* Today in Black History - June 8 *
1868 - Robert Robinson Taylor is born in Wilmington, North Carolina.
He will attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in
1888, where he will study architecture. He will become the
first African American graduate of MIT in 1892 and the first
African American accredited architect in the United States.
After being sought after by Booker T. Washington, during and
after his collegiate studies at MIT, he accepted a position
at Tuskegee Institute. Booker T. Washington employed him to
develop the industrial program at Tuskegee and to plan and
direct the construction of new buildings for the campus. In
addition to building an academic program modeled after MIT,
over the span of 40 years, he designed dozens of essential
buildings, including libraries, dormitories, lecture halls,
industrial workshops and a chapel, transforming a makeshift
campus on an abandoned plantation into a confident, state-
of-the-art institution. After retiring to his native
Wilmington, North Carolina in 1935, the governor of North
Carolina will appoint him to the board of trustees of what
is now Fayetteville State University. He will join the
ancestors on December 13, 1942.
1886 - The first Civil Rights Act is passed.
1892 - Homer Adolph Plessy, an African American shoemaker from New
Orleans, Louisiana, is arrested for sitting in a "whites
only" railroad car. Judge John Ferguson will find him
guilty of the crime of refusing to leave the white railroad
car. Plessy will appeal to the Supreme Courts of both
Louisiana and the United States, and both will uphold
Ferguson's decision and the "separate but equal" doctrine
(Plessy vs. Ferguson).
1924 - George Kirby is born in Chicago, Illinois. He will become a
comedian and, impressionist and delight audiences for more
than 40 years. Kirby will begin his career in Chicago and
will go to Las Vegas in 1952 as part of the Count Basie
show, one of the first African American acts to play Vegas.
He will be best known for impressions of stars such as Jerry
Lewis, John Wayne and Walter Brennan, and for his dead-on
takes of women, notably Pearl Bailey, Ella Fitzgerald and
Sarah Vaughan. He will join the ancestors on September 20,
1995.
1928 - Edward Joseph Perkins is born in Sterlington, Louisiana. He
will become the first African American ambassador to South
Africa (1986-1989). A veteran foreign service professional,
he will serve as U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Liberia
(1985 - 1986), Director of the Office of West African
Affairs in the Bureau of African Affairs at the U.S.
Department of State (1983 - 1985), Deputy Chief of Mission
at the U.S. Embassy in Monrovia, Liberia (1981-1983),
Counselor for Political Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in
Accra, Ghana (1978 - 1981), and ambassador to the United
Nations.
1939 - Bernie Casey is born in Wyco, West Virginia. He will be the
first-round draft pick for the San Francisco 49ers and play
wide receiver. Before retiring from the NFL, he will also
play for the Los Angeles Rams and be named an NFL All-Pro
wide receiver. After the NFL, he will have his acting debut
in "Guns of the Magnificent Seven," and have more than 40
roles to his credit, including Mr. Walter in "Once Upon A
Time...When We Were Colored," Commander Hudson in the TV
series "Star Trek," "Deep Space Nine" and Commander Harris
in "Under Siege." He will have his directorial debut with
the film, "The Dinner (1997). He also will become an
accomplished artist with paintings part of permanent
collections at the California Museum of African American
Art and the Ankrum Gallery in Los Angeles. His works will
also appear in The Hirshorn Museum in Washington, DC, the
Lowe Gallery in Atlanta and the John Bolles Gallery in San
Francisco. He will earn a doctoral degree in humanities
from the Savannah College of Art and Design and serve as
chairman of its board of trustees.
1943 - Willie Davenport is born in Troy, Alabama. He will become a
star in track and field events, whose career will span five
Olympic Games from 1964 to 1980, during which he won a gold
and bronze medal. He will be one of only eight U.S. Olympic
athletes to have competed in both the summer and winter
games. Davenport will win the gold medal in the 110-meter
hurdles in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, and the bronze in
the same event in Montreal, Quebec in 1976. After four
Olympic appearances in the hurdles, Davenport will compete
as the first African American member of the U.S. four-man
bobsled team in 1980. Davenport will coach the 1993 and
1994 U.S. Army Track Team to victory in the Armed Forces
Track & Field Championships. He will be the head coach of
the United States Army Track & Field Team for the 1996
Olympics. He will join the ancestors on June 17, 2002.
1946 - Jennifer Lawson is born in Fairfield, Alabama. She will become a
writer, producer and public broadcasting executive. She will
attend Tuskegee University, majoring in chemistry. She will be
a civil rights activist in high school during the campaign by
Martin Luther King, Jr. that led to his famous letter from
Birmingham Jail. Her activism in the civil rights movement will
lead her to end her Tuskegee studies and become a full-time member
of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), serving
alongside notable civil rights activists. She will work as a
community organizer with SNCC in Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia
and will often serve as a graphic artist for the organization. Her
move into film will come after studying film and obtaining an MFA
from Columbia University, New York. She will write the original
feature screenplay, "Team-mates" in 1976. The production of this
property will serve as the screen debut for Estelle Getty and James
Spader. While working on another script, she will be invited to
become the executive director of the Film Fund, a post she will
hold until 1980, when she will be recruited to the Corporation for
Public Broadcasting, Washington, DC. She will leave that post in
1989 as the Director of the Television Program Fund, providing
millions in grants to film and TV producers. In 1989 she will be
selected by Public Broadcasting System to become its first chief
programming executive. She will serve PBS as Executive Vice
President, Programming and Promotion Services from 1989 to 1996,
when she will leave to establish her own company, Magic Box
Mediaworks, Inc. Under its banner, she will produce "Africa," an
acclaimed eight hour documentary series, made in conjunction with
National Geographic Television and Thirteen, Inc. The series will
premier to critical acclaim on September 9, 2001, two days before
the tragic circumstances of 9/11. She will also produce websites,
most notable "The African American World," for PBS. On December 14,
2010, The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) will name her
senior vice president of Television and Digital Video Content. She
will work closely with PBS, public television stations and independent
production organizations to develop innovative, diverse and creative
programming and content for national public media audiences. She will
bring more than 20 years of public broadcasting expertise to the
position. She will join CPB in February, 2011.
1953 - The Supreme Court rules that District of Columbia restaurants
cannot refuse to serve African Africans.
1958 - Keenen Ivory Wayans is born in New York City. He will become
an actor, comedian, filmmaker, and a member of the Wayans Family
of entertainers. He will first come to prominence as the host
and co-creator of the 1990-1994 Fox sketch comedy series "In
Living Color." He will produce, direct and/or write a large
number of films, starting with "Hollywood Shuffle," which he
co-wrote, in 1987. A majority of these films will include him and
one or more of his brothers and sisters in the cast. One of these
films, "Scary Movie" (2000), which Wayans will direct, will be
the highest-grossing movie ever directed by an African American
until it was surpassed by Tim Story's "Fantastic Four" in 2005. From
1997 to 1998, he will host the talk show "The Keenen Ivory Wayans
Show." Most recently, he will be a judge for the eighth season of
"Last Comic Standing."
1963 - Three bullets are fired into the Clarksdale, Mississippi home
of Dr. Aaron Henry, Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party
candidate for governor.
1968 - James Earl Ray, the alleged assassin of Dr. Martin Luther
King Jr., is captured at London's Heathrow airport.
1969 - Bill Cosby wins an Emmy for a variety special. It is his
fourth Emmy award.
1978 - Through the voice of its president, Spencer W. Kimball, the
Mormon Church reverses a 148-year-long policy of spiritual
discrimination against African American leadership within
the denomination (Official Declaration # 2).
1982 - Leroy "Satchel" Paige, a pitcher in the Negro Leagues and
the first African American pitcher in the American League,
joins the ancestors in Kansas City, Missouri at the age of
75. Paige is heralded as one of the greatest early African
American baseball players in a career that spanned more than
40 years and was enshrined in baseball's Hall of Fame in
1971.
1998 - Military dictator of Nigeria, Sani Abacha joins the ancestors
at the age of 54.
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