In honor of Black History Month, here are few profiles of contributors to history of African descent:

The Honorable Damon J. Keith

Damon J. Keith was born in Detroit, Michigan, and has served as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit since 1977. Prior to his appointment to the Court of Appeals, Judge Keith served as Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. Judge Keith is a graduate of West Virginia State College (B.A. 1943), Howard University Law School (J.D. 1949), where he was elected Chief Justice of the Court of Peers, and Wayne State University Law School (LL.M. 1956).

As a member of the federal judiciary, Judge Keith has consistently stood as a courageous defender of the constitutional and civil rights of all people. In United States v. Sinclair, commonly referred to as the Keith Decision, the Supreme Court unanimously affirmed Judge Keith’s landmark ruling prohibiting President Nixon and the federal government from engaging in warrantless wiretapping in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Judge Keith was heralded for that decision in Joseph Goulden’s book, The Benchwarmers, as “a prime example of an independent federal judge” who “had the courage to say ‘no'” in the face of “a presidency which likened itself to a ‘sovereign.'” “The strength of the judiciary,” Goulden wrote, “is rooted in just such independence as that displayed by Keith.”
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In honor of Black History Month, here are few profiles of contributors to history of African descent:

Bessie Stringfield

The Motorcycle Queen of Miami

(1911–1993), nicknamed “The Motorcycle Queen of Miami”,^[1] was an African American woman credited with breaking down barriers for both women and African American motorcyclists. She was the first African-American woman to ride across the United States solo and during World War IIshe served as one of the few motorcycle despatch riders for the United States military. The award bestowed by the American Motorcyclist Association for ‘Superior Achievement by a Female Motorcyclist’ is named in her honour. In 2002 Stringfield was inducted into the Motorcycle Hall of Fame.  Stringfield was born in Kingston, Jamaica in 1911, but her parents migrated to Boston when she was still young. Her parents died when Stringfield was five and she was adopted and raised by an Irish woman.  At the age of sixteen Stringfield taught herself to ride her first motorcycle, a 1928 Indian Scout. At the age of nineteen she commenced travelling across the United States and eventually rode through the 48 lower states. During this time she earned money from performing motorcycle stunts in carnival shows.^[2] Due to her skin colour, Stringfield was often denied accommodation while travelling, so she would sleep on her motorcycle at filling stations. Continue reading →

In honor of Black History Month, here are few profiles of contributors to history of African descent:

George Washington

Date: Thu, 1872-11-07, on this date we recall the birth of George Washington in 1817. He was an African-American farmer, businessman and the founder of the town of Centralia, Washington.
Born a slave in Virginia, George Washington escaped and was raised by a white family in Missouri. Unable to attend school, he was tutored and eventually ran a sawmill in St. Joseph, MO. He struggled under the racial restrictions of that slave-holding state, and in 1850 joined a wagon train on the Oregon Trail. After reaching the northwest, George Washington again entered the lumber business and established a homestead on the Chehalis River. But his farm lay in the path of the Northern Pacific Railroad.
He and the company came to terms and with the settlement he received, Washington planned a new town in 1872. He called it Centerville, and he laid out 2,000 lots, setting aside sites for parks and churches. The town thrived, though the name was changed to Centralia.
George Washington spent the rest of his life there as an honored citizen. When he died in 1905, the town, 30 miles south of Olympia, shut down for a day of mourning. George Washington Park (named after him) is in the heart of Centralia, at Pearl St. and Harrison St. Continue reading →

In honor of Black History Month, here are few profiles of contributors to history of African descent: