Tag: Black History

Letter From A Birmingham Jail by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

CJ Lawrence

On what would have been Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s 91st Birthday Black With No Chaser Presents “Letter From A Birmingham Jail” Republished in Its Entirety “Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.]” 16 April 1963 My Dear Fellow Clergymen: While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities “unwise and untimely.” Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little…

Happy Thanksgiving? Nahh….

sistahimani

Fist up, Family. A lot of times we celebrate holidays because that’s all we’ve ever known. Yet when we really think about this day of so called “thanks” and  its true meaning, we might as well celebrate the day African slavery began ;and throw a party while we are at it. Let’s really ask ourselves: why we are celebrating the colonization and murder of a people?  So today, I’m here to give you another option! Instead of celebrating Thanksgiving I’ll give you the option of celebrating “I Wish They Would…

Black in the Day…The Passing of a Civil Rights Legend

tyrus78

October 24, 2005: On this day, Rosa Parks, the woman known as the “mother of the civil rights movement,” died. Parks turned the course of American history by refusing in 1955 to give up her seat on a bus for a white man. Rosa Parks , née Rosa Louise McCauley, (born February 4, 1913, Tuskegee, Alabama, U.S.—died October 24, 2005, Detroit, Michigan), African American civil rights activist whose refusal to relinquish her seat on a public bus to a white man precipitated the 1955–56 Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama, which is recognized as the spark that ignited the U.S. civil rights…

Black in the Day…Meet the Real Joe Black

tyrus78

October 1, 1952:   On this date Joe Black became the first black pitcher to win a World Series game. The Dodgers defeated the New York Yankees 4-2. He was told that the color of his skin would keep him out of the big leagues, but Joe Black worked his way up through the Negro Leagues and the Cuban Winter League. He burst into the Majors in 1952 when he signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers. In the face of segregation, verbal harassment, and even death threats, Joe Black rose to the…

Black in the Day…There She is, Miss America

tyrus78

September 17, 1983: On this day 20-year-old Vanessa Williams became the first Black Woman to win the Miss America crown in its 63 year history. This was an extraordinary feat considering the fact that Blacks weren’t even allowed to be contestants during the competition’s first 30 years. Less than a year later, on July 23, 1984, Williams gave up her crown after nude photos of her surfaced. Williams learned that Penthouse magazine would be publishing the unauthorized nude photographs of her in an upcoming issue. Amid growing media controversy and scrutiny, Williams resigned as Miss…