Below is a calendar of multicultural events throughout history that has been put together by the UW-Stevens Point History Department.  This site is in progress!

 

January
 1   
  1808 - US prohibits international slave trade
  1860 - bd George Washington Carver
  1863 - Lincoln signs Emancipation Proclamation  
  1892 - Ellis Island Immigration Station formally opened 
  1990 - David Dinkins becomes first black mayor of NYC  
   
2  
 

1991 - Sharon Pratt Dixon becomes mayor Washington, D.C., first of
such a large and prominent city

   
3  
   
4 1965 - LBJ’s “Great Society” State of the Union
5 1949 - “Fair Deal” State of the Union 
6 1910 -  bd Morris Wright (author) 
7  
8  

1877 - Crazy Horse fights final battle against US troops in Montana

  1964 - LBJ declares “War on Poverty” 
9  
10 1967 - Edward Brooke, first black elected to the US Senate, MA, takes seat
11  
12  
 

 1948 - Supreme Court rules law schools may not discriminate on the basis of race

  1971 -  “All in the Family” debuted on CBS-TV
13  
  1966 - Robert C. Weaver becomes Sec  HUD, first black cabinet member 
  1990 - Douglas Wilder becomes first black governor, VA
14  
15 1908 - Alpha Kappa Alpha established as first Black woman’s Greek college sorority
  1929 -  bd Martin Luther King, Jr. (civil rights leader) 
16  
17 1893 -  US businessmen force abdication of Hawaii’s Queen Liliuokalani  
18

1993 -  MLK holiday observed in all states for the first time

19  
20  
  1942  -  Wannsee conference arrives at “Final Solution”
 

1986  -  US observes first Martin Luther King day   
 

2001  -  Colin Powell sworn in first black Secretary of State

21  
22 1875  -   bd D. W. Griffith (filmmaker)
23  
 

1907  - Charles Curtis becomes first American Indian senator from KS, later becomes Vice President under Herbert Hoover

 

1964 - 24th Amendment ratified eliminating the poll tax in federal elections 
 

1977 - “Roots” miniseries begins airing on ABC 

24  
25  
26

1934 - Apollo Theater opens in NYC

27  
28

1916 - Louis Brandies becomes first Jewish Supreme Court justice 

29

1850 - Henry Clay submits Compromise of 1850 to the senate 

30

1839 - bd Samuel Armstrong, founder Hampton Institute

31

1919 - bd Jackie Robinson (baseball)

 

February

1

1902-1967  bd Langston Hughes
 

1960 - Four black college students begin sit-in at Greensboro,

          NC Woolsworth

2

1848 - Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ends Mexican War
3  
4

1913??? - bd Rosa Parks (civil rights activist)
5

1934 - bd Hank Aaron, Mobile, AL (baseball)
 

1994 - Byron de la Beckwith convicted of murdering Medgar Evers in 1963, sentenced to life in prison

6  
7

1817-1895    bd Frederick Douglass (abolitionist)
 

1934 - bd Earl King (blues)  

8

1693 - charter granted for College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA, includes an Indian School
 

1915 - D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation premiered in Los Angeles

9

1944 - bd Alice Walker (author)

10

1927 - bd Leontyne Price, Laurel, MS
 

1989 - Ron Brown elected first black head of a major US political party
11

1802 -  bd Lydia Maria Child, Medford, MA (abolitionist, reformer)
12

1809-1865 -  bd Abraham Lincoln, Hardin County, KY
13

1910-1989 - bd William Shockley (physicist, racialist)

14  
15  
16

1884-1951 - bd Robert Flaherty (filmmaker/documentarian)
17  
18

1931 -  bd Toni Morrison (poet/author)

19

1942 - FDR signs authorization for Japanese relocation
20  
21

1965 - Malcolm X assassinated by other Black Muslims, NYC

22  
23

1868-1963 - bd W. E. B. Dubois (black activist/historian)
24

1983 - Congressional report calls Japanese internment a

           “grave injustice”

25  
26  
27

1973 -  AIM begins occupation of Wounded Knee, SD (ends in May) 

28  

 

March
1

1940 -  Richard Wright’s Native Son first published

2

1807 - Congress bans international slave trade

1901 - Congress adopts Platt Amendment re Cuban independence

3

1915 - debut of Birth of a Nation in NYC
4  
5  
6

1857 - decision in Dred Scott v. Sanford
7 1850 - Daniel Webster endorses Compromise of 1850 in a three-hour speech as the only means to preserve the Union
8

1782 - Gnadenhutten Massacre in OH

9

1990 - Dr. Antonia Novella becomes first woman and Hispanic Surgeon General

10

1928-1998 - bd James Earl Ray, convicted of murdering MLK

11

1785-1861 - bd John McLean, dissenter in Dred Scott v. Sanford

12  
13  
14  
15  
16  
17

1777-1864 - bd Roger B Taney (Supreme Court)

1910-1987 - bd Bayard Rustin (civil rights)

18

1782-1850 - bd John C. Calhoun

19

1748-1830 - bd Elias Hicks (Quaker minister, abolitionist)

20

1852 - Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin published

21

1965 - MLK leads Selma to Montgomery civil rights march

22  
23

1942 - Japanese internment begins

24  
25

1911 - Triangle Shirtwaist Fire kills 146 workers

 

1965 - MLK reaches end of Selma-Montgomery march

26  
27  
28  
29  
30

1870 - 15th Amendment giving black men the vote declared in effect

31

1927-1993       bd Cesar Chavez (labor leader)

 

April
1  
2  
3

1968 - day before being assassinated, MLK gives “mountaintop” speech to striking sanitation works, Memphis TN

4

1915-1983 - bd Muddy Waters (blues)

 

1968 - MLK assassinated, Memphis, TN

 

1981 - Henry Cisneros elected first Hispanic mayor of a large city, San Antonio

5

1614 - Pocahontas marries John Rolfe

 

1856-1915 - bd Booker T. Washington, Franklin County, VA

 

1937 - bd Colin Powell

6

1909 - Robert Peary and Matthew Henson reach North Pole

7

1915-1959 - bd Billie Holiday (jazz singer)

8  
9

1898-1976 -  bd Paul Robeson (singer/civil rights activist)

  1939 - Marian Anderson sings at Lincoln Memorial after DAR denies her permission to sing in Constitution Hall
10

1947 - Brooklyn Dodgers manager Branch Rickey announces has purchased contract of Jackie Robinson from Montreal Royals, integrating Major League Baseball

11  
12

1861 - Civil War begins when Confederates fire on Fort Sumter, SC

 

1983 - Harold Washington elected Chicago’s first black mayor

13  
14

1775 - Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush organize first anti-slavery society in America

15

1889-1979 - bd A. Philip Randolph (labor leader/civil rights activist)

 

1889-1975 - bd Robert Hart Benton (artist)

 

1838-1937 - bd Bessie Smith (blues singer)

 

1922-1987 - bd Harold Washington (first black mayor Chicago)

 

1947 - Jackie Robinson appears with Brooklyn Dodgers to integrate baseball

16

1862 - bill ending slavery in DC becomes law

17  
18  
19  
20

1971 - Supreme Court upholds busing to achieve school desegregation

21  
22

1889  - Oklahoma land rush begins

 

1993 - US Holocaust Memorial dedicated DC

23  
24  
25

1918-1996 - bd Ella Fitzgerald (jazz singer)

26

1886-1939 -  bd “Ma” Rainey (mother of the blues)

27

1927 - bd Coretta Scott King

28  
29

1899-1974 -  bd Duke Ellington (jazz, composer/bandleader)

 

1992 -  rioting breaks out in Los Angeles after Rodney King verdict

30

 

May
1

1830-1930 - bd Mary Harris Jones, aka Mother Jones (labor organizer)

2  
3  
4

1961 - Freedom Riders leave Washington, D.C. to challenge racial segregation and integration in bus station terminals

5

1892 - Congress passes Geary Chinese Exclusion Act

 

1945 - Japanese balloon attack in Oregon kills pregnant woman and five

          children

6

1882 - Congress passes Chinese Exclusion Act

7  
8

1973 - AIM militants surrendered after ten week siege of Wounded Knee

9

1916-1993 - William du Bois (author/illustrator children’s books)

10

1838-1865 - bd John Wilkes Booth

 

1909-1978 - bd Maybelle Carter (singer/guitarist)

11  
12

1918-1953 - bd Julius Rosenberg (physicist/executed for treason)

13  
14  
15

1970 - Two black students killed at Jackson State, MS during student

          protests

16

1930-1998 - bd Betty Carter (jazz singer)

17

1942 - bd Tah Mahal (blues/folk singer)

 

1954 - Supreme Court issues Brown v. Board ruling ending school segregation

 

2000 - two former Klansmen arrested in 1963 Birmingham church bombing

18

1896 Supreme Court declares “separate but equal” doctrine in Plessy v.

       Ferguson

19

1921 - Congress passes Emergency Quota Act re immigration

 

1925-1965 birthday Malcolm X (minister/civil rights leader)

 

1930-1965       bd Lorraine Hansbury (author Raisin in the Sun)

20

1961 - White mob attacks Freedom Riders in Montgomery, AL, US sends in federal marshalls

 

1996 - Supreme Court strikes down Colorado law banning measures to protect homosexuals from discrimination

21

1904-1943  bd Fats Waller (pianist/composer)

22

2002 Birmingham jury convicts Bobby Frank Cherry of 1963 bombing of a

       church that killed four young girls 

23

1880-1938       bd Benjamin Cardozo (Supreme Court) 

24

1878-1949       bd Bill “Bojangles” Robinson (dancer/film star) 

25

1926-1991       bd Miles Davis (jazz musician/composer) 

26  
27  
28

1863   First Black regiment leaves Boston to fight in the Civil War 

 

1888-1953       bd Jim Thorpe (American Indian athlete) 

29

1973  Tom Bradley elected first black mayor of Los Angeles 

30  
31

1924-1985       bd Patricia Harris (first black woman cabinet member) 

 

September
1

1859   Pullman sleeping cars go into service
 

1942   federal judge in CA upholds Japanese detentions

2

1963   AL Gov George Wallace prevents integration of Tuskeegee HS,

3  
4

1908 bd Richard Wright, Natchez, MS (author)
 

1957 Ark. Gov Orville Faubus calls out National Guard to prevent

       integration of Central High School
5

1887  Sitting Bull killed during an attempt to arrest him
6  
7  
8

1565  Spanish establish first permanent settlement in North America at

         St. Augustine, FL
9  
10  
11

2001  Arab high jackers fly commercial airliners into the World Trade

        Center, NYC, the Pentagon, and a field in PA, leads to

        discrimination against Arabs and Arab-Americans
12

1974 violence breaks out in Boston over court-ordered desegregation
13  
14

1847 US troops under Winfield Scott take Mexico City
15

1923 OK Gov John Calloway Walton declares martial law due to KKK

       activity, beginning of intense negative publicity about the klan
 

1963 Four girls killed in church bombing in Birmingham, AL
16

1925 bd Riley B. “B. B” King, Indianola, MS (blues musician)
 

1950 bd Henry Louis Gates, Keyser, WV (critic, historian)
17

1778 US signs first Indian treaty, with Delawares
18

1850 Congress passes Fugitive Slave Act
19  
20

1962 James Meredith prevented from enrolling in U Mississippi by Gov. Ross Barnett
21  
22

1862  Lincoln orders slaves emancipated Jan 1, 1863
23

1926  bd John Coltrane, Hamlet, NC (jazz musician)
 

1930  bd Ray Charles (musician)
 

1957  Black students withdraw from Little Rock’s Central High due to white mob
24  
25

1957  National Guard escorts black students into Little Rock’s Central High
26  
27  
28

1935 bd Koko Taylor, blues singer
 

1938 bd Ben E. King, Henderson, NC (composer/musician)
29

1962 JFK nationalizes the MS national guard over Meredith college

       admission controversy
30

n.d.  Feast Day of St. Jerome, patron saint of librarians and scholars
 

1962 James Meredith enrolls in University of MS

 

October
1  
2

1800-1831  bd Nat Turner (led slave rebellion)

 

1890-1977  bd Julius “Groucho” Marx, NYC (entertainer)

 

1967  Thurgood Marshall sworn in as first black on the US Supreme Court
3

1790-1866   bd John Ross (Cherokee chief)
 

1941  bd Chubby Checker (musician)
 

1974   Frank Robinson named first black manager in MLB, Cleveland Indians 

4  
5  
6

1927  debut of Al Jolson’s “The Jazz Singer”, first talkie

 

1949  American-born Iva Togouri D’Aquino convicted of being “Tokyo

         Rose”
7

1897-1975       bd Elijah Mohammed (Black Muslim founder)
 

1954 Marian Anderson first black singer hired by Metropolitan Opera

8

1941 bd Jessie Jackson (minister, civil rights)  
9  
10

1901-1988  bd Frederick Douglass Patterson (educator and founder

                United Negro College Fund)
 

1917 bd Thelonius Monk, Rocky Mount, NC (jazz musician, composer)
 

1935 George Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess” opens on Broadway
11  
12

1942 Atty Gen Francis Biddle announces Italian nations in the US no

       longer viewed as enemy aliens

13

1843 B’nai B’rith founded in NYC

14

1964 MLK wins Nobel Peace Prize

15

1830 bd Helen Hunt Jackson, Amherst, MA (author, Indian rights activist)
 

1991 Senate narrowly confirms Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas

       52-48                             

16

1859  John Brown leads raid on federal arsenal in  Harper’s Ferry,
17  
18

1767 Mason Dixon line settled
 

1926 bd Chuck Berry, St. Louis, MO (musician, composer)

1948 bd Ntozake Shange, nee Paulette Williams, Trenton, NJ (playwright)
 

1968 US Olympic Committee suspends two black athletes,  Tommie Smith

        and John Carlos, for giving the black power salute during a medal

        ceremony

19

1944 US Navy announces will accept black women in WAVES
 

1983 Senate approves Martin Luther King holiday
20

1967 seven men convicted in Meridian, MS for violating the civil rights of

       three slain civil rights workers

21

1917-1993 bd Dizzy Gillespie (composer/bandleader)

22  
23  
24  
25  
26

1911 bd Mahalia Jackson, New Orleans (singer, civil rights activist)

27  
28

1789 bd Levi Coffin, Greensboro, NC (abolitionist)
29

1969 Supreme Court orders immediate end to all school segregation
30

1831 capture of Nat Turner
31

1896-1977   bd Ethel Walters (singer)

 

November
1

1950  Charles Cooper becomes the first black to play in the National

         Basketball Association

2

1983   Reagan signs bill establishing MLK holiday    
3

1979  Ku Klux Klan attacs a Communist Workers Party rally in broad

        daylight, killing five and wounding eight, in Greensboro, NC

 

1992  Carol Mosely Braun first black woman elected to US Senate, Illinois 

 

1994  Susan Smith arrested in SC for killing her two infant sons.  She had

        blamed the killing on a black man 

4

1879  bd Will Rogers, Oklahoma (humorist, commentator)   
5

1998  study shows TJ probably fathered at least one of Sally Hemmings=

        children
6

1789 - Father John Carroll appointed as the first Catholic bishop in the USA.

7

1811 Tecumseh killed at Battle of Tippecanoe/Wabash

 

1837 Abolitionist Elijah P. Lovejoy killed by pro-slavery supporters, Alton,

       Ill
 

1963 Elston Howard, New York Yankees, first black American League Most

       Valuable Player

 

1967 Carl Stokes elected first black mayor of a major American city,

       Cleveland, OH
 

1989 Douglas Wilder elected first black governor, VA

 

1989 David Dinkins becomes first black mayor of NYC

8

1966 Edward Brooke first Black elected to US Senate from Massachusetts   
9

1731 bd Benjamin Banneker, (mathematician, architect, writer)   
 

1802 bd Elijah Lovejoy, (abolitionist)  
 

1922 bd Dorothy Dandridge (actor)

 

1961 Professional Golfers Association eliminates it “Caucasians only” rule

10

1801 bd Samuel Howe, Boston, MA (educator, activist, abolitionist)
 

1940 bd Russell Means (Indian activist)

 

1969 Sesame Street debuts  

11

1831 Nat Turner hanged, Jerusalem, VA, for inciting slave insurrection

 

1954 Ellis Island closes (opened 1892)  

12

1492 Columbus discovers land in North America
 

1792 Columbus monument dedicated in Baltimore
 

1954 Ellis Island closes (opened 1892)   
13

1956 Supreme Court bans segregation in interstate buses    
14

1947 bd Buckwheat Zydeco (musician)

15  
16

1873 bd William C. Handy, Florence, AL (musician)   
17  
18

1966 US Catholic bishops do away with meatless Friday
19  
20  
21

1904 bd Coleman Hawkins, St. Joseph, MO (saxophonist)   
22  
23  
24

1868 bd Scott Joplin, Bowie County, TX (composer)   
25

1914 bd Joe Dimaggio, Martinez, CA (baseball player)   
 

1955 ICC bans racial discrimination in interstate bus transportation

26

1792 bd of Sarah Grimke, SC (abolitionist, women=s rights activist)  

 

1858 bd Katherine Drexel (founder Sisters Blessed Sacrament  

27

1951 Hosea Richardson becomes first black jockey in FL 

28  
29

1864 Sand Creek Massacre, CO
 

1908 bd Adam Clayton Powell (minister, congressman, civil rights

        activitist)   
30

1915 bd Brownie McGhee

 

December
1

1955 Rosa Parks arrested for not giving up her seat on a bus to white man in Montgomery, AL

2

1859 John Brown hanged for Harpers Ferry raid 

 

1943 Carmen Jones opens on Broadway

3  
4

1849 bd Crazy Horse 

 

1943 Baseball Commissioner Kennesaw “Mountain” Landis announces clubs

       are free to hire black players

5

1932 bd Little Richard (singer)
6

1865 Thirteenth Amendment abolishes slavery
7

1925  bd Sammy Davis, Jr.

8

1863  Lincoln announces plan for South=s reconstruction

 

1933  bd Flip Wilson (comedian)  
 

1999  Memphis jury finds MLK killed by conspiracy, not a lone gunman

9

1848  bd Joel Chandler Harris, (creator Uncle Remus)
 

1932  bd Redd Foxx (entertainer/actor)
10

1950 Dr. Ralph Bunche wins Nobel Peace Prize for Arab-Isreali

            negotiations  
 

1964  MLK wins Nobel Peace Prize, youngest recipient ever  
 

1999  Computer scientist Wen Ho Lee was arrested on suspicion of spying

         for China. Later 58 out of 59 charges against him would be dropped
11

1872  P. B. S. Pinchback becomes first black governor, acting governor of

        Louisiana

12

1805 bd William Lloyd Garrison (abolitionist editor) 

 

1806 bd Stand Watie (Cherokee chief, Confederate general)
 

1870 Joseph H. Rainey, SC, first black sworn into House Representatives

 

1943 bd Grover Washington, Jr. (musician)

13

  
14

1915 Jack Johnson become first black heavy-weight champion

 

1985 Wilma Mankiller (Cherokee, Oklahoma) becomes first female chief of

       a major tribe

15

1890  Chief Sitting Bull (Sioux) and eleven others killed during arrest

        attempt in Grand River, SD 

16

1936  bd Morris Dees, founder Southern Poverty Law Center

        (Civil Rights activist)

 

 2000 president-elect George W. Bush appoints Colin Powell first black

        Sec State

17

1944  US Army ends policy against Japanese-Americans on the west

         coast, detention camps opened 

18

1865  Thirteenth Amendment ratified, outlawed slavery
19

1933   bd Cicely Tyson

 

1944   Supreme Court upholds detention of Japanese-Americans   
20

1803   US takes possession of Louisiana at New Orleans 

 

1881   bd Branch Rickey, Stockdale, OH (baseball manager)  
21

1959   bd Florence Griffith Joyner (athlete)

22

1696   bd James Ogelthorpe, founder Georgia

23

1867   bd Sarah Breedlove Walker (businesswoman, philanthropist)

24

1865   KKK founded, Pulaski, TN  
25  
26  
27

1927   AShowboat@ opens in New
28

1982   Miami police mortally wound Nevelle Johnson, Jr. in an arcade, sets

         of several days of rioting

29

1890  Wounded Knee Creek, SD, US Seventh Cavalry kills over 400 Sioux

         men, women and children

30  
31

1891  Immigration Depot opened on Ellis Island,   NY