At what should have been the pinnacle of his long career in baseball, Henry Aaron was getting bags of hate mail many containing death threats and living in a storage room at the stadium, accompanied by bodyguards when he ventured out.
It was 1973, the country remained divided along racial lines and Aaron, a Black American playing for the Atlanta Braves, was closing in on Babe Ruth’s holy career record of 714 home runs. To some, it was sacrilegious that a Black man would threaten the record of the immortal Babe.
Aaron eventually tied, then surpassed Ruth’s record, finishing his remarkable 23-year career with 755 homers. Even at that, he felt shortchanged.
Inspired by the historic election of Kamala Harris as America’s first woman vice president, artists collaborate on a new online work presented by Creative Time
Filed in Appointments, Faculty on January 1, 2021
Syd Carpenter was appointed to the Peggy Chan Professorship in Black Studies at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania. An artist, Professor Carpenter’s work is represented in 17 collections nationally, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Professor Carpenter holds a bachelor of fine arts degree and a master of fine arts degree from Temple University in Philadelphia.
Tiffany Murphy, associate professor of law and director of the Criminal Practice Clinic at the University of Arkansas School of Law, has been given the added duties as associate dean for academic affairs. She joined the University of Arkansas faculty in 2014 after teaching at the Oklahoma City University School of Law.
Filed in Breaking News, Leadership on December 28, 2020
The board of trustees of historically Black LeMoyne-Owen College in Memphis, Tennessee, has appointed Vernell A. Bennett-Fairs as the college’s 13th president. She will take office on January 1.
“I’ve been prepared to be a president for some time now,” Dr. Bennett-Fairs told
The Memphis Commercial Appeal. “But I didn’t apply until the presidency that came along that I was interested in. The presidency of an institution where I feel I can be impactful and really gel with the faculty, staff, students, the community. LeMoyne-Owen College is the first presidency I applied for, because that was the right one.”
HBCUs produced Kamala Harris - and most of Houston s Black elected officials
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U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris and Democratic vice presidential nominee speaks to supporters at the University of Houston after a day of campaigning around Texas on Friday, Oct. 30, 2020. Harris, now vice president-elect, is a graduate of Howard University, a historically black college in Washington, D.C.Mark Mulligan, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less
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Prairie View City Councilman Nathan Alexander III is sworn by Judge Shelytha Alexander-Simmons on Monday, Nov. 16, 2020. Alexander, one of the youngest Black elected officials in the state of Texas, graduated from Prairie View A&M in 2020.Elizabeth Conley, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less