December 30

Beauford Delaney (December 30, 1901 – March 26, 1979) began painting as a child in Knoxville where he was mentored by local artist Lloyd Branson and completed his first commissioned work at age 14....

On December 30, 1882, nineteen convicts drowned in the Tuckasegee River near Dillsboro, North Carolina when the ferry they were riding capsized in freezing water. The men, ranging in age from 15 to 55, had been leased from the state penitentiary to work on the Cowee tunnel and were buried in a mass, unmarked grave nearby. Eleven prisoners and one guard were pulled from the river and survived.

Birthdays

Inez Beverly Prosser (December 30, 1897 - September 1934) is often credited with being the first African American woman to earn a PhD in psychology. Although her degree was from the University of Cincinnati School of Education in 1933, her research was in the field of psychology and her advisors were psychologists. Dr. Prosser's dissertation, The Non-Academic Development of Negro Children in Mixed and Segregated Schools, was used over the next twenty years in research leading to the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954.She died in a car accident one year after she received her PhD.

Beauford Delaney (December 30, 1901 – March 26, 1979) began painting as a child in Knoxville where he was mentored by local artist Lloyd Branson and completed his first commissioned work at age 14. He studied art in Boston and New York, receiving critical acclaim and gallery exposure but little commercial success. One of his works from this period, Can Fire in the Park (1946), is described by the Smithsonian American Art Museum as a "disturbingly contemporary vignette [which] conveys a legacy of deprivation linked not only to the Depression years after 1929 but also to the longstanding disenfranchisement of black Americans, portrayed here as social outcasts. Delaney moved to Paris in 1952 where he spent the remainder of his life.

Can Fire in the Park, 1946

Rock innovator Bo Diddley (December 30, 1928 - June 2, 2008) was born Ellas Otha Bates in McComb, Mississippi, taking the surname McDaniel when he moved to Chicago with the family of his mother's cousin, Gussie McDaniel. He began recording with Chess Records in 1954 and was one of the first American male musicians to include women in his band. In 1987 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Joseph F. Beam (December 30, 1954 – December 27, 1988, was an African-American gay rights activist and author who worked to foster greater acceptance of gay life in the black community by relating the gay experience with the struggle for civil rights in the United States. His books In the Life and Brother to Brother were featured in the 1991 television documentary, Tongues Untied.

Eldrick Tont "Tiger" Woods (born December 30, 1957)  was  PGA Player of the Year a record eleven times and the leading money winner ten times. He is the youngest player to achieve the career Grand Slam, and the youngest and fastest to win 50 tournaments on tour. He first reached the number one position in the world rankings in June 1997, and remained consistently at or near the top until 2010.

LeBron James (born December 30, 1964)  has won three NBA championships (2012, 2013, 2016), four NBA Most Valuable Player Awards (2009, 2010, 2012, 2013), three NBA Finals MVP Awards (2012, 2013, 2016), two Olympic gold medals (2008, 2012), an NBA scoring title (2008), and the NBA Rookie of the Year Award (2004). He has also been selected to 12 NBA All-Star teams, 12 All-NBA teams, and six All-Defensive teams.

Events

December 30 is the fifth day of Kwanzaa, symbolized by the principle of Nia or Purpose; to make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.

On December 30, 1929, a charter was granted to the Alpha chapter of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority Inc. at Butler University. In spite of campus racism, the organization was organized on November 12, 1922, in Indianapolis, Indiana, by seven educators.



Photo Gallery

Thornhill Plantation, Greene County, Alabama, Old Slave Cabin - December 30, 1934. (Photographer Alex Bush)

Marian Anderson and Paul Robeson, December 30, 1945, New York City

Publications

Jet Magazine, December 30, 1954

Jet Magazine December 30, 1976 -- Marvin Gaye

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