October 5, 1954 Oscar McKinley Charleston, Negro League baseball player and manager, died. Charleston was born October 14, 1896 in Indianapolis, Indiana. He joined the U. S. Army at the age of 15 and served in the Philippines. He began his professional baseball career in 1915 with the Indianapolis ABC’s and over his career he […]
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October 5th in African American History – Bernard Jeffrey Bernie Mac McCullough
October 5, 1957 Bernard Jeffrey “Bernie Mac” McCullough, comedian and actor, was born in Chicago, Illinois. Mac started as a stand-up comedian around Chicago and in 1989 won the Miller Lite Comedy Search. His first major acting role was in the 1995 film “Friday“. That was followed by other roles in films primarily directed at […]
October 4th in African American History – Bernice Johnson Reagon
October 4, 1942 Bernice Johnson Reagon, singer, composer, scholar and social activist, was born in southwest Georgia. Reagon was an active participant in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s as a member of the Freedom Singers, organized by the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). She is a specialist in African American oral history, performance, […]
October 4th in African American History – Russell Wendell Simmons
October 4, 1957 Russell Wendell Simmons, record producer and entrepreneur, was born in Queens, New York. In the mid-1970s, Simmons enrolled in City College of New York but quit to begin promoting rap music. In 1984 he co-founded Def Jam Records and within three years the companies albums such as the Beastie Boys’ “Licensed to […]
October 3rd in African American History – Charles White
October 3, 1979 Charles White, graphic artist and teacher, died. White was born April 2, 1918 in Chicago, Illinois. He became interested in art by the age of 7 and at 14 was working as a sign painter. White earned a scholarship to the Art Institute of Chicago and graduated in 1937. After graduation, he […]
October 3rd in African American History – Felrath Hines
October 3, 1993 Felrath Hines, curator and artist, died. Hines was born November 9, 1913 in Indianapolis, Indiana. He began his formal art training at the age of 31 at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and later moved to New York City to study at the Pratt Institute. Trained to be an […]
October 2nd in African American History – Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr.
October 2, 1937 Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr., lawyer, was born in Shreveport, Louisiana. Cochran received his B. S. Degree in business administration from the University of California in 1959 and his Juris Doctor from Loyola Marymount University School of Law in 1962. By the late 1970s, Cochran had established his reputation in the Black community […]