February is designated as Black History month. It is for the remembrance of the events in the history of the African Diaspora. I therefore wanted to use this post to highlight the achievements of Blacks in the areas of Science & Medicine and Sports, dubbed Black First
1) Black First in Science and Medicine:
- Roselyn Payne Epps was the first African-American elected national president of the American Medical Women’s Association in 1991.
- Charles Henry Turner (1867-1931) became the first person to prove that insects can hear and distinguish pitch. He was a Zoologist and held a doctorate from the University of Chicago.
- Joycelyn Elders became the first African-American and first woman US Surgeon General in 1993.
- Frederick D. Gregory was the first African-American to pilot a spacecraft. In 1985 STS-51B/Spacelab-3 launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on April 29th with Colonel Frederick D. Gregory as pilot.
2) Black First in Sports:
- Althea Gibson – was the first African American to play in and win Wimbledon and the United States national tennis championship. She won both tournaments twice, in 1957 and 1958. In all, Gibson won 56 tournaments, including five Grand Slam singles events.
- Don Barksdale – a basketball star at UCLA became the first African-American named consensus All-American in 1947.
- Fritz Pollard — was the first African American to play in the NFL. Later in his career he became a coach and also continued to play running back. In 2005 he was inducted into the Professional Football Hall of Fame.
- National Basketball Association (NBA) – In the 1950-51 NBA season Chuck Cooper became the first black player to be drafted when he was chosen by Boston; Nat “Sweetwater” Clifton became the first to sign an NBA contract when he signed with New York, and Earl Lloyd became the first to play in an NBA regular-season game because the schedule had his Washington team opening one day before the others.
- Willie O’Ree — was the first African American to play in the National Hockey League (NHL). He had a short career that was started in 1958 with the Boston Bruins. His career ended in 1961 and the next year that an African American played in the league was 1974 when Mike Marson was drafted by the Washington Capitals.
During this month, I will be presenting “Blacks First” in other areas.
