*                 Today in Black History - January 17                *

 

1759 - Paul Cuffe is born in Cuttyhunk, Massachusetts.  He will become

            a successful shipowner, philanthropist, and a force in the

            movement for African Americans' repatriation to Africa.

 

1874 - Armed white Democrats seize the Texas government and put an end 

            to Radical Reconstruction in Texas.

 

1917 - The United States pays $ 25 million for the Danish Virgin 

            Islands.

 

1923 - The NAACP's Spingarn Medal is awarded to George Washington 

            Carver, head of the department of research, Tuskegee Institute, 

            for his pioneering work in agricultural chemistry.

 

1923 - The first session of the Third Pan-African Congress convenes in 

            London, England.  The second session will be held in Lisbon.

 

1924 - Jewel Plummer Cobb is born in Chicago, Illinois.  She will be

            a prominent cancer research biologist before becoming a

            professor and administrator at Connecticut College and Rutgers

            University and, in 1981, president of California State

            University, Fullerton, the first African American woman to 

            hold such a position in the CSU system.

 

1931 - James Earl Jones is born in Arkabutla, Mississippi.  He will 

            become renowned as an actor, both on the stage and the screen,

            earning a Tony award in 1969 for his portrayal of boxing

            great Jack Johnson in the "The Great White Hope" as well as

            acclaim for his Broadway roles in "A Lesson From Aloes," 

            "Fences," and many others.  Among his film and television

            credits will be the voice of Darth Vader in "Star Wars" and

            leading roles in "Paris" and "Gabriel's Fire."

 

1931 - Lawrence Douglas Wilder is born in Richmond, Virginia.  He will

            graduate from Virginia Union University and serve in the U.S.

            Army in Korea, where he will receive the Bronze Star for 

            heroism. He will attend and graduate from, the Howard 

            University School of Law and become a successful trial 

            attorney.  In 1969, he will be elected as Virginia's first 

            African American  state senator since Reconstruction.  In 1985,

            he will become Virginia's first African American Lieutenant 

            Governor.  He will make history for a third time on January 13, 

            1990, when he takes office as the first elected African 

            American governor in U.S. history.

 

1942 - Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr. is born in Louisville, Kentucky.

            Early in his boxing career, Clay converts to Islam.  As 

            Muhammad Ali, he is one of the first African American athletes 

            to intermingle political and social consciousness with sports. 

            He will become the dominant heavyweight boxer of the 1960s and 

            1970s, winning an Olympic gold medal, capturing the 

            professional world heavyweight championship on three separate 

            occasions, and defend his title successfully 19 times. Ali's 

            extroverted, colorful style, both in and out of the ring, will 

            introduce a new mode of media-conscious athletic celebrity. 

            Through his strong assertions of Black pride, his conversion 

            to the Muslim faith, and his outspoken opposition to the 

            Vietnam War, Ali will become a highly controversial symbol of 

            the turbulent 1960s.

 

1961 - Patrice Lumumba, African revolutionary and first Congolese 

            Premier of the Republic of Congo, joins the ancestors after 

            being murdered at the age of 36, by the secessionist Tshombe's

            soldiers.

 

1966 - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. opens his civil rights campaign in 

            Chicago, Illinois.  This marks the first time, during the 

            civil rights movement, that the campaign takes place in a 

            northern city.

 

1970 - John M. Burgess is installed as bishop of the Protestant 

            Episcopal diocese of Massachusetts.

 

1978 - Dr. Ronald McNair is named by NASA as a participant on a space 

            mission.

 

1989 - The Phoenix Suns/Miami Heat game is cancelled, due to racial 

            unrest in Miami.

 

1990 - The Four Tops, Hank Ballard, and The Platters are inducted 

            into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

 

1996 - Former U.S. Representative Barbara Jordan joins the ancestors 

            in Austin, Texas, at the age of 59. 

 

1998 - Louis Stokes, the first African American congressman from the

            state of Ohio, announces his retirement from Congress at the

            age of 73.  He has been a congressman for three decades.

 

2000 - Nearly 50,000 people march to South Carolina's Statehouse on

            Martin Luther King Day to demand the Confederate battle flag 

            be taken down. They are protesting Confederate flag as a 

            symbol of slavery and racism.


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