*               Today in Black History - April 26               *

1785 - John James Audubon is born in Les Cayes, Saint Dominique
        (later Haiti), to an African Caribbean mother and a French
        father.  He will display an early affinity for bird
        specimens and drawing in France, later emigrating to the
        United States, where he will marry a plantation owner's
        daughter and paint the ground-breaking collection "The
        Birds of America."

1886 - William Levi Dawson is born in Albany, Georgia.  A graduate
        of Fisk University, he will move to Chicago, serve in the
        365th Infantry in World War I, become an attorney and
        initially be involved in Republican politics upon his
        return to the city after the war.  Elected to his first
        term in the United States Congress in 1942, he will serve
        27 years in the House, where he will become the first
        African American representative to chair a committee of
        Congress, the Committee on Expenditures in Executive
        Departments, in 1949.

1964 - The African nations of Tanganyika and Zanzibar merge to
        form Tanzania.

1968 - Students seize the administration building at Ohio State.

1984 - Jazz musician great William Allen "Count" Basie, dies in
        Hollywood, Florida at the age of 77.

1991 - Maryann Bishop Coffey is named the first woman and the
        first African American co-chair of the National Conference
        of Christians and Jews.

1992 - "Jelly's Last Jam" opens at Virginia theater on Broadway.
        Gregory Hines will portray the great jazz composer Jelly
        Roll Morton and will receive a Tony award as best actor in
        a musical in that role.

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

   ______________________________________________________________
           Munirah Chronicle is edited by Brother Mosi Hoj
   	          "The TRUTH shall make you free"

   E-mail:   <[log in to unmask]>
   Archives: <http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/Munirah.html>
   ______________________________________________________________
   To SUBSCRIBE send E-mail to: <[log in to unmask]>
   In the E-mail body place:  Subscribe Munirah Your FULL Name
   ______________________________________________________________
   Munirah(TM) is a trademark of Information Man. Copyright 1998,
   All Rights Reserved by the Information Man in association with
   CODE One Communications.