Montgomery, Alabama - Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, on a Montgomery city bus. The bus driver told Rosa Parks to give up her seat. By law, Black Americans were required to give up their seat, when ordered.
Parks decided not to obey. This was 100 days after Emmett Till was murdered. Parks said ... I thought of Emmett Till, and when the bus driver ordered me to move to the back (of the bus), I just couldn't move.
The white bus driver called the local police. Parks was arrested and booked, by the Montgomery Police.
This event launched the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
Source:
Before Rosa Parks
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New York, New York - With respect to the chickens coming home to roost, Malcolm X’s full statement was never published.
On December 1st, 1963, Malcolm X spoke, at his talk, to a person in the audience. It was titled, 'God’s Judgment of White America.'
The next day the New York Times printed an article on the talk. The headline was 'Malcolm X Scores U.S. and Kennedy'. It quoted Malcolm X. The story read, 'Kennedy twiddled his thumbs at the killing of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu.'
The article added that Malcolm X said, JFK 'never foresaw that the chickens would come to roost so soon.' JFK had been killed nine (9) days before, on November 22nd, 1963.
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- 1969
- December
- death
- Black Panthers
- massacre
- killed by police
- killed
- COINTELPRO
- Chicago
- Illinois
- Lyndon B. Johnson
Chicago, Illinois - Fred Hampton was killed, in bed, in his apartment. Chicago police workers killed him. Hampton was unarmed and asleep, and in bed.
On Wednesday, December 3rd, Fred Hampton taught a political education course. It was at a local church. Members of the Black Panther Party attended. This was the night before his death.
After the class, several Black Panthers went to his Monroe Street apartment to spend the night. This was routine after a course.
Besides Hampton, the group included Deborah Johnson, Blair Anderson, James Grady, Ronald 'Doc' Satchell, Harold Bell, Verlina Brewer, Louis Truelock, Brenda Harris, and Mark Clark.
William O'Neal waited for them, when they arrived. O'Neal was chief of security. There, the group ate a late meal, prepared by O'Neal. The time was around midnight.
O'Neal slipped drugs into Hampton's drink. It was the barbiturate sleep agent secobarbitol. Hampton consumed the drink during the dinner.
The drug sedated Hampton. It kept him asleep, during the police raid. O'Neal left at this point.
At about 1:30 a.m., December 4th, Hampton was on the phone with his mother. He fell asleep, mid-sentence.
At 4:00 a.m., a heavily armed tactical unit, of white males, went to Hampton's apartment. They were sent by the Cook County State's Attorney's Office. They were joined by the Chicago Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
At 4:45 a.m., the tactical unit and Chicago Police shot first. They shot 90 times into Hampton's apartment. Only Mark Clark fired a shot, after being shot first.
Hampton survived the barrage. He was still breathing. The Chicago Police executed him. A point-blank shot was fired, that killed Hampton.
This was part of the FBI's Counter-Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO).
William O'Neal committed suicide on January 15th, 1990 (Martin Luther King Day). O'Neal ran into oncoming traffic on a Chicago expressway. An automobile hit and killed O'Neal.
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Montgomery, Alabama - The Montgomery Bus Boycott began. This was days after the arrest of Rosa Parks. She was tried on charges of disorderly conduct and violating a local ordinance. The trial was only 30 minutes. Parks was found guilty. Her fine was ten dollars ($10). Plus, there were four dollars ($4) in court costs.
Parks appealed her conviction. This was a direct challenge to the law of racial segregation.
On December 1st, the night of Parks' arrest, the Women's Political Council (WPC) gave out leaflets. It showed the start of the boycott, on Monday, December 5th.
On Saturday, December 3rd, the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) made a list of demands to be met. Martin Luther King, Jr. led the MIA.
On December 7th, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) called the boycott an 'agitation among negroes.' The FBI tried to find 'derogatory information' to discredit King.
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Washington, D. C. - The Thirteenth Amendment was ratified. This ended the legal status of chattel slavery.
It read...
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Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
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The words, in Section 1, were taken from the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, article six (6).
Section 2 gave Congress power to make slavery a crime. Congress never used this power to effect, until 1948. Congress let those who broke the law, on slavery, get away with a fine, with no jail time.
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Pearl Harbor, Hawaii - During the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Doris Miller shot down several enemy fighters and helped wounded sailors. He served, as a cook, on the battleship West Virginia, which was sunk in the attack.
Miller had no training on the anti-aircraft gun he used. Many of the white sailors fled, which gave him the chance to use the gun. For his actions, he was given the Navy Cross. It was the first time it was given to a Black American.
The United States Navy tried to hide Miller's feats. The Black American newspaper, the Pittsburgh Courier learned of an unnamed Black American man who was to get a commendation. Lawrence D. Reddick found his name after many attempts to get it from the Navy. After pressure from Black Americans, the Navy finally gave Miller the credit he deserved.
After his heroics, Miller was raised to mess attendant. The Pittsburgh Courier said Miller should be taken out of the war and used to promote war bonds. Instead, the Navy sent him to the South Pacific. The ship where he served, was sunk by a Japanese submarine. Miller died in the attack, November 24, 1943.
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Atlanta, Georgia - White doctors and white police forced Black Americans to take injections. The claim by whites was that it was to stop smallpox. An inoculation for smallpox was known more than 150 years before, by the Black American man Onesimus.
Under the pretense of vaccination, white police broke into a Black American home. Inside, there was a wedding, with guests. The white police held everyone inside the home. White doctors came and forcibly injected them.
A judge was over a city court, where many Black Americans were normally brought. When the judge gave the word, whites locked all inside. Black Americans were forced to take injections. The white police used violence to force injections.
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Vicksburg, Mississippi - Whites killed dozens (possibly hundreds) of Black Americans to remove a Black American man as sheriff, Peter Crosby.
No white was prosecuted, investigated, nor punished.
Source:
Daily Alta California, Volume 26, Number 9029, 21 December 1874
1874 Vicksburg Massacre News Article
1874 Vicksburg Massacre
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Oklahoma City, Oklahoma - Daniel Holtzclaw was convicted of 18 of 36 counts of rape. Also included were sexual battery, stalking, and forcible, oral sodomy. Holtzclaw was an active worker of the Oklahoma City Police Department went he committed the crimes.
13 women testified against Holtzclaw. All of them were Black American women.
Holtzclaw was sentenced to 263 years in prison, in Oklahoma. Holtzclaw was 28 years of age, at the time.
Source:
Police worker Daniel Holtzclaw Convicted As A Serial Rapist
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Los Angeles, California - Sam Cooke was shot to death. Cooke wrote and sang 'A Change Is Gonna Come' among many other popular songs. His friends included Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, and Jim Brown (football).
Cooke was respected for his activism for Black Rights (see Civil Rights). He refused to perform at segregated events.
Mrs. Bertha Franklin shot Cooke in the chest. It pierced Cooke's heart and killed him. The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) quickly ruled the murder a 'justifiable homicide.'
Mrs. Franklin was never charged with Cooke's murder.
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Washington, D. C. - The United States government decided to criminally prosecute cases of slavery. This included debt peonage, and other forms of involuntary servitude. This did not include imprisonment.
White prosecutors avoided slavery cases. Too often, a case was dropped because the prosecutor declined to prosecute. Before this circular, no one was ever convicted for the enslavement of Black Americans.
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Atlanta, Georgia - The movie, Gone With The Wind, was shown for the first time, in public. The Black American actress, Hattie McDaniel, had a major role in the movie.
It was the story of a family of Georgia slave owners. It covered the time just before and after the Slavery War (or Civil War). The movie showed the enslavers as decent and hard-working. Many were made to be sympathetic, despite their use of forced labor.
Black Americans were only in the movie as slaves, in the pre-War period. After the war, Black Americans were shown as lazy or corrupt. The house slaves were shown as submissive, docile, childish, and obedient.
The story made slavery seem the same as a regular job. There were no whips, violence, hunger, or beatings against Black Americans, shown in the movie. McDaniel's role, as a house slave, was used against Black American women to show them as obese, bossy, loyal to her abusers, and hostile to Black American men.
McDaniel was given an Oscar Award for her role. She was not allowed to attend the ceremony because of her skin color. Instead, it was given to her in private.
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New York, New York - The Color Purple was shown for the first time in New York, New York. It was a work of fiction, based on a story by Alice Walker. Steven Spielberg directed the movie.
The movie starred Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg. From its release, the movie has been controversial and heavily criticized by Black Americans.
Some of the complaints, of the movie, were its racist stereotypes of Black American men as violent toward women. The Black American rapist stereotype was created by white males during Reconstruction to lynch (murder) and castrate Black American men.
Another complaint was that this fictional movie, which made Black American men as violent, was directed by a white male, Spielberg. Further, Spielberg already faced charges of racism from Asians. This was from his 1984 Indiana Jones movie.
There was the issue of sexual perversion in the movie. It showed Black American women as sexually deviant. Despite the story being about Black Americans, all the producers were white or homosexual.
The movie went into wide release, February 7, 1986. This was during Black History Month and after the first observance of Martin Luther King Day, as a Federal holiday.
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New Canton, Virginia - Carter G. Woodson was born to Anne Eliza (Riddle) and James Henry Woodson. Both his parents were born into slavery. Woodson was an American historian, author, and journalist.
Woodson founded the Association for the Study of African American Life and History. He was one of the first scholars to study the history of the African diaspora. His work in American history showed Black Americans as more than subjects of white supremacy.
In 1926, Woodson created Negro History Week. It preceded Black History Month.
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Montgomery, Alabama - The Montgomery Bus Boycott ended. It lasted 1 year and 2 weeks. Martin Luther King, Jr. read a prepared statement. 2,500 people, at Holt Street and First Baptist Churches came to hear it.
King urged 'the Negro citizens of Montgomery to return to the buses tomorrow morning on a non-segregated basis.' A person, from the audience, asked about segregated benches downtown. King said the Supreme Court ruling was only for city buses.
King said 'it is true we got more out of this (boycott) than we went in for. We started out to get modified segregation (on buses) but we got total integration.' This was from a Birmingham News account.
At 6:00 a.m., December 21st, 1956, King joined E. D. Nixon, Ralph Abernathy, and Glenn Smiley on one of the first integrated buses. There were only a few instances of verbal abuse and occasional violence.
The Montgomery Advertiser wrote, 'The calm but cautious acceptance of this significant change in Montgomery’s way of life came without any major disturbances.'
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New York, New York - Bernhard Goetz shot four (4) Black Americans, on a subway car. The four (4) victims were Barry Allen, Troy Canty, James Ramseur, and Darrell Cabey.
Four (4) youths rode on a subway train, in Manhattan. Three (3) were 19 years of age. One (1) was 18 years of age. They planned to steal quarters from coin-operated video game machines.
At the 14th Street station, Goetz boarded the train. He took a seat next to the youths. There were fifteen (15) to twenty (20) other people in the subway car.
Cabey told Goetz to give him five (5) dollars. Goetz asked him to repeat what he said. Cabey said it again. Goetz stood. He pulled a revolver from his jacket. Goetz held the gun with both hands, and took a shooting stance. He then shot all four (4) victims.
The youths had no weapons and were unarmed. They made no verbal threats. Goetz had the gun illegally. Before the shooting, Goetz had weapons and target training. Goetz made no attempt to get out of the area before the shooting.
Goetz shot in rapid fire, on a crowded subway train. Cabey was left paralyzed for life. The shooting created a panic on the train, as other riders ran and ducked for safety.
Once the car stopped, the conductor asked Goetz if he was a police worker. Goetz said no. The conductor asked for the gun. Goetz refused, jumped off the train to the tracks below, and ran.
Goetz fled New York City to dispose of the gun. He returned to get some things and fled again to New Hampshire. On December 31, Goetz turned himself into the police in Concord, New Hampshire.
On April 7, 1987, the trial began. On June 16, Goetz was found guilty, by a mostly white jury. The white judge gave Goetz a six (6) months, in prison. On appeal, the setence was changed to one (1) year. Goetz only served eight (8) months.
The four (4) Black American victims sued the white shooter, Goetz, in civil court. The judgments went over $50 million. Years later, Goetz was asked about it. He said, as far as he knew, he paid not one penny.
Source:
Bernhard Goetz Shot Four (4) Black Americans
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Pulaski, Tennessee - The Ku Klux Klan (KKK) was formed. Six (6) ex-Confederate officers, Frank McCord, Richard Reed, John Lester, John Kennedy, J. Calvin Jones and James Crowe, were its first members.
The KKK was the most violent and racist terrorist group, in United States history (outside of the local police). Its purpose was to harass, attack, and murder Black Americans.
The KKK only allowed white male members. The women's version was the Women of the Ku Klux Klan (WKKK). It has always helped the KKK, in its many forms, until today.
The violence of the KKK led the United States government to pass the Enforcement Acts. These three (3) Acts passed in 1870 and 1871, made the actions of the KKK illegal.
The Enforcement Acts led to a gradual decline in KKK activity.
'The Birth of A Nation' (1915) led to a rebirth of the KKK in 1915. President Woodrow Wilson saw the film at the White House. He called it history written in lightning. This effect led to the era of the second KKK.
This second era of the KKK lasted until World War 2. This was its largest and most powerful period. There were tens of thousands of members all over the country. In the 21st Century, the KKK is very limited, but still aided by the WKKK.
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Mims, Florida - Harry T. Moore and his wife, Harriette V. S. Moore were killed the night of December 25th, 1951. A bomb exploded under the bedroom floor of the Moores' home in Mims, Florida.
The couple were equal pay and voting rights activists for Black Americans. They were early organizers for Black Rights in Florida, after World War 2.
Four (4) white male Ku Klux Klan members were suspected of the murder. Yet, none were indicted, charged, nor arrested.
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Charleston, South Carolina - It was cold and windy for the men of the Massachusetts 54th Volunteer Infantry, this Christmas day. Many were in a sour mood. They were in combat. They missed their families, friends, and sweethearts.
Encamped on Morris Island, on the outskirts of Charleston, the men watched the Union shelling of the besieged city.
Our rifles had sounded their fearful Christmas chimes by throwing shells into the city for three hours after one o'clock that morning, recalled Capt. Luis F. Emilio. He added, 'About 3 a.m. a fire broke out in Charleston which illumined the whole sky and destroyed twelve buildings before it was subdued, the falling walls injuring many firemen.'
Emilio, a white Salem, Mass., native, who had just turned 19 three days earlier, had been the acting commander of the regiment for some time following the famed attack on Fort Wagner that July.
From storming the fort on July 18th, Col. Robert Gould Shaw was killed, the regiment's first commander. Two Berkshire County men were killed in the failed attack. One was Henry Burghardt, of Lee. The other was Pittsfield native Eli Franklin. Burghardt was killed in action. Franklin died from his battle wounds, two (2) days later.
In September, Edward Needles Hallowell became the new commander of the 54th. Hallowell was wounded during the Fort Wagner battle, as Shaw's second in command.
That same month, the Confederates abandoned Fort Wagner. That helped open the way for the siege of Charleston.
For months after the attack, the soldiers' spirits were high. They knew they had proved their valor. It showed the fighting ability of all their Black brothers. Yet, by Christmas, after months of seeing no real action, they were feeling low.
'The whole face of nature now presents a drear and gloomy appearance, and the thousands who a month or two ago were full of hope and expectation have gradually come down to that frame of mind so well adapted to wait till something turns up,' commented Cpl. James Henry Gooding, a Black American soldier from the 54th, in a December 1863 letter to the New Bedford (Conn.) Mercury.
The entire month, both the weather and the men's spirits, had been overcast and dreary. There was the shooting of a white deserter from a New Hampshire regiment. The men were required to watch. The same month there was an explosion. It killed several soldiers.
The Confederates steadily attacked the Union. But, it was unusual for a shell to make it into the Union fortifications. This time, a magazine was being repaired by engineers. That made it vulnerable. The shell fell among munitions that went off. Four (4) were killed. Eleven (11) were seriously wounded, according to Gooding.
Added to these events were the continued problems with the men's pay.
The enlisted men of the 54th and its brother regiment, the 55th, fought to get the $13 a month they were due. Government paymasters, cited an 1862 law. They would only pay $7.
Christmas was a subdued affair. For Thanksgiving, the men attended a rousing church service and enjoyed a festive meal. It was followed by an afternoon filled with games. There were sack races and money for the first man to make it to the top of a greased pole.
In contrast, the highlight of Christmas Day was the arrival of letters from home.
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