreme Court.
Due to his poor health, he never
actually argued a case
before the court, succumbing to
tuberculosis at the age of
41.
1870
- Jonathan Jasper Wright is elected to the South Carolina
Supreme Court. He is the first African
American to hold a
major judicial position.
1871
- Jefferson Franklin Long, Republican congressman from Georgia,
makes the first speech by an African
American on the floor
of Congress. His text is to oppose leniency to former
Confederates.
1902
- Langston Hughes is born in Joplin, Missouri.
He will be
known as one of the most prolific
American poets of the
20th century and a leading voice of the
Harlem Renaissance.
In addition to his poetry, Hughes will achieve success as
an anthologist and juvenile author,
write plays and
librettos, found theater groups, and be
a widely read
columnist and humorist. Among his honors will be the
NAACP's Spingarn Medal in 1960. He will
join the ancestors
on May 22, 1967.
1938
- Sherman Hemsley is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He
will become an actor and will known for
his roles in the TV
shows "All in the Family,"
"The Jeffersons," and "Amen." He
will join the ancestors on July 24,
2012.
1948
- James Ambrose Johnson, Jr. is born in Buffalo, New York. He
will become a singer, songwriter,
producer, and musician
working under the name "Rick
James." He will be best known
for his recording of "Super
Freak" and produce Teena Marie,
the gold-certified Mary Jane Girls,
Eddie Murphy, and others.
He will join the ancestors on August 6,
2004.
1957
- P.H. Young becomes the first African American pilot, flying on
an United States scheduled passenger
airline.
1960
- Four African American college students from North Carolina A&T
College in Greensboro, North Carolina
sit at a "whites-only"
Woolworth's lunch counter and refuse to
leave when denied
service, beginning a sit-in protest.
1963
- Nyasaland (now Malawi) becomes a self-governing nation.
1965
- More than seven hundred demonstrators, including Dr. Martin
Luther King Jr., are arrested in Selma,
Alabama.
1965
- Ruby Dee becomes the first African American thespian to play a
major role at the American Shakespeare
Festival in Stratford,
Connecticut.
1978
- The first stamp of the United States Postal Service's Black
Heritage USA series honors Harriet
Tubman, famed abolitionist
and "conductor" on the Underground Railroad.
1982
- The nations of Senegal & Gambia form a loose confederation
named Senegambia.
1991
- President F.W. de Klerk of South Africa, states that he will
repeal all apartheid laws.
1992
- Barry Bonds signs baseball's highest single year contract to
date ($4.7 million).
1997
- BET Holdings and Encore Media Corp. launch BET Movie/Starz,
the first 24 hour African American movie
channel.
2003
- Lt. Colonel Michael P. Anderson, NASA astronaut, joins the
ancestors at the age of 43, when the
Space Shuttle Columbia
explodes during re-entry.
2003
- Ramon "Mongo" Santamaria, joins the ancestors in Miami,
Florida from stroke complications at the
age of 85. He had
been considered one of the most
influential percussionists of
his generation.
2012
- Don Cornelius, the founder of the "Soul Train" television show,
joins the ancestors, succumbing to an
apparent self-inflicted
gunshot wound to his head, at the age of
75.
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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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