Put some respect on Dwayne McDuffie’s name. He is a super legend. He is best known for creating the animated television series Static Shock, writing and producing the animated series’ Justice League Unlimited and Ben 10, and co-founding Milestone Media. McDuffie earned a bachelor’s degree at the University of Michigan in 1983 and attended film school at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. While McDuffie was working as a copy editor at the business magazine Investment Dealers’ Digest, a friend got him an interview for an assistant editor position at Marvel Comics. At Marvel Mr. McDuffie helped develop the company’s first line of superhero trading cards and wrote for established series like Spider-Man and Captain Marvel. He also created Damage Control, a mini-series published at intervals from the late ’80s to the present about a firm that repairs the property damage caused by battles between superheroes and super-villains. However, McDuffie was vocal about the lack of diversity in their comics, especially regarding the curious amount of black characters that rode skateboards or wore chicken suits. In 1990 he left Marvel to pursue freelance opportunities. The company he co-founded, Milestone Media were distributed by DC Comics. His partners were a coalition of African-American artists and writers, consisting of himself, Denys Cowan, Michael Davis, and Derek T. Dingle. Their goal was for Milestone to address the underrepresentation of minorities in American comics, and to create characters that were diverse in their ethnicities, backgrounds and experiences. HATS OFF!
Black History 365 | # 261 Gerald Wilson
Gerald Wilson is the man. A trumpeter, composer, arranger, & bandleader — he earned quite the reputation as a leading composer. His band was one of the greats in jazz, leaning heavily on the blues but integrating other styles. His arrangements influenced many musicians that came after him, including multi-instrumentalist Eric Dolphy, who dedicated the song "G.W." to Wilson on his 1960 release Outward Bound. Wilson began his life in jazz in 1937, when he joined the musician's union and started playing professionally. Two years later, at the age of 21, he was invited to join the highly popular Jimmie Lunceford band in New York City. His impact was immediate, contributing such powerful material as Hi Spook and Yard Dog Mazurka to the Lunceford repertoire. After settling in Los Angeles, he organized the first Gerald Wilson Jazz Orchestra, featuring trombonist Melba Liston and trumpeter Snooky Young among its members. Twice touring the country, Wilson's big band made its mark in New York City, receiving rave reviews playing at the Apollo Theater between bookings of the Ellington and Lunceford bands, and in Chicago, landing a ten-week engagement at the Regal Theater and hiring a young Joe Williams as the band's vocalist there. He contributed his skill as an arranger and composer to artists ranging from Duke Ellington, Stan Kenton, and Ella Fitzgerald to the Los Angeles Philharmonic to his guitarist-son Anthony. Additionally he was a radio broadcaster at KBCA and a frequent jazz educator. Among his more noted commissions were one for the 40th anniversary of the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1998, which he revisited in 2007 with his album Monterey Moods, and one for the 30th anniversary of the Detroit International Jazz Festival in 2009. He’s quoted as saying, “Jazz, to me, has to be loose. You can’t be tight. When you get too tight in jazz, it isn’t making it. Same thing with Duke Ellington. He let his band be relaxed, be loose, take it easy. Nobody gets excited here. You’re late. Okay, so you’re late. Let’s play.” Very fresh, very player. Salute. He died in September, 2014 at 96 years old. Rest in power.
Black History 365 | # 260 Ibrahim Traoré
Shoutout to Ibrahim Traoré. Ibrahim Traoré is a Burkinabè military commander and the transitional president of Burkina Faso. Ibrahim Traoré became the transitional president of Burkina Faso after a military coup in September 2022 — that deposed then-interim president Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba, who had himself gained office in a coup just eight months earlier. Under Traoré's administration, Burkina Faso has pursued a revolutionary and anti-colonial agenda, expelling French soldiers and strengthening ties with Russia. Burkina Faso has nationalized its wealth by creating a state mining corporation. In the 3 years since being interim leader of the West African country, Ibrahim Traoré has been on a rapid campaign to rid his country of any traces of Western influence, he is following the footsteps of legendary leader, Thomas Sankara. Captain Ibrahim Traoré is no longer just the leader of a small, landlocked West African nation; for some, he has become a symbol of resistance, independence, and Pan-African pride. He is making modern day history, salute.
Black History 365 | # 259 Million Man March
Black History 365 | # 258 Booker Wright
This is Booker Wright. In 1965, filmmaker Frank De Felitta produced an NBC News documentary about white attitudes towards race in the American South and the tensions of life in the Mississippi Delta during the Civil Rights struggle. The film outraged some Southern viewers, in part, because of a candid and unforgettable scene featuring Booker Wright, a local African-American waiter in Greenwood, MS. Wright, who worked at a local “whites only” restaurant, went on national television to deliver a stunning and heartfelt monologue about his true feelings about serving the white community, and about his aspirations for his children, who he hoped would grow up free from the prejudice he faced. The repercussions for Booker Wright’s courageous candidness were extreme at the time apparently. He spoke about despite being hurt and disrespected by white customers he would maintain a smile on his face. He was later pistol-whipped by a white police officer. And in 1973, Wright was killed in an altercation with a customer at his own restaurant, Booker's Place. Almost fifty years after Booker Wright’s television appearance, his granddaughter Yvette Johnson, and Frank De Felitta’s son, director Raymond De Felitta, journey into the Mississippi Delta in search of answers: Who exactly was Booker Wright? What was the mystery surrounding his courageous life and untimely murder? And what role did this 1965 NBC News documentary play in his fate? While Booker Wright’s name does not appear in history books, Finding Booker’s Place demonstrates that his legacy continues to inspire, many decades later. Rest in power Mr. Wright.