*Pope Leo XIV was born on this date in 1955. He is a Creole head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State. He was born Robert Francis Prevost at Mercy Hospital in Chicago, Illinois. Known as “Bob” or “Rob” in childhood and to friends as an adult, Prevost was raised in Dolton, […]
learn more*Burl Toler was born on May 9, 1928. He was a Black American football player, a National Football League (NFL) official, and a teacher. Burl Abron Toler Sr. was born in Memphis, Tennessee. Despite his physical gifts and strapping size, Toler never even played a down of prep football at Manassas High School in Memphis. […]
learn more*Warren Logan was born on June 5, 1859. He was a Black educator. He was born in Greensboro, Guilford, North Carolina; his father was Park Logan, and his mother was Pocahontas “Pokey” Smith. He lived in Gilmer Township, Guilford, North Carolina, in 1870. He graduated from Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in Virginia in 1877 […]
learn more*M Street School is celebrated on this date in 1870. This high school was created in Washington, D.C. when the city’s dual public school system was established. Initially, Black and white schools were essentially equal. M Street High School initially began as the Preparatory High School for Negro Youth when Congress established it, and “Originally, […]
learn more*Samora Machel was born on this date in 1933. He was a Black African politician and revolutionary. Samora Moisés Machel was born in Gaza Province, Mozambique, to a family of farmers. His grandfather had been an active collaborator of Gungunhana. Under Portuguese rule, his father, like most Black Mozambicans, was classified as “indígena” (native). He […]
learn more*Addai-Sebo’s birth is celebrated on this date in 1950. He is a Ghanaian analyst, journalist, and pan-African activist. Born and raised in Ghana, Akyaaba Addai-Sebo was part of Kwame Nkrumah’s Young Pioneers Movement. His education took him to the United States in the 1970s, where he was active when “Negro History Week” became Black History […]
learn more*Edwin Howard was born on this date in 1846. He was a Black doctor and medical administrator. Born in Boston, MA., Edwin C.J.T. Howard’s parents were Edwin Howard and Joanna Turpin. He was the brother of educator Joan Imogen Howard. He attended Boston Latin School from 1861 to 1865. He studied at Liberia College in […]
learn more*Graça Machel was born on this date in 1945. She is a Black Mozambican politician and humanitarian. Graça Sembène was born 17 days after her father’s death, the youngest of six children, in rural Incadine, Gaza Province (modern-day Mozambique). She attended Methodist mission schools before gaining a scholarship to the University of Lisbon in Portugal, […]
learn more*Nicole Mitchell was born on February 17, 1967. She is a Black jazz flutist, composer, and professor. Mitchell was born in Syracuse, New York, and moved to Anaheim, California, at eight. Her first instruments were piano and viola, which she started playing in fourth grade. She was classically trained in flute and played in youth […]
learn more*Anne Kennedy was born on this date in 1920. She was a Black classical pianist and piano professor. Anne Lucille Gamble was born in Charleston, West Virginia, to Dr. Henry Floyd Gamble and the former Nina Hortense Clinton. She was the younger of two children born into that union. Gamble had two older step-siblings as […]
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