Born on this day, musical genius, Thomas Greene Wiggins, known as "Blind Tom." After the purchase of his parents by U.S. Colonel Neil Bethune, Wiggins was given out as a discount due to his blindness. From his infancy, Wiggins manifested an extraordinary ability to compose sounds. Bethune’s family learned about the boy’s gifts and Mary ...
Born on this day, May 25, 1972, Octavia Lenora Spencer. Spencer is an American actress and author. She is the recipient of several accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, and a Golden Globe Award. Spencer was born in Montgomery, Alabama to Dellsena Spencer, her father died when she was thirteen. After high school, ...
Born on this day, Lorraine Vivian Hansberry. Hansberry grew up on the South Side of Chicago. She was the youngest of Nannie and Carl Hansberry’s four children. Her father founded Lake Street Bank, one of the first banks for blacks in Chicago. Hansberry was the first black woman to have a play performed on Broadway. Hansberry's play "A Raisin ...
Born on this day, Reginald Martinez Jackson, one of the greatest right fielders to ever hit the baseball field. Jackson born on May 18, 1946 in Pennsylvania into a family of eight. After his parents split, Jackson was sent to live with his father. All through high school, he excelled at sports, playing on the football team, and later the ...
On this day, Mary McLeod Bethune died at the age of 79. Her will, titled “My Last Will and Testament” is a commentary about her many accomplishments and life. Bethune was a fierce educator and black leader of the 20th Century. She was born in South Carolina on July 10, 1875, to parents who previously had been slaves. After completing her ...
Born on this day, Sugar Ray Leonard, a retired professional boxer. Leonard has been called one of the greatest boxers in world history. Leonard was born in Wilmington, SC as Charles Leonard on May 17, 1956. As a young boy, he almost drowned at a creek near his house. He later survived a car wreck with his mother in his pre-teens. By the age ...
Photo credits: Wally McNamee/Corbis via Getty Images
Photo credits: The Document Records Store
Photo credits: The Corporation for Public Broadcasting Tony Brown (pictured) is a Black American activist, television producer, writer, educator, and filmmaker who hosted Tony Brown’s Journal (1968–2008; original name was the Black Journal until 1977). His show was the longest-running Black news media program in U.S. history. He was ...
Photo credits: Louis Mélançon/Metropolitan Opera Archives Gloria Davy (pictured), a rich-voiced soprano who “sang for the sheer joy of singing” had a four-decade career as a concert singer. Early in her career, she replaced Leontyne Price as Bess in the 1954 international tour of Porgy and Bess. In 1958, Davy broke color barriers when ...
Photo credits: R. Gates/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Pearl Bailey made her Broadway debut in the show St. Louis Woman in 1946 and was a legend of stage and screen ever since. Born in Newport News, Virginia on March 29, 1918, Bailey started in vaudeville. She would go on to win a Tony Award for the title role in the all African-American ...
Photo credits: Auburn Avenue Films Maynard Holbrook Jackson, Jr. (picture) was a U.S.-born lawyer and politician that became the first-ever African American mayor of Atlanta, Georgia. Jackson served three terms as the major Southern city's (1974–82 and 1990–94). He was born on March 23, 1938, in the city of Dalla...
