Black History - August 9th

1848 - The Free Soil party is organized at a Buffalo, New York convention attended by African American abolitionists.

1905 - Robert N. C. Nix, Sr. is born in Orangeburg, South Carolina. An 11-term congressman, he will be the first African American representative from Pennsylvania.

1909 - George William Crockett, Jr., is born in Jacksonville, Florida. He will become the first African American lawyer with the U.S. Department of Labor. Crockett will begin his judicial career in Michigan in 1966, when he is elected to the Recorder's Court, a post he will hold until 1978. He will also serve as a visiting judge in the Michigan Court of Appeals and acting corporation counsel for the city of Detroit. He will become a congressman in 1980 at the age of 71 and will be re-elected to serve each succeeding term until his retirement in 1991.

1936 - Jesse Owens wins his fourth gold medal of the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games in the 4x100-meter relay. His relay team set a new world record of 39.8 seconds, which held for 20 years. In their strong showing in track-and-field events at the XIth Olympiad, Jesse Owens and other African American athletes struck a propaganda blow against Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, who planned to use the Berlin Games as a showcase of supposed Aryan superiority.

1945 - Ken Norton is born. He will become a professional boxer and will win the WBC heavyweight champ in 1978.

1955 - Doug Williams is born in Louisiana. He will become a NFL Quarterback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Washington Redskins. While playing for the Redskins, he will lead the team to a victory in the Superbowl XXII and will be named Most Valuable Player.

1960 - A racially motivated disturbance breaks out in Jacksonville, Florida after ten days of sit-in demonstrations, resulting in fifty persons injured.

1961 - James B. Parsons becomes the first African American appointed to the U.S. District Court.

1963 - Whitney Houston is born in Newark, New Jersey. She will achieve fame as a single with her 1985 debut album, which will sell over nine million copies, have three number-one singles and earn a Grammy for the song "Saving All My Love For You." Her 1987 album "Whitney" will debut at number-one on the charts, a first for a female singer.

1967 - Deion Sanders is born. He will become a professional football and baseball player. He will become a NFL All-Pro, and as a major league center fielder, will lead both leagues in triples in 1992.

1971 - Le Roy (Satchel) Paige is inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

1984 - British decathlete Daley Thompson becomes the second man in history to win the decathlon back-to-back in the Olympic Games, while setting the record of 8,847 points. 1987 - Beatrice Foods, International is sold to TLC Group, a New York investment firm led by Reginald Lewis, an African American businessman and entrepreneur. It is the largest business acquisition ever by an African American.

1987 - "Mean" Joe Greene and Gene Upshaw are inducted into the Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

2003 - Gregory Hines, tap dancing virtuoso, joins the ancestors at the age of 57 after succumbing to cancer. He appeared on television, Broadway and in films.

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