National Baptist Convention chartered.

Taj Mahal , original name Henry Saint Clair Fredericks (born May 17, 1942, New York, N.Y., U.S.), American singer, guitarist, songwriter, and one of the pioneers of what came to be called world music. He combined blues and other African-American music with Caribbean and West African music and other genres to create a distinctive sound.

Taj Mahal (the name came to him in a dream) grew up in a musical family. His father, of Jamaican background, was a jazz musician and arranger; his mother, a schoolteacher, sang gospel music. While a student at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in the early 1960s, he began exploring the origins of African-American music and focused on acoustic blues. Following graduation, he played in folk clubs until he moved to California in 1965. There he teamed up with Ry Cooder to form the band Rising Sons.

Returning to solo performing, he released his first album, Taj Mahal, in 1968. This and other albums recorded during the next several years—notably Giant Step/De Ole Folks at Home (1969) and Recycling the Blues and Other Related Stuff (1972)—featured blues songs infused with ragtime, reggae, gospel, and other sounds. Mahal typically accompanied himself on a National steel guitar but was also accomplished on a number of other instruments; he would often include electric instruments, tubas, steel drums, and such exotic instruments as the kalimba (thumb piano) on his recordings, often in unexpected combinations.

Mahal remained active into the early 21st century, recording several dozen albums over the course of his career; a major anthology, In Progress & In Motion (1965–1998), was released in 1998. Mahal’s work included scores for motion pictures—notably Sounder (1972) and Sounder II (1976), in which he also had acting roles—and for the play Mule Bone (1991), originally written by Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston in the 1930s. He received Grammy Awards for best contemporary blues album for Señor Blues (1997) and Shoutin’ in Key (2000).

Prayer Pilgrimage, biggest civil rights demonstration to date, held in Washington.

Rev. Thomas Kilgore, a Los Angeles pastor, was elected president of the predominantly white American Baptist Convention.

Fred Jones was born on May 17, 1893 in Covington, Kentucky.

Patricia Era Bath, a prominent ophthalmologist and innovative research and laser scientist, was the first African American woman physician to receive a patent for a medical invention.  Bath was born on November 4, 1942 in Harlem, New York to Rupert Bath, a Trinidadian immigrant and the first black motorman in the New York City subway system, and Gladys Rupert, a domestic worker.  In 1959 while in high school at Charles Evans Hughes, she received a grant from the National Science Foundation to attend the Summer Institute in Biomedical Science at Yeshiva University. There, she studied the relationship between stress, nutrition, and caner.  In 1964, Bath graduated from Hunter College in New York City with a B.S. in chemistry.  Four years later, she received her medical degree from Howard University Medical School in Washington, D.C.

The start of Bath’s medical career has been one that broke many racial and gender grounds.  From 1970 to 1973, she completed her training at New York University School of Medicine as the first African American resident in ophthalmology. While a young intern at Harlem Hospital and Columbia University, Bath noticed the contrast between the eye clinic of Harlem where half of the patients were visually impaired or blind and Columbia, where only a few patients suffered from blindness.  Because of this, Bath conducted a study and found that blindness among blacks was double that among whites due to the lack of access of proper eye care in black communities.  In an attempt to remedy this alarming problem, she proposed a new worldwide system known as community ophthalmology in which trained eye care volunteers visit senior centers and day care programs to test the vision and screen for cataracts, glaucoma, and other serious eye conditions.  Through this community outreach program, underserved populations whose eye conditions would have gone untreated have a better chance to prevent blindness.

In 1974, she completed a fellowship in corneal and keratoprosthesis surgery (a procedure that replaces

E. Franklin Frazier , in full Edward Franklin Frazier (born September 24, 1894, Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.—died May 17, 1962, Washington, D.C.), American sociologist whose work on African American social structure provided insights into many of the problems affecting the black community.

In the following article, James A. Banks, the Kerry and Linda Killinger Professor and Director of the Center for Multicultural Education at the University of Washington, Seattle, describes his Arkansas communitys reaction to the U.S. Supreme Courts Brown v. Board of Education decision when it was announced in 1954.

I was in the seventh grade at the Newsome Training School in Aubrey, Arkansas when the United States Supreme Court handed down Brown vs. Board of Education on May 17, 1954. My most powerful memory of the Brown decision is that I have no memory of it being rendered or mentioned by my parents, teachers, or preachers. In my rural southern black community, there was a conspiracy of silence about Brown. It was completely invisible.

A conspiracy of silence

I can only speculate about the meaning of the silence about Brown in the Arkansas delta in which racial segregation was codified in both law and custom in every aspect of our lives. The only public library in Lee County was 9 miles from our family farm in Marianna, the county seat that had a population of 4,550. Although I was an avid reader, I could not use the public library. It was for whites only. The only time I saw the inside of the public library was when the choir from my all-black high school entertained a white civic group in the library. We had to see second-run movies at the all-black Blue Haven Theatre. To see first-run movies, we had to go to the white Imperial Theatre and enter the Colored entrance, which led upstairs where the projection room was also located. We could hear the rattle of the movie projector as we tried to concentrate on the movie.

Marianna and Lee County, Arkansas epitomized the institutionalized discrimination and racism that existed throughout the Deep South in the mid-1950s. The conspiracy of silence about Brown in Lee County among whites was probably caused by fear that news of Brown might disrupt the institutionalized racist system of segregation that had been established in Lee County in the years after

Major race riot, Miami, Florida. Sixteen persons were killed and more than three hundred were injured.

U.S. Supreme Court in landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision declared segregation in public schools unconstitutional. The unanimous decision was read by Chief Justice Earl B. Warren.

Frederick Douglass appointed recorder of deeds for District of Columbia.

Dr. Patricia E. Bath of Los Angeles, a renowned ophthalmologist and Black woman, patented (1988) an apparatus that efficiently removes cataracts by using laser technology.

The first Kentucky Derby is won by African American jockey Oliver Lewis riding the horse Aristides. 14 of the 15 jockeys in the race are African Americans.

White firemen on Georgia Railroad struck to protest employment of Blacks.

Laurent Kabilia becomes new President of Zaire and renames it

the Democratic Republic of the Congo.The country was previously under

the 37 year rule of Dictator Mobutu SeSE sEKO.

cONGO HAS DEMOCRACY.

In 1875, Oliver Lewis became the first jockey to win the Kentucky Derby, Americas longest continuous sporting event. Lewis was born in 1856 in Fayette Country, Kentucky, to his parents Goodson and Eleanor Lewis. Lewis was born free, but there is little known about his parents or family.

Lewis was only 19 years old when he entered the first Kentucky Derby. The race was held at what was then the Louisville Jockey Club on May 17, 1875, but is now known as Churchill Downs. Ten thousand spectators watched this first race.  Lewis rode a horse named Aristide, which was one of two colts entered by their owner, H. Price McGrath of Jessamine, Kentucky. The other horse, Chesapeake, was ridden by William Henry. Although the same owner entered both horses, Chesapeake was favored to win the $2,850 purse, and Lewis was told that his job was to lead most of the race to tire out the other horses. Out of the fifteen jockeys in the field, at this first Kentucky Derby, thirteen of them were African American. Aristides trainer, Ansel Williamson, was also an African American.  

Oliver Lewis followed his instructions and was pushing most of the field while trailing a horse named Volcano for most of the race. However, in the last stretch, Chesapeake was unexpectedly far back in the pack while Aristide and Volcano were running neck and neck for first place. Lewis and Aristide pulled away near the finish line and won the race by two lengths.  With that victory Lewis became the first jockey to win the Kentucky Derby. Later that season, Lewis came in second in the Belmont Stakes in New York and won three more races at the Louisville Jockey Club, riding Aristide in all of them. He would never ride in the Kentucky Derby again, however, and would retire after that racing season for unknown reasons.

After retiring, Lewis worked for a short time as a day laborer, but then began providing handicapping tables and racing forms to bookies.  He later became a bookie himself which was legal in Kentucky at that time.   

Lewis married although his

Rachel Boone was a slave of the decendents of the Daniel Boone family who escaped to an army camp near Miami, MO. She gave birth to a son & moved to Warrensburg, MO. Her son became Blind Boone, famous classical pianist known all over the U.S., Canada & Mexico who also reportedly played in Europe. He became known as the pioneer of ragtime because he brought in ragtime music to the concert stage as an encore or when the audience became restless, saying Lets put the cookies on the bottom shelf where everybody can reach them.. His motto was Merit, not sympathy, wins.

May 17, 2007 (aged 83)

Lloyd Alexander, (born Jan. 30, 1924 , Philadelphia, Pa.—died May 17, 2007, Drexel Hill, Pa.), American author who transported readers to a world of fantasy with a five-book series that was known as the Prydain Chronicles. The Book of Three (1964) launched the series, which chronicled the rise of a young hero named Taran from an assistant pig keeper to leader of the imaginary kingdom of Prydain. Along the way, Taran and his memorable companions confront villains, war, and personal dilemmas. The second novel in the series, The Black Cauldron (1965), was chosen as a Newbery Honor Book in 1966, and the last installment, The High King (1968), won the Newbery Medal in 1969. The series also included The Castle of Llyr (1966) and Taran Wanderer (1967). The animated Disney feature film The Black Cauldron (1985) was based on the Prydain novels. After service (1943–46) in the U.S. Army, Alexander attended the Sorbonne. He translated several books from French into English, edited an industrial magazine, and wrote advertising copy in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s while trying to get published. Alexander first found success with And Let the Credit Go (1955), one of several adult books based on his own experiences. He eventually turned his efforts toward children’s literature and released (1963) his first juvenile fantasy, Time Cat: The Remarkable Journeys of Jason and Gareth. Alexander later penned the Westmark trilogy and the Vesper Holly adventures. Westmark (1981), The Kestrel (1982), and The Beggar Queen (1984) dealt with concepts such as democracy, freedom, and corruption in the fictional kingdom of Westmark. Books starring spirited 19th-century orphan Vesper Holly and her guardian offered fast-paced journeys through distant lands where the two characters help right injustices. The series included The Illyrian Adventure (1986), The Drackenberg Adventure (1988), and others. Alexander received many honours, including the National Book Award in 1971 for The Marvelous

Sugar Ray Leonard is a retired professional boxer who has a boxing record of 36 wins, 3 losses, and 1 draw. Leonard was the first ever boxer to win more than a hundred million dollars in purses, owing to his world titles in five separate weight divisions and high profile fights with Wilfred Benitez, Thomas Hearns, and Roberto Durán.

Sugar Ray Leonard was born on May 17, 1956 as Ray Charles Leonard in North Carolina. His parents, Cicero and Getha Leonard, moved to Washington when Ray was three and then to Maryland when Ray was ten. Ray almost drowned at a creek by his house a few years after moving, and he also survived a car wreck with his mother while he was still in his pre-teens. In his autobiography, “The Big Fight: My Life In and Out of the Ring”, Ray also mentions problems at home, including alcohol abuse and domestic violence. He mentioned being sexually abused by an unnamed ‘prominent Olympic coach’ when he was fifteen years old. The revelation shocked the sporting world as most people believed Ray had a reasonably uneventful childhood.

Ray was ‘goaded’ into boxing by his brother Roger, who started boxing as a teenager. At the age of thirteen, Ray started training with Dave Jacobs and Ollie Dunlap at the Palmer Park Recreation Center. By the age of fifteen, Ray was already fighting in the National Division of the Amateur Athletic Union as an Amateur Boxer. A year later, he lied about his age so that he could take part in the Eastern Olympic Trials, where he made it to the semi-finals of the lightweight division. Ray lost that semi-final to a controversial decision, as it was said that Ray’s opponent, Greg Whaley, was hit so many times in that match that he was not allowed to continue in the trials. Ray then went on to win the National Golden Gloves and the National Amateur Athletic Union Light Welterweight Championship in 1974. In 1976, Ray represented the United States Olympic Boxing team along with Howard Davis, John Tate, the Spinks Brothers, Leo Randolph and Charles Mooney. Leonard won the Olympic

Secretary of Energy, Hazel Rollins Reid was born May 17, 1937 in Newport News, Virginia.

On May 17, 1838, abolitionist Sara T. Smith addresses the second Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women which was originally scheduled to be held in Pennsylvania Hall.  The meeting however was moved when anti-abolitionist mobs, upon learning of the Convention, burned the hall to the ground.  The convention was moved to a large private home where Smith gave the address which appears below.

DEAR FRIENDS:-

In that love for our cause which knows not the fear of man, we address you, in confidence that our motives will be understood and regarded ....

We are told that it is not within the province of woman, to discuss the subject of slavery; that it is a political question, and we are stepping out of our sphere, when we take part in its discussion. It is not true that it is merely a political question, it is likewise a question of justice, of humanity, of morality, of religion; a question which, while it involves considerations of immense importance to the welfare and prosperity of our country, enters deeply into the home-concerns, the every-day feelings of millions of our fellow beings. Whether the laborer shall receive the reward of his labor, or be driven daily to unrequited toil-whether he shall walk erect in the dignity of conscious manhood, or be reckoned among the beasts which perish-whether his bones and sinews shall be his own, or anothers-whether his child shall receive the protection of its natural guardian, or be ranked among the live-stock of the estate, to be disposed of as the caprice or interest of the master may dictate-whether the sun of knowledge shall irradiate the hut of the peasant, or the murky cloud of ignorance brood darkly over it-whether every one shall have liberty to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, or man assume the prerogative of Jehovah, and impiously seek to plant himself upon the throne of the Almighty; these considerations are all involved in the question of liberty or slavery.

And is a subject comprehending interests of such magnitude, merely

These cases were decided on May 17, 1954. The opinions of that date, n1 declaring the fundamental principle that racial discrimination in public education is unconstitutional, are incorporated herein by reference. All provisions of federal, state, or local law requiring or permitting such discrimination must yield to this principle. There remains for consideration the manner in which relief is to be accorded.

Because these cases arose under different local conditions and their disposition will involve a variety of local problems, we requested further argument on the question of relief. n2 In view of the nationwide importance of the decision, we invited the Attorney General of the United States and the Attorneys General of all states requiring or permitting racial discrimination in public education to present their views on that question. The parties, the United States, and the States of Florida, North Carolina, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Maryland, and Texas filed briefs and participated in the oral argument.

n2 Further argument was requested on the following questions, 347 U.S. 483, 495-496, n. 13, previously propounded by the Court:

4. Assuming it is decided that segregation in public schools violates the Fourteenth Amendment

(b) may this Court, in the exercise of its equity powers, permit an effective gradual adjustment to be brought about from existing segregated systems to a system not based on color distinctions?

5. On the assumption on which questions 4 (a) and (b) are based, and assuming further that this Court will exercise its equity powers to the end described in question 4 (b),

(a) should this Court formulate detailed decrees in these cases;

(b) if so, what specific issues should the decrees reach;

(c) should this Court appoint a special master to hear evidence with a view to recommending specific terms for such decrees;

These presentations were informative and helpful to the Court in its consideration of the complexities arising from the transition to a system of public education freed of racial

Sugar Ray Leonard

-

Born Wilmington, SC

Equipped with speed, ability and charisma, Sugar Ray Leonard, filled the boxing void left when Muhammad Ali retired in 1981. With the American public in search of a new boxing superstar, Leonard came along at precisely the right time.

Leonard was named Fighter of the Decade for the 1980s. And why not. He entered the decade a champion and left a champion. In between, he won an unprecedented five world titles in five weight classes and competed in some of the eras most memorable contests.

There were few things Leonard could not do once the bell rang. But what he did best was analyze his opponents and devise a strategy to overcome them. He found a way to beat stylists, sluggers and brawlers. And beneath that flashy surface was a competitor with the remorseless ability to put an opponent away when they were hurt. There were few better finishers in boxing.

Leonard surfaced in the publics imagination after winning a gold medal at the 1976 Olympics. He won the WBC welterweight title in 1979 after stopping fellow Hall-of-Famer Wilfred Benitez in a violent chess match that pitted two of the games master technicians.

After one successful defense, Leonard faced legendary lightweight champion Roberto Duran in what may be the most anticipated non-heavyweight fight in history. In a fast-paced battle, Duran dethroned Leonard with a unanimous 15-round decision. Leonard regained the title when Duran quit in the eighth-round of their rematch.

In 1981, Leonard climbed the scale and knocked out junior middleweight champion Ayube Kalule. He then returned to the welterweight division for a unification showdown with WBA champ Thomas Hearns. Leonard and Hearns waged a memorable war but Leonard, behind on all three scorecards, managed to knock Hearns out in the 14th round.

After one more fight, Leonard, suffering from a detatched retina in his left eye, retired. He returned to the ring in 1984 and knocked out Kevin Howard only to retire again.

After nearly three years of