*Bertram Lee was born on January 21, 1939. He was a Black public policy administrator and lawyer. Born in Lynchburg, Virginia, Lee was raised in a public housing project. His father, William, was a teacher, and Lee told the New York Times’s William C. Rhoden that while his family was not affluent, neither were they […]
learn more*Peter Bynoe was born on March 20, 1951. He is a Black attorney and businessman. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Peter Charles Bernard Bynoe’s father, Victor C. Bynoe, emigrated from Barbados at age 13 and became a successful attorney; he represented Boston Celtics player Bill Russell. He also had an Uncle, John Bynoe, who was active […]
learn more*Virginia Lacy Jones was born on this date in 1912. She was a Black librarian and administrator. Virginia Lacy was born to Edward and Ellen Lacy in Cincinnati, Ohio. She spent much of her childhood in Clarksburg, West Virginia, in a family that was “poor, hardworking, proud, and ambitious.” Books and reading were always a […]
learn more*The birth of Edward Allen Jones is celebrated on this date in 1903. He was a Black linguist, scholar, author, and diplomat. E.A. Jones was born to George and Carrie Jones of Indianola, Mississippi. In 1918, at age fifteen, he entered a prep academy and began studying Latin and Greek. Jones received his bachelor’s degree […]
learn more*Eliza Atkins Gleason was born on this date in 1909. She was a Black librarian, university dean, and administrator. Eliza Valeria Atkins was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to Simon Green Atkins and Olenona Pegram Atkins. Her parents were educators; her mother was a teacher, and her father was the founder and first president of […]
learn more*On this date in 1940, The American Negro Exposition opened. Also known as the Black World’s Fair and the Diamond Jubilee Exposition, it was a world’s fair held in Chicago from July until September 1940 to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the end of slavery in the United States after the American Civil War in […]
learn more*Friendship Armstrong Academy was dedicated on this date in 1902. This public charter school is in the Truxton Circle neighborhood of Washington, D.C. With the passage of an act of the 55th Congress, approved March 3, 1899, the school first bore the name Manual Training School No. 2, later changed to Armstrong Manual Training School. […]
learn more*Memphis Slim was born on this date in 1915. He was a Black blues pianist, singer, and composer. Memphis Slim was born John Len Chatman in Memphis, Tennessee. For his first recordings, for Okeh Records in 1940, he used the name of his father, Peter Chatman (who sang, played piano and guitar, and operated juke […]
learn more*Barbara Dane was born on this date in 1927. She was a white-American folk, blues, and jazz singer, guitarist, record producer, and activist. Barbara Jean Spillman was born in Detroit, and her parents arrived from Arkansas in the 1920s. She was the eldest child of a pharmacist. In 1936, her father publicly admonished her for […]
learn more*The Miles Davis Quintet is celebrated on this date in 1955. These were two jazz groups formed from 1955 to early 1969, led by Miles Davis. Most references relate to two distinct and relatively stable bands: the First Great Quintet from 1955 to 1959 and the Second Great Quintet from late 1964 to early 1969, Davis being the […]
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