Very few of the many, many thousands of Confederate soldiers who died defending slavery actually owned slaves. Most were just poor farmers. Not only were the slave owners few and far between, they were clustered in swiftly moving cavalry units that suffered far fewer casualties than the plodding infantry which fell in droves under [...]
How many times have you heard it said, "It's just a conspiracy theory!" The clear implication being that the claim, whatever it is, is obviously false, as if conspiracies do not exist, and never have. Perhaps the biggest conspiracy ever is the promulgation of the now widespread belief that all conspiracy theories are obviously [...]
W.E.B. Du Bois’ The Souls of Black Folk (1903) “powerfully exemplifies the fierce belief in man’s willingness to reason with man.” As a young, pioneering scholar in the, then new, discipline of Sociology, Du Bois “genuinely believed that if he could utilize his training in gathering and presenting the facts concerning the misery of [...]
The Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement ended exactly 100 years apart, 1865 and 1965. . . . The most important speech during the Civil War was President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address (1863). The key speech of the Civil Rights Movement was Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream!”(1963) They are separated by precisely [...]
Alexander had two officers named Cleitus, Black Cleitus and White Cleitus. Black Cleitus led Alexander’s bodyguard, and he was right at his side in Alexander’s first battle in his Conquest of Asia, the Battle at the Granicus River (334 BCE). Near the outset of the contest, Alexander dashed out ahead of the main body of [...]
David Dinkins became the first Black mayor of New York City when he defeated then mayor Ed Koch for the Democratic nomination and went on to beat Republican Rudi Giuliani in 1989. Racial issues were a major factor in his victory. Twenty-four years later race, in the form of the police department's stop-and-frisk policy, is [...]
Joe McCarthy was the infamous United States Senator who launched a witch hunt, known as the Red Scare of the 1950s, which falsely accused so many of being communists intending to destroy the country. Joe McCarthy finally got his comeuppance at a Congressional hearing when Atty. Joseph Nye Welch very pointedly asked Senator McCarthy, [...]
African American Lewis Latimer invented the filament for the light bulb that illuminates our homes and brings motion pictures to life. The first feature length film was D. W. Griffith’s Birth of A Nation (1915). Up until then movies were never more than 30 minutes. Birth Of A Nation, though, was three hours long [...]
Here is a little test. Who am I referring to? He died in his 33rd year. He said the man married to his mother was not his father. He said he was fathered by God. He was called, “King of Kings.” And the name “Issus” is associated with him. Who was he? Jesus Christ? [...]
Embattled TV chef, Paula Deen, is in the news again. Her chief assistant, Dora Clark, a Black woman, is suing Deen for not compensating her properly. She also claims that Deen asked her and other female workers to dress and act like Aunt Jemima, the figure on the pancake box based on a prominent [...]