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Negros
Negros , island (1990 pop. 3,182,252), 4,905 sq mi (12,704 sq km), one of the Visayan Islands, 4th largest of the Philippines, between Panay and Cebu. Although mountainous (Mt. Canloan, a volcano, rises to c.8,088 ft/2,465 m), Negros has extensive arable lowlands; they are intensively cultivated and...
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Satchel Paige
Satchel Paige (Leroy Paige) , 1906-82, American baseball player, b. Mobile, Ala. Celebrated for his wit and extraordinary pitching ability, he became legendary while barnstorming in the Negro baseball leagues prior to the integration (1947) of the major leagues. He played in as many as 2,500 games...
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Mary McLeod Bethune
Mary McLeod Bethune , 1875-1955, American educator, b. Mayesville, S.C., grad. Moody Bible Institute, Chicago, 1895. The 17th child of former slaves, she taught (1895-1903) in a series of southern mission schools before settling in Florida to found (1904) the Daytona Normal and Industrial Institute ...
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Robert Hayden
Robert Hayden , 1913-80, American poet, b. Detroit. After earning his M.A. at the Univ. of Michigan, he taught there and at Fisk Univ. Although the tone of his poems is quiet and often loving, he has a considerable gift for irony and his insights can be shattering. His Ballad of Remembrance (1962)...
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Melville Jean Herskovits
Melville Jean Herskovits , 1895-1963, American anthropologist, b. Bellefontaine, Ohio; educated at the Univ. of Chicago (Ph.B., 1920) and Columbia (Ph.D., 1923). After teaching at Columbia and at Howard Univ. he went to Northwestern Univ., where he taught anthropology from 1927. He did ethnographic ...
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Robert Clifton Weaver
Robert Clifton Weaver 1907-, U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (1966-68), b. Washington, D.C. He was successively adviser to the Secretary of the Interior (1933-37), special assistant with the Housing Authority (1937-40), and an administrative assistant with the National Defense Advis...
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Booker Taliaferro Washington
Booker Taliaferro Washington 1856-1915, American educator, b. Franklin co., Va. His mother was a mulatto slave on a plantation, his father a white man. After the Civil War, he worked in salt furnaces and coal mines in Malden, W.Va., and attended school part time, until he was able to enter the Hamp...
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John Harold Johnson
John Harold Johnson 1918-2005, African-American magazine publisher, b. Arkansas City, Ark. The son of a mill worker, he began his career editing a Chicago insurance company magazine. In 1942 he started Negro Digest, a periodical modeled on Reader's Digest. Encouraged by its success, he founded ...
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Vernon Eulion Jordan, Jr.
Vernon Eulion Jordan, Jr. 1935-, African-American civil-rights leader and lawyer, b. Atlanta, Ga. A graduate of the Howard Univ. Law School, he was executive director (1970-71) of the United Negro College Fund and president (1972-81) of the National Urban League. After being wounded (1980) by a sni...
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Willie Howard Mays, Jr.
Willie Howard Mays, Jr. ( "Say Hey" Willie Mays), 1931-, American baseball player, b. Fairfield, Ala. He began his professional career at 17 with the Black Barons of the Negro National League. In 1951 he joined the New York Giants of the National League and led them to a world championship in 19...
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