President Ronald Reagan signs law designating the third Monday in January Martin Luther King Jr Day, in 1983
On this date in 1976, Jimmy Carter, former governor of Georgia, elected president with strong support from Black voters.
On this date in 1976, Seventeen Black congressmen reelected.
On this date in 1954, Spingarn Medal presented to Dr. Theodore K. Lawles for his research on skin-related diseases.
On this date in 1954, Charles C. Diggs Jr. of Detroit elected Michigan’s first Black congressman.
On this dated in 1930, upon the death of the Ethiopian Empress Zawditu, Haile Selassie was crowned emperor of Ethiopia.
On this date in 1920, Warren G. Harding elected president.
On this dated in 1903, Business and civic leader, Maggie L Walker, opens the St Luke Penny Savings Bank in Richmond, Virginia.
On this date in 1893, Daniel A. Payne died. The sixth bishop of the American Methodist Episcopal Church, Payne was the first African American ordained by the Lutheran Church in 1837. In 1856, he founded Wilberforce University, where he became the first Black president of a college in America.
On this date in 1889 Menelik II was crowned Negusa-Nagast (King of Kings) of Abysinnia, Ethiopia. By 1899 Abysinnia had extended as far as Kenya in the south, Somaliland in the East, and the Sudan in the West. During his reign, Menelik devoted much of his time to the building of railroads, schools, and hospitals.
On this dated in 1880, Republican James A. Garfield elected president.
On this date in 1875, Democrats suppressed Black vote by fraud and violence and carried Mississippi election. “The Mississippi Plan” staged riots, political assassinations, massacres and social and economic intimidation was used later to overthrow Reconstruction governments in South Carolina and Louisiana.
