On Sept. 6, 1960 Rafer Johnson won the Olympic Decathlon, the first for an African American.
On this date in 1988, Lee Roy Young becomes the first African American Texas Ranger in the police force’s 165 year history.
On this date in 1978, Rapper, Model, Actress, Inga DeCarlo Fung Marchand, better known by her stage name Foxy Brown was born.
On this date in 1969, Singer Macy Gray was born.
On this date in 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson named Walter E. Washington commissioner and “unofficial” mayor of Washington, D.C.
Race riot, Atlanta.
On this date in 1930, Leander Jay Shaw, Jr., justice of the Florida State Supreme Court (1983), first African American chief justice (1990) in Florida, the second African American chief justice in any state supreme court, was born.
On this date in 1905, Atlanta Life Insurance Company established by A.F. Herndon.
On this date in 1892, George “Little Chocolate” Dixon defeats Jack Skelly in New Orleans to win the world featherweight title. While some African American citizens celebrate for two days, the New Orleans Times-Democrat says, “a mistake to match a negro and a white man, a mistake to bring the races together on any terms of equality, even in the prize ring.” After this fight, segregation appeared in the boxing ring.
Dixon was noted for his defensive skills and precise style, and for many years after his retirement in 1906 he was hailed as a pioneer of “scientific” boxing.
Race riot, Charleston, South Carolina.
On this date in 1865, Thaddeus Stevens, powerful U.S. congressman, urged confiscation of estates of Confederate leaders and the distribution of land to adult freedmen in forty-acre lots.
On this date in 1848, the National Black Convention met in Cleveland with some seventy delegates. Frederick Douglass was elected president of the convention.
On this date in 1865, Thaddeus Stevens, a powerful U.S. congressman, urged confiscation of estates of Confederate leaders and the distribution of land to adult freedmen in forty-acre lots.
On this date in 1848, the National Black Convention met in Cleveland with some seventy delegates. Frederick Douglass was elected president of the convention.
On this date in 1826, John Brown Russwurm became the first Black to graduate college at Bowdoin College. This was 14 days before Edward Jones graduated Amherst College in Massachusetts.
On this date in 1871, African American Jordan Freeman dies after killing Major William Montgomery in the Battle of Groton Heights
On this date in 1968, the Kingdom of Swaziland was founded.
