Today is April the 11th.
On this date (April 11th):
-1990 (23 years ago): Idaho became the 47th state to recognize the 3rd Monday of January as Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and as a national holiday. The 1st MLK Day was celebrated in January 1991.
-1988 (25 years ago): Willie D. Burton becomes the first African-American to win the Oscar for sound, for the movie "Bird."
-1972 (41 years ago): Benjamin L. Hooks (a Memphis, TN lawyer-minister), was named to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
-1968 (45 years ago): President Lyndon Johnson signed a the Civil Rights Act Of 1968 bill on this day. This bill also made it a crime to interfere with civil rights workers and to cross state lines to incite a riot.
-1967 (46 years ago): Harlem, NY voters defied Congress and re-elected Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.
-1966 (47 years ago): Emmett Ashford became the first Black major league umpire.
-1955 (58 years ago): Roy Wilkins is elected NAACP executive secretary following the death of Walter White.
-1948 (65 years ago): Jack "Jackie" Robinson signs a professional baseball contract and becomes the first black player in the major leagues.
-1899 (114 years ago): Chemist Percy Julian born in Montgomery, AL. Julian studied at DePauw, Fisk, Harvard, and Vienna (Germany) Universities. In his lifetime he discovered several synthetic substances including one that made paint water-tight, cortisone and a fire suppressing foam.
-1881 (132 years ago): Spelman College, an institution sponsored by John D. Rockefeller's family, opened for Negro women in Atlanta, GA. Morehouse became the "Radcliffe and the Sarah Lawrence of Negro education."
That wraps up another trek in African-American History. Remember family, in the mean time and in-between time, log on to www.blackfacts.com for more African-American History artifacts. Until next time, God Bless One Love!!
