Celebrating Black History Month: John E. Rudder, first African American commissioned officer in regular USMC

 

John Earl Rudder, born October 4, 1924 in Paducah, Kentucky, became the first African American to be commissioned into the regular United States Marine Corps.  Frederick C. Branch became an officer in the Marine Corps Reserve in 1946.

He enlisted into the Marines and served during WWII.  After the war, he graduated from the Naval Reserve Officer's Training Corps.  He received his commission as 2nd Lieutenant in the USMC, May 28, 1948.  He entered the Marine Corps' Basic School at the Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Virginia in August, but resigned in 1949.

The FBI put him under long-term surveillance, suspecting him as being a communist. Rudder moved to Washington DC and became activists, protesting war and discrimination.

I had a lot of trouble finding any images or videos of Rudder, so I couldn't find any more information after 1967.  He passed away in 2006 in Paducah, Kentucky.

Celebrating Black History Month: Joe Adams, first African American to win Golden Globe

Joe Adams, born April 11, 1924 in Los Angeles, California, worked his way up from being a truck driver to becoming general assistant for LA radio personality Al Jarvis. Later, Adams became Jarvis' assistant producer.

Adams became the first African American announcer on NBC's radio network and in 1948 he became a DJ and announcer on KOWL radio in Santa Monica. That same year, became the MC and stage director for the fourth Cavalcade of Jazz concert held in LA, in September.  He continued to MC the event for 10 more years.

In June 1951, he began his own TV program on KTTV in LA with a 15-piece orchestra.  

In 1954, Adams portrayed a boxer in Carmen Jones, featuring Dorothy Dandridge, for which he won the Golden Globe for New Star - Actor, becoming the first African American actor to win a Golden Globe.

Celebrating National Hispanic Heritage Month: Katy Jurado, first Mexican-American actress to win a Golden Globe

Katy Jurado, born Maria Cristina Estela Marcela Jurado Garcia January, 16, 1924 in Mexico City, is the first Latin American actress to win a Golden Globe for her work in High Noon in 1952. She is the first Latin American actress to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her work in Broken Lance in 1954.

She began her film career in 1943 appearing in the Mexican film No mataras.  She appeared in 16 more films over the next seven years in what has been named the Golden Age of Mexican Cinema.  

Jurado made her American cinema debut in Bullfighter and the Lady.  Although she was not interested in appearing in American films, she worked on numerous American western films.  She appeared in High Noon with Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly.  She starred in Arrowhead with Charlton Heston and Jack Palance.

Jurado was married to Ernest Borgnine for four years, and had a romantic relationship with Western novelist Louis L'Amour.

She continued acting until 2002 when she appeared in her final film Un secreto de Esperanza, which was released after her death from kidney failure and pulmonary disease in July 2002.

Celebrating Black History Month: DeHart Hubbard, first African-American to win an individual Olympic gold medal 1924

DeHart Hubbard, born November 25, 1903, attended University of Michigan, where he was National Collegiate Athletic Association champion three times, for the outdoor long jump (1923 and 1925), and the 100-hard dash (1925).  He was the Big Ten Conference champion 7 times.

While he was attending college, he participated in the 1924 Summer Olympic Games in Paris and became the first African-American to win an Olympic gold medal for any sport: the running long jump.

He founded the Cincinnati Tigers, a professional baseball team, which played in the Negro American League.

He has been inducted into the University of Michigan Hall of Honor and the National Track Hall of Fame.

Hubbard passed away in 1976.

Comedian extraordinaire Benny Hill born 1924

Benny Hill, born January 21, 1924 in Southampton, England, is best known for his television variety comedy and sometimes bawdy show in the 1980s.  The Benny Hill Show was nominated twice for a Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Comedy series.  

He had a cameo in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang where he played the Toy Maker.  He also appeared in music video Anything She Does with Genesis.

He passed away in April 1992.

Celebrating Native American Heritage Month: Maria Tallchief, Osage and America's first Prima Ballerina

Elizabeth "Marie" Tallchief, born January 24, 1924 in Fairfax, Oklahoma, became America's first major prima ballerina and the first Native American (Osage) to hold the rank.  She started dancing at age three and when she was eight, her family moved to Los Angeles hoping to advance their daughters' dance careers.  Both Marie and her younger sister Marjorie studied dancing and both became leading figures in the world of ballet.

At 17, she moved to New York City and danced with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo.  There, she met choreographer George Balanchine.  With his difficult choreography and her passion for dancing, ballet was revolutionized.  Her performance as the Sugarplum Fairy in the Nutcracker changed the ballet from obscure to being America's favorite.

In 1949, her role in The Firebird, a work by Igor Stravinsky, put her on top of the ballet world.  She became the first American to perform in Moscow's Bolshoi Theater.

She retired in 1966, and actively promoted ballet in Chicago, serving as the director of ballet for the Lyric Opera of Chicago.  She was awarded a Lifetime Achievement award from the Kennedy Center.  

She passed away in April 2013 in Chicago from complications from hip surgery the previous December.

Jonathan Frid "Barnabas Collins" born 1924

Jonathan Frid, born December 2, 1924 in Ontario, Canada, is best known as Barnabas Collins in the daytime horror show Dark Shadows.  Frid served as a seaman in the Royal Canadian Navy during WWII.  

He starred in almost 600 episodes of Dark Shadows and even had an appearance in the 2012 movie version, starring Johnny Depp.

He passed away in April 2012 just a few weeks before the movie was released, making it his final acting role.

Celebrating Black History Month: Shirley Chisholm, first African-American woman to be elected to U.S. Congress

Shirley Chisholm, born November 30, 1924 in New York City, is the first black woman to be elected to the United States Congress.  She was a Democratic member of the New York State Assembly from 1965-1968 and pushed for more black representation on key committees in the Assembly.

She ran for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1968 representing New York's 12th congressional district, which includes parts of Manhattan.  Her campaign slogan was "Unbought and unbossed".

In 1972, she announced that she would run for president, becoming the first black major party candidate to run for that office.  She did not win the nomination, but she did manage to obtain a lot of support, even though most of it were protest votes against McGovern.

She retired from Congress in 1983 and then moved to Florida in 1991.  She passed away in January 2005.

Don 'Deke' Slayton, Apollo-Soyuz astronaut, born 1924

Donald "Deke" Slayton, born March 1, 1924 in Sparta Wisconsin, flew on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in July 1975.  NASA selected him as one of the original Mercury Seven astronauts and was scheduled to pilot the second manned orbital spaceflight in 1962 but did not due to atrial fibrillation, an irregular heart rhythm.

After getting medical clearance in March 1972, he was assigned as the docking module pilot for the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, the first joint U.S.-Soviet space flight, with Tom Stafford and Vance Brand.  They joined cosmonauts Alexey Leonov and Valeri Kubasov on board the Soyuz craft.

Slayton did not fly in space again but became head of NASA's Approach and Landing Test for the space shuttle program.  He retired from NASA in 1980.

He passed away in June 1993 from a malignant brain tumor.

George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" debuts 1924

"Rhapsody in Blue", one of the most iconic and beloved pieces ever composed, made its debut February 12, 1924.  Composer George Gershwin wrote the piece in just 5 weeks before performing it for the first time at the concert, An Experiment in Modern Music, at the Aeolian Hall in New York City. 

Reviews were not all favorable at the time.  One critic said "...Weep over the lifelessness of the melody and harmony, so derivative, so stale, so inexpressive!"

Perhaps "Rhapsody in Blue" was too far over their heads for them to understand.  Paul Whiteman and his band Palais Royal Orchestra recorded the song and by the end of 1927, it had sold a million copies. 

Here's the entire 17 1/2 minute piece. 




You're welcome!

Happy birthday, Sarek!

Mark Lenard who played Sarek on Star Trek would be 91 today.  Although he had a long and varied career, he will probably be best remembered as playing Spock's father in Star Trek, the television series, the animated series and movies.  His debut in the original series was as the Romulan Commander in Balance of Terror.  He was one of the few actors to play a Romulan, a Klingon, and a Vulcan.

Truman Capote, American author, novelist, playwright born in 1924

Truman Capote, known for literary classics as "Breakfast at Tiffany's" was born September 30, 1924.  His final novel "In Cold Blood" was widely praised but afterwards many of the events he portrayed in the brutal murder of a farmer and his family in Kansas have come under question.  Even though it was published in  1966, he managed to maintain his celebrity status by appearing on talk shows.  He passed away on August 25, 1984.