Saturday, June 22, would have been Octavia Butler's 77th birthday (the acclaimed writer died from a fall at age 58 in 2004). Artist Alison Saar has now created a collectible handcrafted edition of Butler's classic, genre-defying 1979 novel, "Kindred," in collaboration with publisher Arion Press. She and Arion creative director Blake Riley spoke to the San Francisco Chronicle about the process of creating the book, which includes 14 original linocuts and is made from a type of paper that Saar says, “looks like cotton that still has some seed and stem in it, the kind of leftover, rougher cotton that enslaved people would be allowed to keep to make their own clothes.”
Last night, Major League Baseball legend Reggie Jackson was asked in a Fox Sports show about how he felt about returning to Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Ala., for a Negro League tribute game. The 78-year-old, who started his MLB career in Birmingham in 1967, did not hold back. He told interviewer Alex Rodriguez about his experience of racial slurs and being denied entry to restaurants and hotels, in a city where the Ku Klux Klan was committing attacks of racial hatred. Here's the story from NBC, including the full video.
MLB will be honoring the Negro Leagues and the legendary Willie Mays with a televised game today at America's oldest ballpark, Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Als. Both teams will be wearing Negro Leagues uniforms — the Cardinals will wear St. Louis Stars kits, while the Giants will wear San Francisco Sea Lions jerseys. On June 17, the day before he died, Mays gave a statement to the San Francisco Chronicle about the game. "My heart will be with all of you who are honoring the Negro League ballplayers, who should always be remembered, including all my teammates on the Black Barons," he said. Here's more from TODAY about the history of Rickwood Field, preparations for the game, and how to watch it.
Today is Juneteenth. Michelle Garcia, Editorial Director of NBCBLK, curated Flipboard's Good Life newsletter this week. She chose a range of stories about the past and present of Juneteenth, including a look at the "Harriet Tubman of Texas," the commercialization of the holiday, and the work that still remains. "Now that it's a federal holiday, part of figuring out how to mark the day as a nation comes with educating the public about it," writes Garcia. Here's her Storyboard.
Willie Mays died yesterday at 93. Our sports editor has curated this Storyboard of tributes to an American icon. "His extraordinary statistical accomplishments speak for themselves, but the grace, joy, energy and intellect with which he played the game allowed him to separate himself from other great players of his, or any, era," writes Lincoln Mitchell for @TheConversationUS.
Frederick Douglass visited Ireland in the decades before the American Civil War, where he met Daniel O'Connell, Ireland's nationalist leader and a vocal critic of slavery. “I am the friend of liberty in every clime, class and colour. My sympathy with distress is not confined within the narrow bounds of my own green island. No — it extends itself to every corner of the earth," O'Connell said at a meeting of his Repeal Association that Douglass attended in September 1845. Here's a look at how his words influenced Douglass's activism: "Agitate, agitate, agitate."
💛 “The Jim Crow Era Was Never ‘Happy Times’ for Black People”
By @clayrivers
Despite what you may have heard in the news lately, the period of Jim Crow was never nor can it ever be viewed as a period of benefit for Black families.
"Black Barbie: A Documentary" produced by Shonda Rhimes, will be released on Netflix on June 19. TODAY shares this clip, featuring Kitty Black Perkins, the designer of Black Barbie, and Beulah Mae Mitchell, who worked on the production line at Mattel, remembering conversations with Barbie creator Ruth Handler. “(Handler) would say, ‘Do you have any suggestions?’” Mitchell recalled. “I was able to say, ‘We want a Black Barbie.’”
A VIRTUOSO RIFF ON AN AMERICAN classic: the inimitable Percival Everett retells the story of Huckleberry Finn from Jim’s perspective, transforming it from a familiar picaresque to a more complex adventure and a meditation on code-switching. A MINUS
Today in Writing History May 22, 1967: Writer and activist Langston Hughes died. Hughes was a leader of the Harlem Renaissance and one of the early pioneers of Jazz Poetry. During the Civil Rights Movement, from 1942-1962, he wrote a weekly column for the black-owned Chicago Defender. His poetry and fiction depicted the lives and struggles of working-class African Americans. Much of his writing dealt with racism and black pride. Like many black artists and intellectuals of his era, he was attracted to communism as an alternative to the racism and segregation of America. He travelled to the Soviet Union and many of his poems were published in the CPUSA newspaper. He also participated in the movement to free the Scottsboro Boys and supported the Republican cause in Spain. He opposed the U.S. entering World War II and he signed a statement in support of Stalin’s purges.
💛 From the @TheDailyEdge article “Talking to White People About Racism”
Not so long ago, if parents disagreed with a specific lesson, they had the option to keep their child home from school that day. They still have that right. They should exercise it.
—@clayrivers
💛 From the @TheDailyEdge article “Talking to White People About Racism”—
Not so long ago, if parents disagreed with a specific lesson, they had the option to keep their child home from school that day. They still have that right. They should exercise it.
—@clayrivers
70 years ago, the Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education led to the desegregation of schools. However this also led to thousands of Black teachers losing their jobs. "Prior to 1954, there were about 82,000 Black teachers in the United States," write a team of academics for @TheConversationUS. "A decade later, with hundreds of segregated schools closing, more than 38,000 Black teachers had been fired by white school leaders." Read more about the importance of Black teachers and why 70 years after Brown, school educators are still mostly white.
Since people are talking about Kent State, Ohio, 1970, it's a good time to talk about Jackson State, Mississippi, 1970.
Similar situation, except there was no active protest, just a bunch of students hanging out. The mayor of Jackson declared a riot and called in the pigs. Someone threw a glass bottle, not at the pigs, but they still opened fire. Phillip Gibbs, a student at Jackson State, and James Green, a high school student who was walking home from his job, were murdered by cops. Many others were wounded.