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Bettis Academy, the 1882 school that trained Negro youth taking farm produce as fees
Seeing that educational opportunities availed to African-Americans was scant, former slave Rev. Alexander Bettis established Bettis Academy and opened its doors on January 1, 1882 to the public. Bettis...
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Remembering Jim Kelly, first black martial arts film star who starred alongside Bruce Lee in ‘Enter the Dragon’
James Milton Kelly, simply known as Jim Kelly, competed in tennis, basketball, football as well as track and field. He might have focused his energies on these outlets had a coach not referred to a Black...
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From a nightclub performer at age 16, Lena Horne ruled Hollywood and got blacklisted for 7 years
In the early 1940s, Walter White, the leader of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) took a stand that portrayals of black American females as maids and men as coons in...
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Why did rock and roll pioneer Fats Domino refuse invitation to his own induction and the White House?
Fats Domino was an American pianist and singer-songwriter, who was one of the pioneers of rock and roll music, as well as, an early rhythm-and-blues star. Helping to define the New Orleans sound with his...
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Did you know spiritual leader Louis Farrakhan was a Calypso musician?
Many black Americans wrote off Louis Farrakhan Sr. now 87 years when already suspecting him of instigating Malcolm X’s assassination in 1965, he made remarks to the effect that what business was...
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Vernie Merze Tate, the professor born to farmers who toured six continents
Never married and without children, Vernie Merze Tate applied herself to scholarship. As a woman of many firsts, she was the first African-American graduate of Western Michigan Teachers College, first...
