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Posts published in May 2015

Grandmaster Flash Joins Upcoming Netflix 1970s Rap Series "The Get Down" as Associate Producer/Adviser

By goodblacknews on May 21, 2015
Grandmaster Flash and Mamoudou Athie
Grandmaster Flash and actor Mamoudou Athie (Photo: Netflix)

 Hip-hop icon Grandmaster Flash is set as an associate producer and adviser on The Get Down, Baz Luhrmann’s upcoming Netflix series about the 1970 NYC music scene and the birth of rap. “I can’t tell you just how much joy and great spirit we are getting from working with some of the founding fathers of the form,” Luhrmann said in a statement. “Not only in music, dance and graffiti but the culture of the time in general. The whole team is absolutely thrilled to have Grandmaster Flash on board.” Netflix also said today that newcomer Mamoudou Athie will play the DJ legend on the show (see photo above). Best known to mainstream audiences for the 1982’s “The Message,” Grandmaster Flash emerged from the ’70s Bronx scene along with fellow DJs Kool Herc and Afrika Bambaataa as a pioneer of the fledgling genre. “Flash developed a host of specific techniques that allowed DJs to move seamlessly from one break beat to another,” said author-journalist Nelson George, part of The Get Down writing team. “Flash’s innovations, developed in his Bronx apartment bedroom, are the bedrock of club spinning, even in the age of (vinyl emulation program) Serato.”

Related: DJ Premier Signs On As Music Producer For VH1 Rap Drama ‘The Breaks’

Flash’s involvement with Get Down follows VH1’s announcement last month of The Breaks, an original movie and potential backdoor pilot about the 1990s NYC hip-hop scene. Gang Starr’s DJ Premier will serve as music producer for that project, becoming the latest music great to oversee soundtracks for TV series including Timbaland on Fox’s Empire and T Bone Burnett on ABC’s Nashville.
article via Erik Pedersen via Deadline.com

Aesthetician Lydia Evans' Skincare Brand SWAG Essentials Flourishes After "Shark Tank" Investors Say No

By goodblacknews on May 21, 2015

Queens Native Kareem Bellamy, Wrongly Imprisoned for 14 Years, Gets $2.75M Settlement from New York State

By goodblacknews on May 21, 2015
Kareem Bellamy, seen reacting when his murder conviction was overturned in 2011, will receive $2.75 million from the state.
Kareem Bellamy, seen reacting when his murder conviction was overturned in 2011, will receive $2.75 million from the state. (Photo: DELMUNDO, ANTHONY FREELANCE NYDN/ANTHONY DELMUNDO)

Innocent Queens man Kareem Bellamy, wrongfully imprisoned for 14 years on murder charges, reaped a $2.75 million windfall from New York State authorities on Wednesday.
“It’s a message that I’ve been saying from the start — that I was innocent,” Bellamy told the Daily News. “But it doesn’t make up for what I went through to be honest.”
Charges against Bellamy, 47, were dropped in 2011 after evidence emerged that cleared him of the fatal Queens stabbing of James Abbott Jr. 17 years earlier.
But prosecutors in the Queens District Attorney’s office never acknowledged that Bellamy was innocent — even after a judge vacated his conviction — arguing instead that an audiotaped confession by a second murder suspect was phony.
“Mr. Bellamy has now been freed from that conviction based on an outright fraud perpetrated against this court,” said Assistant District Attorney Brad Leventhal said at the time. “He has not — I repeat — he has not been exonerated.”
But Bellamy’s longtime lawyer Thomas Hoffman said the settlement, which was approved by Alan C. Marin of the New York Court of Claims, helped make that case.
“It shows some recognition that he never committed the murder,” Hoffman, who has worked with Bellamy for 11 years, told the News. “That’s why it is so symbolic that he received this money.”
Bellamy, a father of three who was incarcerated at the age of 26 until he was 41, was released from prison on bail in 2008.
He now helps advocate for the wrongfully convicted with the Jeffrey Deskovic Foundation.
The Queens District Attorney’s office had no comment by press time.
article by Eli Rosenberg via nydailynews.com

America's Oldest Park Ranger, 93 Year-Old Betty Reid Soskin, Hopes to Inspire Women of Color

By goodblacknews on May 20, 2015
America's Oldest Park Ranger Hopes To Inspire Women of Color Everywhere With Unique Career
America’s Oldest Park Ranger Betty Reid Soskin (photo via bet.com)
If your first thought regarding park rangers resembles something close to a pesky bear and picnic baskets, you clearly haven’t met Betty Reid Soskin, 93, America’s oldest living park ranger.
The nonagenarian, who’s been a member of the National Park Service since she was 85, says she’s not sure that she ever really wanted to be a park ranger, but there’s no way she’s stopping now.
“I still love this uniform. Partly because there’s a silent message to every little girl of color that I pass on the street or in an elevator or on an escalator…that there’s a career choice she may have never thought of,” Soskin said in a recent interview on The Today Show.
Starting her historic career as a file clerk for a segregated union auxiliary in 1942, Soskin then moved to a white neighborhood after World War II, where she received death threats for attempting to build a home there.
Eventually, she found her home among the tons of visitors at Riveter WWII Home Front National Historical Park in Richmond, Calif., where she’s been since 2003.
A walking time capsule, Soskin has made a great joy out of recalling her life to anyone who is interested as she serves as tour guide for the park exhibit “Untold Stories and Lost Conversations,” about the history of wartime women laborers.
She also shares her personal stories as both a political activist and a Black woman in the workforce.
‘Since I’m working from memory, my work tends to be ‘in the moment’ and depends upon my ability to respond to questions out of a well that seems bottomless at times,” she said.
And she’s not planning on retiring any time soon. She clocks in five days a week and says, “And as long as that’s true, and as long as I’m developing new questions, then I’m going to go on living it.”
article by George Chapman Jr. via bet.com

Obama’s New @POTUS Twitter Sets Guinness World Record

By goodblacknews on May 20, 2015
President Barack Obama
President Barack Obama

Barack Obama has joined Twitter and broken a Guinness World Record.

Some of you are probably thinking, “Just joined Twitter? He’s been on the social media site for years—it maybe even helped him win an election.” And you’d be correct—the President’s checkmarked profile, currently with 59.4 million followers, has been active since 2007.

But on Monday, the handle @POTUS (President of the United States) debuted, featuring tweets exclusively from the president. According to Forbes, it was amassing about 3,314 followers per minute in the time between his first tweet around noon and racking up his millionth follower around 4:15 p.m.

So, in just a little more than four hours, the Leader of the Free World got more followers on the microblogging site than many of us will ever see in our social media lifetime.

Within his first 24 hours, Obama was averaging 1,213 followers per minute. As of this writing, he had 2.17 million followers.

He’s still behind Twitter buddy and former President Bill Clinton, who has 3.52 million followers, and former rival Hillary Clinton, who has 3.54 million.

But back to the world record. According to the Huffington Post, Obama logged the “fastest time to reach 1 million followers on Twitter.” That honor had previously been held by Avengers actor Robert Downey Jr., who reached the milestone in about 24 hours upon joining Twitter in April 2014.

His new account is not in the top-tier of users with the most followers—at least not yet. The honor for the most followers belongs to singer Katy Perry, who has 69.9 million followers, and Justin Bieber, who comes in second with 64 million. Obama’s first Twitter account, run by the group Organizing for Action, is at No. 59.4 million followers.
article by Joe Lyons via blackenterprise.com

Born On This Day in 1925: Minister and Human Rights Activist El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (aka Malcolm X)

By goodblacknews on May 19, 2015

Malcolm X Red Headby Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)

Born Malcolm Little on May 19, 1925 in Omaha, Nebraska and known primarily as Malcolm X,  El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz‎ was an African-American minister for the Nation of Islam and a human rights activist who rose to national and international prominence in the 1960s.

He was a courageous advocate for the rights of blacks, a man who indicted white America in the harshest terms for its crimes against black Americans, and one of the greatest and most influential African Americans in U.S. history.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X as told to Alex Haley and published in 1965, remains an important, seminal work to this day, and the Spike Lee-directed feature film Malcolm X garnered critical acclaim as well as an Academy Award nomination for Denzel Washington.

To more fully appreciate the genius of this man, it pays to hear him speak for himself. Even if you just watch the first two minutes of the video below, you will have done yourself an immeasurable favor:

United Negro College Fund Announces New Michael Jackson and Ray Charles Scholarships

By goodblacknews on May 19, 2015

michael-jacksonr-ray-charles
Musical legends Michael Jackson and Ray Charles (photo via eurweb.com)

The United Negro College Fund (UNCF) is putting the icon status of Michael Jackson and Ray Charles towards a great cause with the establishment of two new scholarship programs.
A press release reveals the Michael Jackson scholarship will provide financial assistance to communication arts and social science students attending a UNCF college/university during the upcoming academic year.
To qualify for the scholarship, high school seniors must plan on enrolling at a UNCF member school in the fall. Proof of acceptance at the UNCF college/university must be submitted. Depending on the financial need of the student as verified by the attending University or College, the scholarship will provide an award totaling up $5,000.
In addition to the Michael Jackson scholarship, the release detailed the intent of the Ray Charles Endowed Scholarship, which is set up to help African-American students with high academic promise that have significant financial need.
Endowment scholarships, which are renewable for up to one year, will be awarded to students who meet the recommended eligibility criteria. Criteria includes students being an African-American junior enrolled full-time at a UNCF member HBCU and having a minimum cumulative grade point average of 3.0 on a 4.0 scale. In addition, students must have a demonstrated unmet financial need that is verified by their college or university.
For more details on the Michael Jackson UNCF Scholarship, click here. More information on the Ray Charles Endowment Scholarship can be found here.
article by Qwest7 via eurweb.com

Cicely Tyson, Oprah Winfrey Recognize African American Achievements In TV During Paley Center Tribute

By goodblacknews on May 17, 2015
OPRAH WINFREY CICELY TYSON
Oprah Winfrey and Cicely Tyson at A Tribute To African-American Achievements In Television hosted by The Paley Center For Media at Cipriani Wall Street on May 13, 2015 in New York City. (Photo by Mike Coppola/Getty Images)
The Paley Center for Media hosted a star-studded event Thursday evening celebrating the 35th anniversary of BET’s launch, as well as the groundbreaking achievements of African-Americans in television over the years.
The guest list was basically a who’s who of black America. Everyone from Oprah Winfrey, Cicely Tyson, Larry Wilmore, Tracee Ellis Ross, Lee Daniels, Kerry Washington, Michael Strahan and Phylicia Rashad. Winfrey kicked off the night with an opening monologue, during which she expressed her gratitude for the evolution of African-Americans contributing to some of today’s most successful shows on television.
“When I was growing up there were so few people of color on television, but when there was one of us we would end up missing it because we would be calling everybody else saying, ‘it’s coming on right now. Turn on ‘Ed Sullivan.’ It’s coming on,’” she said. “So part of the power of tonight’s event will be to appreciate and to honor our history as we continue to be an interval part of the entertainment industry.”
One of the evening’s many heartfelt moments occurred during Cicely Tyson’s speech in recognition of her illustrious career. The iconic actress went on to recall the time where she received backlash for her 1963 role as secretary Jane Foster on the CBS drama series “East Side/West Side.” The breakthrough role — which featured Tyson wearing a natural hair style — marked a first for a black actress and sparked a nationwide hair movement.
“This has been a wonderful evening and an emotional evening for me watching the positive strides we’ve taken over the years. We’re not there yet, but we’re going to get there,” Tyson declared. “I have been especially moved by the moments that were a flashback for me… when I first appeared on the air with a natural and received barrels of negative letters that had to do with the fact that I was disgracing the role of the image of black women when I was in a position to glorify it.”
“Well, finally at last I am ecstatic to say that we as a race of people have come to recognize and accept the fact that our pride and glory is our hair… that doesn’t mean you can’t wear your hair the way you want to.”
article by Brennan Williams via huffingtonpost.com

Claudine Gay Appointed Dean of Social Science at Harvard University

By goodblacknews on May 17, 2015

Harvard Dean Claudine Gay (photo via harvardgazette.com)
Professor Claudine Gay (photo via news.harvard.edu)

Claudine Gay, a Harvard professor of government and African and African American Studies, and a distinguished scholar of mass political behavior, has been appointed the Dean of Social Science.
Gay, who will begin her new role on July 1, joined the Harvard faculty in 2006, and has served as director of graduate studies for the Department of Government for the past five years. She has also been a member of the Committee on General Education, and earlier this year joined the Steering Committee for the Institute of Quantitative Social Science. She serves on numerous editorial boards and scientific associations, and is vice president of the Midwest Political Science Association.

Beyoncé Travels to Haiti For United Nations Humanitarian Mission

By goodblacknews on May 17, 2015

Beyonce in HaitiBeyoncé recently traveled to Haiti in an effort to assist the United Nations on a humanitarian mission.
According to Vibe, with her organization BeyGood, Beyonce visited towns throughout the country to help with food, water and other imperative resources including medical attention from the UN doctors.
Haiti U.N. mission spokeswoman Sophie Boutaud de la Combe said Saturday that Beyonce made the visit to see what progress has been made since the 2010 earthquake that devastated the country.
De la Combe says the singer visited Haiti with Valerie Amos, undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator and that she was also able to “meet some of the people who were affected by it.”
Beyonce posted several pictures to her Instagram account documenting her trip to Haiti with a simple caption that reads, “Haiti. Humanitarian Mission with the UN.”
It wasn’t immediately clear how long Beyonce’s stop in Haiti was or exactly where she visited.

The country is still recovering from the 2010 tragedy that shattered Haiti’s capital and surrounding areas and claimed as many as 300,000 lives.

article by Dominique Hobdy via essence.com