Our Story!

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Lucy Terry
by Susan Robinson
http://www.gibbsmagazine.com/Lucy 1.htm

The baby whose slavery name would become Lucy Terry was born in Africa around 1730. Slave traders sold her in Rhode Island while she was very young, and it is believed that she was purchased by the Terry family of Enfield, Connecticut. At the age of five she was sold again, to Ebenezer Wells, of Deerfield, Massachusetts. Wells had Lucy baptized in the Puritan church in Deerfield; she became a member of the church when she reached the age of fourteen. It is not known how Lucy Terry became literate, but it is reasonable to conclude that she was taught while growing up in the Wells household.
Lucy Terry remained with the Wells family until 1756, when she married a free African American man, Abijah Prince. Lucy became a free woman, although it is not known whether her husband had to buy her freedom or if Wells freed her of his own accord. Abijah and Lucy Terry Prince had six children; at least one of their sons, Cesar, is known to have fought in the Revolutionary War.
Lucy Terry Prince composed poetry that was transmitted orally, as was common in colonial times. Because most of her works were not formally published, only the poem “Bars Fight” remains; a Deerfield resident, Harriet Hitchcock, recorded it from memory after Lucy Terry Prince’s death. It was printed in 1855 (Josiah Holland’s History of Western Massachusetts) for the first time, more than one hundred years after it was composed, and was thus preserved. The poem describes a violent incident between settlers and Native Americans in Deerfield in 1746.

Bars Fight
Samuel Allen like a hero fout
And though he was so brave and bold
His face no more shall we behold.
Eleazer Hawks was killed outright
Before he had time to fight
Before he did the Indians see
Was shot and killed immediately.
Oliver Amsden he was slain
Which caused his friends much grief and pain
Samuel Amsden they found dead
Not many rods off from his head.
Adonijah Gillet we do hear
Did lose his life which was so dear.
John Saddler fled across the water
And so escaped the dreadful slaughter.
Eunice Allen see the Indians coming
And hoped to save herself by running
And had not her petticoats stopt her
The awful creatures had not cotched her
And tommyhawked her on the head
And left her on the ground for dead.
Young Samuel Allen, Oh! lack a-day
Was taken and carried to Canada.

The Princes later settled in Vermont. Abijah Prince, who already owned land in Massachusetts, acquired holdings in Vermont and was one of the founders of the town of Sunderland, Vermont. Lucy Terry Prince’s reputation as a skilled storyteller and orator grew, and in the 1790s she became the first African American woman to argue a case in front of the Supreme Court of the United States. The Princes had become involved in a land dispute with one Colonel Eli Bronson, and had retained Isaac Ticknor (who would later become a governor of Vermont) as legal counsel. Despite having hired a lawyer, Lucy Terry Prince went before the Supreme Court personally, and won the case.
Abijah Prince died in 1794. Some accounts say that Lucy Terry Prince argued before the board of Williams College in an attempt to persuade them to admit one of her sons—if this indeed occurred, the attempt failed. Lucy Terry Prince died at the age of ninety-one in Vermont. She is remembered as the first Black woman to present a case to the Supreme Court (and win), and as our earliest-known African American poet. []


Don't quit. Never, ever give up!


Make yourself a love day and stay up!

 

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Black German Holocaust Victims - Please visit: universalzulukemeticmuurs.net

So much of our history is lost to us because we often don't write the history books, don't film the documentaries, or don't pass the accounts down from generation to generation. One documentary now touring the film festival circuit, telling us to "Always Remember" is " Black Survivors of the Holocaust" (1997). Outside the U.S., the film is entitled "Hitler's Forgotten Victims" (Afro-Wisdom Productions). It codifies another dimension to the "Never Forget" Holocaust story - our dimension.

Did you know that in the 1920s, there were 24,000 Blacks living in Germany? Neither did I. Here's how it happened, and how many of them were eventually caught unawares by the events of the Holocaust.

Like most West European nations, Germany established colonies in Africa in the late 1800s in what later became Togo, Cameroon, SPAN Namibia, and Tanzania. German genetic experiments began there, most notably involving prisoners taken from the 1904 Heroro Massacre that left 60,000 Africans dead, following a 4-year revolt against German colonisation. After the shellacking Germany received in World War I, it was stripped of its African colonies in 1918. As a spoil of war, the French were allowed to occupy Germany in the Rhineland - a bitter piece of real estate that has gone back and forth between the two nations for centuries. The French willfully deployed their own colonised African soldiers as the occupying force. Germans viewed this as the final insult of World War I, and, soon thereafter, 92% of them voted in the Nazi party.

Hundreds of the African Rhineland-based soldiers intermarried with German women and raised their children as Black Germans. In Mein Kampf, Hitler wrote about his plans for these "Rhineland Bastards". When he came to power, one of his first directives was aimed at these mixed-race children. Underscoring Hitler's obsession with racial purity, by 1937, every identified mixed-race child in the Rhineland had been forcibly sterilized, in order to prevent further "race polluting", as Hitler termed it.

Hans Hauck, a Black Holocaust survivor and a victim of Hitler's mandatory sterilisation program, explained in the film "Hitler's Forgotten Victims" that, when he was forced to undergo sterilisation as a teenager, he was given no anaesthetic. Once he received his sterilisation certificate, he was "free to go", so long as he agreed to have no sexual relations whatsoever with Germans.

Although most Black Germans attempted to escape their fatherland, heading for France where people like Josephine Baker were steadily aiding and supporting the French Underground, many still encountered problems elsewhere. Nations shut their doors to Germans, including the Black ones. Some Black Germans were able to eke out a living during Hitler's reign of terror by performing in Vaudeville shows, but many Blacks, steadfast in their belief that they were German first, Black second, opted to remain in Germany. Some fought with the Nazis (a few even became Lutwaffe pilots)!

Unfortunately, many Black Germans were arrested, charged with treason, and shipped in cattle cars to concentration camps. Often these trains were so packed with people and (equipped with no bathroom facilities or food), that, after the four-day journey, box car doors were opened to piles of the dead and dying. Once inside the concentration camps, Blacks were given the worst jobs conceivable. Some Black American soldiers, who were captured and held as prisoners of war, recounted that, while they were being starved and forced into dangerous labour (violating the Geneva Convention), they were still better off than Black German concentration camp detainees, who were forced to do the unthinkable-man the crematoriums and work in labs where genetic experiments were being conducted. As a final sacrifice, these Blacks were killed every three months so that they would never be able to reveal the inner workings of the "Final Solution".

In every story of Black oppression, no matter how we were enslaved, shackled, or beaten, we always found a way to survive and to rescue others. As a case in point, consider Johnny Voste, a Belgian resistance fighter who was arrested in 1942 for alleged sabotage and then shipped to Dachau. One of his jobs was stacking vitamin crates. Risking his own life, he distributed hundreds of vitamins to camp detainees, which saved the lives of many who were starving, weak, and ill-conditions exacerbated by extreme vitamin deficiencies. His motto was "No, you can't have my life; I will fight for it."

According to Essex University's Delroy Constantine-Simms, there were Black Germans who resisted Nazi Germany, such as Lari Gilges, who founded the Northwest Rann - an organisation of entertainers that fought the Nazis in his home town of Dusseldorf - and who was murdered by the SS in 1933, the year that Hitler came into power.

Little information remains about the numbers of Black Germans held in the camps or killed under the Nazi regime. Some victims of the Nazi sterilisation project and Black survivors of the Holocaust are still alive and telling their story in films such as "Black Survivors of the Nazi Holocaust", but they must also speak out for justice, not just history.

Unlike Jews (in Israel and in Germany), Black Germans receive no war reparations because their German citizenship was revoked (even though they were German-born). The only pension they get is from those of us who are willing to tell the world their stories and continue their battle for recognition and compensation.
After the war, scores of Blacks who had somehow managed to survive the Nazi regime, were rounded up and tried as war criminals. Talk about the final insult! There are thousands of Black Holocaust stories, from the triangle trade, to slavery in America, to the gas ovens in Germany. We often shy away from hearing about our historical past because so much of it is painful; however, we are in this struggle together for rights, dignity, and, yes, reparations for wrongs done to us through the centuries. We need to always remember so that we can take steps to ensure that these atrocities never happen again.

For further information, read: Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany, by Hans J. Massaquoi.
http://www.amonhotep.com/2004/0901.html


“I cannot commend too highly the spirit shown among the colored combat troops, who exhibit fine capacity for quick training and eagerness for the most dangerous work.” —General John J. Pershing


Evil has no face, for no one is exempt from anything and anything is possible of anyone.. -Milosophy


Peace, Blessings & Stay Up!

 

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James Derham (c. 1757-1802?) was the first African-American to formally practice medicine in the United States though he never received an M.D. degree. Derham was born into slavery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was owned by several doctors, and one of his owners, a physician named Dr. Robert Love, encouraged him to go into medicine. By working as a nurse, he purchased his freedom and in 1783 he opened a medical practice, by age 26 his annual earnings exceeded $3,000. Derham met Dr. Benjamin Rush, the father of American medicine, and Rush was so impressed by Derham that he encouraged him to move to Philadelphia. There he became an expert in throat diseases and in the relationship between climate and disease. Derham disappeared after 1802, his fate is unknown.


Make everyday a day in heaven... -Milosophy


Peace, Blessings & Stay Up!

 

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Today's BF will take you about an hour or so to watch. Please take a peek for 5 minutes or so; I promise the peek will prompt you to return and view the entire content when you have time. Please click or cut and paste the link, view this and let me know what you think.


http://www.pbs.org/tpt/slavery-by-another-name/watch/


“The white man's happiness cannot be purchased by the black man's misery.”
― Frederick Douglass


“Without a struggle, there can be no progress.”
― Frederick Douglass

Keep moving forward in the struggle... Never, ever give up... -Unknown


“Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”
Frederick Douglass


A man that's loyal to his master despises himself - Milosophy



Peace, Blessings & Stay Up!

 

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Marie Van Britton Brown

Marie Van Britton Brown was born on October 30, 1922 , in Jamaica, Queens, New York City. She was an African-American inventor, who in 1966 had the idea for a home surveillance device. Marie Brown applied for a patent along with Albert Brown in 1966 for a closed circuit television security system. She died on February 2, 1999, in the very same place.

Marie Van Brittan Brown was an African-American woman who invented the security system. She and her husband, Albert, created a system for a motorized camera to show images on a monitor. They applied for a patent in 1966 and it was granted. Marie Van Brittan Brown was an African-American inventor. Born October 30, 1922 - Died February 2, 1999 Queens, New York. back in 1966 the idea for a home surveillance device seemed almost unthinkable. That was the year famous African-American inventor Marie Van Brittan Brown, and her partner Albert Brown, applied for an invention patent for a closed-circuit television security system - the forerunner to the modern home security system.

Brown's system had a set of four peep holes and a camera that could slide up and down to look out each one. Anything the camera picked up would appear on a monitor. An additional feature of Brown's invention was that a person also could unlock a door with a remote control. She was given an Award for the National Scientists Committee (NSC)


Peace, Blessings & Stay Up!

 

[hanginbals]

How this post make it to page 17?
BUMP!!

 

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Black buying power nears $1.1 trillion​

WASHINGTON - Black buying power is expected to reach $1.1 trillion by 2015, according to The State of the African- American Consumer Report, recently released, collaboratively by Nielsen, a leading global provider of insights and analytics into what consumers watch and buy, and the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), a federation of more than 200 Black community newspapers across the U.S.

“Too often, companies don't realize the inherent differences of our community, are not aware of the market size impact and have not optimized efforts to develop messages beyond those that coincide with Black History Month,” said Cloves Campbell, NNPA chairman. “It is our hope that by collaborating with Nielsen, we'll be able to tell the African-American consumer story in a manner in which businesses will understand,” he said, “and, that this understanding will propel those in the C-Suite to develop stronger, more inclusive strategies that optimize their market growth in Black communities, which would be a win-win for all of us.”

The report, the first of annual installments in a three year alliance between Nielsen and NNPA, showcases the buying and media habits and consumer trends of Black Americans.
The 41st Annual Legislative Congressional Black Caucus Foundation Conference set the backdrop for the Sept. 22 announcement. Flanked by civic, business and legislative leaders, Nielsen and NNPA executives talked about the relevance and importance of the information shared in the report and the fact that it will be distributed in NNPA's 200+ publications, reaching millions of readers and online viewers.


“We see this alliance with NNPA as an opportunity to share valuable insights, unique consumer behavior patterns and purchasing trends with the African-American community,” said Susan Whiting, vice chair, Nielsen. “By sharing, for example, that African-Americans over-index in several key areas, including television viewing and mobile phone usage, we've provided a better picture of where the African-American community can leverage that buying power to help their communities,” she said.
“Likewise, the information points businesses in the right direction for growing market share and developing long range strategies for reaching this important demographic group.”


According to the report, consumer trends include:
• With a buying power of nearly $1 trillion annually, if Blacks were a country, they'd be the 16th largest country in the world.
• The number of Black households earning $75,000 or higher grew by almost 64 percent, a rate close to 12 percent greater than the change in the overall population's earning between 2000 and 2009. This continued growth in affluence, social influence and household income will continue to impact the community's economic power.
• Blacks make more shopping trips than all other groups, but spend less money per trip. Blacks in higher income brackets, also spend 300 percent more in higher end retail grocers more than any other high income household.
• There were 23.9 million active Black Internet users in July 2011—76 percent of whom visited a social networking/blog site.
• Thirty-three percent of all Blacks own a smart phone.
• Black Americans use more than double the amount of mobile phone voice minutes compared to Whites—1,298 minutes a month vs. 606.
• The percentage of Blacks attending college or earning a degree has increased to 44 percent for men and 53 percent for women.
The report is also available at www.nielsen.com and www.nielsen.com/africanamerican — Nielsen's microsite which highlights tailored information to the Black community.






Peace, Blessings & Stay Up!​

 

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WORD!

 

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I must first give credit/props to WorldEx for his post "Wonders of the African World". I love the West Coast Africa and from the five Countries and many Cities I have been to there they will always be apart of my soul and life. I love the Womens and the life! It is where are people are from!



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Reginald F. Lewis was born on December 7, 1942 in an East Baltimore neighborhood he once described as “semi-tough.” Lewis was strongly influenced by his family. His parents, grandparents. uncles, and aunts always encouraged Lewis to “be the best that you can be.” Reginald’s grandmother would teach him the importance of saving, even cutting and peeling strips from the bottom of a tin can and nailing it to the floor of a closet to protect his savings.


Lewis’ grandfather was headwaiter and maitre d’ at a private country club. It was while working there as a teenager that Lewis says his grandfather advised him. - “Know your job and do it well.” He also told Reginald stories about Paris during World War I, cultivating in him a lifelong love of French Language, food, and culture. At the age of ten, Lewis set up a delivery route to sell the Afro American newspaper. After building the business from ten customers to more than a hundred in two years, he sold the route at a profit.

Early Education
Reginald’s family stressed the value of education at an early age. Lewis received early schooling from the Oblate Sisters of Providence, established by women of African descent whose mission was teaching and caring for African American children. Later at Dunbar high School, he distinguished himself as an athlete on the playing field and a hard working student in the class room. He was quarterback of the football team shortstop for varsity baseball, a forward on the basketball team and was team captain of all three. Lewis was also ele cted vice president of the student body.

College at VSU
Reginald F. Lewis entered Virginia State University in 1961 on a football scholarship. An injury cut short his football career and he focused on school and work. One of the jobs was as a photographer’s sales assistant. He generated so much business that he was offered a partnership. Reginald declined because he had bigger things in mind for the future. A handwritten schedule that he kept says: “To be a good lawyer, one must study HARD.” And he did, graduating on the dean’s list his senior year.


Onward to Harvard Law In 1965, the Rockefeller Foundation funded a summer school program at Harvard Law School to introduce a select number of black students to legal studies. Reginald lobbied for his acceptance and got in. He made such an impression that Lewis was invited to attend Harvard Law School that fall — the only person in the 148-year history of the school to be admitted before applying. During his third year at Harvard Law, Lewis discovered the direction his career would take as the result of a course on securities law. His senior year thesis on mergers and acquisitions received an honors grade.
“Those of us on the faculty who saw in him then the promise of greatness had no idea of the extraordinary achievements he was to attain.” -Frank Sander, Professor, Harvard Law School

Law Practice
After graduation (HLS ‘68), Lewis landed a job practicing corporate law with a prestigious New York law firm . Two years later he—along with a few others—set up Wall Street’s first African American law firm. Lewis focused on corporate law, structuring investments in minority owned businesses and became special counsel to major corporations like General Foods and Equitable Life (now AXA).
RFL was of counsel to the New York-based Commission for Racial Justice and represented The Wilmington Ten. He was successful in forcing North Carolina to pay interest on the Wilmington Ten bond.



The Merger and Acquisition Strategy
A desire to "do the deals myself" led Lewis to establish TLC Group, L.P. in 1983. His first successful venture was the S22.5—million dollar leveraged buyout of McCall Pattern Company. It was a struggling business in a declining industry. Lewis streamlined operations, increased marketing, and led the company to two of the most profitable years in McCall’s 113-year history. In the summer of 1987, he sold the company for $65 million, making a 90 to 1 return on his investment.


The 985 Million Dollar Leveraged Buyout
Fresh on the heels of the McCall deal, Lewis purchased the international division of Beatrice Foods (64 companies in 31 countries) in August 1987. The deal was supported by the most powerful investment banker then, Drexel Burnham Lambert, and led by high yield bond king Michael Robert Milken. Lewis, after closing the deal in December 1987, re-branded the corporation as TLC Beatrice International, Inc. At S985 million, the deal was the largest offshore leveraged buyout ever by an American company. As Chairman and CEO, Lewis moved quickly to reposition the company, pay down the debt, and vastly increase the company’s worth. With revenues of $1.5 billion, TLC Beatrice made it to Fortune’s 500 and was first on the Black Enterprise List of Top 100 African American owned businesses.


Transition to Eternal Life
In January 1993, at age 50, Reginald F. Lewis died after a short illness. A letter at his funeral from longtime friend David N. Dinkins, former mayor of New York, said, “Reginald Lewis accomplished more in half a century than most of us could ever deem imaginable. And his brilliant career was matched always by a warm and generous heart.” Dinkins added, “It is said that service to others is the rent we pay on earth. Reg Lewis departed us paid in full.”
“Reginald Lewis held close to his dream. It was a dream fueled by imagination, inspiration, and dedication.” - Hon. David N. Dinkins

The Legacy Continues...
Even after his death, Lewis’ philanthropic endeavors continue. He had expressed a desire to support a museum of African American culture. In 2002. The Maryland State Legislature allocated thirty-two million dollars for a museum of Maryland African American history and culture 10 be built near Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. One component of the museum, a partnership between the museum and the Maryland State Department of Education, focused on an African American curriculum to be developed and taught in all Maryland public schools.
The Foundation board decided that this was what Reginald Lewis would have supported and made its largest grant to date, $5 million. The grant to the Museum was placed in an endowment to support education programs. When the museum opened in June 2005, to great fanfare, it was named the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History and Culture.



Lawyer, entrepreneur, philanthropist, CEO, devoted family man, loyal friend—Reginald F. Lewis lived his life according to the words he often quoted to audiences around the country;
“Keep going, no matter what.”
Lewis’ biography “Why Should White Guys Have All the Fun?” was co-authored by former USA Today business writer Blair Walker and made the Best Seller list of Business Week when published in 1994.





Kool Guy - huh?



Peace, Blessings & Stay Up!​

 

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Mayme Agnew Clayton (1923-2006)
Mayme Agnew Clayton (August 4, 1923 – October 13, 2006) was a librarian, and the Founder, President & Spiritual Leader of the Western States Black Research and Education Center (WSBREC), the largest privately held collection of African-American historical materials in the world. The collection represents the core holdings of the Mayme A. Clayton Library Museum and Cultural Center (MCL) located in Culver City, California. The museum is expected to have a low-key opening in late 2010 as fundraising continues.

Over the course of 45 years, Clayton single-handedly and with her own resources, collected more than 30,000 rare and out-of-print books. The collection is considered one of the most important for African-American materials and consists of 3.5 million items on the topic of African-American culture, according to UCLA Magazine. Her collecting grew from her work as a librarian, first at the University of Southern California and later at the University of California, Los Angeles, where she began to build an African-American collection. "Ms. Clayton, an avid golfer, traveled for her sport, trolling for rare finds wherever she went. The centerpiece of the collection that grew this way is a signed copy of Phillis Wheatley’s Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, from 1773. First published by an American of African descent, the book was acquired for $600 from a New York dealer in 1973. In 2002 it was appraised at $30,000," according to the New York Times.
Other items in her collection include movie posters (one featuring Stepin Fetchit), newspaper clippings regarding actress Dorothy Dandridge, and a letter handwritten by educator Booker T. Washington.

Mayme Agnew was born in Van Buren, Arkansas on August 4, 1923. Her father, Jerry Agnew, Sr. owned and operated a general store, the only black-owned business in Van Buren. Dr. Clayton’s mother, Mary Knight Agnew was a homemaker and renowned Southern cook, whose dinner gatherings drew friends from far and near. She had two siblings, Jerry, Jr. and Sarah Elizabeth (a well-known Southern California educator). Jerry and Mary consciously chose to expose their children to African Americans of accomplishment. During a 1936 visit to Arkansas by Mary MacLeod Bethune, Dr. Clayton’s parents drove a significant distance to be sure that their children could hear her speak. Dr. Bethune remained a lifelong inspiration for Dr. Clayton," according to the MCL website.

She first attended Lincoln University of Missouri before transferring to University of California, Berkeley, where she received a B.A. She moved to New York City in her 20s, met Andrew Lee Clayton, and they married in 1946, and then moved to California to a bungalow in West Adams, California.
She began her career at USC in 1952, until she became a law librarian for UCLA in 1957. In 1969 she helped establish the university’s African-American Studies Center Library, and began to buy out-of-print works by authors from the Harlem Renaissance.
She earned an MLS from Goddard College in Vermont, and was awarded a PhD in Humanities from La Sierra University in 1985.


Peace, Blessings & Stay Up!

 

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Colin Luther Powell was born on April 5, 1937[5] in Harlem, a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan in 1937 to Jamaican immigrant parents Luther Theophilus Powell and Maud Arial McKoy and was raised in the South Bronx. After a long and distinguished military career, he joined BGOL to enforce people not to read
ALL OF THIS FUCKIN BULLSHIT!!!

The Hockey knowledge is dope

 

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