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African American Achievers |
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In celebration of the many achievements and continuing contributions of African American men and women, We presents you with a Black History biography for each day in the month of February. We encourage you to come back daily to learn about a culture that is rich in talent and diversity.
Carol Brice
Wilma Rudolph
Lillian Evanti
Dr. Dorothy Height
Dr. Mary Carnegie
Dr. Daniel Hale Williams
Robert C. Maynard
Ernest Just
Pearl Primus
Shirley Chisholm
Elizabeth Mora
Gen. Benjamin O. Davis
Sam Langford
Dr. Andrew J. Foster
Dr. Alondra Oubre
Thurgood Marshall
Mary Church Terrell
William Grant Still
The Healy Brothers
Louis Latimer
Rosa Parks
Nina Simone
J.A. Rogers
Benjamin Banneker
The Delany Sisters
Dick Gregory
Charles "Rich" Patterson
Dorothy Dandridge
Carol Brice(1918-1985)
Carol Brice was one of the first African American classical singers to record extensively. Born into a musical family in Sedalia, North Carolina, she attended high school at the historic Palmer Memorial Institute and then studied music at Talladega College in Alabama. She launched her career while attending the Juilliard School in New York, performing with Bill "Bojangles" Robinson in the musical The Hot Mikado. A versatile contralto who was also noted for her opera and concert performances, Brice met with numerous musical opportunities and succeeded in her career despite the prejudice experienced by most black singers in the 1940's.
She also had the privilege of singing at St. George's Episcopal Church in New York, where famed baritone soloist Harry Thacker Burleigh was choir director. In 1943, she became the first African American musician to win the Walter Naumburg Award. Brice and her husband, Thomas Carey, formed a regional opera company while teaching at the University of Oklahoma in Norman. Brice has a number of outstanding recordings to her credit. She won a Grammy Award for her recording of Porgy and Bess.
Wilma Rudolph (1940-1994)
Born in St. Bethlehem, TN, Wilma Rudolph was the first female American runner to win three gold medals in the Olympic Games. Before the 1960 Olympics at Rome, she earned the title of "World's Fastest Woman" by finishing the 200-meter race in 22.9 seconds. During the games, she earned gold medals by winning the 100-meter dash and the 200-meter dash and anchoring the 400-meter relay team.
These achievements are remarkable by any standard, but they are phenomenal in light of the fact that as a child Rudolph suffered an attack of polio and scarlet fever that left her unable to walk without braces or orthopedic shoes until age twelve.
Rudolph's accomplishments helped remove barriers to women's participation in track and field events. Among the many honors and awards she received, was named Associated Press Woman Athlete of the Year and received the Babe Didrikson Zaharias Award. After her retirement as a runner, Rudolph served as assistant director of a Chicago youth foundation, helping to develop girls' track and field teams, and went on to promote running nationally. Considered one of the greatest female athletes in history, Rudolph was inducted in the U.S. National Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1974. Wilma has recently been nominate for the Congressional Gold Medal.
Lillian Evanti(1890-1967)
Opera singer Lillian Evanti was born Lillian Evans in Washington, D.C. She married her vocal teacher, music professor Roy Wilfred Tibbs, and created her stage name, Evanti, by combining her family name and her married name. A lyric soprano, Evanti performed worldwide and was the first black to sing with an organized opera company in Europe. In 1932, she gave a recital at the Belasco Theater, at that time the only prestigious venue in Washington to present African American performers to desegregated audiences.
In 1934, she gave a command performance at the White House for President and Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt. In 1941, with Mary Cardwell Dawson, she established the National Negro Opera Company in Pittsburgh, PA to provide a venue for African Americans to perform and study opera. In 1997, Evanti's grandson, Thurlow E. Tibbs Jr., endowed the Smithsonian Institution with the collections of his grandmother along with other artifacts. The Evans-Tibbs House in Washington, D.C. is included in the National Park Service's National Register of Historic Places.
Dr. Dorothy Irene Height(B. 1912)
Dr. Dorothy I. Heightis President Emeriti of the National Council of Negro Women (NCNW), an organization composed of chartered community sections and national affiliates with an outreach to more than four million women. She has been an acclaimed leader in the struggle for human rights for all people for more than five decades. A self-help advocate, Dr. Height has been instrumental in initiating NCNW-sponsored food, child-care, housing, and career education programs that embody self-help principles.
In 1986, she conceived and organized the Black Family Reunion Celebration in Washington, D.C., to accentuate the positive aspects of black families. Today, the celebration continues to stress black people's historical strengths, valued traditions, and contributions to American life and culture. Dr. Height has traveled widely throughout Europe, Asia, Latin America, Africa, and the Caribbean region and has received countless awards and honorary degrees for her tireless work in increasing opportunities for those in need and promoting leadership and self-reliance. Dr. Height is both the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedomand the United States Congressional Gold Medal.
Dr. Mary Elizabeth Carnegie(B. 1916)
Dr. Mary Elizabeth Carnegie has made significant advances for African Americans in the field of nursing. Born in Baltimore, MD, she lived in Washington, D.C., with her aunt and uncle while attending school and working part-time at a "whites only" cafeteria. After graduating from the Lincoln Hospital School for Nurses and earning a degree in sociology from West Virginia State College, Carnegie became assistant director of nursing at Hampton University in Virginia, where she established the state's first nursing program for blacks.
A research center at Hampton, the M. Elizabeth Carnegie Nursing Archives, was named in her honor. In 1945, she became the first dean of the School of Nursing at Florida A. & M. University. A highly regarded researcher and educator, Dr. Carnegie has held key editorial positions with several leading nursing journals and is Editor Emeriti of Nursing Research. Her book The Path We Tread, Blacks in Nursing Worldwide,1854-1984 is a seminal work on the history of black nurses around the world.
Dr. Daniel Hale Williams(1858-1931)
After earning his medical degree at the Chicago Medical College in 1883, Daniel Hale Williams opened a practice on Chicago's South Side. Barred, along with other black physicians, from operating at Chicago hospitals, he became determined to establish a hospital that would employ black doctors and train black nurses. As a result of his efforts, Provident hospital, a facility for people of all races, opened in 1892 in a three-story stove-heated facility with twelve beds.
There, in 1893, Williams became the first surgeon to perform successful open-heart surgery, suturing the heart and pericardium of a stabbing victim. His patient, James Cornish, recovered fully and lived another fifty years after the operation. That same year, President Cleveland appointed Williams surgeon in chief of Freedmen's Hospital in Washington, D. C.; during his five-year tenure there he reorganized the hospital and organized a training school for black nurses.
From 1899 until his death, Williams served as professor of clinical surgery at Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tennessee. He was inducted into the fellowship of the American College of Surgeons at its first convention in 1913. Throughout his life, he devoted much of his energy to supporting the NAACP and opening hospitals and training schools for black doctors and nurses.
Robert C. Maynard(1937-1993)
Robert Maynard was self-disciplined and strong willed from his youth. He took to heart his father's admonition that "every task has to be approached in a certain way. You've got to determine the tools that are going to be required to do it, and make sure you have those tools before you start." As a young boy, Maynard began jotting down his thoughts about what had happened at school and reciting them at the dinner table. As his skills and confidence increased, his mother remarked, "So, you're going to be the writer!" Later, even though his family emphasized the importance of receiving a good education and his five older siblings had attended college, Maynard dropped out of high school to work part time as a reporter for the New York Age Defender.
In 1966, Maynard was awarded a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard university. After completing his studies, he became the first black national correspondent for the Washington Post. He stayed with the Post for eleven years, then established the Robert C Maynard Institute for Journalism Education in Berkeley, CA. The Institute's primary objective was to promote diversity in journalism; by 1983, according to Maynard, it was "by far the single largest source of minorities entering the field of journalism." Maynard then became editor of the floundering Oakland Tribune in Oakland, CA, and subsequently astonished readers by purchasing the newspaper from the Gannett Company. Despite stiff competition from the San Francisco Chronicle, the Tribune's circulation steadily grew under Maynard's direction. Moreover, his syndicated column appeared in more than ninety newspapers across the country.
Ernest Just(1883-1941)
Ernest Just received numerous awards, grants, and fellowships during his prolific career--including, in 1915, the first-ever Spingarn Medal--for his groundbreaking research in biology and embryology. An outstanding student, Just completed his studies at a four-year preparatory school in three years. After receiving top honors in zoology and history at Dartmouth College, he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa for outstanding academic performance and graduated magna cum laude.
Just initially taught English at Howard University, but switched to teaching in the medical school's zoology and physiology department. Over a twenty-year period, when he was not teaching he was usually conducting research at the Marine Biological Laboratory on Martha's Vineyard under Frank Lillie, head of the zoology department at the University of Chicago. Just advanced the study of parthenogenesis (growth of an organism from an unfertilized egg) pioneered by German physiologist Jacques Loeb and demonstrated the importance of the protoplasm, part of the cell nucleus. He determined that the chemical factors influencing heredity exist in the protoplasm, from which genes extract the necessary information. Despite Just's outstanding performance in and contributions to his field, he was never granted an appointment to a major institution or elected to the National Academy of Sciences.
Pearl Primus(1919-1994)
To improve her educational opportunities, Pearl Primus' parents, Edward and Emily Primus, moved from Trinidad, Pearl's birthplace, to New York City. After attending Hunter College High School, she majored in both biology and premedical studies at Hunter College. Primus wanted to become a physician, but the combined effects of the Great Depression and racial discrimination reduced her options drastically. She studied at night while looking for work during the day. Finally, she accepted a position as an understudy in a National Youth Administration dance group.
She'd had no previous training in dance, yet her fluid movements and natural sense of rhythm were outstanding. Encouraged by the group to try out for a scholarship offered by the New School for Social research, she succeeded, becoming the school's first black student. In 1943, Primus made her dance debut and came away with high honors. Although she was still torn between medicine and dance, she found that through dance she could express her feelings about the plight of all black people. While trying to work through this conflict, she sought advice from John Martin, a writer for the New York Times. Martin apparently felt no ambivalence in the matter. He later wrote about Primus that "she is a broadly creative dancer, with tremendous power and a technique that bowls you over. She can jump over the Brooklyn Bridge. When she throws herself down and rolls across the floor at forty miles an hour, it makes your hair curl with excitement."
Shirley Chisholm(b. 1924)
Personal commitment to making a difference is exemplified in Shirley Chisholm. Born in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood to a Barbadian seamstress and a Guyanese factory worker, she attended Brooklyn College on a scholarship and then earned a master's degree in education from Columbia University. After becoming an expert on early childhood education, Chisholm worked as a consultant to the New York City bureau of child welfare from 1959 to 1964.
Wanting to serve people on an even broader level, in 1968 Chisholm ran for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives against James Farmer, director of the Congress of Racial Equality, and was elected, becoming the first black woman to serve in the House of Representatives. Her fluency in Spanish helped Chisholm serve her constituents well. In 1972 Chisholm declared her candidacy for the office of president of the United States-an effort described in her book The Good Fight. She later published an autobiography, Unbought and Unbossed. Chisholm retired from Congress in 1983 and taught at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts. She spoke out against the Vietnam Waruntil it ended, and she has continued to speak out for the interests of the urban poor.
Elizabeth Catlett Mora(b. 1915)
Elizabeth Catlett was born in Washington, D.C., the youngest of three children. She studied art under Grant Wood at the University of Iowa, then taught at Hampton University in Virginia. Catlett married artist Charles White in 1941, and the two moved to New York. There they mingled with other intellectuals and artists, including Jacob Lawrence and Langston Hughes, who were similarly concerned with the expression of black art and culture in the United States. Through her paintings and sculptures Catlett expressed a profound concern for the plight of the women and the poor.
In 1946 Catlett received a Rosenwald Fellowship and she and White visited Mexico, where they studied painting, sculpture, and lithography and worked with Taller de Grfica Popular, a socially active artists' collective. The following year they divorced.
Catlett remained in Mexico City, working with some of the most distinguished printmakers of the city. In 1962, after her marriage to painter-engraver Francisco Mora, Catlett became a Mexican citizen and made Mexico her home while maintaining her U.S. citizenship. Today, Catlett continues to use her creative gifts to evoke in her audience a sharp awareness of social ills.
General Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. (1877-1970)
Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. rose through the military ranks to become the first African American general in the U.S. Army. Born in Washington, D.C., he attended Howard University briefly and then enlisted in the army at the beginning of the Spanish-American War. During his fifty-year military career, General Davis fought in three wars, led an all-black cavalry unit, served as inspector general of the army, and taught military science at Tuskegee Institute and the historic Wilberforce University. During World War II, he served in Europe as a special advisor on race relations.
His son, Benjamin O. Davis, Jr., followed in his father's footsteps becoming the first African American general in the U.S. Air Force. The younger Davis said that his parents instilled simple values for him to follow: "Treat others as you wish them to treat you. Feel sorry not for yourself, but for those whose blinding prejudice bars them from getting to know your wonderful qualities. An work hard at everything you do."
General Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. received the U.S. Army's Distinguished Service Medal and Bronze Star and France's Croix de Guerre. In 1997, The U.S. Postal Service issued a postage stamp commemorating his career.
Sam E. Langford(1886-1956)
Sam Langford was a well-known and respected boxer in the early 1900's, considered one of the most punishing punchers in boxing history. Born in Weymouth Falls, Digby County, Nova Scotia, Langford ran away from home at age twelve and worked his way to Boston. At sixteen, measuring 5 feet seven inches and weighing 135 pounds, he made his professional boxing debut and won his first fight. Within eighteen months, he had fought and defeated Joe Gans, the world lightweight champion. Unfortunately, it was not a title bout. This lack of official recognition was to characterize Langford's twenty-one year boxing career; he never held a world boxing title even though he fought and defeated many who did.
Three years into Langford's professional boxing career, he began competing as a heavyweight. In 1906, he took on Jack Johnson, black heavyweight champion and contender for the world crown. Johnson was in his prime and had both a size and a weight advantage, but it took him fifteen rounds to defeat Langford. He never gave Langford a rematch. Throughout his career, Langford found himself in an unusual situation; although he was qualified to fight in divisions other than heavyweight, no champion would risk his title against him.
Between 1902 and 1923, Langford fought nearly 300 recorded bouts in every division from lightweight to heavyweight and was rarely defeated, but he never got the title match he deserved. By the early 1920's, advancing blindness had begun to cause problems for Langford; nevertheless, he won the heavyweight championships in Mexico and Spain in 1923. In 1955, Langford was elected into The Ring magazine's Boxing Hall of Fame, the first nonchampion to be so honored. More recently, the community of Weymouth Falls erected a plaque in Langford's honor; his grave in Cambridge, MA, was given a proper headstone; and CBC radio produced an hour-long documentary about his life titled Sam E. Langford: "The Boston Terror."
Dr. Andrew J. Foster(1925-1987)
Dr. Andrew J. Foster, a pioneer in education for deaf individuals, was instrumental in founding twenty-two schools and an equal number of religious programs for deaf children in more than twenty African countries. Foster was born in Birmingham, AL, and lost his hearing at age eleven after suffering from spinal meningitis. Drawn to a career in education, he attended the Alabama School for the Negro Deaf in Talladega and, in 1954, became the first African American to graduate from Gallaudet College in Washington, D.C. After obtaining his master's degree, Foster set out to achieve his childhood dream of establishing schools for deaf students.
In 1956, Foster founded the Christian Mission for Deaf Africans, and a year later he opened the Accra Mission School for the Deaf in Accra, Ghana. He also established a boarding school for deaf children in Mampong-Akwapim, near Accra, and a mission in Ibadan, Nigeria. These institutions, which marked the beginning of education for the deaf in Africa, also created opportunities for Foster's African students to attend Gallaudet College. Foster later received an honorary doctoral degree from Gallaudet for his contributions to the education of deaf people. A deeply religious man, Foster taught sign language to many Africans so they could fulfill his favorite Bible verse, Isaiah 29:10: "In that day, the deaf will hear the words of the book." Dedicated and tireless, he continued opening schools in Africa until the end of his life in 1987.
Dr. Alondra Oubr(b. 1950)
Dr. Alondre Oubr is a medical anthropologist, writer, and research consultant. Over the past twenty years, her research has helped to bridge the gap between orthodox modern medicine and complementary alternative healing practices. She is one of a small number of African American scientists trained in ethnopharmacology-the study of medicinal plants and other natural substances for pharmaceutical use. Dr. Oubr's desire to develop new therapeutic tools to fight disease led her to study medical anthropology.
By the time she was in graduate school, her interests had expanded to include the evolution of the human brain and the origin of human races. During the 1970's, she studied traditional Chinese, African, Native American, and Hawaiian herbal medicines, gaining great insight into non-Western healing systems. Her goal was to integrate these practices into traditional Western medicine. In 1992, she joined Shaman Pharmaceuticals as a staff scientist, becoming perhaps the first full-time medical anthropologist for a pharmaceutical company. Since childhood, Dr. Oubr has been intrigued with race, ethnicity, and xenophobia, or fear of those different from one's own group. Her studies in physical anthropology and human evolution have shed light on the subject of race and race relations.
Thurgood Marshall(b. 1908-1993)
Thurgood Marshall is a well-known figure in the history of civil rights and justice in America. For 24 years a fixture on the United States Supreme Court, the first black Supreme Court Justice, Marshall did more through the legal system than anyone else to further the progress of the civil rights movement. His seat on the bench was eyed by conservatives for many years because he had the loudest voice in support of constitutionally supported individual rights.
From 1940 to 1961, Marshall served as legal director of the NAACP. This was a pivotal time when racial segregation was a key issue. The "separate but equal" ruling of 1896 was for Marshall and the NAACP a major obstacle, which they set out to defeat. In 1954, they succeeded with the Supreme Court's passing of Brown vs. Board of Education, which declared segregation in the public schools unconstitutional. Marshall retired from the Supreme Court with a lashing attack on the conservative majority's propensity to overturn precedent after precedent. The court of which he was a member for 24 years sought to protect the rights of the powerless, minorities, women and the indigent. But, said Marshall, "Power, not reason, is the new currency of this court's decision making." He stated further that "the majority today sends a clear signal that scores of established constitutional liberties are now ripe for reconsideration." Thurgood Marshall has been honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Mary Church Terrell(1863-1954)
Mary Eliza Church Terrell was a champion of human rights, particularly women's rights, throughout most of her life. In 1954, the year Brown vs. Board of Education declared segregation unconstitutional, she could still be seen marching with her cane at the head of picket lines at the age of ninety. Her father's influence coupled with her educational experiences gave Mary a broad, well rounded perspective on the world and on the problems confronted by women and people of color. So she began a life of activism for human rights and desegregation.
She headed many progressive activist organizations, including the Colored Women's League of Washington, D.C.; The National Association of Colored Women; and the International Council of Women of the Darker Races, which promoted greater understanding and knowledge of people of color throughout the world. She gave her support to Susan B. Anthony and was instrumental in the international women's movement. A master of languages, Terrell represented black women in the American delegation to the International Congress of Women in Berlin. She was the only American delegate to deliver her address in languages other than English. She inspired the congress of women in fluent German and French, as well as in English.
In 1919, she received international recognition at the International Peace Congress in Zurich, where she spoke on the condition of black Americans. She once said that "it is unfortunate that a people or race is generally judged by the action of its most illiterate and vicious representatives rather than by the more intelligent and worthy classes." One biographer said of her that "Negroes had no more staunch and uncompromising defender at home or abroad. She allowed no defamer or malinger of Negro honor, especially that of Negro women, ever to escape the logic of her scalding."
William Grant Still(1895-1978)
William Grant Still is a composer and conductor extraordinaire. His successful music career was prompted by his mother, his high school literature teacher and his father, who encouraged Still to get an education. Though his mother wanted him to become a doctor, she initiated his musical interests by arranging for him to study violin a few years before he entered college. From that experience, Still knew that music would become his life and that nothing would ever sway him from that goal.
Still received his formal education at Wilberforce University, Oberlin Conservatory of Music and the New England Conservatory. While at Oberlin, he received a scholarship in composition, completing a year's work in less than three months. Because of his creative talent, he was awarded several fellowships, which allowed him to experiment with various forms of composition arrangements. He received national attention in 1940 at the New York World's Fair, when he was chosen to compose a musical arrangement for the Democracy exhibit in the Perisphere. He was selected by a jury that heard recordings of works by many composers without their names being disclosed. They liked Still's works "Lenox Avenue" and "From a Deserted Plantation."
William Grant Still was a prolific composer, writing music for orchestras, big bands, choral groups, the stage, radio, television and films. His work gained wide acclaim because of his expert orchestration and the strong social and racial implications of his music. Some of his most popular compositions are: "And They Lynched Him to a Tree," "Darker America," "Africa," "From the Black Belt," "Pages from Negro History," and his Afro-American Symphony of 1935, which was performed in New York, Philadelphia and Berlin. He conducted the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra in 1936, becoming the first black to conduct a major orchestra in the United States. Still has received dozens of awards and citations for his musical compositions, all of which he began with a prayer. Each of his compositions bears the inscription "With humble thanks to God, the source of inspiration."
The Healy Brothers
James Augustine (1830-1900)
Patrick Francis (1834-1910)
James Augustine Healy and Patrick Francis Healy were two of five children born to Michael and Mary Eliza Healy. Michael Healy was a transplanted white Irishman; Mary Eliza was a former slave. By Georgia law, their children could have been sold as slaves. In fact, selling their children as slaves was once suggested to the Healys by a group of white planters, who were, consequently, run off the Healy property by dogs on command of Michael Healy. He and Mary Eliza dedicated themselves thereafter to providing education and opportunity for their children. Their efforts were well rewarded.
In 1865, James Augustine Healy became the first black Roman CatholicBishop in the United States. People often recall the story of a young girl who was confessing her sins to Healy and stopped abruptly in the in the middle of her confession. When the bishop urged her to continue, she replied, "I can't tell you the rest of my sins." "Why?" asked Bishop Healy. "I said the bishop was as black as the devil." The girl blurted. "My child," he said, "you can say he's as black as coal or as black as the ace of spades, but don't say he's as black as the devil."
Patrick Healy became the first black to earn a Ph.D. degree, and he received numerous medals and commendations. He was the twenty-ninth president of the prestigious Georgetown University (1873-1882). As a tribute to his outstanding leadership during his presidency at Georgetown, the Healy Building was erected. It served as a center for administration, a classroom, and a dormitory.
Lewis Howard Latimer(1848-1928)
Considering the importance of his contributions, Lewis Latimer's name is amazingly obscure. A pioneer in the electric lighting industry, Latimer and his inventions, in a sense, brought light to the world. Yet his legacy remains lost in the darkest chambers of history. In 1865, after being discharged from the navy, Latimer worked as an office boy in a patent law firm. There his interest and talent in drawing blossomed. He provided the firm with patent drawings of such high quality that he was soon promoted to chief draftsman.
This position allowed him to improve his patent drawing skills, thereby preparing him for a momentous opportunity: he was selected to assist Alexander Graham Bell with his patent application for the telephone. Latimer improved on Bell's design, and the patent was issued in 1876. Latimer became very interested in inventing and electricity. In 1880, he began to study all aspects of electricity and conducted experiments to improve on Thomas Edison's electric light bulb. Latimer developed a process of using a carbon filament in Edison's bulb, which doubled the life of the bulb. He also supervised the installation of electrical lighting systems in New York City, Philadelphia, Montreal and London.
In the late nineteenth century, two major companies were vying for dominance in developing new patents for lighting systems in the United States: Maxim-Weston (Westinghouse) and Edison Electric (General Electric). Ironically, Latimer had worked and developed patents for both companies; this brought the two to an impasse, which was settled by forming a patent board. Latimer was selected to be chief draftsman of this board.
The genius of Lewis Latimer and his link to Thomas Edison is well documented but not widely known. Upon his death in 1928, a "Statement of the Edison Pioneers" was issued, ending with the following: "Broad-mindedness, versatility in teh accomplishment of things intellectual and cultural, a linguist, a devoted husband and father-all were characteristics of [Lewis Latimer], and his genial presence will be missed from our gatherings."
Rosa Parks(b. 1913)
Rosa Parks can rightfully be called the mother of the civil rights movement. In Montgomery, AL, blacks had to enter the bus through the front door and pay their fares, then walk out of the bus to the back door to find seating. The first ten rows of the bus were reserved for whites, even if they weren't filled. So black women could often be seen standing exhausted and holding grocery bags over an empty seat. If the white section was filled to capacity, blacks were forced to relinquish their seats to whites.
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parksand three other blacks sat in a row of seats just beyond the white section, which was filled. A white man boarded the bus and proceeded to look for a seat. At that time, the bus driver told Mrs. Parks and others to get up from their seats so this one person could be seated. The others moved, but Rosa Parks refused. She was tired and had reached the end of her tolerance for this type of injustice. The driver called the police; Parks was arrested, fingerprinted, jailed and fined fourteen dollars.
On the night of her arrest, an organization called the Women's Political Council (WPC), led by Jo Ann Robinson, an English professor, rallied around Parks and launched the Montgomery bus boycott. They distributed thousands of leaflets and encouraged the NAACP, churches and their congregations and other civil rights organizations to lend their support and participate in the boycott. The Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), a group of ministers dedicated to the spiritual and organizational leadership of the boycott, began to play an active role in continuing to pressure the city to change the discriminatory laws. As a result of the courageous work of Parks, Jo Ann Robinson, and the WPC, Martin Luther King, Jr., president of the MIA, rose to national prominence and Montgomery succumbed to the boycott. Proud recipient of the United States Congressional Gold Medaland the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Nina Simone(b. 1933)
By age seven Nina Simone, born in Tryon, NC, was playing the organ for her church and singing in the church choir. Her musical talents blossomed during the 1960's as she sang in nightclubs and recorded blues, jazz and soul compositions on the Phillips and RCA labels. Her voice, with its alto quality, and her unique vocal style lend a distinctive interpretation to the songs in her eclectic repertoire. Best known for her songs about racial justice recorded during the height of the civil rights movement, Simone's "To Be Young, Gifted and Black" and "I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free" spoke clearly of the conditions many were trying to address.
In recent times, Simone has recorded and performed primarily in Europe, but she experienced a resurgence of popularity in the United States with her 1993 recording "A Single Woman".
Joel Augustus Rogers(1880-1966)
No single person has combed through as many books, traveled to as many places or reproduced as many historical documents--written and photographic-on the subject of black history as has Joel Augustus Rogers. The father of anthrophotojournalism, Rogers laid a broad foundation for research into the history of blacks around the world with his classic works World's Great Men of Color, Sex and Race, Africa's Gift to America, Nature Knows No Color Line and One Hundred Amazing Facts About the Negro, with Complete Proof.
Born in Jamaica on September 6, 1880, Rogers came to the United States in 1917. Mostly self-educated, he learned several foreign languages, knowledge that aided him tremendously with his research in Europe and Africa. He wrote for the Pittsburgh Courier, the Journal of Negro History, Crisis and The Messenger, and he self-published most of his books. His goal was to present the complete history of blacks and their relationship with other races and cultures in order to promote better understanding among the branches of the human race.
Rogers encountered public criticism from some black scholars, who cited his lack of formal education and deemed his methods unacceptable in their lack of scholasticism. One of those critics, W.E.B. DuBois, accurately described Rogers in his book The World and Africa. DuBois wrote: "I have learned much from J.A. Rogers. Rogers is an untrained American Negro writer who has done his work under great difficulty without funds and at much personal sacrifice. But no man living has revealed as many important facts about the Negro race as has Rogers.
Benjamin Banneker(1731-1806)
Benjamin Banneker was born and spent his entire life on his father's farm in Baltimore County, MD. Lacking an extensive formal education, Banneker taught himself literature, astronomy, history and mathematics with books he borrowed from his friend George Ellicott. He also taught himself to play the flute and violin. Naturally gifted in mathematics, Banneker compiled his first ephemeris in 1791, which gave the positions of the sun, moon and planets for each day of the year; solar and lunar eclipses; daily rising and settings of the sun and other stars; changing lengths of days; daily weather forecasts; tide tables and the like.
This information was the basis of his almanac, a work that was widely published and the subject of considerable discussion. Banneker's interest in science is evidenced by his being the first to record the arrival of the "seventeen-year locusts," or periodical cicadas, a phenomenon he observed three times in his lifetime. Banneker constructed a wooden clock that accurately kept time, even though previously he had seen only a sundial and a pocket watch. He calculated the clock's gear ratios and carved them with a pocket knife, and the clock worked until it was destroyed in a fire after his death.
In 1791, Banneker was recruited by surveyor Andrew Ellicott to assist in the survey of federal land for a new national capital city, Washington, D.C. Although his name appears on none of the contemporary documents relating to its planning and surveying Banneker played an important role in the layout and design of the city. Banneker died on October 9, 1806, just short of his 75th birthday. Two days after his death, while the burial was in progress, his house caught fire and burnt to the ground, destroying his clock and all his books, instruments and writings.
The Delany Sisters
Elizabeth "Bessie" Delany (1891-1995)
Sarah "Sadie" Delany (b. 1889)
Affectionately referred to as the Delany sisters, these dynamic centenarians have made a great impression on the hearts of Americans. Their father, Henry Beard Delany, the first black Episcopal bishop, was born into slavery. He earned a college degree and married Nanny James Logan, his college sweetheart and the valedictorian of their class, and the couple raised ten children. Growing up on the campus of St. Augustine's College in Raleigh, NC, where their father was vice-principal, shaped the sisters' attitudes about the importance of achievement. They both graduated from St. Augustine's and then from Columbia University. Sadie, with a master's degree in education, became a teacher, and Bessie, with a D.D.S. degree became New York's second black female dentist.
In 1993, the Delany sisters published their first book, Having Our Say: The Delany Sister's First 100 Years, written with journalist Amy Hill Hearth. This award-winning account of their fascinating lives was on the New York Times best-seller list for more than a year, sold more than 900,000 copies, and was translated into four languages. The memoir was made into a delightful play that premiered in Princeton, NJ, and, after a successful run on Broadway, toured major U.S. cities.
Bessie Delany died in her home in 1995 with her sister by her side. Although Sadie was saddened by her loss, she handled the event with strength and courage. She has recently written a second book with Hearth, On My Own at 107: Reflections on Life Without Bessie.
Dick Gregory(b. 1932)
Dick Gregory has succeeded at many endeavors: as a champion track and field athlete, a pioneering stand-up comic, an author, a promoter of healthy lifestyles, a businessman, and a human rights activist. Born in St. Louis, MO, Gregory learned early about responsibility, working at odd jobs such as shining shoes to help support himself and his large family. In high school, Gregory consistently set records in track and field events, earning a scholarship to Southern Illinois University.
An intelligent, quick-witted man, Gregory began using political satire to bring attention to social injustice and inequality, receiving his big break as a comedian at the Chicago Playboy Club in 1961. Hired as a replacement act, he performed brilliantly to a potentially hostile audience. He recalls: "The audience fought me with dirty, little insulting statements, but I was faster, and I was funny...They stopped heckling and they listened." An extended contract at the club launched Gregory's career in comedy.
His popularity gave him a national forum in which to address poverty, segregation, social inequality, and the Vietnam War. His periodic fasts to protest these injustices, along with his adoption of a vegetarian diet, brought about a physical transformation. He lost more than half of his 280 pounds, stopped smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol, and gradually began to "feel stronger and healthier than ever before."
Still on the battle front today, Dick Gregory is fearless and unrelenting. He is a major attraction in any venue, speaks frequently to young and old around the world, and has become a revered leader in the black community. Writer Peter Barry Chowka said, "He is that rare combination [like Mahatma Gandhi] of activist and healer, one whose own life illustrates how real change first must come from within oneself." Distinguished recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Dorothy Dandridge(1922-1965)
Influenced by their mother's aspiration to an acting career, Dorothy Jean Dandridgeand her older sister, Vivian, performed in Baptist churches across the country as young girls, billed as the "Wonder Children." In the early 1930's, Rudy Dandridge moved the girls to Los Angeles and enrolled them in Lauretta Butler's dancing school. There they met Etta Jones, who later joined them in an act called the Dandridge Sisters. The act met with worldwide success, providing a stepping stone for Dorothy eventually to pursue an acting career.
In 1954, Dandridge was the first black woman to be nominated for an Academy Award, as best actress in the movie Carmen Jones. Other nominees were Grace Kelly, Judy Garland, Audrey Hepburn, and Jane Wyman. Although Kelly won, Dandridge has achieved international acclaim. Ecstatically, she told her sister, "Vivi, now I will do the work I love...acting. No more working in the saloons for me."
Dandridge had studied acting and all facets of the entertainment business for years, but Hollywood was not ready for this beautiful, talented black woman. Directors often sought to cast her as a temptress. Although Dandridge was approached by the director of Cleopatra for the leading role, Elizabeth Taylor was selected, and dark makeup was used to simulate the skin tone of the Egyptian Queen.
Since her death in 1965, Dandridge has received many awards for her outstanding contributions to the field of entertainment and for opening doors for other blacks. Although she did not live to see her star placed on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Dorothy Dandridge will never be forgotten. A rare beauty with enormous talent and determination, she was also a black pioneer.
Charles "Rich" Patterson(1833-?)
Born into slaveryon a Virginia plantation, Charles R. "Rich" Patterson became a master blacksmith and gained his freedom by crossing the Allegheny Mountains, hiking through West Virginia, and crossing the Ohio River to reach Greenfield, OH, a station on the Underground Railroad. There, Patterson worked for the Dines and Simpson Carriage and Coach Makers Company. Later, in partnership with J.P. Lowe, he formed a company that became known for its expertly crafted horse-drawn carriages; soon he had bought out his partner and formed the highly successful C.R. Patterson and Sons Carriage Company.
After Patterson's death, his eldest son took over the family business. Noticing more and more of the "funny-looking horseless" carriages on the road, he reported to the company's board, "In 1902 there was one car to 65,000 people, and by 1909 there was one vehicle for every 800 people...I believe it's time for us to build a Patterson horseless carriage." On September 23, 1915, young Patterson saw his dream roll off the assembly line-an awkward-looking two-door coupe.
C.R. Patterson and Sons could not compete, however, with Henry Ford, on his way to becoming one of the world's largest automobile manufacturers. In 1939, the company closed its big wooden doors. Most believe that C.R. Patterson would have been saddened, but very proud to know that his name on a product still meant the highest quality.
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