*                  Today in Black History - October 25             *

1806 - Benjamin Banneker joins the ancestors at the age of 74 in Ellicott
        Mills, Maryland.  Banneker was a self-taught mathematician and
        builder (at age 21) of the first striking clock built in the United
        States.  An amateur astronomer, Banneker's calculations for solar
        and lunar eclipses appeared in 29 editions of his almanacs,
        published from 1792 to 1797.

1915 - Attorney James L. Curtis is named minister to Liberia.

1926 - Crisis magazine, led by editor W.E.B. DuBois, awards its first
        prizes in literature and art.  Among the winners will be Arna
        Bontemps' poem "Nocturne at Bethesda," Countee Cullen's poem
        "Thoughts in a Zoo," Aaron Douglas' painting "African Chief"
        and a portrait by Hale Woodruff.

1940 - The Committee on the Participation of Negroes in the National
        Defense Program met with President Roosevelt.

1940 - The National Newspaper Publishers Association is founded.

1940 - The Spingarn Medal is presented to Dr. Louis T. Wright for his
        civil rights leadership and his contributions as a surgeon.

1940 - Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr. is promoted to Brigadier General,
        the first African American to attain that rank in the United
        States Army or any other branch of the Armed Forces.

1958 - Ten thousand students, led by Jackie Robinson, Harry Belfonte
        and A. Phillip Randolph, participate in the Youth March for
        integrated schools in Washington, DC.

1958 - Daisy Bates, head of the Arkansas chapter of the NAACP, and
        the nine students who integrated Little Rocks's Central High
        School are awarded the Spingarn Medal for their courage and
        leadership in the civil rights struggle.

1962 - Uganda is admitted as the 110th member of the United Nations.

1968 - The city of Chicago officially recognizes Jean Baptiste Pointe
        de Sable as its first settler.

1973 - Abebe Bikila, Ethiopian marathoner who won the Olympic Gold
        Medal in 1960 and 1964, joins the ancestors at the age of 46.

1976 - Clarence "Willie" Norris, the last surviving member of the
        nine Scottsboro Boys, who were convicted in 1931 of the
        alleged rape of two white women on a freight train, is pardoned
        by Governor George Wallace.  Norris had spent 15 years in
        prison and had been a fugitive fleeing parole in Alabama in
        1946.

1983 - Mary Francis Berry, professor of history and law at Howard
        University, and two other members of the Civil Rights
        Commission are fired by President Ronald Reagan.  Considered a
        champion of minority concerns on the Commission, Berry will
        charge the administration with attempting to "shut up"
        criticism. She will later sue and be reinstated.

1983 - The United States and six other Caribbean nations invade the
        island nation of Grenada.

1988 - Two units of the Ku Klux Klan and eleven individuals are ordered
        to pay $1 million to African Americans who were attacked during
        a brotherhood rally in predominately white Forsythe County,
        Georgia.

1990 - Evander Holyfield knocks out James "Buster" Douglas in the third
        round of their twelve-round fight to become the undisputed
        world heavyweight champion.  Holyfield's record stood at 25-0,
        with 21 knockouts.

1997 - The Million Woman March, organized by grass root sisters, led by
        Sister Phile Chionesu and Sister Asia Coney, takes place in
        Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  The event is attended by 1.3
        million attendees (300,000 to 1 million according to
        Philadelphia officials).  The MWM had been promoted by word of
        mouth and avoided traditional media and mainstream groups, such
        as sororities and many civil rights groups.  Sis. Chionesu calls
        the march "a declaration of independence from ignorance,
        poverty, enslavement, and all the things that have happened to
        us that has helped to bring about the confusion and disharmony
        that we experience with one another."

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