culture
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NFL Hall of Famer Jim Brown: 1964 Championship Ring Was Stolen
The 1964 NFL championship ring belonging to former Cleveland Browns star Jim Brown is a prize in anyone’s eyes. However, the ring, which is up for auction at Lelands, was stolen from the famed running back 40 years ago, he claims, according to the Associated Press. Brown says that the claim that he authenticated the…
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NY Mother in Custody After Baby Abandoned on Subway Platform
On Monday around 11:50 a.m., a young mother riding the New York City subway with her 7-month-old baby waited for the subway car to come to a stop at Manhattan’s Columbus Circle station. Once the doors opened, the mother pushed the red-and-white polka-dot stroller that the baby was seated in onto the subway platform. The…
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Missing NYC World War II Veteran Found in Las Vegas
Last week Richard Micheaux, a decorated World War II veteran, put on his U.S. Open logo cap, blue carpenter jeans, an off-white shirt with black and red stripes and brown shoes, with his dog tags proudly draped around his neck. Micheaux, 93, headed out his door last Tuesday morning for what was supposed to be…
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Leading Black Producers on Broadway Adapt Film Black Orpheus
Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage and Tony Award winner George C. Wolfe are looking to ride the Brazilian wave energized by the World Cup and the upcoming 2016 Summer Olympics by bringing the film Black Orpheus to Broadway, the Associated Press reports. The musical’s producers will be Stephen Byrd, Alia Jones-Harvey and Paula Marie Black.…
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Cuba: Is It Time to Turn Enemies Into Frenemies?
You can’t ignore a rogue Caribbean communist island a jump from the Florida coast, especially when it’s run by guys named Castro. But President Obama didn’t want his spot blown when he sent a low-key missive to Cuban President Raúl Castro just a couple of weeks ago. There was very little noise made when he…
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Janet Mock Breaks Through the Isolation for Transgender Women of Color
I recently added a new name to my list of inspirational writers: Janet Mock. Her best-selling memoir, Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love and So Much More, is a beautiful—at times bumpy—journey through girlhood. Reminiscent of Zora Neale Hurston’s iconic Their Eyes Were Watching God, it is a touching story of self-realization and self-love.…
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Credit Invisibility Means Less Economic Opportunity in Black America
“I am invisible, understand,” Ralph Ellison famously wrote, “simply because people refuse to see me.” He was speaking of the double consciousness that accompanied the burden of blackness in America more than 60 years ago. But according to Yale professor Frederick Wherry, this conundrum is not just social and political but also economic—and that sense of…
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MLK Jr. Bridge in Indiana Vandalized
The Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Bridge in Fort Wayne, Ind., has been vandalized for the second time in two weeks, the Journal Gazette reports. According to the news site, the scribbles defacing two benches along the bridge, discovered Sunday, decried interracial relationships, specifically involving black men and white women. “White women do not…
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83-Year-Old Texas Woman Wards Off Thief With Stick and Boiling Water
Lillie McClendon is no pushover, and she made sure to demonstrate that Sunday to a would-be burglar who broke into her home and demanded money, ABC News reports. The 83-year-old Houston native had just stepped out of the shower and put some clothes in the laundry when she noticed an open window and that her…
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Really? Meme Shames Black Women for Buying Weaves From Koreans
The image above, which appears to have been created sometime last year, resurfaced and popped up in our Facebook newsfeed today, along with a reminder of a seemingly timeless theme: the stereotype-based shaming of black women for choices that don’t harm anyone and, really, aren’t anyone else’s business. The meme—which essentially says that black women wear…