January 27

On January 27, 1991, Whitney Houston sang the National Anthem prior to Super Bowl XXV at Tampa Stadium on January 27, 1991 in Tampa, Florida, considered to one of the best Super Bowl National Anthem singing performances ever. Photographed by George Rose/Getty Images

Julius Lester (born January 27, 1939) was a faculty member at UMass Amherst for 32 years, first in the department of  Afro-American Studies and later in the Judaic and Near Eastern Studies department, as well as teaching courses in comparative literature, English, and history. He is the author of 44 books, including his first, an instructional book on how to play the 12-string guitar, co-authored with Pete Seeger, and is a regular essayist for The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Village Voice, The New Republic, and other publications. As a member of SNCC he was the chief photographer, and his images have been displayed in the civil rights exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution as well as in solo exhibitions. He has also hosted radio and television shows in New York City and recorded two albums of traditional and original songs for Vanguard Records.

Birthdays

Will Marion Cook (born William Mercer Cook, January 27, 1869 – July 19, 1944) was a composer and arranger who had studied at the Oberlin Conservatory and the National Conservatory of Music as well as under Antonín Dvořák while in Europe. He is probably best known for his popular songs and Broadway musicals, such as Clorindy, or The Origin of the Cake Walk and In Dahomey. He was the son of Howard Law School dean John Hartwell Cook and the father of diplomat Will Mercer Cook.

Frederick Douglass "Fritz" Pollard (January 27, 1894 – May 11, 1986) was one of the first two players, along with Bobby Marshall, in the National Football League during the 1920 season, and the following year Pollard was named player-coach, making him the first African American coach as well. In 1926 all nine of the black players in the NFL were removed from the league at the end of the season. Pollard also coached Lincoln University's football team during the 1918 to 1920 seasons and served as athletic director of the school's World War I era Students' Army Training Corps. In the 1930s, he founded his own professional football team, the Brown Bombers. The Depression ended the Brown Bombers’ run in 1938, and he went on to other ventures, including a talent agency, tax consulting and film and music production.

Elmore James (January 27, 1918 – May 24, 1963) was an American guitarist, singer, songwriter, and band leader. He was known as King of the slide guitar but was also noted for his use of loud amplification and his stirring voice. He was strongly influenced by Robert Johnson, Kokomo Arnold and Tampa Red, recording several of Tampa Red's songs and using two of Tampa Red's former band two musicians in his own backing band, the Broomdusters.

John H. Cross Jr. (January 27, 1925 – November 15, 2007) was best known as the pastor of the 16th Street Baptist Church, an African American Baptist congregation in Birmingham, Alabama, at the time of church's racially motivated bombing in 1963. The bombing, which ripped through the church and killed four young girls, became a rallying cry for the Civil Rights Movement and propelled the problems of racial segregation in The South into the national spotlight. Cross spent much of the rest of his life working for racial reconciliation in the South.

Bobby "Blue" Bland (born Robert Calvin Brooks, January 27, 1930 - June 23, 2013) sang with Eddie Fisher while serving in the U.S. Army and began his professional career as part of Johnny Ace's revue on Beale Street and the Chitlin' Circuit. His first solo success was with the 1957 R&B chart no. 1 hit "Farther Up the Road", which also reached no. 43 on the Billboard Hot 100, followed by "I Pity the Fool", "Turn On Your Love Light",  "Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday Is Just as Bad)", and"That's The Way Love Is" in the early 1960s. He began recording for ABC Records in the 1970s, putting out the successful albums His California Album and Dreamer, and was inducted into the  Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.

Billy "White Shoes" Johnson (born January 27, 1952) was a kickoff returner and wide receiver for the NFL Houston Oilers and Atlanta Falcons from 1974 through 1988. He was a fan favorite and one of the first players to display elaborate celebrations in the end zone. He was the only player selected to the National Football League 75th Anniversary All-Time Team not in the Hall of Fame.

Ronald E. Richardson (January 27, 1952 – April 5, 1995) was an actor and operatic baritone who began his career in the mid 1970s appearing in regional theater and opera productions. He appeared in several Broadway musicals from 1978-1993, arguably best known for his Tony Award and Drama Desk Award-winning performance of Jim in the 1985 Broadway musical Big River.





Events

On January 27, 1961, Leontyne Price debuted at the Metropolitan Opera as Leonora in Verdi’s Il Trovatore where she received a 42-minute ovation, one of the longest in the Met’s history. She has 15 Grammys for voice recordings, the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1964), the Kennedy Center Honors (1980), and the National Medal of Arts (1985). Although Price wasn’t the first African American to perform at the Metropolitan Opera, she was the first to sing many different roles at the Met and to build an opera career in the US and in Europe.

On January 27, 1972, Mahalia Jackson passed away in Chicago. Her funeral at the Greater Salem Baptist Church saw 50,000 people view her glass and mahogany coffin in tribute; 6,000 people attended her funeral. Coretta Scott King eulogized Ms. Jackson along with Reverend Leon Jenkins and then Mayor Richard Daley. Sammy Davis Jr. and Ella Fitzgerald attended her funeral. The soon-to-be Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin closed the funeral with her rendition of “Precious Lord, Take My Hand.”

On January 27, 1984, Michael Jackson suffered second-degree burns during a pyrotechnics stunt filmed for a Pepsi-Cola commercial. Jackson underwent treatment to hide the scars on his scalp, and had his third rhinoplasty shortly afterward.




Photo Gallery

January 27, 1958: Following a near fatal plane ride Little Richard gives up rock and roll (don't worry, he'll be back) and enrolls in Oakwood College, a school for African-Americans run by the Seventh Day Adventist so he can get his degree in divinity.

Sade poses on January 27, 1984. Photo by B. Gomer, Getty Images

Stevie Wonder and singer Whitney Houston attending 13th Annual American Music Awards on January 27, 1986 at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, California

Michelle Obama, January 27, 2010

Photo Gallery

Norman Washington Manley Ousts Jamaican Leader William Alexander Bustamante for Prime Minister Post - Jet Magazine, January 27, 1955

Jet Magazine, January, 27, 1977 — Roots — The miniseries, based on Alex Haley's novel, originally aired over eight consecutive nights (January 23-30, 1977) on ABC.

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October 24

Marjorie Stewart Joyner (October 24, 1896 – December 27, 1994) graduated from A.B. Molar Beauty School in Chicago in 1916, the first African American to do so. She briefly operated her own salon on South State Street before joining Madame C. J. Walker's company, traveling in sales and training beauticians across the country. She eventually supervised 200 salons, and was a member of the board of directors. During this time she devised a multi-rod permanent wave device that could be used to either straighten or curl hair, becoming one of the first African American women to hold a patent. She was a founder of a professional association for beauty school owners and teachers now known as Alpha Chi Pi Omega and of the National Council of Negro Women. She was as an advisor to the Democratic National Committee in the 1940s, and advised several New Deal agencies trying to reach out to black women. In the Chicago area she chaired the Chicago Defender Charities as well as the Bud Billiken Parade. She fulfilled a lifelong goal in 1974 at the age of 77 by graduating from Bethune-Cookman University with a degree in psychology.

Birthdays

Saunders Terrell, better known as Sonny Terry (October 24, 1911 - March 11, 1986) was a blind Piedmont blues musician known for his energetic blues harmonica style, which frequently included vocal whoops and hollers, and imitations of trains and fox hunts, often working with Brownie MdGhee throughout his career. In 1938 Terry was invited to play at Carnegie Hall for the first From Spirituals to Swing concert, and later that year he recorded for the Library of Congress.  He was in the 1947 original cast of the Broadway musical comedy Finian's Rainbow and also appeared in the film The Color Purple, directed by Steven Spielberg. With McGhee, he appeared in the 1979 Steve Martin comedy The Jerk.

 Graham Brown (born Robert Elwood Brown, October 24, 1924 - December 13, 2011) attended Howard University where he earned a BA in theater, and studied method acting at the Actors Studio in New York. He began his career as a Shakespearean actor at the Guthrie Theater and was an original member of the Negro Ensemble Company (NEC), appearing in many NEC productions including Ceremonies in Dark Old Men and The River Niger. On television he played a judge and a minister on “Law and Order,” recurred on “Days of Our Lives” and a school principal on “Sanford and Son.” His film roles included Spike Lee’s “Malcolm X” and “Clockers” as well as “The Muppets Take Manhattan,” in which he played Mr. Wrightson, the irritable department store manager.

Kweisi Mfume (born Frizzell Gerald Gray; October 24, 1948) has served on the Baltimore City Council (1978-1986), in the U.S. House of Representatives (1987-1996) where he was chair of the Congressional Black Caucus for one term, and as President of the NAACP (1996-2004). Since 2013 he has been Board Chairman of his undergrad alma mater, Morgan State University. Mfume also holds a Master of Liberal Arts degree from Johns Hopkins. In the early 1970s, he legally changed his name to Kweisi Mfume, a name from Ghana that translates to "Conquering Son of Kings".


Events

On October 24, 1865 Paul Bogle was hanged for his role as leader of Jamaica's Morant Bay Protests earlier in the month. Over 400 protesters were killed during the uprising, and over 300 more arrested with many of these executed or sentenced to long prison terms. There was worldwide criticism of Governor John Edward Eyre's handing of the protests, and he was suspended and recalled to England with Jamaica being made a Crown Colony, governed directly from England. The Morant Bay rebellion turned out to be one of the defining points in Jamaica's struggle for both political and economical enhancement, and Bogle is a national hero commemorated on currency and in the Jamaican culture.

On October 24, 1935, the play Mulatto by Langston Hughes opened on Broadway at the Vanderbilt Theater, becoming the first play written by an African American to become a long-running Broadway hit.  Mulatto ran on Broadway for more than a year and toured for two seasons. The play was greatly altered by the producer, Martin Jones, who sensationalized an already shocking story. Many critics cite the autobiographical elements of the play, which detail the racial conflict between a white plantation owner, Colonel Thomas Norwood, and the mulatto son Robert, whom he refuses to recognize as his own.

The National Coalition of 100 Black Women (NCBW) was founded on October 24, 1981 by representatives from 14 states and DC. The purposes of the Coalition are to foster principles of equal rights and opportunities; promote the awareness of Black culture; develop the potential of the membership for effective leadership and participation in civic affairs; take action on specific issues of national & international importance, and cooperate with other persons and organizations to achieve mutual goals.

On October 24, 2005, Rosa Parks passed away at the age of 92. Front seats of city buses in Detroit and Montgomery were reserved with black ribbons in honor of Parks until her funeral. Her coffin was flown to Montgomery and taken in a horse-drawn hearse to the St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church, where she lay in repose at the altar on October 29, 2005, dressed in the uniform of a church deaconess. In the evening the casket was transported to Washington, D.C. and transported by a bus similar to the one in which she made her protest, to lie in honor in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. She is the first woman and the first American who had not been a U.S. government official to receive this honor. Her funeral service was seven hours long and was held on November 2, 2005, at the Greater Grace Temple Church in Detroit.

On October 24, 2007, Negro League first baseman and coach Buck O'Neil was posthumously given the first Lifetime Achievement Award by the National Baseball Hall of Fame after having fallen short in the Hall of Fame vote in 2006, and the award was named in his honor. The Buck O'Neil Lifetime Achievement Award is presented every three years to honor an individual who enhances baseball's positive image on society, who broadens the game's appeal, and whose integrity and dignity are comparable to the namesake of the award, John Jordan "Buck" O'Neil.



Photo Gallery

Michael Jackson at the premiere of The Wiz on October 24, 1978 in New York City. Photo: Bettman/Corbis.

On October 24, 1996, Motown Records founder Berry Gordy received a star on the Hollywood Walk of
Fame. Gordy helped launch the careers Stevie Wonder, The Temptations, Diana Ross, Smokey Robinson,
 Michael Jackson and many others. Present for his celebration on the Walk of Fame were Smokey, Stevie and Diana.

Publications

Harper's Weekly cartoon (24 October, 1874) Worse than Slavery: portrays a black family
 between a lynched body hanging from a tree and the remains of a burning schoolhouse.

Model Betty Davillier -- Jet Magazine, October 24, 1963

The Black Panther (October 24, 1970)

SOUL, October 24, 1977 -- The Emotions

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October 17

Jupiter Hammon (October 17, 1711 - c. 1806) published his poem, An Evening Thought. Salvation by Christ with Penitential Crienes: Composed by Jupiter Hammon, a Negro belonging to Mr. Lloyd of Queen's Village, on Long Island, the 25th of December, 1760, as a broadside in 1761, making him the first author of African descent in what would become the United States. He later published An Address to Miss Phillis Wheatley in 1789, chastising her for the worldly themes of her writing. At the inaugural meeting of the African Society on September 24, 1786, he delivered his  Address to the Negroes of the State of New York. He had spent his lifetime in slavery and said, "If we should ever get to Heaven, we shall find nobody to reproach us for being black, or for being slaves. He also said that, while he personally had no wish to be free, he did wish others, especially young people, to be free. In 2013, Julie McCown, a doctoral student from the University of Texas at Arlington, discovered a third poem by Hammon stored in the archives of Yale University which presents a different perspective on slavery, describing it not as the will of God but a manmade evil.

Birthdays

Samuel Ringgold Ward (October 17, 1817 – c. 1866) toured England in 1853 and 1854 speaking on behalf of the Anti-slavery Society of Canada, writing of his experiences in Autobiography of a Fugitive Negro: his anti-slavery labours in the United States, Canada and England. Ward had previously edited abolitionist newspapers in New York, Boston, and Canada, and also served as a Congregationalist pastor. He also worked for abolition through political means as a member of the Liberty Party and later the Free-Soil Party. At the Liberty Party National Convention in June 1848, he received 12 of a possible 84 votes to place second in balloting for that party's nomination as their candidate for Vice President.

Halle Tanner Dillon Johnson (October 17, 1864 - April 26, 1901) became the first female physician in Alabama when Booker T. Washington recruited her from the Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1891 to provide health care for Tuskegee Institute and the immediate area. While there, she also founded a nursing program and a dispensary at the school. She left Tuskegee three years later when she married Rev. John Quincy Johnson and later died in childbirth in Nashville where he pastored St. Paul A.M.E. Church. She was the daughter of A.M.E. Bishop Benjamin Tucker Tanner and the sister of artist Henry Ossawa Tanner.

Lerone Bennett (born October 17, 1928) began his career writing for the Atlanta Daily World after graduation from Morehouse College in 1949. His tenure with Johnson Publishing started in 1952 when he became city editor of Jet, followed by associate editor of Ebony in 1953,  senior editor in 1958, and executive editor in 1987. His history articles began in 1954 when he wrote about Sally Hemmings and Thomas Jefferson. He has published a number of books on black history, most notably Before the Mayflower: A History of the Negro in America, 1619-1966 and Forced into Glory: Abraham Lincoln's White Dream.

Howard Ellsworth Rollins, Jr. (October 17, 1950 - December 8, 1996) studied theater at Towson University before leaving school to play the role of "Slick" in the PBS soap opera Our Street. He appeared as George Haley in Roots (1977) and as Andrew Young in the miniseries King (1978). In 1981, he made his film debut in the film Ragtime, earning nominations for an Academy Award and a Golden Globe for best supporting actor. Rollins also starred in A Soldier's Story (1981). He was best known for his portrayal of Virgil Tibbs in the TV crime drama In the Heat of the Night beginning in 1988 but was replaced after six years by Carl Weathers because of legal issues due to substance abuse.

Mae Carol Jemison (born October 17, 1956) entered Stanford at age 16, graduating with a B.S. in chemical engineering and fulfilling the requirements for a B.A. in African and Afro-American Studies. She attended medical school at Cornell while she also took lessons in modern dance at the Alvin Ailey school. She was in private practice briefly before joining the Peace Corps from 1983 to 1985 as a medical responsible for the health of Peace Corps Volunteers serving in Liberia and Sierra Leone. She applied to NASA's astronaut program after being inspired by Sally Ride to fulfill a childhood dream, and was accepted in the first class of astronauts selected after the Challenger accident.She became the first black woman to travel in space when she went into orbit aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavor on September 12, 1992. On the flight she took a poster from the Alvin Ailey American Dance Company representing the creativity of both science and dance, several small art objects from West African countries to symbolize that space belongs to all nations, and a photograph of early African American aviator Bessie Coleman. After leaving NASA in 1993 she founded her own company, the Jemison Group that researches, markets, and develops science and technology for daily life, as well as the Dorothy Jemison Foundation for Excellence, named in honor of her mother. She is a Professor-at-Large at Cornell University and was a professor of Environmental Studies at Dartmouth College from 1995 to 2002.

Events

On October 17, 1787, Prince Hall, along with others, sent a petition to the Senate and House of Representatives of Massachusetts urging that ‘means be provided for the education of colored people.’ He wrote that blacks were taxed as whites were and that they had not been backward in paying their proportionate share of the total taxation. He declared that they were willing to pay their ‘equal part’ but that they were denied the privileges of education in many cases, that there had been oversight in ‘the education of our children'.

On October 17, 1985, Black Poetry Day was established to celebrate past and present poets like Langston Hughes, Phillis Wheatley, Frank X. Walker and Maya Angelou. This day is not officially endorsed by an American city, state, or federal government, but it has gained fame and grown because of its importance in black heritage, in literacy, and in community meaning. Schools and the general public are asked to spend this day appreciating African-American authors and spreading the word of Black poets through friends, family members, and throughout the world.

Photo Gallery

Rosalynn Carter, Marian Anderson, President Jimmy Carter October 17, 1978 The White House, Washington, D.C.

Publications

Jet Magazine, October 17, 1963

Ebony Fashion Fair Model Janet Winston of Morristown, New Jersey is the Jet Centerfold
Jet Magazine, October 17, 1963

 LIFE magazine — October 17, 1969: Naomi Sims -- Black models take center stage

The Black Panther (October 17, 1970)

People Magazine, October 17, 1977 — O.J. Simpson

 People Magazine, October 17, 1983 --  Michael Jackson

Living In, Living Out: African American Domestics in Washington, D.C., 1910-1940 by Elizabeth Clark-Lewis. $10.00.
192 pages. Author: Elizabeth Clark-Lewis. Publisher: Smithsonian Institution Press (October 17, 1994)

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