Slide 2 Famous African Americans Slide 3 1996 Honorees Henry
Aaron Slide 4 On April 8, 1974 at the Atlanta Braves Ball Park, the
night seemed charged with human electricity. In the fourth inning,
the Los Angeles Dodgers were leading 3 to 1, but the Braves had a
man on base and Henry Aaron was batting. Al Downing threw a slider
and Aaron blasted it into the stands for home run number 715. Hank
Aaron had broken Babe Ruth's career home run record. For Aaron,
this was the high point in a long journey begun in 1952 when, at
18, he left home in Mobile, Alabama to join the Indianapolis Clowns
in the Negro League. Sometime that year, the Milwaukee Braves
purchased his contract and sent him South to one of its farm teams
to gain experience. Two years later, he returned to Milwaukee. In
1957, the Milwaukee Braves won the World Series and Aaron was
chosen the League's Most Valuable Player (MVP). OHHH H E N R Y ! !
! Slide 5 Continued.. During 1973 & 1974 as Aaron attempted to
break Ruth's record sportswriters called the era, "The Chase." This
created unwanted anxiety and frustration for him (930,000 pieces of
mail alone). Most of it was encouraging, but many expressed racial
taunts and death threats if he dared surpass Ruth's record. As a
precaution, his lifestyle changed & the Braves hired bodyguards
to protect him. While reflecting about his life and baseball Aaron
expressed these concerns: "I wonder if I really need baseball
anymore...and if it really needs me. But whenever I wonder about
it, I usually come to the conclusion that I do, and it does -- at
least for the time being. Baseball needs me because it needs
somebody to stir the pot, and I need it because it's my life. It's
the means I have to make a little difference in the world." Hank
Aaron retired from baseball in 1976 & became an Atlanta Braves
executive. He is currently a senior vice president for Turner
Broadcasting. Slide 6 James Earl Jones ~ Actor Best Known As Voice
of Darth Vader of Star Wars Slide 7 James Earl Jones was born on 17
January 1931, in Mississippi. He is of African-American, American
Indian (Choctaw and Cherokee) & Irish ancestry. His paternal
great-great-grandmother, Parthenia Connolly, was from Ireland &
worked as an indentured servant. She married a former slave named
Brice (no surname) & he took his wife's name Connolly. To help
correct his stuttering, he wrote poetry & read it in front of
class. He also took dramatic lessons to calm himself. It appeared
to work -- he has starred in many films over a 40-year period,
beginning with the classic Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to
Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964).Dr. Strangelove or: How I
Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb Jones is probably best
known for his role as Darth Vader (voice only). He has also
appeared on "The Simpsons" (89) & played Mufasa in The Lion
King (94)."The Simpsons"The Lion King His "death" was erroneously
announced during a live broadcast of an NBA playoff game in 1998.
The deceased was actually James Earl Ray, the convicted assassin of
Martin Luther King.James Earl RayMartin Luther King Slide 8 Richard
Wright Slide 9 190860: American Author Wright was an African
American born on a Mississippi plantation. He struggled through a
difficult childhood & worked to educate himself. He moved to
Chicago in 1927 & in the 1930s joined the city's Federal
Writers' Project & wrote Uncle Tom's Children (1938), a
collection of four novellas dealing with Southern racial problems.
His novel Native Son (1940), which many consider Wright's most
important work, concerns the life of Bigger Thomas, a victimized
African American struggling against the complicated political &
social conditions of Chicago in the 1930s. In 1932, Wright joined
the Communist party but, later left it in disillusionment. After
World War II, Wright moved to Paris. His Black Boy (1945), also
regarded as one of his finest works, is an account of his childhood
and youth. Other works include Twelve Million Black Voices (1941),
a folk history of African Americans; American Hunger (1977), among
others. Originally censored by his publishers due to their racial,
political, or sexual candor, Wright's works were reissued
unexpurgated in 1991. Slide 10 Langston Hughes Writer, Poet, Author
James Langston Hughes was born February 1, 1902, in Joplin,
Missouri. He was raised by his grandmother until he was thirteen,
when he moved to Lincoln, Illinois, to live with his mother and her
husband. It was in Lincoln, Illinois, that Hughes began writing
poetry. Following graduation, he spent a year at Columbia
University & travelled to Africa and Europe working as a
seaman. In November 1924, he moved to Washington, D.C. Hughes's
first book of poetry, The Weary Blues in 1926. He finished his
college education at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania three years
later. In 1930 his first novel, Not Without Laughter, won the
Harmon gold medal for literature. One his most famous poems is..
Theme for English B. Slide 11 Theme for English B by Langston
HughesLangston Hughes The instructor said, Go home and write a page
tonight. And let that page come out of you-- Then, it will be true.
I wonder if it's that simple? I am twenty-two, colored, born in
Winston-Salem. I went to school there, then Durham, then here to
this college on the hill above Harlem. I am the only colored
student in my class. The steps from the hill lead down into Harlem,
through a park, then I cross St. Nicholas, Eighth Avenue, Seventh,
and I come to the Y, the Harlem Branch Y, where I take the elevator
up to my room, sit down, and write this page: / It's not easy to
know what is true for you or me at twenty-two, my age. But I guess
I'm what I feel and see and hear, Harlem, I hear you: hear you,
hear me--we two--you, me, talk on this page. (I hear New York,
too.) Me--who? Well, I like to eat, sleep, drink, and be in love. I
like to work, read, learn, and understand life. I like a pipe for a
Christmas present, or records--Bessie, bop, or Bach. I guess being
colored doesn't make me not like the same things other folks like
who are other races. So will my page be colored that I write? /
Being me, it will not be white. But it will be a part of you,
instructor. You are white-- yet a part of me, as I am a part of
you. That's American. Sometimes perhaps you don't want to be a part
of me. Nor do I often want to be a part of you. But we are, that's
true! As I learn from you, I guess you learn from me-- although
you're older--and white-- and somewhat more free. / This is my page
for English B. Slide 12 http://www.dancetheatreofharlem.com/ Arthur
Mitchell DANCEDANCE Slide 13 Arthur Mitchell was born in New York
City on March 27, 1934. When his father left him, his mother &
4 siblings, Arthur started shining shoes for money to support the
family. He learned to tap dance at the Police Athletic League glee
club & at the age of 13, Arthur was encouraged to audition for
the New York High School of Performing Arts. For his audition
Mitchell performed Fred Astaire's Top Hat, White Tie and Tails and
got a full scholarship. Most dance teachers encouraged Mitchell to
pursue modern dance (more accepted for black dancers), but his
ballet teachers encouraged him to go that route pursue ballet.
Arthur auditioned for the Katherine Dunham School of Dance for more
ballet classes & won a scholarship. Upon Arthur Mitchell's high
school graduation in 1952 he won the school's annual dance award,
being the first male student to do so & at the age of 18, he
got a scholarship to attend the School of American Ballet. Upon his
arrival at the School of American Ballet Mitchell was told by
Lincoln Kirstein that to succeed, he would need to work twice as
hard as any other dancer. He was very dedicated and worked
extremely hard even though parents complained of his presence in
class & him partnering their daughters. After two years of
study and an appearance on Broadway in Truman Capote's House of
Flowers Arthur Mitchell joined the New York City Ballet in 1955.
Slide 14 Mitchell's debut with the NY City Ballet was in Western
Symphony but his big break wasn't until Balanchine choreographed
the Agon pas de deux for him and Alegra Kent in 1957. Audience
members complained about Mitchell partnering a white woman but
Balanchine never payed much attention. In 1959 Arthur became a
soloist & soon after a principal dancer making him the first
black principal dancer of a major ballet company. Mitchell's best
performance was as Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream in 1964. In
1968, Arthur Mitchell and Alegra Kent were finally allowed to
perform the Agon pas de deux on television on the Johnny Carson's
The Tonight Show. The U.S. Govt asked Mitchell to help create the
National Ballet of Brazil but after learning of Martin Luther King
Jrs. assassination, Mitchell was so shaken by the news that he
decided to help the black community of his childhood through dance
& he got the opportunity when soprano singer Dorothy Maynor
invited him to start a dance program at her Harlem School of the
Arts. In 1968 the dance program had 30 students. Mitchell left the
doors open so that people walking by could look in and see the
classes. In just a few months attendance rose to 400 students &
the facilities could no longer support those classes. Arthur
remodeled a garage with his own money and funds found with the help
of Balanchine and Kirstein and started his own dance school, the
Dance Theatre of Harlem. His former ballet teacher Karel Shook
helped direct the Dance Theatre of Harlem. Slide 15 Maya Angelou,
real name Marguerite Johnson (1928- ), is a multitalented American
poet and memoirist, also known as a dancer, actress, and
screenwriter. She received the National Medal of Arts for the year
2000. She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in
1998. Angelou has become a renown poet and autobiographer: "I Know
Why the Caged Bird Sings" (1070), "Wouldn't Take Nothing for my
Journey Now"(1993), and "And Still I Rise" (1978), to cite a few
works. At William Jefferson Clinton's inauguration in 1992, Angelou
read her poem, "On the Pulse of Morning." Her poetic style includes
metaphor, alliteration, assonance, consonance, synecdoche, and
internal rhyme.
