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05/28/2012 - 04:19
PALO ALTO -- Dr. Christopher Chua, principal scientist with PARC, will recall the scientific accomplishments of his mentor and friend, the late Dr. Robert Lawrence Thornton, during the exhibition LET YOUR LIGHT SHINE: The Lasers of Dr. Robert Lawrence Thornton on Saturday, June 16 in a program beginning at 10 a.m. in The Tech Museum of Innovation, 201 S. First St. in San Jose.
Thornton worked at PARC for 15 years following his doctorate in applied physics at Stanford, the first black to achieve that degree there, winning 46 patents. The Washington, D.C. native was a two-time winner of the Xerox Eagle Award for its top patent producers. At the time of his death, Thornton operated a manufacturing company, UbiquiLight, delivering some of the most advanced industrial lasers.
05/25/2012 - 14:59
Fourth of Five Parts African-Americans and the Golden Gate Bridge
SAN FRANCISCO -- There was mixed news in mid-1935: the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters received a charter from the American Federation of Labor after the stirring speech of A. Philip Randolph at its conference here; but the Civilian Conservation Corps was opening a segregated camp in San Francisco.
05/24/2012 - 16:50
FT. POINT -- As the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge proceeded across the entrance of the San Francisco Bay, African-Americans in San Francisco sought to bridge the gap between their hopes and the reality of discrimination.
05/24/2012 - 13:01
Third of Five Parts African-Americans and the Golden Gate Bridge
SAN FRANCISCO -- One of the brightest spots of the Great Depression was the artistic brilliance of Sargent Claude Johnson. He tied for best in show at the 55th annual exhibition of the San Francisco Art Association in 1934 with his mentor Beniano Bufano. Critic Jehanne Bietry Salinger gushed: "If I were, however, to list all of the outstanding items in the show regardless of the various media in which they have been executed, I would speak above all of that impressive piece of wood sculpture "Forever Free" by Sargent Johnson of Berkeley. It is the wood image of a Negro woman. She wears a white corsage and a black skirt. He has used color over the wood, white, black and brown....For sheer plastic beauty, one will have to go far and wide to find a better piece of work...It is sculpture, but before and beyond that, it is art, and it is art because it is wholly authentic, a complete unit, something that springs from the very soul of the artist, has been deeply felt and is alive."
05/23/2012 - 15:57
Second of five parts
04/19/2012 - 16:08
SAN FRANCISCO -- Cakewalk: an historical novel about the unsung creators of jazz is a must-have for the serious jazz aficionado.
The personalities and scenes of the thrilling mystery are also illuminated in Come to the Water: Sharing the Rich Black Experience in San Francisco.
04/05/2012 - 02:39
SAN FRANCISCO -- Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Fiona Ma, D-San Francisco, commemorates the 164th anniversary of California's first public school with a proclamation on April 3.
03/27/2012 - 14:50
The dedication of the first public school in California on April 3, 1848 is just one of the many milestones across the San Francisco waterfront left by William Alexander Leidesdorff.
03/10/2012 - 03:29
SAN FRANCISCO -- Professional road warriors hopping from conference hotel to convention center almost get a tear in their eye when someone pulls them aside and says, "I know where you can get some real food."
Say Grace and Wipe Yo' Hands: Black Restaurant.NET's Top 500 Places to Eat unlocks the emotional connection between African-Americans and their food by providing an easy to use directory to often-little known outposts of African-American culture which can be found in almost any American city -- if one knows where to look.
03/03/2012 - 15:00
SAN FRANCISCO -- Come to the Water: Sharing the Rich Black Experience in San Francisco (ASPIRE SAN FRANCISCO) is cited in a Sunday, March 4 New York Times online story on the five African-American local organizations founded in 1852 as part of the National Underground Railroad.
Come to the Water is a textbook designed to meet the California history/social science standards as a psycho-social intervention to meet the objectives of the Education Code. A reporter for the Times local partner, Bay Citizen, attended a session of the seven-week course on teaching S.F. black history at Hannibal Lodge No. 1, the oldest Prince Hall lodge in the West. The course concludes with a summary on Monday, March 5 at 4:30 p.m. in the Latino-Hispanic Reading Room of the San Francisco Main Library to mark Black American Day.
In section 37221, the state Education Code designates: "(d) March 5, the anniversary of the death of Crispus Attucks, the first black American martyr of the Boston Massacre, known as "Black American Day" on which day schools shall include exercises and instruction on the development of black people in the United States."
01/03/2012 - 15:34
SAN FRANCISCO -- For the second consecutive year, the seven-week course Come to the Water provides a broad overview of the significant African-American heritage in California and the West. The course, taught by historian John William Templeton, is intended to provide educators, youth workers and parents with the skills and content to provide culturally responsive instruction.
01/02/2012 - 11:51
ATLANTA -- One would normally think about a family reunion on a church lawn as a place to taste black eyed peas that seemed as if they were just picked and roasted over an open fire.
11/12/2011 - 22:50
SAN FRANCISCO -- The International Longshore and Warehouse Union was one of the biggest catalysts to free Nelson Mandela from 26 years in a South African prison, notes Willie L.
10/18/2011 - 22:05
SAN FRANCISCO -- The ingredient of the civil rights struggle usually overlooked by historians is the financing of activism.
08/03/2011 - 05:51
SACRAMENTO -- For decades, the mural of Queen Califia in the California State Capitol was covered by sheet rock. Hardly anyone understood the significance of the image.
