Black History News
Rachel Robinson, Hank Aaron, and Presidents Obama, Bush, Clinton & Carter Launch the Month-Long “Tip Your Cap” Campaign to Honor the 100th Anniversary of Baseball’s Negro Leagues
Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter, in collaboration with civil rights hero Rachel Robinson and baseball legend Hank Aaron, are joined by scores of baseball players and other professional athletes, sports executives, entertainers, journalists and others for an unprecedented tribute to the 100-year anniversary of the founding of baseball’s Negro Leagues. The Tip Your Cap campaign, which is being directed…
Read MoreIconic Charleston English Teacher N.C. Williams Passes
By Barney Blakeney A pillar of the Charleston community passed away June 27. Ms. Naomi C. Williams, or “N.C’’ as she was affectionately called by her peers at C.A. Brown High School and the community at large, was a renowned educator in the Charleston County Public School system for over 35 years. She was 94…
Read MoreUgandans Launch Drive To ‘Decolonize’ Local Area Streets
A petition to rename roads honoring British colonial figures has gathered thousands of names. The move comes as similar actions against dubious historical figures are taking place in the U.S. and South Africa. Speke Road, for example, is named after the British explorer John Hanning Speke, the first European to reach Nyanza, one of the…
Read MoreFilm review: John Lewis – Good Trouble
“I feel lucky and blessed that I’m serving in the Congress… But there is a force that is trying to take us back to another time and another dark period,” warns congressman John Lewis. And he’d know. Since age 17, this brave crusader has been at the forefront of the civil rights movement. Now at…
Read MoreGoogle Doodle Celebrates LGBTQ+ Rights Activist Marsha P. Johnson
On June 30th, 2020, in light of Pride Month in the U.S., Google launched a Doodle, illustrated by Los Angeles-based guest artist Rob Gilliam, celebrating LGBTQ+ rights activist, performer, and self-identified drag queen Marsha P. Johnson, who is widely credited as one of the pioneers of the LGBTQ+ rights movement in the United States. On this day in 2019, Marsha…
Read MoreSecretary Bernhardt Designates John Hope Franklin Reconciliation Park as African American Civil Rights Network Site
U.S. Secretary of the Interior David L. Bernhardt has designated the John Hope Franklin Reconciliation Park as an official member of the African American Civil Rights Network (AACRN), formally recognizing the historical and national significance of the tragic Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 and Dr. John Hope Franklin’s work to advance the African American civil rights movement. The African…
Read MoreNASA Names Headquarters After ‘Hidden Figure’ Mary W. Jackson
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine announced June 23 the agency’s headquarters building in Washington, D.C., will be named after Mary W. Jackson, the first African American female engineer at NASA. Jackson started her NASA career in the segregated West Area Computing Unit of the agency’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. Jackson, a mathematician and aerospace engineer, went on to lead programs…
Read MoreStruggle Seen in Belgium Over Racist Historical Statues
Some of the largest anti-racism protests in Europe have taken place in Belgium, the birthplace of King Léopold II, whose brutal rule of Congo from 1885 to 1908 caused an estimated 10 million Congolese deaths through murder, starvation and disease. This past week, close to 12,000 people gathered in central Brussels. They were targeting the…
Read MoreHistoric Greenwood Chamber of Commerce Launches National Campaign to Restore the Original Black Wall Street
The Historic Greenwood Chamber of Commerce announced during a June 18 press conference they are launching a campaign to raise funds to restore Black Wall Street, a once affluent black community. In the early 20th Century, Tulsa, Oklahoma was home to one of the most affluent black business districts in the United States. Black Wall Street had approximately 600 businesses,…
Read MoreMother Emanuel’s Legacy of Hope Five Years Later
By Alicia Lutz Five years ago, on June 17, 2015, the Holy City was forever changed. What started with a Bible study in the basement of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church on Calhoun Street in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, became the scene of mass murder at the hands of a racist. Nine members of…
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