* Today in Black History - July 7 *
1781 - James Armistead, an American slave, infiltrates the
headquarters of General Cornwallis and becomes a servant
hired to spy on the Americans. In reality, Armistead is
a cunning double agent working for the French ally
General Lafayette and reports on the movements and troop
strength of the British. His reports are critical to the
surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.
1791 - The nondenominational African Church is founded by Richard
Allen, Absalom Jones, and Benjamin Rush.
1851 - Charles A. Tindley, African American Methodist preacher
and songwriter is born in Berlin, Maryland. He will be
is known as one of the "founding fathers of American Gospel
music." The son of slaves, he will teach himself to read
and write at the age of 17. He will be a driven young man,
working as a janitor while attending night school, and
earning his divinity degree through a correspondence course.
In 1902, he will become pastor of the Calvary Methodist
Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the church
where he had earlier been the janitor. Tindley's "I'll
Overcome Some Day" was the basis for the American civil
rights anthem "We Shall Overcome," popularized in the 1960's.
His most enduring gospel hymns include 'Stand By Me,'
'Nothing Between,' 'Leave It There' and 'By and By.' He will
compose over 47 gospel standards. At the time he joins the
ancestors in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on July 26, 1933, his
church will have 12,500 members. The Tindley Temple United
Methodist Church in Philadelphia will be named after him.
1893 - Walter White, NAACP leader, is born in Atlanta, Georgia. After
graduating from Atlanta University in 1916, he will become an
official with the Standard Life Insurance Company, one of the
largest Black-owned businesses of its day. He will also take
part in civic affairs, helping to found the Atlanta branch of
the NAACP that same year. With White as secretary, the branch
will quickly score a victory for educational equality by
preventing the school board from eliminating seventh grade in
the Black public schools. In 1917, James Weldon Johnson, field
secretary for the NAACP will visit Atlanta. He will be
impressed with White's enthusiasm and political skills and
will persuaded the national board of directors to appoint him
the assistant secretary. In January, 1918 White will move to
New York and join the NAACP staff. For the next ten years his
primary responsibility will be conducting undercover
investigations of lynchings and race riots. Using his fair
complexion to his advantage, he will approach members of lynch
mobs and other whites who had witnessed or were involved in
racial violence. He will trick them into giving him candid
accounts that the NAACP would then publicize. During these
years he will investigate forty-one lynchings and eight race
riots, including the riots in Elaine, Arkansas, and Chicago,
Illinois, during the Red Summer of 1919. On more than one
occasion he will narrowly escape vigilantes who discover his
true identity. He will become the Executive Director of the
NAACP from 1931 until he joins the ancestors in 1955.
1906 - Leroy Robert "Satchel" Paige, baseball pitcher, (Negro League
and American League) is born in Mobile, Alabama. (His birth
year is an estimate) In 1965, 59 years after Paige's supposed
birthday, he took the mound for the last time, throwing three
shut-out innings for the Kansas City Athletics. He will be
inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New
York in 1971.
1915 - Margaret Walker is born in Birmingham, Alabama. Encouraged by
Langston Hughes and others, Walker will become a writer best
known for her volume of poetry 'For My People,' her novel
'Jubilee,' and a biography of novelist Richard Wright.
1921 - Ezzard Charles is born in Cincinnati, Ohio. He will become a
boxer and will be undefeated as an amateur, winning the 1939
AAU National middleweight title before turning professional in
1940. After military service during World War II, he will
defeat Hall-of-Famer Archie Moore and avenge losses to Lloyd
Marshall and Jimmy Bivins to earn a No. 2 ranking at light
heavyweight in 1946. He will fight five light heavyweight
champions, beating four of them, but will never challenge for
the light heavyweight crown. He will finally win the vacant
NBA heavyweight title by defeating Jersey Joe Walcott in 1949.
He will earn worldwide recognition as heavyweight king the
next year by decisioning an aged Joe Louis. After three
successful defenses of the undisputed crown, he will lose the
title in a third battle with Walcott. Charles will announce
his retirement from the ring on December 1, 1956. He will join
the ancestors in 1975 and will be enshrined in the
International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1990.
1941 - Vernard R. Gray is born in Washington, DC. He will become a
pioneer in the Black Arts Movement. He will begin in the
1960's as a photographer/videographer documenting African
American culture in the Washington, DC metropolitan area and
around the world. He will found the Miya Gallery in downtown
DC in 1976, introducing the community to various manifestations
of African culture over twenty-five years and from 1996 will
serve as an Internet developer for many artists, small
businesses and non-profit organizations at
http://www.connectdc.com.
1945 - Fern Logan is born in Jamaica (Queens), New York. A graduate of
Pratt Institute, she will study photography in the mid 1970's
with master photographer Paul Caponigro. Among her best-known
works will be the renowned "Artists Portrait Series" of African
American artists such as Romare Bearden, Roy deCarava, and Jacob
Lawrence as well as commanding landscapes and scenes of nature.
1948 - The Cleveland Indians sign Leroy "Satchel" Paige at the age of
42. He will be the American League 'Rookie of the Year'.
1948 - Edna Griffin, her infant daughter Phyllis, John Bibbs and Leonard
Hudson, will enter the Katz Drug Store in downtown Des Moines,
Iowa, sit at the lunch counter and order ice cream. They will
be refused service and Griffin will soon organize a protest
against the drugstore's policy of refusing service to blacks.
Criminal charges will be filed against Katz for violating Iowa's
1884 Civil Rights Act. The law prohibits discrimination in
public accommodation. Katz will be found guilty and will appeal
the verdict to the Iowa Supreme Court, which affirms the
decision a year later. The case will be settled with Griffin
receiving a one dollar settlement and the drugstore forced to
change its ways.
1960 - Ralph Sampson is born in Harrisonburg, Virginia. He will become
arguably the most heavily recruited (for both college and the NBA)
basketball prospect of his generation. Playing for the University
of Virginia, he will become one of only two male players in the
history of college basketball to receive the Naismith Award as the
National Player of the Year three times. He will be the only
player to win the Wooden award twice. He will becom a professional
basketball player with Houston Rockets. In the 1985-86 NBA season,
Sampson will (in his third season with the Rockets) lift the
Rockets from 14-68 in the 1982-83 season before his arrival to one
of the best in the NBA. In Game 5 of the 1986 NBA Western
Conference Finals, his last second tip-in at the buzzer will beat
the Los Angeles Lakers and send the Rockets to only their 2nd NBA
Finals appearance in franchise history. His NBA career will
quickly deteriorate as he becomes burdened with numerous knee
injuries. In 1988, by the time he is traded to the Golden State
Warriors, the rest of his career will become very limited. In 1989,
he will be traded to the Sacramento Kings where he will basically
be a third-string player. He will average 4.2 points per game and
3.0 points per game for the 1989-90 and 1990-91 seasons
respectively. He will play one final season with the Washington
Bullets in 1991-92 where he averages two points per game. He will
win numerous individual awards in the short period of time he was
healthy, but will never win a national or NBA championship.
1975 - "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow
is Not Enuf," a play by 26-year-old Ntozake Shange, premieres
in New York City.
1994 - Panama withdraws its offer to the United States to accept thousands
of Haitian refugees.
1997 - Harvey Johnson is sworn in as the first African American mayor
in Jackson, Mississippi.
1998 - Imprisoned Nigerian opposition leader Moshood Abiola joins the
ancestors before he can be released from his political
imprisonment. The government indicates that he succumbed from
an apparent heart attack.
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