Blockson collection

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On December 7, 1942, Reginald F. Lewis is born in Baltimore, Maryland. Lewis became a partner in Wallace, Murphy, Thorpe & Lewis, the first African American law firm on Wall Street. He later became the owner of TLC Beatrice International Holdings Inc., the largest black-owned business in the nation and the first to make more than $1 billion in annual sales. At one point in the 1980s, because of his legal and entrepreneurial work, Reginald Lewis was the richest African American in the United States.

On the same day in 1941, Doris “Dorie” Miller, a cook, Third Class on the U.S. Navy’s USS Arizona, shoots down four Japanese warplanes during the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. Miller was commended for his actions by the Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox received the Navy Cross May 27, 1942.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Images: from the Internet Up: Reginald Lewis Down: Doris Miller

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On December 2, 1884, Granville T. Woods receives U.S. Patent No. 308,876 for his telephone transmitter.

Also on December 2, in 1891, Charles Harris Wesley is born to Matilda and Charles Snowden Wesley in Louisville, Kentucky. A noted historian of African American culture, Wesley served as a minister of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, was the director of Research and Publications for the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, and wrote The History of Alpha Phi Alpha, about the Black Greek-letter fraternity he was a member of.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Images: from the Internet Up: Granville T. Woods Down: Charles H. Wesley

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On November 23, Mamie Elizabeth Till Mobley, the mother of Emmett Louis Till, a 14-year-old boy who was lynched in Money, Mississippi, on August 28, 1955, is born Mamie Carthan on November 23. Born the only child of John and Alma Carthan in a small town near Webb, Mississippi, Mamie was raised in Illinois, because her father wanted to get his family away from the racism still prevalent in their native state. Mamie’s insistence that her son’s casket remain open for viewing during his funeral helped spur the Civil Rights Movement. Mamie Carthan Till Mobley lived until age 81; she died on January 6, 2003.

Also, on November 23, 1946, Bobby Lee Rush is born in Albany, Georgia, but raised in Chicago, Illinois. In 1968, Rush was a co-founder and served as the first defense minister of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers. After leaving the Panthers and working in various other political and non-political spheres, Rush became a Chicago city council-man. He moved on to the national level in 1993 when he was elected to serve as the U.S. Congressional Representative fir Illinois’s 1st district.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Images: from the Internet Up: Mamie Elizabeth Till Mobley Down: Bobby L. Rush

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On November 18th, 1797, the preacher, abolitionist, and women’s rights activist Sojourner Truth is born with the name Isabella Baumfree on the Colonel Johannes Hardenbergh estate in Swartekill, in New York’s Ulster County. In 1843, she gave herself the name Sojourner Truth.

On the same day in 1900, Theologian Howard Thurman is born in Daytona Beach, Florida. A minister, professor, and chaplain, Thurman became a pacifist and visited Mohandas Gandhi in India. There he learned about nonviolent resistance to oppression, a tactic later adopted by the Civil Rights Movement. Under the influence of Quakerism, Thurman developed a mystical, spiritual life, and his religious writings continue to be popular inspirational literature.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Images: Left: Sojourner Truth Right: Howard Thurman (the Internet)

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[IMPORTANT EVENT]

The Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection, Temple University Libraries in association with the Tyler School of Art, and Temple University

cordially invites you to an opening celebration for the exhibition

“Frank Stewart’s Romare Bearden” & Donor Reception for Ruth Fine

Tuesday, November 17, 2015 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Also on view images of Romare Bearden in Philadelphia from the John W. Mosley Photograph Collection

Guests will enjoy hors d’oeuvres and desserts as students, faculty and staff say “Thank You” to Ruth Fine for donating the The Art of Romare Bearden Curatorial Research Files to the Blockson Collection.

The Blockson Collection presents a photography exhibition depicting a visual biography of artist Romare Bearden (1911-1988) by photographers Frank Stewart and John W. Mosley in conjunction with the exhibition, Procession: The Art of Norman Lewis (1909-1979) on view at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (PAFA) -- November 13, 2015 through April 3, 2016 curated by distinguished art historian, Ruth Fine.

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On November 13, 1930, Benny Andrews is born in Plainview, Georgia. One of 10 children born to sharecroppers, Andrews became the first in his family to graduate from high school and after serving in the U.S. Air Force, he was able to attend the Chicago Art Institute. Famed as a print-maker and painter, Andrews also gained for his activism, particularly in his role as a co-founder and co-chair of the Black Emergency Cultural Coalition (BECC) in 1969. BECC was created to protest the New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art “Harlem on my Mind exhibit, which had been created without the input of Black curators. Andrews taught art for 29 years at New York City’s Queens College and founded the Benny Andrews Foundation, Inc.

Also, on November 13, 1930, Janet Collins, who was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, on March 2, 1917, becomes the prima ballerina with New York’s Metropolitan Opera Co. when she appeared in Verdi’s Aida.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Images: the Internet Left: Benny Andrews Right: Janet Collins

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On November 4, 2008, U.S. Senator Barack H. Obama II becomes the first African American to be elected president of the United States. President-elect Obama will be the 44th president.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Image: the Internet

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On October 30, 1916, Leon Day is born in Alexandria, Virginia. At 5 feet 9 inches and 170 pounds, Day became a top strikeout pitcher with the Baltimore Black Sox, Brooklyn/ Newark Eagles, and the Baltimore Elite Giants of the Negro Baseball Leagues. Day appeared in a total of seven East-West All-Star games. On July 23, 1942, Leon Day pitched for the Newark Eagles and struck out 18 Baltimore Elite Giants to set a Negro National League record. Also, on this day in 1989, Frank L. Mingo dies of heart failure at the young age of 49. A famed advertising executive, Mingo was born on December 13, 1939, in McComb, Mississippi. Mingo and Caroline Jones co-founded the Mingo-Jones Advertising company in 1977, which in 1986 was renamed The Mingo Group. At the time of his death, The Mingo Group, Inc., was one of the United States’ largest African American-owned and operated advertising agencies with billings of $62 million a year. The Mingo Group was renamed the Chrisholm-Mingo Group in 1996

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Photos: Up: Leon Day, taken by John W. Mosley Down: Frank L. Mingo - the Internet

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On October 23, 1947, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) petitions the United Nations at Lake Success regarding racial conditions in the United States. W.E.B Dubois, who served as the organization’s director of special research, spearheaded the NAACP’s 155- page petition entitled, “An Appeal to the World: A Statement on the Denial of Human rights to Minorities in the Case of Citizens of Negro Descent in the United States to the treatment of people of color under colonial imperialism. It was delivered to the United Nations Division on Human Rights and debated by the Drafting Committee as they looked at how to design the United Nations.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Photo by Mosley Phila

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On October 19, 1859, Byrd Prillerman is the last of 17 children born to John Franklyn and Charlotte Prillerman in Shady Grove, Virginia. Prillerman was enslaved at birth, but went on to become a co-founder of the West Virginia Colored Institute (which was renamed the West Virginia State College in 1929; and, in 2004, it became West Virginia State University) and served as the instutition’s president from 1909 to 1919.

Also, on the same day in 1933, the U.S. Navy is opened to African American women.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Image: Internet

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On October, 15, 1837, Fannie Muriel Jackson Coppin is born enslaved. But when her aunt, Sarah Clark, saw how intelligent Fannie was, she earned money and saved the $175 needed to purchase Fannie’s freedom. Fanny was later paid to work as a servant and used that income to study. She went on to attend Ohio’s Oberlin College in 1860, and even while a student there, she spent her evenings teaching free reading and writing courses to other African Americans. After graduating in 1865, Fanny taught Greek, Latin, and Mathematics at the Ladies Department at Philadelphia’s Institute for Colored Youth (which later became Cheyney University of Pennsylvania) before being named the school’s principal. Fannie Jackson Coppin was the first African American woman to become a school principal. She would marry Reverend Levi Jenkins Coppin, a minister at Bethel A.M.E Church in Baltimore, MD and, together, they founded a missionary school called the Bethel Institute in South Africa. Although Fanny Jackson Coppin died on January 21, 1913, the Baltimore, MD-based Fanny Jackson Coppin Normal School for training of teachers was named in her honor in 1926; the school is now known as Coppin State University. Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Image: Internet

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On October 14, 1964, at age 35, Martin Luther King, Jr., becomes the youngest man ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize.

Also, on the same day in 1896, Oscar McKinley Charleston is born in Indianapolis, Indiana. The seventh of 11 children, Charleston’s father, Tom, was of the Sioux nation and his mother, the former Mary Jeannette Thomas, was African American. Known as “the Hoosier Comet”, Charleston was 6 feet tall and 190 pounds and played center field. He even served 10 years as a player-manager in baseball’s Negro National League from 1915 to 1945. Charleston had a lifetime batting average of .353 during his 27-year career.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Image: Left: Martin Luther King Jr. Right: Oscar McKinley Charleston

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On October 12, 1904, William Montague Cobb is born to Alexizne Montague and William Elmer Cobb in Washington, DC. Cobb was the first African American to earn a PhD in anthropology, and through his work as a physical anthropologist and anatomist, he studied the concept of race and showed how racism in the science of physical anthropology quickly became racist ideas that were later propagated in the wider society. Cobb’s studies helped push the NAACP forward in its efforts to gain civil rights for African Americans, and he would serve as president of the organization from 1976 to 1982.

Sources: "African American History Day by Day" by Karen Juanita Carrillo Image: Internet

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Blockson Collection Fall Programming

BLOCKSON COLLECTION FALL PROGRAMMING

-- Thursday, November 12, 2:00 PM --

"Celebrating the Life of Mel Dorn Shamlin, Cecil B. Moore Freedom Fighter"

This program examines the life and legacy of Mel Dorn Shamlin, an important Philadelphia activist and participant in the fight to desegregate Girard College. Program Participants include his colleagues, friends, and those who fought against police brutality and racial segregation.

-- Tuesday, November 17, 2:00 PM --

Exhibition Opening & Donor Reception for Curator Ruth E. Fine "Frank Stewart’s Romare Bearden" also featuring Romare Bearden in Philadelphia from the John W. Mosley Photograph Collection

Join us to celebrate the opening of the Blockson Collection exhibition "Frank Stewart’s Romare Bearden" and Ruth E. Fine’s donation of Bearden’s (1911 – 1988) writings, exhibition catalogs, and press clippings. Fine’s gift also includes slides of artworks used for the exhibition catalogue, The Art of Romare Bearden, a show she curated for the National Gallery of Art in 2003. The work is considered one of the best bibliographies on any African American artist.

This exhibition is presented with the Tyler School of Art in conjunction with Procession: The Art of Norman Lewis (1909-1979), curated by Ruth E. Fine and on view at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts from November 13, 2015 through April 3, 2016.

-- Saturday, November 21, 2:00 PM --

"The National Marian Anderson Historical Residence Museum Honors Charles L. Blockson" Marian Anderson Historical Residence Museum, 762 South Marian Anderson Street

Join the Marian Anderson Historical Residence Museum, a nationally registered historic site and former home of the great contralto vocalist, as they honor Charles L. Blockson, scholar, bibliophile, and founder of the Blockson Collection.

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MOONSTONE ARTS CENTER AND THE BLOCKSON COLLECTION PRESENT:

The Institute for Colored Youth and the On-Going struggle for Education

Thursday, October 15, 2015 - 12 Noon Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection Temple University, Sullivan Hall, 1330 Polett Walk

Exhibition : "African American Education in Philadelphia and Beyond: Past and Present"

Join us for a Tour and Introduction to this new exhibit with Curator, Dr. Diane D. Turner (Exhibition will be on view September 13, 2014 to March 2016)

Education was important to African Americans both enslaved and free. In spite of racial discrimination and laws that prohibited the education of Americans of African descent, they took advantage of every opportunity offered to them to learn. Reading and writing became major forms of African resistance to slavery. Free blacks, Quakers, Abolitionists, both black and white, as well as Black churches and Black literary societies played significant roles in the founding of schools for blacks. Among the important holdings held at the Blockson Collection are large collections of items on African American education. This exhibition highlights rare items that tell the story of the Black experience from the period of enslavement.

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Friday, October 16, 2015 – 7:00 pm 1199C Hospital Workers Union Headquarters 1319 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA

"A Discussion with Haki Madhubuti & Safisha Madhubuti"

The Madhubutis have spent their lives working to promote African American education. They have taught at traditional schools; have created schools which reflect their own views on education; have mentored children from pre-school to graduate school; have taught and inspired generations; have produced their own teaching materials through their own publishing house; and have combined theory with practice, not being happy to sit in the ivory tower. This couple reflects the very best in what artists and educators should be: honest and brave with the highest integrity and skill, they have been unstoppable.

Facilitated by Diane D. Turner, Curator of the Blockson Collection, Temple University Libraries.  Her areas of teaching and research include Black history, film and music and she is the author of the children’s book, "My name is Oney Judge" illustrated by Cal Massey and "Feeding the Soul: Black Music, Black Thought."