*                  Today in Black History - June 21               *

1821 - The African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Zion Church is formally
        constituted in New York City.   Nineteen clergymen were present,
        representing six African American churches from New York City,
        Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,  New Haven, Connecticut and Newark,
        New Jersey.

1832 - Joseph Haynes Rainey is born in Georgetown, South Carolina.  He
        will become the first African American elected to the U.S. House
        of Representatives, where he will serve five terms.

1859 - Henry Ossawa Tanner is born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.  Son of
        AME bishop Benjamin Tanner, young Tanner will forgo the ministry
        to take up painting.  Constantly facing the tension between
        racial stereotypes and and his art, Tanner will eventually
        emigrate to France to pursue his art, considered by many the
        finest produced by an African American.  He will be known for his
        commanding use of light and color in his seascapes, scenes of
        everyday life, and religious paintings.

1923 - Marcus Garvey is sentenced to 5 years for using the U.S. mail to
        defraud.

1927 - Carl B. Stokes, the first African American elected mayor of a
        major American city is born.   Stokes will be elected to two terms
        as mayor of Cleveland, Ohio at a time of urban riots and racial
        unrest in many major U.S. cities.  Civil rights leaders said his
        election was an advance, both symbolic and genuine, for the cause
        of black political empowerment.  He is instrumental in getting
        through a law requiring city contractors to have minority
        employment programs.   President Clinton will appoint him in 1994
        as ambassador to the Seychelles, an island nation in the Indian
        Ocean.

1945 - Colonel Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. becomes the first African American
        to command a U.S. Army Air Force base when he takes command of the
        477th Composite Group of Godman Field in Kentucky.

1951 - PFC William H. Thompson is posthumously awarded the Congressional
        Medal of Honor.  He is the first African American recipient since
        the Spanish-American War.

1964 - One African American and two white civil rights workers - Michael
        H. Schwerner,  Andrew Goodman and James E. Chaney - disappear after
        release from a jail near Philadelphia, Mississippi.  They are later
        found murdered.

1965 - Arthur Ashe leads UCLA to the NCAA tennis championship.

1990 - Little Richard gets a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.

        *********************************************************
        The source for these facts are "Encyclopedia Britannica,
        "InfoBeat," "I, Too, Sing America - The African American
        Book of Days," "Before the Mayflower", "Black Firsts" and
        independent research by the Information Man.
        *********************************************************

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