Fact #30 Bill Cosby Actor and comedian Bill Cosby is also an avid musician. The jazz drummer served as master of ceremonies for the Los Angeles Playboy Jazz Festival for many years, stepping down in 2012. Fact #31 Paul Cuffee, a philanthropist, ship captain and devout Quaker who supported a return to Africa for black citizens, transported 38 free African Americans to Sierra Leone in 1815. He also founded one of the first American integrated schools in 1797. Fact #32 Tice Davids, a runaway slave from Kentucky, may have been the inspiration for the first usage of the term Underground Railroad, though the origins of the term are shrouded in mystery. According to reports, after Davids swam across the Ohio River, his owner was unable to find him. He allegedly told the local paper that if Davids had escaped, he must have traveled on an underground railroad. Davids is thought to have made his way to Ripley, Ohio. Fact #33 At a time when universities did not typically offer financial assistance to black athletes, African-American football star Ernie Davis was offered more than 50 scholarships. Fact #34 Thomas Andrew Dorsey, considered the Father of Gospel Music, was known for his fusion of sacred words and secular rhythms. His most famous composition, Take My Hand, Precious Lord, was recorded by the likes of Elvis Presley and Mahalia Jackson. Fact #35 W.E.B. Du Bois and William Monroe Trotter founded The Niagara Movement, a black civil rights organization that got its name from the groups meeting location - Niagara Falls. Fact #36 W.E.B. Du Bois died one day before Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his I Have a Dream speech at the March on Washington (August 28, 1963).
Posted on: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 23:12:25 +0000
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