Fact #3
Allensworth is the only California community to be founded, financed and governed by African-Americans. Created by Allen Allensworth in 1908, the town was built with the intention of establishing a self-sufficient, all-black city where African-Americans could live their lives free of racial discrimination.
Fact #4
Jazz, an African–American musical form born out of the Blues, Ragtime, and marching bands originated in Louisiana during the turn of the 19th century. The word Jazz is a slang term that at one point referred to a sexual act.
Fact #5
Artist Charles Alston founded the "306 Group", a club that provided support and apprenticeship for African-American artists during the 1940s. It served as a studio space for prominent African-American artists such as poet Langston Hughes; sculptor Augusta Savage; and mixed-media artist Romare Bearden.
Fact #6
Before Wally Amos became famous for his "Famous Amos" chocolate chip cookies, he was a talent agent at the William Morris Agency, where he worked with the likes of The Supremes and Simon & Garfunkel.
Fact #7
Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated on friend Maya Angelou's birthday on April 4th, 1968. Angelou stopped celebrating her birthday for many years afterward, and sent flowers to King's widow every year until Mrs. King's death in 2006.
Fact #8
Louis Armstrong bought his first coronet at the age of 7 with money he borrowed from his employers. He taught himself to play while in a home for juvenile delinquents.
Fact #9
Musician Louis Armstrong earned the nickname "Satchmo" from his peers. The name was short for "satchelmouth", a reference to the way he puffed his cheeks when he played his trumpet.
Fact #10
After a long career as an actress and singer, Pearl Bailey earned a bachelor's in theology from Georgetown University in 1985.
Fact #11
After African-American performer Josephine Baker expatriated to France, she famously smuggled military intelligence to French allies during World War II. She did this by pinning secrets inside her dress, as well as writing them in invisible ink on her sheet music.
Fact #12
Scientist and mathematician Benjamin Banneker is credited with helping to design the blueprints for Washington, D.C.
Fact #13
Before he was a renowned artist, Romare Bearden was also a talented baseball
player. He was recruited by the Philadelphia Athletics on the pretext that he
would agree to pass as white. He turned down the offer, instead choosing to
work on his art.
player. He was recruited by the Philadelphia Athletics on the pretext that he
would agree to pass as white. He turned down the offer, instead choosing to
work on his art.
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