Thursday, February 28, 2013

Martin Luther KIng

                                                      Martin Luther King Jr Histoy





Martin Luther King Jr. was born on January 15, 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia. King, both a Baptist minister and civil-rights activist, had a seismic impact on race relations in the United States, beginning in the mid-1950s. Among many efforts, King headed the SCLC. Through his engagement, he played a key role in ending the legal segregation of African-American citizens in the South and other areas of the nation, as well as the creation of the Civil Rights. He led non-violent protests to fight for the rights of all people including African Americans. He hoped that America and the world could become a colorblind society where race would not impact a person's civil rights. He is considered one of the great speakers of current times and his speeches still inspire many to this day. In his first major civil rights action, Martin Luther King Jr . led the Montgomery Bus Boycott. This started when Rosa Parks refused to move to give up her seat on a bus to a white man. As a result, Martin led a boycott of the public transportation system. The boycott lasted for over a year. It was very tense at times. Martin was arrested and his house was bombed, but in the end he succeeded and segregation on the Montgomery busses ended.

 I chosed to do Marthin Luther King JR because he had inspired  Many African and American people. He had made the world  better between black and white because there was rascicms going on as well as not having equal rghts within each other. For example, white people had more freedom than the black people. White poeple basically could do anything they wanted during that late century. They had more power than African americans did. I learned that he had a simple mission which that was to unite the world as one which that means it doesnt matter where your from or what skin colr you have as long we all have our equal rights and freedom. His speech was basically about  That one day he wants it to be, that boys and girls of all races are treated all the same, and there was no spliting of the races at all.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lX1zIIMQg30&safe=active 

This is a video of one of his speech called "I have a Dream".


Monday, February 25, 2013


Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
When Kareem Abdul-Jabbar left the game in 1989 at age 42, no NBA player had ever scored more points, blocked more shots, won more MVP awards, played in more All-Star Games, or logged more seasons. His list of personal and team accomplishments is perhaps the most awesome in league history: Rookie of the Year, member of six NBA championship teams, six-time NBA MVP, two-time NBA Finals MVP, 19-time All-Star, two-time scoring champ, and a member of the NBA 35th and 50th Anniversary All-Time Teams.

Thursday, February 14, 2013

Miles Davis


 History of Miles Davis

     Miles Davis was a son of a wealthy dental surgeon and a music teacher. Miles Davis was born on May 26, 1926 in Alton, Illinois. Miles’s father introduces him to the trumpet at age 13. He quickly advanced a talent by having a private tutor of Elwood Buchanan. Elwood Buchanan was a friend of his father who directed a music school. Buchanan played the trumpet without vibrato, which was a opposing to the common style used by trumpeters such as Louis Armstrong, and which would come to influence and help improve to Miles Davis. 
     Miles played professionally while in high school. At the age of 17, the famous Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker invited him to join them on stage when they needed a trumpet player because one of his band mates was sick. In 1944, Miles left Illinois to New York, where he joined the Institute of Musical Art (Julliard). While attending school, Miles look for Charlie Parker, and once he joined with him, Miles began to play at Harlem nightclubs. 
In 1945, Miles decided to drop out of Julliard with the permission of his father and become a full-time jazz musician.In 1949, Davis formed a nine-piece band with uncommon additions, such as the French horn, trombone and tuba.

In 1990, Miles received the Lifetime Achievement Grammy for his figure of work. In 1991, he played with Quincy Jones at the Montreux Jazz Festival.

Later in that same year, on September 21, 1991, that Davis would accede to pneumonia and respiratory failure and die at the age of 65. He was considered one of the top musicians of his era and he was an influence of Jazz. 















I really like the beat of this song and how he is playing the trumpet.

Monday, February 11, 2013

John Hope Franklin



John Hope Franklin




John Hope Franklin was born in Rentiesville, Oklahoma. He was raised in Tulsa and he graduated from Fisk University in 1935.  He also earned a master's and a doctorate in history from Harvard University. He study hard and pay a lot of attention to school to achieve the scholarly discipline necessary to write the story of his race. He also wanted include painful events that touched his own life. John Hope Franklin was an African American writer. In 1997 John Hope Franklin's literary landmark From Slavery to Freedom was marked as the fiftieth anniversary of the publication. In its seventh edition, translated into five languages and a lot of them were sold. Unlike any others , it has reshaped the way of African American history understanding and teaching. Since he start to write, John Hope Franklin has become one of the world's most celebrated historians. He published The Color Line which is a Legacy for the Twenty-First Century. His most recent book, is My Life and an Era. John Hope Franklin is James B. Duke and he is a Professor Emeritus of History at Duke University and also served on the faculties at St. Augustine's College, Howard University, Brooklyn College, and the University of Chicago. He is a former president of the Southern Historical Association. He received dozens of major awards and more than 100 honorary degrees. In 1995, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom which is one of the nation's highest civilian honor. That same year John Hope Franklin Research Center was founded at Duke as a repository for African and African American studies documentation.





Sunday, February 10, 2013

I Just Called To Say I Love You





-"He has created a very distinctive body of music that has become an important part of America's fabric." (James H. Billington)


Stevie Wonder was born blind on May 13, 1950, Saginaw, Michigan.  He showed an early gift for music, first with a church choir in Detroit, and later with a bevy of instruments including the harmonica, piano, and drums, all of which he taught himself before the age of ten. He was just 11 years old when he was discovered by Ronnie White of the Motown band, the Miracles. In 1962, he released his debut album, Little Stevie Wonder the 12 Year Old Genius. In 1980s, he produced a selection of hits that included the soundtrack single "I Just Called to Say I Love You" for the Gene Wilder film, The Woman in Red (1984). This single also won Wonder an Oscar. Also in the 1980s, Wonder successfully spearhead a movement to create a national holiday recognizing Dr. Martin Luther King. Over the course of his long career, Wonder, who has been married twice and has seven children, has been honored with numerous awards. He has won 25 Grammys, a number that includes his Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1989 he was elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. More recently Wonder was recognized with the Second Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song in 2009.

I'm really amazed at him, because he has won tons of awards even he's blind. He also sings in the "We are the World", which is my favorite song.




Saturday, February 9, 2013

Harriet Tubman



Civil Rigths Activist


Harriet Tubman was born to enslaved parents in Dorchester County, Maryland, in 1820 and originally named Araminta Harriet Ross.Tubman was a short woman without characteristic features. With a bandanna on her head and several front teeth missing, she tolerated the harsh existence of a field hand, including brutal beatings. In 1849 she fled slavery, leaving her husband and family behind. She returned to the South at least nineteen times to lead her family and hundreds of other slaves to freedom through the Underground Railroad in 1850. Operating her native intelligence and drawing on her boundless courage, she escaped bounty hunters seeking a reward for her capture. Tubman also served as a spy and nurse during the Civil War. Her services as nurse, and spy were asked by the Union government. For more than three years she nursed the sick and wounded in Florida.  As leader of a corps of local blacks, she made rebel territory, collecting information.  Tubman led the way on his celebrated expedition up the Combahee River in June 1863. For all of her work, Tubman was paid only two hundred dollars over a three-year period and had to support herself by selling pies, gingerbread, and root beer.

After the war, Tubman returned to Auburn, New York, and continued to help blacks forge new lives in freedom. She cared for her parents and other needy relatives, turning her residence into the Home for Indigent and Aged Negroes. Lack of money continued to be a pressing problem, and she financed the home by selling copies of her biography and giving speeches. Her most memorable appearance was at the organizing meeting of the National Association of Colored Women in 1896 in Washington, D.C. Two generations came together to celebrate the strength of black women and to continue their struggle for a life of dignity and respect. Harriet Tubman, the oldest member present, was the embodiment of their strength and their struggle.

Muhammad Ali





Muhammad Ali is one of the greatest boxer of all time in my perspective. Ali was born January 17,1942 in Louisville Kentucky. At the age of 12, he discovered his talent for boxing when a kid stole his bike. So he went to the police officer which was Joe Martin and said  " I want to beat up the guy who stole my bike'' And Joe Martin replied ''Well, you better learn how to fight before you start challenging people," So that was the point when Ali pursue boxing and the funny part was the police officer was his trainer. Joe Martin (Police Officer) trained Ali how to box and soon began his boxing career. In 1960 Ali won a spot on the U.S Olympic boxing team. After he defeated Zbigniew Pietrzkowski from Poland; Ali than won a gold medal which was the best experience of his life. After his Olympic victory, Ali heralded as an American hero.
As years past by, Ali  was doing some religious searching and decided to join the black Muslim group which was lead by Elijia Muhammad and was called ''the Nation of Islam''. In 1964. At first, he called himself "Cassius X," but  eventually he changed to Muhammad Ali. Hear is a small  Documentary video about him http://www.biography.com/people/muhammad-ali-9181165



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cR2kPDpDu8M<<  Here are  Ali boxing highlights back in the days.




Friday, February 8, 2013




Jack Roosevelt Robinson

Jack Roosevelt Robinson born  Cairo, Georgia January 31, 1919. He was the youngest of five children. He gave up the football career to join the U.S. Army in 1942. While a member of the armed forces, he faced charges for refusing to move to the back of bus. The day that Jackie and led him to dedicate himself to the fight for equality in American Society. After leaving the army in 1944, he played in the Negro Leagues. Opposing crowds and ballplayers often taunted Robinson, and some players on his own team did not support him. However Jack never give up , and he won the MVP award in 1949. Robinson was able to further his passion for equality. He spoke out against injustice, testified before the House of Representatives, and served on the board of the NAACP. He death in 1972, his wife Rachel Imus established the Jackie Robinson Foundation, which honors his legacy and provides scholarships to youth.

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Negro History Week




How Did It All Started?

 
For my article on African American History Month, I decided to investigate who was the person behind that made the decision that African History had to be remembered. So I found that person was Carter G. Woodson. He was son of two former slaves James and Eliza Riddle Woodson, but that didn’t stop him from getting his PhD on history from Harvard University. In 1915, Woodson and Jesse E. Moorland co-founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (ASNLH). The organization was the platform that launched his mission of the importance and awareness of Black history. I believe that by doing this he wanted to show the people how much did African people contributed to the development of our civilization. He could also have done it so people wouldn't forget how they had fought for what they want it; while I was reading this article I discovered that to make people more aware of the Black history, Woodson and his ASNLH peers started the celebration of the “Negro History Week” which later on expanded to a month. I always had tough that the Black History Month was originally an idea that came from the government in a way to honor many other heroes that made history for their people, so their people would have a voice to identify with. However it was them who decided that they need it to let people know how as any other “normal” person they did too, had to work extra hard to keep a roof over their heads and families’ heads, to bring a piece of bread to the table, and still remind faithful that someday their stories would be told.




Another person I came across while doing my research was John Hope Franklin, who grabbed  my attention because he won the John W. Kluge Prize for Achievement in the Study of Humanity. This prize consist on recognizes and celebrates work of the highest quality and greatest impact in areas that advance understanding of the human experience. The prize is awarded for lifetime achievement in fields of humanistic and social science studies that are not included in the Nobel Prizes. The reason I decided to keep researching about this other hero is because he was honored an amazing price for his knowledge about humanity and not only the knowledge of it but the understanding of it too. Also because he wrote many books such as Mirror to America, relating to the Civil Rights. To me I believe he gave the perspective of how being an African American was, and to show that he was gave that award show his fully comprehension of human nature, but mostly it  shows his comprehension of the reason of why the human nature decides to take action. 
 

Monday, February 4, 2013

Marian Anderson

                                       Proving Her Talents
 
 
       Marian Anderson was born in February 27, 1897, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She began singing at an early age. Her father did everything so his daughter can have singing lessons. After her father died she began teaching herself and also many helped her and her family economically. She was known for trying hard and perfected the songs she sang.
      She had won many recognized prizes, including the chance to sing at the Lewisohn in New York. After she continued her tour through Europe in 1928. She got famous in many countries for the talent she had of singing. She was considered the first African American to receive an invitation to perform at the White house,  but actually she performed  at the Lincoln Memorial. She was really brave to do this I’m proud of her, even though people didn’t want her to sing because of her race color, she sang and stood up bravely. She encourages many African Americans to make them value themselves by doing things like and enjoy even though people disagree with them. She also encourages other by being the first African American singer to perform the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. In many occasions she was rejected to sing in some places because of her color but still she made proud her people by showing her talents to others.  
 
 
 
 

Breaking the Color Barrier



The date April 15, 1947 was an important one for African Americans. On that day, Jack Roosevelt Robinson (1919-1972), better known as Jackie Robinson, became the first African-American Major League Baseball player.
As a member of the Montreal Royals (AAA farm team) and later the Brooklyn Dodgers, Robinson is remembered not only for his athleticism, but for breaking the color barrier as well. In fact, his impact was so great that Larry Doby, the first African-American baseball player in the American League, joined the Cleveland Indians only three months later. African American Satchel Paige also became a Cleveland Indian the following year. Jackie Robinson became a heroic symbol in African-American communities and served as an inspiration to those who had never been given equal opportunities to succeed.
Robinson had been a stellar athlete in college as well, lettering in four sports at the University of California at Los Angeles. Brought to the major leagues by the Brooklyn Dodgers' general manager Branch Rickey, Robinson endured death threats, physical abuse, and taunting. In the end, however, Robinson stood victorious by becoming the first-ever Rookie of the Year in Major League Baseball, winner of the National League batting title, and Most Valuable Player for the 1949 season. Because of his success, increasing numbers of African Americans began to play professional sports.

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Maternity Leave: Week One Update

My first week of maternity leave has been mostly recovery from child birth and getting used to a new schedule. I received all the wonderful informal letters from students today and they all made me smile.  Many asked for more pictures and details about our new baby’s name, so here goes...

The Name: Kristoff David
My husband and I couldn’t agree 100% on a name. We both craved a name with a special meaning, but were unable to find one that we both liked. While in labor and walking around the hospital, the two of us went through almost every name in “The Perfect Baby Name” book by Jeanine Cox. We eventually stumbled onto Kristoff. This is a Scandinavian version of Christopher. Christopher is the patron saint of travelers and also my husband's middle name. David is my husband's first name. Kristoff David gave us a new and interesting way to include the baby's namesake as well as originality.

The Birth:
Let’s just say, it was a long day and a half! I didn’t sleep for about 36 hours, but it was all worth it. Kristoff is amazing.

The Attitude:
Although babies typically don’t smile until they are several months old, Kristoff has already showed us some personality: