#SailingIntoBlackHistory

First off APOLOGIES for not being consistent with posting on here like I was in the beginning! School and work have had me ragged y’all! But I am going to be back on it for a minute because I have a lot of things to talk about starting with the sailing trip around the world!

So… for those who may have missed it, after researching other people who have circumnavigatied the globe via sailboat, I have discovered that there has never been a Black American woman who has done it! So I will be making Black History!!
So… help us out and help me to keep #SailingIntoBlackHistory!

https://www.gofundme.com/ee-safetyequip

FYI…
First thing first is getting the boat ready to be seaworthy! Obviously circumnavigating the world is dangerous enough in the best circumstances so we don’t want to add boat issues to the mix. We have some of what we need to shore things up. We just need to get the rest and have her hauled out and maintained (some things can’t be done while she’s on the water and we’re living in her). For now the estimate of that is a bit over $2000 USD. We have the money to do all the things we need to do that can be done at mooring while we’re on her but just need that last little bit.

This campaign is set at $500 goal for the life vests. Anything we get over that will be used for the rest of the safety equipment upgrades.  We appreciate any small amount and every share/tweet/repost/etc.

THANKS SO MUCH FOR YOUR SUPPORT! ^_^

P.S.
Stay tuned for more info as I research companies from whom to request support for this potential milestone. :-)

Testing Something Out — The Emuna Endeavor

Sharing this post from the trip blog on my Black culture blog just to give it some signal boost. Click the link to read the full details. :-)

We have a free upgrade for one year that allows us to add a “Payment Button” to our blog posts. This is the first attempt. Seems legit. ^_^

via Testing Something Out — The Emuna Endeavor

Sketchbook Saturday 2017/07/08

I’m still digging into the classic archives from my teens. (Click to see a larger image.)

 

Unfinished Sketch from November 1989

 

The 80s were great for hair and fashion. It wasn’t just the rare weirdo that had an extreme style.  We flossed and flaunted all day every day! This drawing definitely reflects that aspect of the years of my youth. :-)

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Sketchbook Saturday 2017/07/01

Looks like I skipped one from earlier in 1989. (Click to view larger image.)

 

Sketch from May of 1989

 

I think this one is also from when I was hanging out with my cousin. Before that, I mostly just did self-portraits.   During that time I did do a LOT more other faces of an Afrocentric variety.

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If you would like a print of anything that I post, feel free to hit me up in the comments or using the contact form below

 

Sketchbook Saturday 2017/06/24

Yet another flashback to my drawings from my teen years… I almost feel like I should post these as “Throwback Thursday” posts. I’m not going to, though. :-P

(Click to view larger image)

 

Sketch from October 1989

 

In 1989, I was really getting into more of the Black side of my being. The funny thing about that is it was because of my white cousin who I was hanging out with a lot at the time.

We use to joke that since I was raised by my white mom and white stepdad with their son my white brother in mostly white neighborhoods, I was basically white. In her case, she had a Black stepdad and halfbreed black sister and lived in mostly Black neighborhoods so she was in a lot of ways “Blacker” than me.

She was the one who told me about hair grease and finger waves and baby hairs and big earrings. The influence of the people and music she exposed me to shows a LOT in the art I did at the time.

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If you would like a print of anything that I post, feel free to hit me up in the comments or using the contact form below

Sketchbook Saturday 2017/06/17

Still reminiscing about summer 1989… 18 was a good year. :-)

 

Sketch from July 1989

 

I’m pretty sure that this is one that I did at my cousin’s man’s place. I think it may even have been drawn from a magazine ad or an article about someone who was famous at the time but I can’t remember now.

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Sketchbook Saturday 2017/06/10

Another sketch from my teen years, June 1989 to be exact. Still somewhat of a self-portrait because I liked to draw things that reflected who I was.

 

Sketch from June 1989

 

I don’t remember if I drew this at home or at my cousin’s man’s place, but it was in that same era.

With this one, I am pretty sure I was challenging myself to get over my aversion to drawing a whole person. I hated drawing legs and feet and always felt like my proportions were off if I drew head to toe.

I think I did OK. :-)

 

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Sketchbook Saturday 2017/06/03

Still going through my flashback sketches… this one is from 1989 when I was 18 years old. (Click image to enlarge.)

Sketch from 1989

I’m pretty sure this was done after I graduated when I was hanging out with my (white) cousin and her (Black, white, and Asian) hoodlum gang banger friends.

We used to go over to her man’s apartment and just hang out there for HOURS and I would always take my sketchbook because I would get bored just sitting there listening to music (he didn’t have a TV).

I have a LOT of sketches from that summer.

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Sketchbook Saturday 2017/05/27

When I was in high school I really liked drawing clothes. I also did a lot of self-portraits.

I think I was trying to emulate Frida Kahlo with the self-portraits.

I lived outside of town and hardly ever went anywhere since I didn’t have a car so I spent a lot of time alone. I was the only model available I guess.

(Click on the image to enlarge.)

 

A drawing I did in 1989 of myself in my prom dress

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Sketchbook Saturday 2017/05/20

Since I am relaunching, I think I am going to go through my sketchbook in chronological order. Here is another somewhat self-portrait drawn back in 1987 when I was 16 and a junior in high school. Click on the image to view it full size (the image is VERY big).

 

“Distraught” completed 9-2-87

 

This one I took a while to draw. Unfortunately, I didn’t put the START date so I don’t know exactly how long. I wonder. Probably a few days working on it maybe a half hour to an hour at a time.

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Black History 365 #9 – The first Black people to… establish an African Episcopal church

African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas

Absalom Jones

Every day I will explore the obvious (and not so obvious) parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

Today we have a two-for-one. We will look at African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas and  Absalom Jones:

1794:  First African Episcopal Church established: Absalom Jones founded African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

1804:  First African American ordained as an Episcopal priest in the U.S.: Absalom Jones in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas was founded in 1792 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as the first black Episcopal Church in the United States. It developed from the Free African Society, a non-denominational group formed by blacks who left St. George’s Methodist Church because of discrimination. Led by Absalom Jones, a free black and lay Methodist preacher who became ordained in 1804 as a priest in the Episcopal Church, the Church became one of the major features in Philadelphia’s black cultural life.

Absalom Jones (1746 – February 13, 1818) was an African-American abolitionist and clergyman. After finding a black congregation in 1794, he was the first African American ordained as a priest in the Episcopal Church of the United States, in 1804. He is listed on the Episcopal calendar of saints and blessed under the date of his death, February 13, in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer as “Absalom Jones, Priest, 1818”.

The Church became the first black church in the country to purchase a pipe organ, and then the first to hire a black woman as organist, Ann Appo.

While the congregation has worshiped in several different buildings, it has remained continuously active since its founding. The original building, dedicated on July 17, 1794 at Fifth and Adelphi Streets, is under the passageway/plaza now known as St. James Place. The congregation is now located at the intersection of Overbrook and Lancaster Avenues in Philadelphia’s Overbrook Farms neighborhood. Other locations included Twelfth Street below Walnut Street, 57th and Pearl Streets, and 52nd and Parrish Streets. Clergy and parishioners were active in abolitionism and the Underground Railroad in the 19th century and in the modern Civil Rights Movement.

Black History 365 #8 – The first Black people to… found an African Methodist Episcopal Church

Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

Today is Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church:

1793:  First African Methodist Episcopal Church established: Richard Allen founded Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church was founded in 1794 by Richard Allen, an African-American Methodist minister. The church has been located at the corner of Sixth and Lombard Streets in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, since that time, making it the oldest church property continuously owned by African Americans. The church was organized by African-American members of St. George’s Methodist Church who walked out due to racial segregation in the worship services.

It was one of the first African-American churches in the United States, dedicated July 29, 1794, by Bishop Francis Asbury. On October 12, 1794, Reverend Robert Blackwell announced that the congregation was received in full fellowship in the Methodist Episcopal Church. The current church, constructed in 1888-1890, has been designated a National Historic Landmark.

In 1816 Allen brought together black congregations from the region to organize the new African Methodist Episcopal Church denomination. He was elected bishop of this church.

Allen and his wife, Sarah Allen are both buried at the Church.

Black History 365 #7 – The first Black people to participate in the Back-to-Africa movement

This drawing is actually of Freetown in Sierra Leone since I couldn’t find any of Settler Town.

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

Today it’s Settler Town:

1792:  First major African-American Back-to-Africa movement: 1,200 Black Loyalist slaves who escaped to settle in Settler Town, Sierra Leone

Settler Town, Sierra Leone or Settler Tong in Krio is the oldest part of Freetown, Sierra Leone and was the home of the Nova Scotian Settlers Settlers were African American ex-slaves (who immigrated to Sierra Leone and established the first permanent free African American settlement in Africa). During the nineteenth century, Settler Town was a prestigious residential area, due to the fact it was the original portion of Freetown, Sierra Leone, having been established on March 11, 1792.

 

Sketchbook Saturday 2017/05/13

Since I am relaunching the blog, I guess I will relaunch the posts of my art too. :-)

This week is a blast from the past.  A self-portrait I drew from a photo back when I was in high school. :-)
(Click on the image to enlarge.)

 

(Self-portrait circa 1988)

When I was in high school I had a lot more time to draw so I was actually somewhat good at it back then. I don’t even know if I could do something this good now. Ah well. The joys of growing up and becoming an adult! Ha!

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Black History 365 #6 – The first Black person to… practice medicine in the United States

 

Inscription: “First regularly-educated Colored Physician in the United States.”

 

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

This time is a 3-for-1 with a medical theme:

1783 – First African American to formally practice medicine in the U.S.: James Derham, who did not hold an M.D. degree

1837 – First formally trained African-American doctor: Dr. James McCune Smith from the University of Glasgow, Scotland

1847 – First African American to graduate from a U.S. medical school: Dr. David J. Peck (Rush Medical College)

~*~

James Derham

Derham was born into slavery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was owned by several doctors, and one of his owners, a physician named Dr. Bob Love, encouraged him to go into medicine. By working as a nurse, he purchased his freedom by 1790. He opened a medical practice, and by the age of 20 his annual earnings exceeded $3,000.

Derham met with Dr. Benjamin Rush, the father of American medicine, and Rush was so impressed by Derham that he encouraged him to move to Philadelphia. There he became an expert in throat diseases and in the relationship between climate and disease.

He also had 10 siblings. Derham disappeared after 1801 and died of a heart attack.

~*~

Dr. James McCune Smith

James McCune Smith (April 18, 1813 – November 17, 1865) was an American physician, apothecary, abolitionist, and author. He is the first African American to hold a medical degree and graduated at the top in his class at the University of Glasgow, Scotland. He was the first African American to run a pharmacy in the United States.

~*~

Dr. David J. Peck

David Jones Peck (c. 1826-1855) was an American physician. He was the first African American to receive a Doctor of Medicine from an American medical school.

Peck was born to John Peck[disambiguation needed], one of the most prominent abolitionists, ministers, and businessmen in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. From about 1844 to 1846, Peck studied medicine under Dr. Joseph P. Gazzam, a white anti-slavery physician. After his two years of study with Gazzam, Peck entered Rush Medical College, Chicago in autumn 1846, and graduated in 1847. During the summer after graduation, Peck toured the state of Ohio with William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass.

He set up a medical practice in Philadelphia in 1848. He married Mary Lewis in Chicago, IL in 1849. When his medical practice in Philadelphia proved unsuccessful, he returned to Pittsburgh in 1850.

At the suggestion of Martin R. Delany, Peck moved to San Juan del Norte, Nicaragua in early 1852. No photographs of Dr. Peck are known to be in existence.

Peck was killed in the spring of 1855 in a skirmish between Democratic forces and their Republican rivals at Jalteva, Nicaragua (near Granada). The latter forces had been deposed after an election in 1854. Dr. Peck’s death is recollected by Charles W. Doubleday in Chapter 4 of his “Reminiscences of the ‘filibuster’ War in Nicaragua. Peck died as the result of concussion injuries sustained when a Republican cannonier fired on the position from which Doubleday and Peck had been observing their activities.

Black History 365 #5 – The first Back people to… be part of a military regiment

 

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

For today’s entry:

1778
First African-American U.S. military regiment: the 1st Rhode Island Regiment

The 1st Rhode Island Regiment was a Continental Army regiment from Rhode Island during the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783). Like most regiments of the Continental Army, the unit went through several incarnations and name changes. It became well known as the “Black Regiment” because, for a time, it had several companies of African American soldiers. It is regarded as the first African-American military regiment, albeit with the misconception that its ranks were exclusively African-American.

Black History 365 #4 – The first Black people to… Have a settlement as free persons before emancipation

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

For today’s entry:

1738
First free African-American community: Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose (now usually referred to as Fort Mose)

Fort Mose Historic State Park (originally known as Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mosé) is a U.S. National Historic Landmark (designated as such on October 12, 1994),[2] located two miles north of St. Augustine, Florida, on the eastern edge of a marsh. The original site of the fort was uncovered in a 1986 archeological dig. The 24-acre (9.7 ha) site is now a Florida State Park, administered through the Anastasia State Recreation Area. Fort Mose was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1994 and is the “premier site on the Florida Black Heritage Trail.”[3] The fort has also been known as Fort Moosa or Fort Mossa.
Fort Mose (pronounced “Moh-say”) was the first free black settlement legally sanctioned in what would become the United States.[4] The community began when Florida was a Spanish territory.

Black History 365 #3 – The first Black people to… form a Black Christian congregation

 

 

This image is from an old pamphlet written by white historians in the 1800s so I’m not sure if this is really Silver Bluff Baptist or not.

 

 

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

For my fourth entry this month:

1773
First separate African-American church: Silver Bluff Baptist Church, Aiken County, South Carolina

The Silver Bluff Baptist Church in Aiken County, South Carolina, was founded by several enslaved African Americans who organized under elder David George in 1773-1775.

The historian Albert Raboteau has identified it as the first separate black congregation in the nation, although others contend for that distinction. After the British occupied Savannah in 1778 during the American Revolutionary War, George and his congregation of 30 slaves went to the city for freedom behind their lines. The British had promised freedom to slaves who escaped from rebel masters. Those members who stayed in Savannah after the end of the American Revolutionary War evolved into the First African Baptist Church.

George was highly influential in the early black Baptist movement. Resettling with his family and Black Loyalists in Nova Scotia, he founded a congregation there. George also founded a congregation and Baptist church in Freetown, Sierra Leone, where he and his family migrated in 1792.

Black History 365 #2 – The first Black woman to… be a published author

Phillis Wheatley

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

For today’s entry:

1773
First known African-American woman to publish a book: Phillis Wheatley (Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral)

Phillis Wheatley (May 8, 1753 – December 5, 1784) was both the second published African-American poet and first published African-American woman. Born in Senegambia, she was sold into slavery at the age of 7 and transported to North America. She was purchased by the Wheatley family of Boston, who taught her to read and write, and encouraged her poetry when they saw her talent.

The publication of her Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (1773) brought her fame both in England and the American colonies; figures such as George Washington praised her work. During Wheatley’s visit to England with her master’s son, the African-American poet Jupiter Hammon praised her work in his own poem. Wheatley was emancipated after the death of her master John Wheatley. She married soon after. Two of her children died as infants. After her husband was imprisoned for debt in 1784, Wheatley fell into poverty and died of illness, quickly followed by the death of her surviving infant son.

#BH365 #1 – The first Black person to… be a published author

 

Jupiter Hammon

 

Every day I will explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than being stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

For my first entry:

1760:  First known African-American published author: Jupiter Hammon (poem “An Evening Thought: Salvation by Christ with Penitential Cries”, published as a broadside)

Jupiter Hammon (October 17, 1711 – before 1806) was a black poet who in 1761 became the first African-American writer to be published in the present-day United States. Additional poems and sermons were also published. Born into slavery, Hammon was never emancipated. He was living in 1790 at the age of 79, and died by 1806. A devout Christian, he is considered one of the founders of African-American literature.

#BH365 Black History 365 – The First Black…

Hello there!

I am rebooting this blog and am restarting the “Black History 365” series. Starting tomorrow, I will post a new figure in U.S. history of someone who “broke the color barrier” in any area of life.

This series is how I have chronicled all the things I am learning and have learned about the culture and history that I was denied growing up.

If you have been with this blog from the beginning this will come back to some things from a few years ago, but I figure we can all use a refresher.

Thank you for joining me on this journey,
Niccolea

 

Dear Readers,

I am going through things in life that are not motivating me to post on any of my blogs. I am feeling like a massive rebirth will be necessary soon.

I truly appreciate all of you who have been with me since the beginning as I have gone on this journey of self-examination and self-discovery in an attempt to more fully connect to a community that I was not raised in (I grew up in southern Arizona with my white mother and white stepfather in predominately poor white and Mexican neighborhoods).

This blog will be silent again for a week or two and then I will have PLENTY to re-evaluate and revisit. I hope you will be here to share it with me.

As always, THANKS FOR READING <3
~ Niccolea

Hello there, WordPress!

I have been severely slacking on keeping in touch with you dear reader-folk.

When I started this blog back in 2013, I was dating a VERY pro-black Rasta from Newark, New Jersey.

That relationship put me into a mindset that has come and go over the years: AM I BLACK ENOUGH???

I hate that this is even a thing that any melinated person has to think about, but as a Black/white biracial who was raised by my white mother and stepfather in predominately white neighborhoods it has been an ongoing mental struggle.

So I started a blog to write it out.

I began a series about my cultural journey within Blackness in spite of my lack of proximity to a Black community. In spite of being raised by white people, the fact was and is that I am BLACK.

This blog is called AfrocentriqueAZ because that is where I lived most of my life. It is a very specific perspective on what it is to be a brown girl in a white world.

Because I was raised in Arizona, one thing I know is that even with Black History Month, my ethnic education was extremely lacking.

So I  started my Black History series that I did off and on.

Now…

The time is quickly coming to move on to the next adventure in my life.

I have been focused on the sailing trip around the world since before this blog existed. I was invited back in 2012 and have been navigating a series of events to get ready to actually do this thing.

The part where I may be the first Black American woman to sail around the world is an unexpected accidental part of the whole thing.

I have a LOT of work to do, but I wanted to check back with those of you who still have me in your reader. I appreciate you!

Thanks for reading,
~ Niccolea

Photo source: gyenyamejapan.blogspot.com

Sex and the Single Lady Generation X African American Style

YASSS GURL! Turning 46 tomorrow and JUST recently tried the OK Cupid. NEVER AGAIN. I live in Oregon which is only 1% Black to begin with. I broadened my horizons and STILL NO. *sigh*

THIS PART THOUGH: I am a relic from a forgotten era: a time in which men asked for your phone number, called you and you talked for hours, having mentally stimulating conversations about life, music politics and all kinds of deliciousness. <– WTF IS UP WITH THE REFUSAL OF GROWN ASS MEN NOT WANTING TO VERBALLY COMMUNICATE???

The Potty Mouth Granny

Often on the social media, when discussions about the dating game comes up and how it truly sucks to be an African American single woman in your forties, marginally attractive black men are quick to chime with “You need to choose better or expand your circle.” Negro please.  A lot of these niggas ain’t worth two dead flies and what is so pathetic is that these men know that already because these two bit niggas are their friends. But these dudes spend their time trying to convince women that it is our fault for not choosing this fabled, little seen creature who is allegedly in abundance but we are too choosy and like thugs to find one: The Proverbial Good Black Man.

I have an eclectic mix of black lady friends on the social media who expand from California to New York. From London to Barbados and all these ladies…

View original post 936 more words

Hello, Readers

I had a lot of plans for this blog. I was going to share with you all of my journey and all the things I have learned about the skin that I am in and all that means in America (especially growing up in Arizona). Then I had this trip to get ready for and my poetry to write and submit and just work to do and life to live.

I do want to be more for you. I really do. I have to admit that 2016 is going to stay quiet. I’ll come back from time to time to keep you posted about things having to do with my Afrocentric nature.

Thank you for reading,
Niccolea

circa 1982

Support Dollars Update July 2016

An update on things for the sailing trip…

The Emuna Endeavor

We don’t promote to get support dollars that often so there hasn’t been much to update. We did do a successful IndieGoGo campaign that raised $541 which we used to buy life vests and flares for our flare gun. Yay!

We also got some sailing gloves (finally) and are ready to take a sail next week. I will be wearing the GoPro on that trip so we can have some footage (of Dov and our friends at least). Stay tuned! ^_^

Thanks for reading!
~ Niccolea

Are you raising funds for a sailing adventure? How is that going for you? We would love to hear from you in the comments!  ^_^

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Sailing into History Update & Some Black History

I have been deeply neglecting my blogging duties. Funny but I thought that school ending in March would give me MORE time to blog but I have filled that time with building my passive income resources and looking for sources of funding for the “Sailing into History” documentary.

One connection regarding the film was when I happened to log in to Linkedin (I rarely do) and saw that a former coworker had changed industries and is currently working in filmmaking. He was excited by my project and is in the process of finding funding for the film.

My most recent work on this project was to meet with Emmy-nominated filmmaker Ron Craig to see if he could either take on the project or to refer me to someone who could. He could do neither but he was very encouraging and definitely will send someone my way if he does find someone who can either fund or help produce the film.

It may not be exactly what I was hoping to gain from the meeting, but I feel blessed to have spent time with an accomplished elder who happens to have recently moved to my area so perhaps I can have more mentoring from him. I am definitely grateful.

Here is a link to the film he worked on about the Black man named York that was with the Lewis and Clark expedition: http://watch.opb.org/video/1249419963/

Thanks for reading!
~ Niccolea Miouo

SO… Let’s Try This Again, Shall We?

UUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!

I am NOT doing well on keeping up with my blogging goals. I really feel like I need to just start over.

I fell off my post a day about Black History and that disappoints me greatly. I feel like I have let you all down. These posts are as much for my own education too and so I have let myself down. :-/

PLUS, I really want to be more accountable for this lofty goal of being the first Black American woman to sail around the world… BUT… so far I am in big time FAIL mode. :-/
I did start with the organizing of my existing lists and the gathering of some more companies to contact so there’s that.

BUT TO ACCENTUATE THE POSITIVE AND
PLAN FOR WHAT’S NEXT

I have to acknowledge that I have a lot going on with the charity poetry book and the fundraising campaign for new life vests for the sailing trip around the world plus work and now that the sailing season has now OFFICIALLY started every Tuesday and Thursday starting next week will be all about being out on the river in SOMEBODY’S sail boat. I have a LOT to learn in a very short time.

I truly appreciate you all for following along on this journey of mine and being patient with me living life and forgetting to post about it. ^_^

 

TODAY’S TO DO: MAKE LISTS

Today I will be finding sailing organizations, black organizations, companies whose products we use now, and companies whose products we will be using as we sail. I do have information for quite a few organizations already.

Most of the work I did December 2015. I have contacted 44 Black organizations for advice (responses from zero). I have contacted about 80 Black news outlets nationwide (response from one). I don’t have an organized list of the sailing organizations I’ve contacted so I need to do that (I have only gotten one reply regardless of the number). I also don’t have an organized list of how many companies I have contacted to get direct sponsorship with goods or funds (again only 1 reply). Somewhere in my emails I have a list of Black maritime organizations that I started compiling in March this year, but I have not contacted any of them yet.

Today is the day that I organize the information I already have in to one convenient file (an Excel spreadsheet with a tab for each category). Plus I will do a thorough Google search for sailing organizations and magazines, and all the other categories. I will look on the marine store websites for the brands that we would like to use. I will even look up boat manufacturers. Plus, later I’ll go through the boat and make a note of EVERYTHING we use down to mundane things like facial tissue and whatnot.

Once I have the lists made the next step will be to contact the organizations to get advice on fundraising and publicity and then contact the companies to actually get some kind of sponsorship whether it be funds or goods. Making the lists today is the EASY part. It will be a long and tedious process, but still the easy part.

I’ll check back in later with an update on how many new companies and organizations I found. Stay tuned! ^_^

Thanks for reading!
~Niccolea

Accountability aka The Daily DID

I am a PRO when it comes to making to do lists. I can make lists all day all year. The catch is do I actually get any of it DONE? Sadly, I feel like I have been only half stepping when it comes to keeping up with getting closer to the goal of sailing around the world.Sure, I went to school for a year so that I wasn’t TOTALLY inexperienced, but since school ended in April, I have done exactly ZERO things to further my cause.

That is where the new category in this blog comes in. Under the “Sailing Into History” category will be this new category: The Daily DID. This is where I will put what I actually accomplished on a daily basis. There is always SOMETHING no matter how small that I can do to be sure that this time next year the sailing ACTUALLY HAPPENS.

SO… I will be posting a to-do list in the mornings and then posting updates before I go to bed of what on the list for the day I actually got done. I’ll post today’s to-do list in a separate post. And here we go!

 

Starting from Zero – What I Tried and Failed

Sorry to have fallen WAY behind on the Black History 365 posts! In the meantime, here is a peek at one of the things I am currently working on.

The Emuna Endeavor

Hello!

I’ve decided to start doing posts about the difficult journey I have been on to create passive income so that I will still have money coming in while sailing around the world with The Emuna Endeavor. I’ll be calling it: Starting from Zero – Searching for Ways to Create Passive Income Without Upfront Money. Chapter One? What I Tried and Failed.

What have I tried so far?

— Network Marketing —

I have attempted multiple times over the years to participate in network marketing but I do not have the discipline or the interest to do the up front face-to-face client work necessary for that to have consistent returns that lead to passive income in the long run. I know quite a few people who have had immense success in network marketing, but I am just not cut out for it apparently.

— Print on Demand —

In 2011-2012 I was…

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We now have an Instagram account!

This gallery contains 4 photos.

Originally posted on The Emuna Endeavor:
https://www.instagram.com/emunaendeavor/

Black History 365 – First African American invited to dine at the White House

Booker T. Washington:
1901 – First African American invited to dine at the White House
1940 – First African American to be portrayed on a U.S. postage stamp

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

Booker T. Washington:
1901 – First African American invited to dine at the White House
1940 – First African American to be portrayed on a U.S. postage stamp

From Wikipedia:

Booker Taliaferro Washington (April 5, 1856 – November 14, 1915) was an African-American educator, author, orator, and advisor to presidents of the United States. Between 1890 and 1915, Washington was the dominant leader in the African-American community.

Washington was from the last generation of black American leaders born into slavery and became the leading voice of the former slaves and their descendants. They were newly oppressed in the South by disenfranchisement and the Jim Crow discriminatory laws enacted in the post-Reconstruction Southern states in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

His base was the Tuskegee Institute, a historically black college in Alabama. As lynchings in the South reached a peak in 1895, Washington gave a speech, known as the “Atlanta compromise,” which brought him national fame. He called for black progress through education and entrepreneurship, rather than trying to challenge directly the Jim Crowsegregation and the disenfranchisement of black voters in the South. Washington mobilized a nationwide coalition of middle-class blacks, church leaders, and white philanthropists and politicians, with a long-term goal of building the community’s economic strength and pride by a focus on self-help and schooling. But, secretly, he also supported court challenges to segregation and passed on funds raised for this purpose. Black militants in the North, led by W. E. B. Du Bois, at first supported the Atlanta compromise but after 1909, they set up the NAACP to work for political change. They tried with limited success to challenge Washington’s political machine for leadership in the black community but also built wider networks among white allies in the North. Decades after Washington’s death in 1915, the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s took a more active and militant approach, which was also based on new grassroots organizations based in the South, such as CORE, SNCC and SCLC.

Booker T. Washington mastered the nuances of the political arena in the late 19th century, which enabled him to manipulate the media, raise money, strategize, network, pressure, reward friends and distribute funds while punishing those who opposed his plans for uplifting blacks. His long-term goal was to end the disenfranchisement of the vast majority of African Americans, who still lived in the South.

(For MUCH more information, read the full Wikipedia article)

wikipedia Primary sources

• Du Bois, WEB (1903), “3”, The Souls of Black Folk, Bartleby.
• Washington, Booker T (Sep 1895), The Atlanta Cotton States Exposition Address, History matters, GMU.
• ——— (September 1896), “The Awakening of the Negro”, The Atlantic Monthly 78
• ——— (1901). Up from Slavery: An Autobiography. Garden City, NY: Doubleday. Documenting the American South. Other online full-text versions available via Project Gutenberg, UNC Library
• ——— (December 1906). “A Farmers’ College on Wheels”. The World’s Work: A History of Our Time XIII: 8352–54. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
• ——— (October 1910). “Chapters From My Experience I”. The World’s Work: A History of Our Time XX: 13505–22. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
• ——— (November 1910). “Chapters From My Experience II”. The World’s Work: A History of Our Time XXI: 13627–40. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
• ——— (December 1910). “Chapters From My Experience III”. The World’s Work: A History of Our Time XXI: 13784–94. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
• ——— (January 1911). “Chapters From My Experience IV”. The World’s Work: A History of Our Time XXI: 13847–54. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
• ——— (February 1911). “Chapters From My Experience V”. The World’s Work: A History of Our Time XXI: 14032–39. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
• ——— (April 1911). “Chapters From My Experience VI”. The World’s Work: A History of Our Time XXI: 14230–38. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
• Washington, Booker T; Harlan, Louis R; Blassingame, John W (1972), The Booker T Washington Papers, University of Illinois Press, ISBN 0-252-00242-3, retrieved February 4,2009; fourteen volume set of all letters to and from Booker T. Washington.
  • “cumulative index”, BTW 14, History cooperative.

Black History 365 – First Black mathematics graduate student

1887 – – First Black mathematics graduate student, Kelly Miller

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

1887: First Black mathematics graduate student, Kelly Miller

From BlackPast.org

Kelly Miller, mathematician, intellectual, and political activist, was born on July 23, 1863 in Winnsboro, South Carolina to Kelly and Elizabeth Miller. Like many African Americans who took advantage of increased educational opportunities after the civil war, Miller attended Howard University in Washington, D.C. He earned a B.A. in 1886.  While at Howard he served as a clerk in the US Pensions Office.

In 1887 Miller became the first graduate student at Johns Hopkins University where he studied mathematics and physics. An increase in tuition forced Miller to leave Johns Hopkins in 1889 without completing his graduate work.  He continued his studies as a student of Captain Edgar Frisby, an English mathematician at the US Naval Observatory and briefly taught mathematics at M Street High School in Washington before being hired by Howard University as a professor of mathematics.  Miller taught mathematics at Howard for the next five years.   He also enrolled in Howard University for graduate study, earning an  M.A. in 1901 and an LL.B from Howard University Law School in 1903.  In 1894, Miller married Annie May Butler and the couple had five children named Newton, Paul, Irene, May, and Kelly Jr.  Three years later, in 1897, he helped found the first organization for black intellectuals known as the American Negro Academy.

Like other turn of the twentieth century black intellectuals, Miller believed that the developing social sciences would be useful in assessing the experiences of black Americans and in charting a course for their future advancement.  He helped organize Howard’s sociology department during the 1890s and served as a professor of sociology from 1895 to 1934.  Miller’s interest in the plight of African Americans encouraged him to assist W.E.B. DuBois in editing the Crisis, the magazine of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and to craft numerous lectures and pamphlets that examined the racial experiences of black Americans. His thoughts and ideas appeared in weekly columns that were published in more than 100 newspapers in the 1920s and 1930s and appeared in several books including Race Adjustment (1908), Out of the House of Bondage (1914), and The Everlasting Stain (1924).

In addition to his duties as an educator and researcher, Miller served as dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Howard from 1907 to 1918.  After spending over fifty years at Howard University as a student, teacher, and administrator, Miller retired from Howard in 1931. He died in Washington, D.C. in 1939.

Sources:
Dr. Scott W. Williams, “Kelly Miller,” Mathematics of the African Diaspora, http://www.math.buffalo.edu/mad/special/miller_kelley.html (Accessed September 7, 2010); Carter G. Woodson, “Kelly Miller,” Journal of Negro History 25 (January, 1940): 126-138; August Meier, “The Racial and Educational Philosophy of Kelly Miller, 1895-1915,” Journal of Negro Education 29 (July, 1960): 121-27; William M. Banks, Black Intellectuals: Race and Responsibility in American Life (New York: W.W. Norton & Company), 71-72, 96, 283-284.

– See more at: http://www.blackpast.org/aah/miller-kelly-1863-1939#sthash.7vjRz7kA.dpuf

Black History 365 – First African-American nominee for Vice President of the United States

Frederick Douglass, ca. 1879. George K. Warren. (National Archives Gift Collection)
Exact Date Shot Unknown
NARA FILE #: 200-FL-22
WAR & CONFLICT BOOK #: 113

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

1872: First African-American nominee for Vice President of the United States: Frederick Douglass by the Equal Rights Party. (He has many other accomplishments as well, as most are aware.)

From Wikipedia

Frederick Douglass (born Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey, c. February 1818 – February 20, 1895) was an African-American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. After escaping from slavery in Maryland, he became a national leader of the abolitionist movement from Massachusetts and New York, gaining note for his dazzling oratory and incisive antislavery writings. He stood as a living counter-example to slaveholders’ arguments that slaves lacked the intellectual capacity to function as independent American citizens. Even many Northerners at the time found it hard to believe that such a great orator had once been a slave.

Douglass wrote several autobiographies. He described his experiences as a slave in his 1845 autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, which became a bestseller, and was influential in promoting the cause of abolition, as was his second book, My Bondage and My Freedom (1855). After the Civil War, Douglass remained an active campaigner against slavery and wrote his last autobiography, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass. First published in 1881 and revised in 1892, three years before his death, it covered events during and after the Civil War. Douglass also actively supported women’s suffrage, and held several public offices. Without his approval, Douglass became the first African American nominated for Vice President of the United States as the running mate and Vice Presidential nominee of Victoria Woodhull, on the Equal Rights Party ticket.

A firm believer in the equality of all peoples, whether black, female, Native American, or recent immigrant, Douglass famously said, “I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong.”

~~~~~~~

For MUCH more information about this major fingure in Black history, read the full article in Wikipedia

Black History 365 – First African-American midshipman admitted to the United States Naval Academy

(No image available for John H. Conyers)

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

1872: First African-American midshipman admitted to the United States Naval Academy: John H. Conyers (nominated by Robert B. Elliott of South Carolina)

From Wikipedia:

James Henry Conyers (October 24, 1855 – November 29, 1935) of South Carolina was the first black person admitted to the United States Naval Academy on September 21, 1872.

In 1872, the fifteen year old James Conyers was nominated for admission to the Naval Academy by South Carolina congressman Robert B. Elliott. After successfully completing “competitive district examinations after [his nomination as a midshipman] and passing the final test examinations at Annapolis,”, Conyers received his appointment as a “cadet-midshipman” and was sworn in on September 24, 1872. Contemporary newspapers noted favorably on Conyers, describing him as having a “complexion of about brown coffee color, with the usual curly hair of his race, and stands five feet three inches tall.”

From the beginning, Conyers met with difficulty, being subjected to all manner of hazing by his fellow midshipmen. He was cursed at, spat upon and physically manhandled. Some of his classmates even attempted to drown him. In the fall of 1872, Conyers was marching when he was kicked and punched by several otherCadets, among them the Academy’s boxing champion George Goodfellow.

News of the incident and the constant hazing experienced by Conyers leaked to the newspapers, and a three-man board was convened to investigate the attacks. Goodfellow denied any wrongdoing and Conyers claimed he could not identify any of his attackers. The board nonetheless concluded that “His persecutors are left then without any excuse or palliation except the inadmissible one of prejudice.” To give Conyers a fair chance at succeeding on his own merits, they believed strong measures should be taken. In the end Goodfellow and two others were dismissed from the Academy. The abuse continued in more subtle forms however, and his grades suffered. After surviving another hazing incident where nine midshipmen (including Andrew Summers Rowan) were subsequently dismissed from the Naval Academy due to their involvement, Conyers finally resigned in October 1873

~~~~~~~~~~

Wikipedia References

1. Harley, Sharon (1996). The timetables of African-American history: a chronology of the most important people and events in African-American history. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 9780684815787. Retrieved 27 May 2013.
2. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Standard Certificate of Death, State of Carolina, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Registered no. 351291, File no. 16364 for James H. Conyers, dated November 29, 1935, Charleston, S.C. Ancestry.com. South Carolina, Death Records, 1821-1961 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2008.
3. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f} Schneller, Robert John (2005). Breaking the color barrier: the U.S. Naval Academy’s first Black midshipmen and the struggle for racial equality. New York: New York University Press. ISBN 978-0-8147-4013-2. Retrieved 27 May 2013.
4. [Henry E. Baker,] “Naming of Holley Was Not to Pay Campaign Promises; Putting Record straight; Former Cadet H. E. Baker, States That Three Colored Boys Entered The Academy And Four Others Were Nominated,” (New York) Age, April 8, 1922, 1
5. Crane, Michael A. (2004). A fistful of thorns: Doc Holliday and Kate Elder 1880. Klamath Falls, OR: Boot Hill Press. p. 113. ISBN 978-0-9745914-0-7. Retrieved 27 May2013.
6. Clare, Rod (July 2005). “Review of Schneller, Robert J., Jr., Breaking the Color Barrier: The U.S. Naval Academy’s First Black Midshipmen and the Struggle for Racial Equality”. H-War, H-Net Reviews. Retrieved 27 May 2013.
7. “Ancestry.com. Charleston, South Carolina, Marriage Records, 1877-1887 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2007.
8. 1900 Federal Census for the City and County of Charleston, South Carolina [Precinct 2, Charleston City, Charleston County Enumeration District 90, Sheet 10-A, Lines 44-51]
9.  Luce, Stephen B. (1868) SEAMANSHIP: Compiled from Various Authorities, and Illustrated with Numerous Original and Select Designs, for the Use of the United States Naval Academy. NY: D. van Nostrand, Fourth Edition
10. https://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/21802761_seamanship-signed-by-1st-black-midshipman

Gods of Egypt is the most racist film ever.

My dude Scott tells it like it is!

Scott Woods Makes Lists

“Oh, I knows. I knows. I’m just a worn-out ol’ man what don’t do nothin’ but tell stories. But they ain’t never done no harm to nobody. And if they don’t do no good, how come they last so long? This here’s the only home I knows. I was going to whitewash the walls, too, but not now. Time done run out.”

– Uncle Remus, Song of the South (1946)

* * *

When Stargate came out my boys and I went to see it on opening day at the Eastland Cinema 8. Our black consciousness was at peak levels and the trailer for Stargate looked like a black nationalist’s wet dream: pyramids, Egyptian gods, ancient technology, confused white folks…it looked to be awesome. Back then, the world wasn’t able to spoil everything months before it came out, or warn us that Stargate was going to be on some Chariots…

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Black History 365 – First African American to vote in an election under the 15th Amendment

Thomas Mundy Peterson

 

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

1870: First African American to vote in an election under the 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution, granting voting rights regardless of race: Thomas Mundy Peterson

From Wikipedia:

Thomas Mundy Peterson (October 6, 1824 – February 4, 1904) of Perth Amboy, New Jersey was the first African-American to vote in an election under the just-enacted provisions of the 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution. His vote was cast on March 31, 1870.

He was born in Metuchen, New Jersey. His father, also named Thomas, worked for the Mundy family. It is unclear if he was a slave of the family or not. His mother, Lucy Green, was a slave of Hugh Newell (1744-1816) of Freehold Township, New Jersey. She was manumitted at age 21 by Newell’s will.

He was a school custodian and general handyman in Perth Amboy. Active in the Republican Party, he became the city’s first African-American to hold elected office, on the Middlesex County Commission.[3] He was also the city’s first “colored” person to serve on a jury.

Peterson voted in a local election held in Perth Amboy, NJ over the town’s charter. Some citizens wanted to revise the existing charter while others wished to abandon the charter altogether in favor of a township form of government. Peterson cast his ballot in favor of revising the existing charter. This side won 230 to 63.[4] Peterson was afterward appointed to be a member of the committee of seven that made the revisions.[5] Historical records as to his contribution to revisions in the form of minutes, writing, or other records are still wanting.

To honor Thomas Mundy Peterson as the first African-American voter after the passage of the 15th Amendment, the citizens of Perth Amboy raised $70 (over $1,000 in 2010 dollars) to award him with a gold medallion. The full medallion consists of a gold bar from which a two inch diameter medallion was hung. The hanging medallion featured a profile bust of a clean-shaven Abraham Lincoln. It was presented to Thomas Mundy Peterson on Memorial Day, which was then called Decoration Day, May 30, 1884. He is said to have loved the medal and never considered himself properly dressed without it affixed to his left breast. Later in life financial instability forced Peterson to sometimes pawn the medallion. It is currently housed at the historically African-American Xavier University of Louisiana.

The medallion awarded to Thomas Mundy Peterson by the citizens of Perth Amboy in 1884.

~*~

This is a very meaningful first for me. There are things we 21st century Americans take for granted. Voting is definitely one of them. I know Audrey Lorde said that we can’t bring down the oppressors with their own tools, but if we remain effectively silent and refuse to participate then the oppressors truly do have ALL the power instead of just a good portion of it. Voting by itself is not enough of course, but it is definitely a part of the multi-pronged approach to increasing the fairness in our society.

Black History 365 – First African-American woman school principal

Fanny Jackson Coppin

 

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

1869: First African-American woman school principal: Fanny Jackson Coppin (Institute for Colored Youth)

From Wikipedia:

Fanny Jackson Coppin (January 8, 1837 – January 21, 1913) was an African-American educator and missionary and a lifelong advocate for female higher education.

Born an American slave, Fanny Jackson’s freedom was purchased by her aunt at age 12. Fanny Jackson spent the rest of her youth working as a servant for author George Henry Calvert, studying at every opportunity. In 1860, she enrolled in Oberlin College in Ohio, the first college in the United States to accept both black and female students. She writes in her autobiography:

“The faculty did not forbid a woman to take the gentleman’s course, but they did not advise it. There was plenty of Latin and Greek in it, and as much mathematics as one could shoulder. Now, I took a long breath and prepared for a delightful contest. All went smoothly until I was in the junior year in College. Then, one day, the Faculty sent for me–ominous request–and I was not slow in obeying it. It was a custom in Oberlin that forty students from the junior and senior classes were employed to teach the preparatory classes. As it was now time for the juniors to begin their work, the Faculty informed me that it was their purpose to give me a class, but I was to distinctly understand that if the pupils rebelled against my teaching, they did not intend to force it. Fortunately for my training at the normal school, and my own dear love of teaching, tho there was a little surprise on the faces of some when they came into the class, and saw the teacher, there were no signs of rebellion. The class went on increasing in numbers until it had to be divided, and I was given both divisions. One of the divisions ran up again, but the Faculty decided that I had as much as I could do, and it would not allow me to take any more work.”

~~~~~~~~~~

References

1. Perkins, Linda M. “Heed life’s demands: The educational philosophy of Fanny Jackson Coppin”. Journal of Negro Education (1982): 181-190.
2. Perkins, Linda Marie. Fanny Jackson Coppin and the Institute for Colored Youth, 1865-1902. Vol. 9. Garland, 1987
3. Reminisces of School Life, Hints on Teaching, Philadelphia, PA 1913
4. History of Coppin State University

External links

• Works by or about Fanny Jackson Coppin at Internet Archive
• Works by Fanny Jackson Coppin at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
• Fanny Jackson Coppin at Pagewise
• Fanny Jackson Copping Club, blackpast.org
• Reminiscences of School Life, and Hints on Teaching, 1913

Black History 365 – First college owned and operated by African Americans

First college owned and operated by African Americans: Wilberforce University in Ohio

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

1863: First college owned and operated by African Americans: Wilberforce University in Ohio

From Wikipedia:

Wilberforce University is a private, coed, liberal arts historically black university (HBCU) located in Wilberforce, Ohio. Affiliated with the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, it was the first college to be owned and operated by African Americans. It participates in the United Negro College Fund.

The founding of the college was unique as a collaboration in 1856 by the Cincinnati, Ohio Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church and the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME). They planned a college to provide classical education and teacher training for black youth. Leaders of both races made up the first board members.

When the number of students fell due to the American Civil War and financial losses closed the college in 1863, the AME Church purchased the institution to ensure its survival. Its first president, AME Bishop Daniel A. Payne, was one of the original founders. Prominent supporters and the US government donated funds for rebuilding after a fire in 1865. When the college added an industrial department in the late 19th century, state legislators could sponsor scholarship students.

The college attracted the top professors of the day, including W. E. B. Du Bois. In the 19th century, it enlarged its mission to include students from South Africa. The university supports the national Association of African American Museums to broaden the reach of its programs and assist smaller museums with professional standards.

~~~~~

Wikipedia References

1. Jump up^ Staff (2009-03-13). “National Register Information System”. National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service.
2. Jump up^ “Wilberforce University: Yesterday and Today”. Wiberforce University. Retrieved January 1, 2007.
3. Jump up^ “NASA Education Facility Opens at Wilberforce University”. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Archived from the original on November 16, 2006. Retrieved January 1, 2007.
4. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Campbell (1995), Songs of Zion, p. 263
5. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Talbert, Horace (2000). “The Sons of Allen: Together with a Sketch of the Rise and Progress of Wilberforce University, Wilberforce, Ohio 1906”.Documenting the South. University of North Carolina. pp. 264–265, 273. RetrievedJuly 25, 2008.
6. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f g h} James T. Campbell, Songs of Zion, New York: Oxford University Press, 1995, pp. 259–260, accessed Jan 13, 2009
7. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Talbert (1906), Sons of Allen, p. 267
8. Jump up^ Horace Talbert, The Sons of Allen: Together with a Sketch of the Rise and Progress of Wilberforce University, Wilberforce, Ohio, 1906, p. 273,Documenting the South, 2000, University of North Carolina, accessed Jul 25, 2008
9. Jump up^ “Wilberforce University’s Administration of the Title IV, Higher Education Act Programs: Final Audit Report” (PDF).
10. Jump up^ “Library”. Wilberforce University. Retrieved March 24, 2010.
11. Jump up^ http://blog.al.com/wire/2013/09/rep_demetrius_newton_first_bla.html
12. Jump up^ “Golf Pioneer Dies”. Morning Journal News. Jan 2, 2010.
13. Jump up^ O’Neal Parker, Lonnae. “A tender spot in master-slave relations”. Washington Post. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
14. Jump up^ Nelson, Samantha. “Dolen Perkins-Valdez: Wench”. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
15. Jump up^ “Black Caucus of the American Library Association Literary Awards (1994–Present)”. Infoplease. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
16. Jump up^ Perkins-Vadez, Dolen (2010). Wench. Amistad. ASIN B004NE8RZ4.

External links:

• Wilberforce University Official Website
• Wilberforce University Official Athletics Website
• Horace Talbert, The Sons of Allen: Together with a Sketch of the Rise and Progress of Wilberforce University, Wilberforce, Ohio, 1906, Documenting the American South, University of North Carolina

Black History 365 – First African-American captain to sail a whaleship with an all-black crew

1822, First African-American captain to sail a whaleship with an all-black crew: Absalom Boston

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

1822: First African-American captain to sail a whale ship with an all-black crew: Absalom Boston

From Wikipedia:

Absalom Boston was born in Nantucket, Massachusetts, to Seneca Boston, an African-American ex-slave father, and Thankful Micah, a Wampanoag Indian mother. His grandfather or possibly uncle, a slave named Prince Boston, was part of the crew of a 1770 whaling voyage, but refused to turn over his earnings to his white master. Instead, he went to court and won both his earnings and freedom, making him the first black slave to win his freedom in a U.S. jury trial.

Boston spent his early years working in the whaling industry. By the time he reached 20, he acquired enough money to purchase property in Nantucket. Ten years later, he obtained a license to open and operate a public inn.

In 1822, Boston became the captain of The Industry, a whaleship manned entirely with an African-American crew. The six-month journey returned with 70 barrels of whale oil and the entire crew intact.

Boston retired from the sea after The Industry returned to Nantucket from its historic voyage. He concentrated on becoming a business and community leader, and also ran for public office. Together with fellow captain, Edward Pompey, he led the Nantucket abolitionist movement. He was also a founding trustee of Nantucket’s African Baptist Society, and the African Meeting House in Nantucket. In 1845, after his daughter Phebe Ann Boston was barred from attending a public school, he successfully brought a lawsuit against the Nantucket municipal government to integrate the public education system.

References

1. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Robert Gambee and Elizabeth Heard (2001). Nantucket Impressions. Robert Gambee. pp. 206–207. ISBN 0-393-01010-4. Retrieved 2009-11-23.
2. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d} Johnson, Robert (Spring 2002). “Black-White Relations on Nantucket”. Historic Nantucket. Retrieved 2009-11-23.
3. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c} Bill Delahunt, remarks made during “The Role of Civil Rights Organizations in History”, February 11, 1997, Congressional Record Volume 143, U.S. Government Printing Office.
4. Jump up^ Finkelman, P. (2006). Encyclopedia of African American History, 1619-1895: From the Colonial Period to the Age of Frederick Douglass Three-volume Set. Oxford University Press, USA. pp. 1–417. ISBN 9780195167771. Retrieved 2015-04-01.
5. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} “Whaling Museum and Peter Foulger Museum”. Museum of African American History. Retrieved 2009-11-23.

Black History 365 – First African American to join the Freemasons

First African American to join the Freemasons: Prince Hall

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

For today’s entry:

1775: First African American to join the Freemasons – Prince Hall

From BlackPast.org:

Prince Hall (c. 1735-1807) was an important social leader in Boston following the Revolutionary War and the founder of black freemasonry. His birth and childhood are unclear. There were several Prince Halls in Boston at this time. He is believed to have been the slave of a Boston leather worker who was granted freedom in 1770 after twenty-one years of service. He then opened a successful leather goods store, owned his house, was a taxpayer, and a voter. Hall supplied the Boston Regiment with leather goods and may have fought in the Battle of Bunker Hill.

In 1775, fifteen free blacks, including Hall, joined a freemason lodge of British soldiers. They formed their own lodge, African Lodge #1, when the British left. However, they were not granted full stature by the Grand Lodge of England until 1784. The actual charter arrived in 1787, at which time Hall became the Worshipful Master. Even though they had full stature, most white freemason lodges in America did not treat them equally. Hall helped other black Masonic lodges form. Upon his death in 1807, they became the Prince Hall Grand Lodges.  There are 46 lodges across the United States today.

Hall used his leadership position to organize black activism. In 1787, Hall unsuccessfully petitioned the Massachusetts legislature to send blacks back to Africa where they could be fully free and also serve as a trading partner. Later that year, Hall’s petition for black public school funding was denied. But in 1796, Boston approved his request to fund black schools, but they said they did not have a building, so Hall let the school operate from his home. Hall helped Massachusetts pass legislation outlawing the slave trade and punishing those involved with it (1788). Hall continued to work for abolition, equal rights, and economic advancement in the black society until his death.

Sources:
“Prince Hall,” Africans in America. 1998. WGBH and PBS. 12 July 2006, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part2/2p37.html ; “Prince Hall,” Encyclopedia of Black America, Augustus Low and Virgil A. Clift, eds. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981), p. 412; “Prince Hall,” Gale Bibliography Resource Center. 12 July 2006, http://www.gale.com/BiographyRC/

– See more at: http://www.blackpast.org/aah/hall-prince-c-1735-1807#sthash.GaifPbJO.dpuf

Wikipedia has further information, references and sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Hall

Black History 365 – First known African American to be elected to public office

1768 – First known African American to be elected to public office: Wentworth Cheswell, town constable in Newmarket, New Hampshire. (There were no actual portraits found in a search so I used this one about his riding out to warn his New Hampshire countrymen about the British coming during the Revolutionary War.)

 

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

From African American Registry:

1746-04-11  Wentworth Cheswell
From Newmarket, NH Cheswell was the only child of Hopestill and Catherine Keniston Cheswell. There is virtually no information about Catherine Keniston in Newmarket town records. However, the various local historians and genealogists generally accept that she came from a local Newmarket/Durham family, and that she was white. Like his father before him, Wentworth Cheswell was born to a white mother.

Young Cheswell was a key figure in New Hampshire politics and the son of Hopestill Cheswell, a well known pre-Revolutionary house builder. The elder Cheswell, a mulatto, was an independent Black man who held an important business position during slavery. The younger Cheswell too excelled in local politics. Named for Royal Governor Benning Wentworth, he attended Dummer Academy. He was a justice of the peace and yeoman landowner, and like Paul Revere, Cheswell, made a midnight ride on horseback to warn New Hampshire residents of coming of British soldiers.

In Newmarket, NH he served as town assessor, selectman and coroner. He preserved important town records and helped start the first private library in Newmarket. From 1768, when he was elected constable until his death in 1817, Cheswell held a succession of town or local government positions. Besides serving as assessor, town auditor and coroner, he was also voted a selectman. From his appointment in 1805 onwards, Wentworth Cheswell exercised the authority of Rockingham County’s Justice of the Peace.

His life was used in public debated during the 1820 Missouri Compromise as an example of how Blacks were able to be equals in society with whites. His grave site is currently being researched and restored by Richard Alperin who lives nearby on the site of the former Cheswell home. Cheswell died on March 8, 1817 at aged 71.

Reference:
“A PEOPLE OF COLOR”:
A Study of Race and Racial Identification in New Hampshire, 1750-1825
by Erik R. Tuveson, B.A.,
Colgate University, 1992

References listed on the Wall Builders article about him:
William C. Nell, The Colored Patriots of the American Revolution, With Sketches of Several Distinguished Colored Persons: To Which is Added a Brief Survey of the Conditions and Prospects of Colored Americans (Boston: Robert F. Wallcut, 1855), pp. 120-121.

Sidney and Emma Nogrady Kaplan, The Black Presence in the Era of the American Revolution, Revised Edition (Amherst: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1989), pp. 200-202.

Thomas Truxtun Moebs, Black Soldiers-Black Sailors-Black Ink: Research Guide on African-Americans in U.S. Military History, 1526-1900 (Chesapeake Bay: Moebs Publishing Company, 1994), pp. 226, 259, 280.

From the Wikipedia article about him:

References

1. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f g h} Rachel Grace Toussaint, “Legacy of Newmarket founding father revealed”, seacoastonline.com, 22 December 2002, hosted at Newmarket, New Hampshire Historical Society
2. Jump up^ http://hnn.us/article/51808 (see also: African-American officeholders in the United States, 1789–1866)
3. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f} Mark J. Sammons and Valerie Cunningham, Black Portsmouth: Three Centuries of African-American Heritage, (2004), pp. 32-33, accessed 27 July 2009
4. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f} Mario de Valdes y Cocom, “Cheswell”, The Blurred Racial Lines of Famous Families, PBS Frontline, 1996
5. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c} Rev. Steve Williams, “Wentworth Cheswell”, America’s Founding Fathers website, 2009
6. Jump up^ W. Dennis Chesley and Mary B. Mcallister, “Pioneers in New Hampshire Archaeology: Wentworth Cheswell Esquire”, The New Hampshire Archaeologist, Vol. 22 (1), 1981
7. Jump up^ Mark J. Sammons and Valerie Cunningham, Black Portsmouth: Three Centuries of African-American Heritage, (2004), p. 124, accessed 27 July 2009
8. Jump up^ Sammons and Cunningham (2004), p. 124
9. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Peg Warner, “Graveyard to get TLC”, seacoastonline.com, 28 April 2006, hosted at Newmarket, New Hampshire Historical Society

Further reading

• Fitts, James Hill. History of Newfields, NH, Volumes 1 and 2 (1912).
• George, Nellie Palmer. Old Newmarket (1932).
• Getchell, Sylvia (Fitts). The Tide Turns on the Lamprey: A History of Newmarket, NH. (1984).
• Harvey, Joseph. An Unchartered Town: Newmarket on the Lamprey-Historical Notes and Personal Sketches.
• The Granite Monthly. Volume XL, Nos. 2 and 3. New Series, Volume 3, Nos. 2 and 3 (February and March, 1908).
• Knoblock, Glenn A. “Strong and Brave Fellows”, New Hampshire’s Black Soldiers and Sailors of the American Revolution, 1775-1784 (2003).
• Tuveson, Erik R. A People of Color: A Study of Race and Racial Identification in New Hampshire, 1750-1825. Thesis for M.A. in History (May 1995). Available at library of the University of New Hampshire.

External links

• Mario de Valdes y Cocom, “Cheswell”, The Blurred Racial Lines of Famous Families, PBS Frontline, 1996

Black History 365 – First African American to achieve world championship in any sport

First African American to achieve world championship in any sport: Marshall “Major” Taylor, for 1-mile track cycling

 

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

From BlackPast.org:

Taylor, Marshall W. (1878-1932)
He was a black pioneer in sports long before Jackie Robinson, Joe Louis, Jesse Owens, and even the legendary Jack Johnson. He did not play baseball as Robinson did, nor was he a pugilist as were Johnson and Louis, and although he participated in a sport where the main objective was speed, he was not a track and field person as was Jesse Owens.

His name was Marshall “Major” Taylor, and he rode a bicycle. He was born in 1878 near Indianapolis and was soon recognized as a young black man with a natural talent for riding a bicycle. He had won a number of races in Indianapolis and Chicago by the time he was only fifteen years old. Because of the unadulterated racism directed toward him in the Midwest, he moved to Worchester, Mass., when he was seventeen, and he soon became one of the fastest American amateur cyclists. He turned professional in 1896 and became an overwhelming sensation. It is said that the spectators loved his bold courage. Because of his ability to ride and to win so often, as a black man he had to endure intense racist opposition. Yet he persevered and refused to allow racism to break his spirit.

In 1897 and 1898, because of rules that did not allow blacks to compete, Taylor was prevented from winning the American sprint championships. However, in 1899, after setting a number of world records, Taylor won the World Sprint Championship in Montreal. This achievement made him only the second black athlete to hold a title in any sport. (The first was bantamweight boxer George Dixon, who won the title fights in 1890-91.)

In 1901, Taylor had an exceptional European tour, where he defeated every European champion who challenged him. He raced for five seasons in Paris and two seasons in Australia. Retiring from racing in 1910, Taylor was characterized as “the fastest bicycle rider in the world,” even though his American career was extremely limited because of the color of his skin.

Sources:
 – Michael W. Williams ed., The African American Encyclopedia (New York: Marshall Cavendish, 1993); http://www.majortaylorassociation.org/who.htm.
– See more at: http://www.blackpast.org/aah/taylor-marshall-w-1878-1948#sthash.A0dKePJE.dpuf

Wikipedia references:

Bibliography

• Autobiography: The Fastest Bicycle Rider in the World, 1929 ISBN 0-8369-8910-4
• Major Taylor: The Extraordinary Career of a Champion Bicycle Racer by Andrew Ritchie, 1988 ISBN 0-8018-5303-6
• Major Taylor, Champion Cyclist by Lesa Cline-Ransome ISBN 0-689-83159-5
• Major: A Black Athlete, a White Era, and the Fight to Be the World’s Fastest Human Being by Todd Balf ISBN 0-307-23658-7
• “Tracks of Glory” (1992) TV mini-series (starring: Philip Morris)…. Marshall W. ‘Major’ Taylor … aka Tracks of Glory: The Major Taylor Story (International: English title: complete title)
• Major Taylor: The Inspiring Story of a Black Cyclist and the Men Who Helped Him Achieve Worldwide Fame, by Conrad Kerber and Terry Kerber, Skyhorse Publishing, 2014. ISBN 978-1628736618

References

1. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d} “Who was Major Taylor”. Bridgewater, Connecticut: Bridgewater State University. November 17, 2004.
2. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d} “Marshall W. “Major” Taylor: First Black world champion cyclist”. Afrik News, 2010. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
3. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f g h i j} “They had a Dream”. Chronicle Telegram (Elyria, Ohio). March 8, 1970.
4. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e} “Recalling a Champ: Cyclist Major Taylor”. Southtown Star (Tinley Park, Illinois). October 18, 2009.
5. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} “Pedalers Ready to Race”. The New York Times (New York, New York). September 26, 1895.
6. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} “Six Day Cycle Race”. The Fort Wayne News (Fort Wayne, Indiana). December 5, 1896.
7. Jump up^ “Severe Spills – Defective Banking at Madison Square Garden Throws Many Riders”. Syracuse Daily Standard (Syracuse, New York). December 6, 1896.
8. Jump up^ “Again Winners! Newton Tires”. Boston Daily Globe (Boston, Massachusetts). May 23, 1897.
9. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Southwick, Albert B. (September 16, 2001). “Who was Major Taylor?”.Telegram & Gazette (Worcester, Massachusetts).
10. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c} Ritchie, Andrew. Major Taylor: The Extraordinary Career of a Champion Bicycle Racer. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988, page= p. 114; 131. Retrieved January 12, 2011.
11. Jump up^ “Archdeacon: Cemetery brings sporting past to life”. Cox Ohio Publishing, 2010.
12. Jump up^ Ritchie, Andrew. Major Taylor: The Extraordinary Career of a Champion Bicycle Racer. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988.
13. Jump up^ “Rich Cycle Race”. The Lowell Sun (Lowell, Massachusetts). August 6, 1904.
14. Jump up^ Novich, Max M., Abbotempo, UK, 1964
15. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} Ritchie, Andrew. Bearings, US, 24 December 1896. Bicycle Books, US, 1988.
16. ^ Jump up to:^{a b} The Fastest Bicycle Rider in the World. Autobiography, 1929 ISBN 0-8369-8910-4.
17. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f} “About Major Taylor”. Major Taylor Bicycling Club of Minnesota, 2010. Retrieved January 26, 2011.
18. Jump up^ “Wheel Notes”. The Mansfield News (Mansfield, Ohio). August 6, 1904.
19. Jump up^ Marshall W. “Major” Taylor Scrapbooks, 1897-1904, AIS.1984.07, Archives Service Center, University of Pittsburgh
20. Jump up^ “The Worcester Whirlwind” (PDF). Bicycle Indiana. July 30, 2009.
21. Jump up^ Major Taylor Bicycling Club of Minnesota
22. Jump up^ MAJOR TAYLOR CYCLING CLUB CHICAGO
23. Jump up^ Major Taylor Cycling Club of New Jersey
24. Jump up^ The Alum Creek Greenway Trail – The Central Ohio Greenway trail system
25. Jump up^ Columbus Trail to be dedicated to Major Taylor, Aug 30th, 2010 by Jeff Stephens Consider Biking
26. Jump up^ “Tracks of Glory (TV mini-series)”. imdb. Internet Movie Database. Retrieved14 August 2012.
27. Jump up^ New-York Tribune. Library of Congress – (New York N.Y.) 1866-1924, July 22, 1901, Cycle Racing report

External links

• Marshall Taylor at Find a Grave
• The Major Taylor Society
• The Major Taylor Association
• Marshall W. “Major” Taylor Scrapbooks, 1897-1904, AIS.1984.07, Archives Service Center, University of Pittsburgh
• Major Taylor Flickr – Belgium Poster 1902
• Song: Major Taylor’s Grave

Black History 365 – First African American appointed to serve as U.S. Army Paymaster

1898
First African American appointed to serve as U.S. Army Paymaster: Richard R. Wright

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

From WIkipedia:

Richard Robert Wright, Sr. (May 16, 1855 – July 2, 1947) was an American military officer, educator and college president, politician, civil rights advocate and banking entrepreneur. Among his many accomplishments, he founded a high school, a college and a bank. He also founded the National Freedom Day Association.

(For more information, please read the full Wikipedia article)

Also from Wikipedia:

Suggested reading

• Elmore, Charles J. (1996), Richard R. Wright, Sr., at GSIC, 1891-1921: A Protean Force for the Social Uplift and Higher Education of Black Americans, Savannah, Georgia: privately printed.
• Hall, Clyde W. (1991), One Hundred Years of Educating at Savannah State College, 1890-1990, East Peoria, Ill.: Versa Press.
• Patton, June O. (1996), “‘And the Truth Shall Make You Free’: Richard Robert Wright, Sr., Black Intellectual and Iconoclast, 1877-1897”, The Journal of Negro History, Vol. 81.

References

1. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f g} “Pennsylvania: Life and Times of Major Richard Robert Wright, Sr. and the National Freedom Day Association”. Retrieved 2007-08-30.
2. Jump up^ Kranz, Rachel (2004). African-American Business Leaders and Entrepreneurs. Infobase Publishing. p. 302.
3. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f g h i} “Savannah State University”. New Georgia Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2007-08-30.
4. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c} “African American Firsts Highlight Rich Legacy”. University of Pennsylvania. Retrieved 2008-08-30.
5. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f} “125 Influential People and Ideas: Richard Robert Wright Sr.”.Wharton Alumni Magazine. Retrieved 2008-08-30.^{[dead link]}
6. Jump up^ “Documenting the American South”. Retrieved 2008-08-30.
7. Jump up^ “National Freedom Day: A Local Legacy”. Retrieved 2007-08-30.

   a different version of the information can be found on BlackPast.org via this link:
   http://www.blackpast.org/aah/wright-richard-r-sr-1855-1947
   

Black History 365 – First African-American woman to work for the United States Postal Service

First African-American woman to work for the United States Postal Service: Mary Fields

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

From Wikipedia:

Mary Fields, also known as Stagecoach Mary and Black Mary (c. 1832–1914), was the first African-American woman employed as a mail carrier in the United States and the second woman to work for the United States Postal Service.

Fields stood 6 feet (182 cm) tall and weighed about 200 lbs (90 kg), liked to smoke cigars, and was once said to be as “black as a burnt-over prairie.” She usually had a pistol strapped under her apron and a jug of whiskey by her side.

(For more information, please read the full Wikipedia article)

Black History 365 – First African American to earn a doctorate degree (Ph.D.) from Harvard University

First African American to earn a doctorate degree (Ph.D.) from Harvard University: W.E.B. Du Bois

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!
From Wikipedia:

William Edward Burghardt “W. E. B.” Du Bois (pronounced /duːˈbɔɪz/ doo-boyz; February 23, 1868 – August 27, 1963) was an American sociologist, historian, civil rights activist, Pan-Africanist, author and editor. Born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, Du Bois grew up in a relatively tolerant and integrated community. After completing graduate work at the University of Berlin and Harvard, where he was the first African American to earn a doctorate, he became a professor of history, sociology and economics at Atlanta University. Du Bois was one of the co-founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909.

Du Bois rose to national prominence as the leader of the Niagara Movement, a group of African-American activists who wanted equal rights for blacks. Du Bois and his supporters opposed the Atlanta compromise, an agreement crafted byBooker T. Washington which provided that Southern blacks would work and submit to white political rule, while Southern whites guaranteed that blacks would receive basic educational and economic opportunities. Instead, Du Bois insisted on full civil rights and increased political representation, which he believed would be brought about by the African-American intellectual elite. He referred to this group as the Talented Tenth and believed that African Americans needed the chances for advanced education to develop its leadership.

Racism was the main target of Du Bois’s polemics, and he strongly protested against lynching, Jim Crow laws, anddiscrimination in education and employment. His cause included people of color everywhere, particularly Africans and Asians in colonies. He was a proponent of Pan-Africanism and helped organize several Pan-African Congresses to fight for independence of African colonies from European powers. Du Bois made several trips to Europe, Africa and Asia. After World War I, he surveyed the experiences of American black soldiers in France and documented widespread bigotry in the United States military.

Du Bois was a prolific author. His collection of essays, The Souls of Black Folk, was a seminal work in African-American literature; and his 1935 magnum opus Black Reconstruction in America challenged the prevailing orthodoxy that blacks were responsible for the failures of the Reconstruction Era. He wrote the first scientific treatise in the field of sociology; and he published three autobiographies, each of which contains insightful essays on sociology, politics and history. In his role as editor of the NAACP’s journal The Crisis, he published many influential pieces. Du Bois believed that capitalism was a primary cause of racism, and he was generally sympathetic to socialist causes throughout his life. He was an ardent peace activist and advocated nuclear disarmament. The United States’ Civil Rights Act, embodying many of the reforms for which Du Bois had campaigned his entire life, was enacted a year after his death.

Black History 365 – The First Black Named to a College Football All-America Team

First African American named to a College Football All-America Team: William H. Lewis, Harvard University

From Wikipedia:

William Henry Lewis (November 28, 1868 – January 1, 1949) was an African-American pioneer in athletics, law and politics. Born in Virginia as the son of freedmen, he went North to college, where he became the first African-American college football player, and the first in the sport to be selected as an All-American. In 1903 Lewis was the first African American to be appointed as an Assistant United States Attorney; in 1910 he was the first to be appointed as one of the five United States Assistant Attorney Generals, despite opposition by the Southern Democratic block; and in 1911 he was the first African American to be admitted to the American Bar Association.

When Lewis was appointed as an Assistant Attorney General in 1910, it was reported to be “the highest office in an executive branch of the government ever held by a member of that race.” Before being appointed as an AAG, Lewis served for 12 years as a football coach at Harvard University. During that period, he wrote one of the first books on football tactics and was considered a nationally known expert on the game.

Black History 365 – First African American to sing at Carnegie Hall

Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones, known as Sissieretta Jones

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

 

From Wikipedia:

Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones, known as Sissieretta Jones, (January 5, 1868 or 1869 – June 24, 1933) was an African-American soprano. She sometimes was called “The Black Patti” in reference to Italian opera singer Adelina Patti. Jones’ repertoire included grand opera, light opera, and popular music.

Matilda Sissieretta Joyner was born in Portsmouth, Virginia, United States, to Jeremiah Malachi Joyner, an African Methodist Episcopal minister, and Henrietta Beale. By 1876 her family moved to Providence, Rhode Island, where she began singing at an early age in her father’s Pond Street Baptist Church.

In 1883, Joyner began the formal study of music at the Providence Academy of Music. The same year she married David Richard Jones, a news dealer and hotel bellman. In the late 1880s, Jones was accepted at the New England Conservatory of Music. In 1887, she performed at Boston’s Music Hall before an audience of 5,000.

Jones made her New York debut on April 5, 1888, at Steinway Hall. During a performance at Wallack’s Theater in New York, Jones came to the attention of Adelina Patti’s manager, who recommended that Jones tour the West Indies with the Fisk Jubilee Singers. Jones made successful tours of the Caribbean in 1888 and 1892.

In February 1892, Jones performed at the White House for President Benjamin Harrison. She eventually sang for four consecutive presidents — Harrison, Grover Cleveland, William McKinley, and Theodore Roosevelt — and the British royal family.

Jones performed at the Grand Negro Jubilee at New York’s Madison Square Garden in April 1892 before an audience of 75,000. She sang the song “Swanee River” and selections from La traviata. She was so popular that she was invited to perform at the Pittsburgh Exposition (1892) and the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago (1893).

In June 1892, Jones became the first African-American to sing at the Music Hall in New York (renamed Carnegie Hall the following year). Among the selections in her program were Charles Gounod’s “Ave Maria” and Giuseppe Verdi’s “Sempre libera” (from La traviata). The New York Echo wrote of her performance at the Music Hall: “If Mme Jones is not the equal of Adelina Patti, she at least can come nearer it than anything the American public has heard. Her notes are as clear as a mockingbird’s and her annunciation perfect.” On 8 June 1892, her career elevated beyond primary ethnic communities, and was furthered when she received a contract, with the possibility of a two-year extension, for $150 per week (plus expenses) with Mayor James B. Pond, who had meaningful affiliations to many authors and musicians. The company Troubadours made an important statement about the capabilities of black performers, that besides minstrelsy, there were other areas of genre and style.

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WIKIPEDIA SOURCE LINKS:

• History’s Unsung Opera Star, National Public Radio, June 11, 2007
• Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones at Encyclopædia Britannica
• Sissieretta Jones at The African American Registry
• Sissieretta Jones at Black History Pages
• Sissieretta Jones at The Black Past
• Sissieretta Jones at Find-A-Grave

Black History 365 – First African-American police officer in present-day New York City

Photo Source: http://crimestoppersatlanta.org/blog/
(Not sure if this image is actually of Wiley Overton or is just a file photo of a random Black officer)

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!
There was not a Wikipedia article so this is what I found from the few things listed online:

Hired by the City of Brooklyn before it merged with New York in 1898, the Police Department considers Wiley G. Overton, sworn in by Brooklyn in 1891, as the city’s pioneer black officer. [1] Sadly, Overton was met with hostility from his white counterparts and only two years later, he resigned from his post. [2]

There is not much information online about Wiley Overton and I am not sure that the image on the Crime Stoppers article is really Overton or not. I did contact the The National Black Police Association (NBPA) to see if their organization keeps any historical records of things like this. I also contacted the City of Brooklyn Police Department with the same question. I’ll update this if I can be given more information and/or sources of info.

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SOURCES:

[1] Recalling First Black Appointed to New York Police Dept.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/27/nyregion/recalling-samuel-battle-who-became-first-black-on-nypd.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

[2] Google Books: African American Firsts: Famous Little-Known and Unsung Triumphs of Blacks by Joan Potter (p 135)
http://books.google.com/books?id=dfbxF9dKhoAC&pg=PA135&lpg=PA135&dq=Wiley+Overton+brooklyn+police&source=bl&ots=v1Lkzc5oqw&sig=3wYnagY2zXql2iFlHj-EP1d4LfM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=h88hVK-nMdfmoASbzoCIDQ&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Wiley%20Overton%20brooklyn%20police&f=false

Crime Stoppers Atlanta
http://crimestoppersatlanta.org/blog/2013/02/first-african-american-president/
(I’m not sure why this article which is CLEARLY about 1st black police officer has a URL saying first black president but it IS the URL that was in the address bar)

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Black History 365 – First African-American woman to hold a patent

Judy W Reed’s patent application

In 2016 for my Black History 365 series, I explore the obvious and not so obvious parts of American history that those called Black have taken part in. The things that we (Black people) have done other than be stolen from our homeland and made forced labor in a land foreign to us. I’m going to start this series by looking up the first time someone African-American did something and broke the color barrier in that activity or field. I’ll be starting with Wikipedia and working my way out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts

I will be learning a lot of this as I go since I am a product of the standardized Euro/Anglo/Caucasian leaning public school system. I hope you enjoy learning with me. I’ll be going down the list chronologically as it appears in the Wikipedia article.

If you have any other sources or additional information for this topic, please share in the comments. I also welcome any and all comments and discussion. Thanks for reading!

From http://www.blackpast.org/
(There was no article in Wikipedia even though the achievement was listed on their List of African-American firsts page)

Little is known about Judy W. Reed, considered to be the first African American woman to receive a United States patent.

In January of 1884, Reed applied for a patent on her “Dough Kneader and Roller.” The application was for an improved design on existing dough kneaders. Reed’s device allowed the dough to mix more evenly as it progressed through two intermeshed rollers carved with corrugated slats that would act as kneaders. The dough then passed into a covered receptacle to protect the dough from dust and other particles in the air.

On September 23, 1884, Reed received Patent No. 305,474 for her invention. There is no record of her life beyond this document.

Since women sometimes used their first and/or middle initials when signing documents, often to disguise their gender, and patent applications didn’t require the applicant to indicate his or her race, it is unknown if there are earlier African American women inventors before Reed.

http://www.blackpast.org/aah/reed-judy-w-c-1826#sthash.BihmqYzR.dpuf

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