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Juneteenth Signed into Law as a Federal Holiday

Juneteenth Signed into Law as a Federal Holiday

By goodblacknews on June 17, 2021

Today President Joe Biden signed into law that June 19, best known as “Juneteenth” will now be a U.S. federal holiday, effective immediately.

“Juneteeth” is the term that has been used across centuries to commemorate June 19, 1865, the day enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, first learned from Union Army Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger that the Civil War was over, and they were free by order of the president (Lincoln, who had issued the Emancipation 2 1/2 years earlier). Celebrations occurred every year in Texas on Juneteenth, and later spread across the South as the idea caught on.

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management, which is the human resources office for the federal government, tweeted today that most federal employees will observe the new holiday — Juneteenth National Independence Day — on Friday since June 19 falls on a Saturday this year.

Biden said signing the legislation into law is one of the greatest honors he will have as president. Vice President Kamala Harris also signed the legislation in her capacity as President of the Senate.

By making Juneteenth a federal holiday, “all Americans can feel the power of this day, and learn from our history, and celebrate progress and grapple with the distance we’ve come but the distance we have to travel,” Biden said.

Activist Opal Lee (via marketwatch.com)

Biden also praised the efforts of Opal Lee, 94, an activist who at the age of 89 walked from her home in Fort Worth to Washington, D.C., to get Juneteenth named a national holiday.  Biden referred to her as “a grandmother of the movement to make Juneteenth a federal holiday.”

Katori Hall, Les Payne and Tamara Payne, Darnella Frazier, Wesley Morris and More Win Pulitzer Prizes in 2021

Katori Hall, Les Payne and Tamara Payne, Darnella Frazier, Wesley Morris and More Win Pulitzer Prizes in 2021

By goodblacknews on June 11, 2021

Mitchell S. Jackson’s winning essay from June 2020, Twelve Minutes and a Life, offered a deeply affecting account of the killing of Ahmaud Arbery that combined vivid writing, thorough reporting and personal experience to shed light on systemic racism in America.

A formerly incarcerated person, Jackson is also a social justice advocate who engages in outreach in prisons and youth facilities in the United States and abroad.

Georgetown University professor Marcia Chatelain’s Franchise offers a nuanced account of the complicated role the fast-food industry plays in African-American communities, a portrait of race and capitalism that masterfully illustrates how the fight for civil rights has been intertwined with the fate of Black businesses.

Hall’s Hot Wing King is a deeply felt consideration of Black masculinity and how it is perceived, filtered through the experiences of a loving gay couple and their extended family as they prepare for a culinary competition.

Tania Leon’s Stride premiered at David Geffen Hall, Lincoln Center, New York City on February 13, 2020, a musical journey full of surprise, with powerful brass and rhythmic motifs that incorporate Black music traditions from the US and the Caribbean into a Western orchestral fabric.

To see the complete list of 2021 Pulitzer Prize recipients and more details about them, click here.

[Photo collage: top l-r are Darnella Frazier, Wesley Morris, Tania León; bottom l-r are Katori Hall, Michael Paul Williams, Marcia Chatelain via pulitzer.org]

(paid links)

School Board in Jacksonville, FL Votes to Rename Six Schools Honoring Confederates

School Board in Jacksonville, FL Votes to Rename Six Schools Honoring Confederates

By goodblacknews on June 7, 2021

After an almost year-long campaign and debates led by grassroots racial justice organizations (like the Northside Coalition of Jacksonville), the Duval County School Board in Jacksonville, Florida has voted to change the names of six schools currently named after figures prominent in the Confederacy during the U.S. Civil War.

Come August 3, Kirby-Smith Middle School will become Springfield Middle School, Joseph Finegan Elementary School will become Anchor Academy, Stonewall Jackson Elementary School will become Hidden Oaks Elementary, Jefferson Davis Middle School will become Charger Academy, J.E.B. Stuart Middle School will become Westside Middle School and Robert E. Lee High School will renamed Riverside High.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, there are 103 public schools named for Confederate leaders in the U.S. The SPLC also points out that the years Jim Crow laws emerged and the Civil Rights movement took place were the years with the greatest increase in the dedication of Confederate monuments and symbols.

Whose Heritage map via SPLC.org

“At this point in time it’s important to start thinking about who we want to be,” said Duval County public schools board chair Elizabeth Andersen. “As a board, we were listening to our community members and wanting to move forward so that every student that walks in our building understands that they are respected, that they are capable of achieving their highest potential, and that all of their lives matter.”

MUSIC MONDAY: “Where I’m From” – A Free-Wheeling Celebration of African American Music Appreciation Month 2021 (LISTEN)

MUSIC MONDAY: “Where I’m From” – A Free-Wheeling Celebration of African American Music Appreciation Month 2021 (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on June 7, 2021

by Marlon West (FB: marlon.west1 Twitter: @marlonw IG: stlmarlonwest Spotify: marlonwest)

Happy Monday again, you all.

Well, it is always African American Music Appreciation Month (aka Black Music Month) around these parts! We celebrate Black music every week here at Good Black News.

It’s been more than a year since I started making weekly playlists honoring African American music in its many forms.

If you’ve been tuning in with any regularity, you know I am no stranger to a free-wheeling and hours-long playlist.

When it comes to a collection that tracks Gospel, Blues, Jazz, R&B, Rock, Hip-Hop, and everything in between, this one was bound to be a long one:

Have a great week.

Marlon West (photo courtesy Marlon West)

[Editor’s Note: ICYMI, below are links to some of Marlon’s most popular playlists from 2020. Enjoy!]

“We Will Never Forget”: Omarion, Lalah Hathaway and Kierra Sheard’s Tulsa Tribute Anthem Proceeds to Aid Reparations Campaign for Massacre Survivors and Descendants (WATCH)

“We Will Never Forget”: Omarion, Lalah Hathaway and Kierra Sheard’s Tulsa Tribute Anthem Proceeds to Aid Reparations Campaign for Massacre Survivors and Descendants (WATCH)

By goodblacknews on June 2, 2021

It’s more than fitting that this year’s Black Music Month begins with the release of a tribute anthem honoring the legacy of Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma on the 100th anniversary of its purposeful destruction, which was officially acknowledged by President Joe Biden in a speech yesterday.

“We Will Never Forget” is the featured track from LeBron James’ Springhill Company and CNN Documentary film, Dreamland: The Burning of Black Wall Street, that premiered on CNN on the centennial anniversary of the Black Wall Street Massacre May 31, 2021.

This soul stirring song recorded by Omarion, Lalah Hathaway and Kierra Sheard, written and produced by Greg Curtis and executive produced by Michelle Le Fleur, honors the families and descendants of the 1921 Greenwood District massacre in Tulsa. 

Proceeds from the single benefit social change grassroots organization Color of Change to aid the social justice movement to end systemic racism and racially motivated violence.

Color of Change currently has a campaign going to demand the Centennial Commission and City of Tulsa give 80% of the $30 million raised to the survivors and descendants of the Tulsa Race Massacre. Learn more about it here.

To learn more about Tulsa, read: Tulsa, 1921: Reporting a Massacre

or The Burning: Massacre, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921

(paid links)

HISTORY: Honoring Memorial Day and its African American Origins

HISTORY: Honoring Memorial Day and its African American Origins

By goodblacknews on May 31, 2021

[Photo/Image via chicagocrusader.com]

Although May 30, 1868 is cited as the first national commemoration of Memorial Day at Arlington National Cemetery, events lead by African Americans in Charleston, SC to decorate the graves of fallen Civil War soldiers occurred on May 1, 1865, less than a month after the Confederacy surrendered.

Reports of this early version of Memorial Day or “Decoration Day” as it was called, were rediscovered in the Harvard University archives in the late 1990s by historian David Blight, author of the 2018 biography Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom.

To quote from history.com:

When Charleston fell and Confederate troops evacuated the badly damaged city, those freed from enslavement remained. One of the first things those emancipated men and women did was to give the fallen Union prisoners a proper burial. They exhumed the mass grave and reinterred the bodies in a new cemetery with a tall whitewashed fence inscribed with the words: “Martyrs of the Race Course.”

And then on May 1, 1865, something even more extraordinary happened. According to two reports that Blight found in The New York Tribune and The Charleston Courier, a crowd of 10,000 people, mostly freed slaves with some white missionaries, staged a parade around the race track. Three thousand Black schoolchildren carried bouquets of flowers and sang “John Brown’s Body.” Members of the famed 54th Massachusetts and other Black Union regiments were in attendance and performed double-time marches. Black ministers recited verses from the Bible.

Despite the size of the gathering and newspaper coverage, the memory of this event was “suppressed by white Charlestonians in favor of their own version of the day,” Blight stated in the New York Times in 2011.

On May 31, 2010, near a reflecting pool at Hampton Park, the city of Charleston reclaimed this history by installing a plaque commemorating the site as the place where Blacks held the first Memorial Day on May 1, 1865.

During the dedication of the plaque, the city’s mayor at the time, Joe Riley, was present to celebrate the historic occasion which included a brass band and a reenactment of the Massachusetts 54th Regiment.

In 2017, the City of Charleston erected yet another sign reclaiming the history and commemorating the event:

Read more:

Tina Turner, Jay Z Among Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Inductees for 2021

Tina Turner, Jay Z Among Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Inductees for 2021

By goodblacknews on May 12, 2021

[Photos: Jay Z / Tina Turner via wikipedia.commons.org]

Among the six inductees who’ll be formally inducted as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame class of are rock and R&B legend Tina Turner, and hip hop artist and impresario Jay Z. This will be Turner’s second induction — she was voted in in 1991 as part of the Ike & Tina Turner duo.

Additionally, LL Cool J, who has been nominated six times since 2010, is being honored with a “Musical Excellence Award.”

Joining LL Cool J in getting that Musical Excellence honor is solo star and “fifth Beatle” Billy Preston, and jazz/soul visionary Gil Scott-Heron is being recognized with an Early Influence Award along with early 20th century blues musician Charley Patton.

Finally, the Ahmet Ertegun Award, usually given to record industry executives or other non-performing figures, goes to Clarence Avant this year, the trailblazer who was subject of the 2019 Netflix documentary The Black Godfather.

The four other main inductees this year are the Go-Go’s, Todd Rundgren, Carole King and Foo Fighters.

The 36th annual ceremony is set for October 30 at Cleveland’s Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse, a return to a live event with performances. Due to the pandemic, last year’s class was inducted virtually in pre-recorded segments that aired on HBO.

SiriusXM subscribers will be able to hear a live simulcast with edited version to be aired later on HBO and HBO Max.

Born on this Day in 1927: Civil Rights Activist, Icon and Author Coretta Scott King (WATCH)

Born on this Day in 1927: Civil Rights Activist, Icon and Author Coretta Scott King (WATCH)

By goodblacknews on April 27, 2021

Practically all Americans celebrate or at the very least know about the national Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday. But how many know it came to pass because of the activism and efforts of his widow, Coretta Scott King?

Today, on what would have been Coretta Scott King’s 94th birthday, we honor and celebrate her.

Coretta Scott King worked alongside MLK Jr. throughout the civil rights movement, and continued social justice work for decades after his assassination in 1968 until her own passing in 2006.

The mother of four founded the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in 1968 and activist lobbied tirelessly for fifteen years to have her late husband’s birthday recognized as a federal holiday.

In 1983 she finally succeeded when President Ronald Reagan signed a bill into law declaring MLK Day starting on January 20, 1986. Coretta Scott King honored the occasion in Atlanta, Georgia, placing a wreath on King’s tomb and holding a ceremony at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr. King had served as co-pastor for eight years before his death.

Coretta Scott King also spoke up for women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, against the Vietnam War, against apartheid in South Africa and called out the FBI for its extensive surveillance of both her and MLK. King wrote about her life and work in the book My Life With Martin Luther King, Jr., first published in 1969.

In 2005, King allowed her alma mater, Antioch College, to create the Coretta Scott King Center as a learning resource to address issues of race, class, gender, diversity, and social justice for the campus and the surrounding community. The Center opened in 2007.

King was inducted into the Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame in 2009 and the National Women’s Hall of Fame in 2011.

To learn more about her life and legacy, watch the video above, or check out the books My Life, My Love, My Legacy and Coretta Scott by Ntozake Shange and Kadir Nelson.

(paid links)

Site of Harriet Tubman’s Cabin Where She Lived With Her Parents in Dorchester County, MD Found by Archaeologists

Site of Harriet Tubman’s Cabin Where She Lived With Her Parents in Dorchester County, MD Found by Archaeologists

By goodblacknews on April 20, 2021

According to the Washington Post, state and federal officials announced that archaeologist Julie Schablitsky and her team believe they have found the site where Harriet Tubman lived with her parents and siblings in the early 1800s in Dorchester County, Maryland before she escaped enslavement and became a conductor for the Underground Railroad.

To quote washingtonpost.com:

The structure, of unknown form, was owned by [Tubman’s] father. A timber foreman and lumberjack who had been enslaved, he had been given his freedom, the house where he lived and a piece of land near the Blackwater River by his enslaver.

Officials said bricks, datable pieces of 19th-century pottery, a button, a drawer pull, a pipe stem, old records and the location all pointed to the spot being the likely site of the Ben Ross cabin.

The find is a crucial piece of Tubman’s story, experts said. And it illuminates the role that her father, and her family, played in her development into the fearless Underground Railroad conductor that she became.

The Underground Railroad was the clandestine network of guides, like Tubman, and safe houses mostly across the eastern United States that rescued thousands of enslaved people from bondage in the South in the years before the Civil War.

Between about 1850 and 1860, using stealth and disguise, Tubman made 13 trips home, spiriting 70 people out of enslavement, historians believe. Among those she saved were several brothers and her parents, who, while no longer enslaved, were still in danger in Maryland.

Her father was a devout patriarch who taught Tubman the ways of the marshy woodlands where they lived and struggled to keep his family together within the machinery of slavery, experts said.

Once free, Ben purchased his enslaved wife, Rit, and for a time sheltered Tubman and several of her siblings, all still enslaved, in his cabin in what is now the federal Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge, south of Cambridge, Md.

Kate Clifford Larson, author of the Harriet Tubman biography Bound For The Promised Land, is quoted as saying: “That landscape became her classroom. Those years she lived with her father were absolutely crucial to the development of Harriet Tubman.”

The project began last year when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service bought for $6 million a 2,600-acre tract adjacent to Blackwater and refuge manager Marcia Pradines heard the Ben Ross cabin might have existed in the tract. She contacted Maryland experts to see if an archaeologist wanted to investigate.

Schablitsky and her team went have been working in the area since last fall and dug over 1,000 test pits. Only recently, after scouring the area with a metal detector, did something finally turn up — a coin from 1808 — that finally lead them on the right path to the right place.

Image without a caption

The coin was found about a quarter-mile from where the cabin would eventually be located, and last month as the team dug further, more artifacts were uncovered from the 1820s-1840s time period.

The combination of records, location and artifacts finally added up, Schablitsky said. “It’s not just one artifact that tells us we have something. It’s the assemblage. It’s the multiple pieces.”

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2021/04/20/harriet-tubman-maryland-home-found/