Commentary: African American Scientists and Inventors
by Black Kos Editor, Sephius1
Throughout his life, Hyman Y. Chase was a man of great intellectual stature who liked to remind mere mortals, in a booming voice, that he had a PhD from Leland J. Stanford University. In 1936, at the age of 34, he was appointed Chairman of Howard University’s Zoology Department, which was financed by the Julius Rosenwald Fund.
Chase was undoubtedly a brilliant academic, but by 1939, he was getting restless in the winds of war. Thanks to supporters like Eleanor Roosevelt, blacks were going to play a larger part in this war, and would no longer be relegated to the roles of truck-drivers and cooks. Talk of a black infantry regiment forming at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, stirred Chase to action. He left his job at Howard and entered active military service in 1940. His education earned him an officer’s rank and made him one of the first black commanding officers.
It was a tough road ahead. Chase’s first regiment was delayed at port in Virginia because the state government would not tolerate a large battalion of armed blacks in one of its ports. Chase endured this indignity, and the 366th Infantry Division was eventually deployed to North Africa. Chase’s unit ended up in Italy, where they were cut down by German fire on the Po River. Later, during occupation duty in Germany, Chase helped to mastermind the brilliant logistical plan to airlift supplies to the embattled city of Berlin, which had been blockaded by Soviet forces.
Throughout the war, charges of cowardice were made against black soldiers. Chase saw first-hand that the white officers assigned to black units were substandard, and believed that the real issue was poor leadership. (In the 1990s, Medals of Honor were awarded to seven black soldiers who served in the units that had been so harshly criticized during the war.) He knew that, in the future, it would be necessary to include well-trained black officers in the officer corp. By the time the war ended, Chase was motivated by a fury that only a man of his intelligence could focus and control. His fiery attitude angered many white officers, and he was forced to defend himself against charges that were intended to ruin his career......Read More
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News by dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
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Environmental racism and classicism affect vast swath of the US. The New Republic: The EPA Is Finally Getting Serious About Protecting Poor Communities.
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n Tuesday, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) passed a ground-breaking rule requiring industry-wide monitoring of emissions at petroleum refineries. The new regulations, which the agency says will reduce pollution by 5,200 tons per year and lower cancer risk for 1.4 million people, mark a turning point in the agency's spotty record on environmental justice.
The EPA has long been criticized for ignoring the disproportionate impact of environmental issues upon minorities and the poor. But in its 745-page ruling this week, the agency specifically focused on "environmental justice populations"—groups that often live close to refineries and are most heavily affected by the resulting pollution. Until now, the EPA did not require monitoring at refinery fences, but the new ruling will place between 12 and 24 monitors at each distillery. According to EPA administrator Gina McCarthy, the regulation is designed to create "refineries that are better neighbors" to the communities that skirt their boundaries. If the mandate is properly implemented, local residents will be able to access a database to see whether dangerous levels of pollutants have passed from refinery barriers into their communities.
“This rule is one of EPA’s first to include an environmental justice analysis," said environmental justice activist Hilton Kelley, who has fought for regulation of petrochemical and waste facilities in Texas. According to Jesse Marquez, founder of the Coalition for a Safe Environment, the new regulations should enable communities to better understand their air and any health issues associated with it. “Our community is elated,” he said of Wilmington, Los Angeles, a low-income, majority-Latino neighborhood that sits in the shadow of four refineries. “We did not get everything we asked for. … But this is the first major step in that direction.”
These regulations further demonstrate the EPA's renewed dedication to environmental justice under the Obama administration. Since becoming EPA administrator in July 2013, McCarthy has made pointed attempts to incorporate environmental justice as a talking point and issued the draft EJ 2020 plan, which intends to include environmental justice in rulemaking and increase dialogue with affected communities. Now, these commitments are seeing action.
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In her Sunday speech, which tackled economic injustice and violence against African Americans, she threw down a gauntlet for the current presidential contenders. The Root: Elizabeth Warren’s Embrace of Black Lives Matter Is an Example of Moral Leadership.
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Elizabeth Warren is not running for president.
But based on the dazzling speech she recently delivered on racial and economic justice, she most definitely should. Sen. Warren (D-Mass.) furthered our national conversation about race with a bold speech linking racial equality, public policy, economic justice and American history.
Warren’s #BlackLivesMatter speech Sunday at the Edward Kennedy Institute in Boston threw down a political and moral gauntlet, as she became the first politician of national stature to articulate a full-throated endorsement of the battle against structural and institutional racism that has become the cri de coeur of Black Lives Matter activists around the nation and the world.
Warren did this through a deft combination of historical analysis and policy brief, noting, “Coming out of the Great Depression, America built a middle class, but systematic discrimination kept most African-American families from being part of it.”
Most importantly, Warren highlighted the link between race and class in America: “Economic justice is not—and has never been—sufficient to ensure racial justice.”
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British prime minister ducks official calls for UK to apologise for its role in the slave trade or pay reparations. The Guardian: Jamaica should 'move on from painful legacy of slavery', says Cameron.
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David Cameron has called for Jamaica and the UK to “move on” from the deep wounds caused by slavery but ducked official calls for Britain to apologise for its role or pay reparations.
Speaking to the Caribbean country’s parliament, the prime minister struck a defiant note as he spoke of his pride that Britain had played a part in abolishing the “abhorrent” trade, without highlighting its historic involvement in the transfer of slaves from west Africa and ownership of slaves in the Caribbean.
He called for the two countries to “move on from this painful legacy and continue to build for the future”.
His trade trip to Jamaica, the first for 14 years by a UK prime minister, has been overshadowed by the issue of slavery. Cameron was warmly received by a military band playing God Save the Queen on arrival at the airport and received a hug from the country’s prime minister, Portia Simpson Miller.
However, during the trip, high-profile politicians and campaigners drew attention to a distant relative of Cameron’s, Gen Sir James Duff, who was compensated for losing 202 Jamaican slaves in 1833 when the trade was abolished.
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Moms Mabley, Redd Foxx and Richard Pryor will be honored the same night the legendary theater kicks off its new comedy club. The Root: The Apollo Theater to Induct 3 Black Comedy Legends Into Its Walk of Fame.
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in 1969, trailblazing comedian Jackie “Moms” Mabley stood onstage in her trademark floppy hat and flowered housedress and told the audience her slogan for the week.
“Quit it if you can’t get it,” she told the crowd to raucous laughter. “If you can do something with it, get it!”
The African-American vaudeville-circuit fixture turned Broadway stage and film star was the first female comedian featured at the legendary Apollo Theater in Harlem in the late 1930s. Mabley, born Loretta Mary Aiken, appeared on its stage more times than any other performer. Now she, along with fellow comedians Redd Foxx and Richard Pryor, is being inducted into the theater’s Walk of Fame Thursday at 5 p.m. in a special ceremony. After that, the Apollo will kick off its new Comedy Club at 9 p.m. on its Soundstage, featuring up-and-coming comedic talent.
“It’s about time someone other than a musical act has been inducted,” says Bob Sumner, Apollo Comedy Club curator and former producer of Def Comedy Jam. “It’s time for them and it’s beautiful because, when you think of comedy, that’s who you think of in so many different ways.”
Richard Pryor; Jackie “Moms” Mabley; Redd Foxx
RICHARDPRYOR.COM; COURTESY OF THE APOLLO THEATER; COURTESY OF THE APOLLO THEATER
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