Teaneck names first African American to fire chief post
By Joseph Ax, NorthJersey.com
Anthony Verley was sworn in as the town’s newest fire chief this week, the first time this diverse town has named a black man to the post.
“When you make a milestone like that, it’s after the sacrifices of many before you,” Verley said Wednesday. “I appreciate that there are many others that blazed a trail before me, and I hope that I will now help someone else progress in the future.”
Verley, who has served as interim chief since Robert Montgomery’s retirement this spring, has experienced a turbulent couple of years.
In 2009, he was demoted from deputy chief to captain when the town eliminated the rank of deputy chief as a cost-cutting measure.
Earlier this year, after a series of legal challenges from the town’s two fire unions and a ruling from the state that the captains were improperly asked to perform duties outside of their rank, Verley was reinstated as a deputy chief.
Ohio governor picks running mate, 1st Black woman, as high court justice
SOURCE: Associated Press (Ohio.com)
Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland picked the woman who ran at his side in his failed re-election bid as the next justice of the Ohio Supreme Court.
Yvette McGee Brown will be the first black woman to serve on the state’s highest court and the third black justice in Ohio history. She will assume the seat Jan. 1.
The Democratic governor selected McGee Brown, the former lieutenant governor candidate, to fill the vacancy created by the November election of Justice Maureen O’Connor as chief justice.
Strickland said McGee Brown, raised by a teenage mother and her grandmother, would bring an important viewpoint to the Republican-dominated court.
A healthy trend at medical schools
By Kemba Dunham, Boston Globe
As a child, Ryan Rasmus dreamed of being a doctor. Now, the 22-year-old is a first-year student at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston.
“There is a great responsibility that comes with this education,’’ said Rasmus, an African-American who is originally from Houston. ’’It will enable me to impact my community in ways that may increase their quality of life and their longevity.’’
More minority students like Rasmus are enrolling in US medical schools, according a study by the Association of American Medical Colleges, a nonprofit that represents all 150 accredited medical schools in the United States and Canada. Native Americans had the largest enrollment growth, at 24.8 percent, followed by a 9 percent increase for Hispanics; 2.9 percent for African-Americans; and 2.4 percent for Asians. The growth is in part due to a push by schools to attract more underrepresented minorities — African-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Native Americans, and mainland Puerto Ricans — to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse population.
U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin to speak at Appalachian’s Dec. 12 commencement
SOURCE Appalachian State University
U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin will deliver the commencement address Dec. 12 at Appalachian State University. She will speak on “The Surgeon General’s Vision for a Healthy and Fit Nation.”
Benjamin will address graduates of the College of Arts and Science, Reich College of Education and University College at 10 a.m. in the Holmes Convocation Center on campus. She will address graduates of the College of Fine and Applied Arts, College of Health Sciences, Hayes School of Music and Walker College of Business beginning at 2 p.m., also in the Holmes Center.
Oral histories of African-Americans now online
SOURCE: Associated Press
The public can now listen to stories of segregation, community life and other issues important to Springfield’s African-American community simply by logging onto a computer.
The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum has put the oral histories online through a partnership with the Springfield African American History Foundation.
State historian Tom Schwartz says the Lincoln Library is trying to tell the larger story of Illinois, not just the life of the 16th president. He says the oral histories help listeners understand the lives of African-Americans and the contributions they have made to Illinois.
There currently are 15 interviews online, and more will be added as they are transcribed.
They touch on topics from family life to discrimination to the 1908 Springfield Race Riots.
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Online: http://www.alplm.org/oral_history/african_american/african_american_history.html
Bramlett’s Q-School achievement a milestone in African-American golf
By Farrell Evans, Golf.com
The history of African-American golf has some notable milestones. In 1961, the fall of the PGA’s caucasian-only clause gave men like Charlie Sifford and Pete Brown a chance to play on the PGA Tour. In 1975, Lee Elder became the first African-American to play in the Masters. (Four years later, he was the first person of color to compete in a Ryder Cup.)
These milestones might only be known to hardcore golf fans, but everybody remembers Tiger Woods embracing his dad after winning the 1997 Masters. What Jim Nantz called “a win for the ages” had a unique significance for African-Americans like the World War II veteran who told me that Tiger’s win felt as good as when Joe Louis beat Max Schmeling in their 1938 rematch at Yankee Stadium. After Woods’s first victory at Augusta National, many African-American parents saw golf as a sport their children could play, just as Barack Obama’s election made the presidency seem possible.
A stash of love letters results in Vanderbilt scholar’s first book
SOURCE: Vanderbilt University
Long-neglected love letters between a domestic servant husband and his teacher wife have provided an important part of a new book that tracks how middle class African American marriages evolved in the early and mid 20th century.
Stormy Weather: Middle-Class African American Marriages between the World Wars, published by The University of North Carolina Press, was written by Anastasia C. Curwood, assistant professor of African American and Diaspora Studies at Vanderbilt University. The book documents the strains that developed in African American marriages as the early civil rights and sexual revolutions played out.
“Around the turn of the century, the big concept was respectability – chastity and piety in women, breadwinning and restrained manliness in men,” Curwood said.
But mass migration of black Americans to the north along with evolving political and sexual mores complicated matters, she found.
Study: Black Students Who Attend HBCUs More Successful in Math, Technology
By Andy Moore, Black Web 2.0
According to a recent study done by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, students who attend Historically Black Colleges and Universities are more likely to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).
On Monday, The Commission released its annual briefing report on The Educational Effectiveness of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)and Encouraging Minority Students to Pursue Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Careers. The study found that students at historically black colleges and universities reported higher levels of academic involvement in their studies and in faculty research projects than black students at non-HBCUs.
According to The Commission, the success of these programs comes from the lack of “academic mismatch” that is often found at non-HBCUs. Academic mismatch occurs when an admitted student’s credentials fall below those of the median student in that program.
Bass Spreads Holiday Cheer at Florida Hospital for Children
By Dan Savage, Orlando Magic
The Orlando Magic always make an extra effort to increase their immense number of off-the-court endeavors around the holiday season.
This year is no different.
Prior to heading on his team’s west coast trip, the Magic’s Brandon Bass paid a visit to pediatric patients at Florida Hospital for Children to spread some holiday cheer.
The 6’8” power forward did his best impersonation of Kris Kringle, donning a Magic-themed Santa cap as he popped into the rooms of countless children throughout the evening.
Obama Signs Bill Settling African-American Farmers’ and Native Americans’ Lawsuits
SOURCE: ABC Radio
Signing a law that he says closes a “long and unfortunate chapter” in the nation’s history, President Obama put his signature on the bill Wednesday to settle African-American farmers’ and Native Americans’ lawsuits against the federal government.
“This is one of those issues where you don’t always get political credit, but it’s just the right thing to do,” Obama said at the bill signing surrounded by multiple members of Congress in Eisenhower Executive Office Building.
The legislation authorizes $1.15 billion for black farmers who say they were discriminated against by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and is a bill that was introduced by then-Senator Obama. The legislation also authorizes a $3.4 billion settlement with American Indians who say the U.S. Interior Department mismanaged trust accounts for natural resource royalties.
“Now, after 14 years of litigation, it’s finally time to address the way that Native Americans were treated by their government. It’s finally time to make things right.”
Six Degrees of Jeffrey Wright
By Armond White, NY Press
When Jeffrey Wright’s unforgettable performance as Muddy Waters in Cadillac Records was overlooked by movie prize-givers in 2008, he moved on. Ahead of him was A Free Man of Color, a play that theater visionary George C. Wolfe had commissioned in 2003 during his tenure at The Public Theater, and is currently being produced by Lincoln Center Theater. Playwright John Guare created a lead role—Jacques Cornet, the 19th-century Louisiana freed slave—commensurate with Wright’s talent and political awareness. The role of Cornet, whose transition to freedom coincided with the Louisiana Purchase and the territorial exploration of Lewis and Clark, showcases Wright’s talent. In other words, Wolfe and Guare were situating Wright in history in a way that makes up for the marketplace neglect of Cadillac Records and the achievement it represented for the cultural appreciation of black artists from Muddy Waters to Wright himself.
Muskegon Heights African-American museum expanding
By Clayton Hardiman, MLive.com
In the building at Peck Street and Center Avenue, opposite Muskegon Heights City Hall, the past is gaining a future.
Alongside the building, a new addition has sprung up. When it opens officially, probably some time in December, visitors will find new exhibit space, a small auditorium and multimedia enhancements.
Board members of the Muskegon County Museum of African American History say the $110,000 addition will help them fulfill their mission of recounting history and paying tribute to the lives of giants.
‘We have big hearts, and we do big things’
By Lisa Thornton, Charlotte Observer
In 1978, a thousand dollars was a small fortune.
Back then, minimum wage stood at $2.65 an hour, a movie ticket cost a dollar and a gallon of gas ran around 63 cents.
That year, to nearly 80 local black men, a thousand dollars bought a home for a legacy both rich and unique.
Along Concord’s Old Speedway Drive, the men purchased a little better than an acre of wooded land surrounded by pastures of grazing cows and fields of soybeans.
Holt honored as Business Person of the Year by Central La. Business League
SOURCE: The Town Talk
Sibal Suarez Holt of S. Holt Construction LLC has been honored by the Central Louisiana Business League as its 2010 Jimmie Rax Sr. Business Person of the Year.
The award was presented Friday night at the league’s annual meeting and Christmas gala.
Since her relocation to Alexandria from Baton Rouge, Holt has built several homes in Alsace Loraine, a subdivision in South Alexandria. Her company’s motto is “We Build Dreams.”
“We do what we say we will do, always in an effective, cost-efficient and high-quality manner,” Holt said.
She is the first female African-American general contractor in the city of Alexandria, according to a news release from the Business League.
Birmingham Museum of Art Takes a Historic Look at an African-American Art Movement
SOURCE: ArtDaily
 On December 5, the Birmingham Museum of Art will open an exhibition designed to open 21st century eyes to an astounding, if little-known phenomenon in the history of African-American art: The Spiral Collective.
Spiral was the name taken by a group of artists, including Romare Bearden, Reggie Gammon, Charles Alston, Norman Lewis, Hale Woodruff, Richard Mayhew, and Emma Amos who came together in New York in the 1960s, and took on the challenge of creating art that responded to the Civil Rights Movement. The collective existed for only a short time, yet each member of the group, working on their own and together, produced powerful works that testified not only to the common themes arising from the struggle for human rights, but to the divergent ways different artists would seek to address those themes. |
PHOTOS Forgotten history: Naples cops piece together ’54 slaying of black officer
By Ryan Mills, Naples News
NAPLES — In the dark between two shanties, John Wesley drew his .38-caliber pistol. He fired two shots.
One struck Officer Carl Strickland in the mouth. The second got him in the head.
As Strickland lay bloody and dying, Wesley ran. Strickland never had time to react, much less time to run.
It was Nov. 6, 1954 — a murder that has long since been forgotten.
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The Naples police department’s honor guard fired a 21-gun salute on a sunny morning in May 2009.
First African-American priest gets his due
By Jacques Kelly, Baltimore Sun
A few weeks ago, in response to a column about downtown Baltimore’s Seton Hill, Jerilyn Manning gave me a call. She told me that I had missed a good story. She was so right.
She is the event coordinator for the Charles R. Uncles Senior Plaza at 607 Pennsylvania Ave. I caught up with Manning and Uncles Plaza this week. It was a revelation — how an 1893 Roman Catholic seminary, St. Joseph’s, had been transformed into a residence for senior citizens.
The Rev. Charles R. Uncles was the first African-American to be ordained a Roman Catholic priest. The son of a Baltimore & Ohio Railroad mechanic, he and his story made national news. The New York Times covered his ordination in 1891.
“His name and his story needs to be told,” Manning said as she walked me through the former chapel where Uncles celebrated Masses in the 1890s. That chapel is now a multipurpose room used by residents of the building. Its fancy arched ceiling is well preserved.
Christopher Brown hired as Alcorn State University’s new president
By Elizabeth Crisp, Clarion Ledger
The state College Board has hired Christopher Brown to become the 18th president of Alcorn State University.
Brown, 38, currently is vice president and provost at Fisk University in Nashville. He’s expected to start at Alcorn in January.
Brown, a Charleston, S.C.-native, has been fielding questions from campus constituents for most of the day. In meetings with alumni, faculty, students and others, he discussed his vision for Alcorn, touching on athletics, budgets, student activities and fundraising.
“It feels natural,” he said about possibly leading the state’s land grant HBCU. “I’m convinced that this is where I’m supposed to be, and this is where I’m supposed to serve.”
Interview with the Head of the New Office of African-American Male Achievement
By Christopher Johnson, The Oakbook
Oakland’s young black men are in trouble. They make up a disproportionately large number of youths in the criminal justice system. At the same time, when it comes to attendance, literacy, math scores and other achievement indicators, black boys in Oakland Unified Schools are coming in last. To begin tackling some of these tremendous challenges, OUSD recently created the Office of African-American Male Achievement. Christopher Chatmon, a 42-year-old professional teacher and education chairman for 100 Black Men of the Bay Area, is the executive director. He spoke with The OakBook contributor Christopher Johnson about how his experiences as a young man shaped his dedication to the OAAMA, and what he hopes to accomplish over the next several years.
Click on the above link for the audio interview.
Smithsonian has a look at African-American heirlooms
By Gina Damron, Detroit Free Press
Area residents were able consult with experts on how to maintain and preserve their artifacts and prized heirlooms. James Gordon, public affairs specialist with the museum, said the initiative has been held across the country and the Detroit event, at the Detroit Public Library’s Main Branch, was the eighth stop.
Shirley Burke of West Bloomfield brought in a fiddle, believed to be 150 years old, that belonged to her great-grandfather, who she said received it from his slaveholder in Arkansas. She is interested in donating the instrument to the museum.
“It doesn’t help or serve any purposes to have it in the closet,” Burke said.
A Tribute to Dr. Josie Robinson Johnson
By Gary Cunningham, Star Tribune
“She was then as she is now: always, calm, witty, a glutton for hard work, and shrewd as they come. Though she was still a young woman in the mid-60s, Josie was already a veteran civil- rights campaigner and a seasoned lobbyist for fair housing and employment laws at the State Capital. She was known and respected by legislators, governors and business leaders.”Navy Commissions U.S.S. Gravely, Newest Burke-Class Destroyer
By Jane Anderson, Suite 101
The U.S. Navy commissioned its latest Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, the U.S.S. Gravely, on Nov. 20, 2010, in Wilmington, N.C. The ship honors Vice Admiral Samuel Lee Gravely Jr., the first African American to command a Navy warship.
About 4,000 sailors and guests attended the commissioning ceremony, held at the North Carolina State Ports facility. The audience included friends and family of Gravely himself, including veterans who served with him on the U.S.S. Taussig, which he commanded in combat. Gravely died in 2004.
Cullen Jones Crosses The Country Providing “Golden” Swimming Lessons
By Claudio Cabrera, News One
When Olympic gold medalist Cullen Jones was five-years old, he swam to a part of the pool he wasn’t supposed to – the deep end. That day he nearly drowned and lost his life. But instead of allowing the fear to engulf him, Jones went ahead and asked his parents to teach him how to swim.
Earlier this year, six African-American teenagers in Shreveport, Louisiana weren’t as lucky. On a day that was supposed to be full of fun, dancing and barbecuing, tragedy struck when six teenagers drowned in the deep 20-30 feet waters of the Louisiana Red River.
Deceased NFL Star’s Donated Organs Save 4 Lives
SOURCE: News One
One week before Christmas of 2009, NFL star Chris Henry lost his life after having a domestic spat with his fiancée. As his fiance drove away, Henry, 26, fell off the back of a moving pickup truck and died after suffering brain damage.
However, Henry’s mother, Carolyn Glaspy, has ensured that her son’s legacy will extend beyond the football field.
Moments after doctors told Glaspy that Henry’s injuries were too severe for survival, she decided to donate his organs. The lives of Brian Polk, Donna Arnold, James Benton and Thomas Elliot were saved after receiving Henry’s organs. Polk received a kidney, Benton received a liver, Arnold received a pancreas and a kidney, and Elliot received two lungs.
The touching story was featured on the CBS’ pregame NFL show on Thursday afternoon and brought usual tough guys James Brown and Boomer Esiason to tears.
School Named After Black Journalist Dedicated
SOURCE: WSMV
A Nashville school celebrated a big milestone Thursday. Robert Churchwell Magnet School, formerly Wharton Elementary School, was officially dedicated during a ceremony.Named after Robert Churchwell Jr., the school is Nashville’s first museum magnet school that serves students pre-K through fifth grade.Churchwell was the first black journalist to work at a prominent southern newspaper, the now-defunct Nashville Banner.His son was at Thursday’s ceremony and said his father would be proud.”I was just thinking how he would love to be here,” said Andre Churchwell.Several school officials and Mayor Karl Dean spoke at the ceremony, and all the students were in attendance. They also unveiled a portrait of Churchwell that will hang in the school’s hallway.
Tradition of Excellence 