* Today in Black History - November 26 * 1866 - Rust College is founded in Holly Springs, Mississippi. 1872 - Macon B. Allen is elected judge of the Lower Court of Charleston, South Carolina. Allen, the first African American lawyer, becomes the second African American to hold a major judicial position and the first African American with a major judicial position on the municipal level. 1878 - Marshall Walter "Major" Taylor is born in Indianapolis, Indiana. He will become an American cyclist and win the world 1 mile (1.6 km) track cycling championship in 1899 after setting numerous world records and overcoming racial discrimination. He will be the first African American athlete to achieve the level of world champion and only the second black man to win a world championship, after Canadian boxer George Dixon. He will hold the title of "the world's fastest bicycle racer" for 12 years. He will join the ancestors on June 21, 1932 in Chicago, Illinois. 1883 - Sojourner Truth, women's rights advocate, poet, and freedom fighter, joins the ancestors in Battle Creek, Michigan. 1890 - Savannah State College is founded in Savannah, Georgia. 1933 - Garrett Mims is born in Ashland, West Virginia. Known as Garnet Mims, he will become a singer, influential in soul music and rhythm and blues. He will first achieve success as the lead singer of Garnet Mimms & The Enchanters, and will be best known for the 1963 hit "Cry Baby", later recorded by Janis Joplin. According to Steve Huey at AllMusic, his "pleading, gospel- derived intensity will make him one of the earliest true soul singers [and] his legacy will remain criminally underappreciated." He will first record as a member of the Norfolk Four, for Savoy Records in 1953. He will return to Philadelphia after serving in the military and, after a spell in a doo-wop group, the Deltones, will form another group, the Gainors, in 1958, with Sam Bell, Willie Combo, John Jefferson, and Howard Tate. The Gainors will record several singles over the next few years for the Red Top, Mercury and Talley Ho labels, but will fail to have any chart success. Mimms and Bell will leave the group in 1961, and join with Charles Boyer and Zola Pearnell to form Garnet Mimms and the Enchanters. The group will move from Philadelphia to New York in 1963, and begin to work with the songwriter and record producer Bert Berns, who will sign them to the United Artists label and team them with fellow songwriter and producer Jerry Ragovoy. Dominic Turner will write that "the partnership between the Enchanters on the one hand and Ragovoy and Berns on the other will be very much an experiment in applying Mimms' gospel and deep soul roots to the new uptown soul in vogue in New York." The new team will have an immediate hit with "Cry Baby", written by Berns and Ragovoy, and with uncredited vocal backing by the Gospelaires, featuring Dionne Warwick, Dee Dee Warwick, and Estelle Brown. The song will top the R&B chart and will go on to number4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1963. It will sell over one million copies, and will be awarded a gold disc. The group will follow it up with "For Your Precious Love," a cover of Jerry Butler and the Impressions' original, which will hit the Billboard Top 30 later that year, as did the flip side, "Baby Don't You Weep." Another hit recording with the Enchanters, "A Quiet Place", will become a popular song among the Carolina beach music community. In 1964 he will leave the Enchanters for a solo career; with Sam Bell as lead vocalist, the group will go on to have a minor hit with "I Wanna Thank You". He will continue to record for United Artists, and will have several minor R&B hits over the next two years, including "One Girl" and a cover of the Jarmels' "A Little Bit of Soap." Some of his recordings at that time, including "It Was Easier to Hurt Her", "As Long As I Have You", and "Looking For You", will later become \ popular on the British Northern soul scene. Berns and Ragovoy will produce Mimms' final Top 40 hit in 1966, "I'll Take Good Care Of You", which will climb to #15 in the R&B chart and number 30 in the Hot 100. he will also release three albums on United Artists, As Long As I Have You (1964), I'll Take Good Care Of You and Warm and Soulful (both 1966). He will move to the UA subsidiary label Veep in 1966, releasing several singles including "My Baby", later recorded by Janis Joplin and will make the live setlist of the last edition of The Yardbirds and early Led Zeppelin, and the following year toured in the UK with Jimi Hendrix. An album, Garnet Mimms Live, will be recorded with Scottish band the Senate (who featured drummer Robbie McIntosh, later of the Average White Band), and will be released in the UK in 1967. He will continue to work with Ragovoy, and in 1968 will start recording for Verve Records. In 1968–69, Led Zeppelin will perform an extended version of Mimms' "As Long As I Have You" on their UK and US tours. Mimms' final recordings for several years will be issued on the GSF label in 1972. In the late 1970s, he will release a few funk songs under the name Garnet Mimms and the Truckin' Company. He will have his only hit in the UK at this time, when "What It Is", produced by Randy Muller of Brass Construction, will reache number 44 for one week on the UK Singles Chart in June 1977. He will give up his music career shortly afterwards. He will become a born-again Christian, and in the 1980s will find his calling ministering to lost souls as part of the New Jerusalem Prison Ministry. He will later establish the Bottom Line Revival Ministries, again ministering to prisoners. In 2007 he will return to recording, and a year later will release a new gospel album Is Anybody Out There? on the Evidence label, produced and (primarily) written by Jon Tiven. He will be given a Pioneer Award in 1999 by the Rhythm and Blues Foundation. 1939 - Annie Mae Bullock is born in Nutbush, Tennessee. She will meet Ike Turner in the early 1950's at a St. Louis, Missouri club. Soon after, she will begin singing with his band on occasional engagements and be better known as Tina Turner. In 1959, they will form the Ike and Tina Turner Revue. After separating from Ike and the band, she will build an even more successful career on her own. After her divorce from Ike Turner, she will rebuild her career through live performances. In the early 1980s, she will launch a comeback with another string of hits, starting in 1983 with the single "Let's Stay Together" followed by the 1984 release of her fifth solo album "Private Dancer" which will become a worldwide success. "What's Love Got to Do with It", the most successful single from the album, will later be used as the title of a loosely-based biographical film adapted from her autobiography. In addition to her musical career, she will also experience success in films, including a role in the 1975 rock musical "Tommy" and a starring role in the 1985 Mel Gibson blockbuster film "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome," as well as a cameo role in the 1993 film "Last Action Hero. One of the world's most popular entertainers, she will also be referred to as "The Queen of Rock 'n' Roll." She will be termed the most successful female rock artist, winning eight Grammy Awards and selling more concert tickets than any other solo performer in history. Her combined album and single sales will total approximately 200 million copies worldwide. She will be noted for her energetic stage presence, powerful vocals, and career longevity. In 2008, she will return from semi- retirement to embark on her "Tina!: 50th Anniversary Tour." Her tour will become one of the highest selling ticketed shows of 2008�2009. Rolling Stone magazine will rank her no. 63 on their 100 greatest artists of all time. In 1991, she will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. 1968 - O.J. Simpson is named Heisman Trophy winner for 1968. A running back for the University of Southern California, Simpson amassed a total of 3,187 yards in 18 games and scored 33 touchdowns in two seasons. He will play professional football with the Buffalo Bills and the San Francisco 49ers and be equally well known as a sportscaster and actor. 1970 - Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. the first African American general in the U.S. military, joins the ancestors at the age of 93 in Chicago, Illinois. 1970 - Charles Gordone is awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his play, "No Place To Be Somebody." 1970 - Painter, Jacob Lawrence is awarded the Spingarn Medal "in tribute to the compelling power of his work which has opened to the world...a window on the Negro's condition in the United States" and "in salute to his unswerving commitment" to the Black struggle. 1986 - Benjamin Sherman 'Scatman' Crothers, actor, who is best known for his role as "Louie" on TV's "Chico & the Man", joins the ancestors at the age of 76, after succumbing to pneumonia. The pneumonia was a complication of lung and esophageal cancer. ______________________________________________________________ Munirah Chronicle is edited by Mr. Rene' A. Perry "The TRUTH shall make you free" E-mail: <[log in to unmask]> Archives: http://listserv.icors.org/archives/Munirah.html http://blackagenda.com/cybercolonies/index.htm _____________________________________________________________ To SUBSCRIBE send E-mail to: <[log in to unmask]> In the E-mail body place: Subscribe Munirah Your FULL Name ______________________________________________________________ Munirah(TM) is a trademark of Information Man. Copyright 1997 - 2016, All Rights Reserved by the Information Man in association with The Black Agenda.