These Baptist groups, the Foreign Mission Convention of the United States, the American National Baptist Convention, the Baptist National Education Convention, Merged and established the National Baptist Convention at an Atlanta meeting.

On this day, David Walker of Massachusetts wrote his fiery tract The Appeal. Its eloquence and uncompromising defiance was a source of great inspiration to African people, free and slave, as well as cause for alarm for Southern slave owners and many Northern abolitionists who favored more gradual change.

Secretary of the army cleared the military records of 167 soldiers who were dishonorably discharged in 1906 because they refused to identify alleged participants in the Brownsville Raid.

Shirley Ajayi was the first African American given a part on a television show as a psychic! The show lasted for about one year[actually six months] in Chicago, Illinois since the show was seasonal! Shirley started her career the minute her predictions came true! She was renamed Aura and hired to do the remaining shows for some six months! After that many psychic flooded the scene from Psychic Friends Network to the present Miss Cleo! Even the movie The Matrix was influenced by her with the character The Oracle. This fact is true! Shirley is also a distant cousin to Oprah Winfrey who also was on television in Chicago around the same year 1986!

Constance Baker Motley was born on September 14, 1921 in New Haven, Connecticut.  She was the ninth child in a family of 12 children.  Her parents were emigrants from the island of Nevis in the West Indies. Motley grew up attending New Haven’s integrated public schools and soon became an avid reader.  She was inspired by books concerning civil rights heroes and by the age of 15 she had decided to become a lawyer.  Due to her familys economic situation she could not afford to attend college immediately after graduating high school.  Instead she took up a job as a maid for a short time before finding a job with the National Youth Administration.  Giving a speech at the local community center one night, a wealthy white contractor, Clarence Blakeslee, was so impressed that he offered to pay for her college.

Motley began her college career at Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee in 1941. In 1943 she transferred to New York University where she received her bachelor’s degree in economics.   In 1944 she became the first black woman to be accepted into Columbia Law School.  It was here where she met Thurgood Marshall, chief counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.  Motley worked for the Legal Defense Fund while she obtaining her degree, which she received in 1946.  In that same year she married a real estate broker, Joel Wilson Motley, Jr.  Their marriage would eventually produce a son, Joel Wilson Motley III.  

Motley’s career with the NAACP would bring her many high profile cases often involving school desegregation. She played a major role in the legal preparation for the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education case and was the first black woman to argue a case before the United States Supreme Court.  She was also the lead council in the case to allow James Meredith to gain admission to the University of Mississippi in 1962.  Besides fighting for the rights of blacks to get into segregated schools, Motley also defended protestors arrested during the Freedom Rides sit-ins of the early 1960’s.  She won nine out of ten

Governor Barnett found guilty of civil contempt of the federal court. United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ordered Barnett to purge himself of contempt or face arrest and a fine of $10,000 a day.

Purlie Victorious, a farce by playwright Ossie Davis, opened on Broadway.

Joseph Paul Franklin, an avowed racist, sentenced to life imprisonment for killing two Black joggers in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Massacre in Louisiana. The Opelousas Massacre

occurred in Louisiana on September 28, in which

an estimated 200 to 300 black Americans were killed.

Death of Rev. Lemuel Haynes (88), Revolutionary War veteran and pioneer Black preacher, in Granville, New York.

Althea Gibson was a tennis player and later professional golfer who became the first African American woman to cross the racial barrier and compete professionally in both sports. She was born on August 25, 1927 in South Carolina. Her family was under severe financial duress due to the Great Depression, and moved to Harlem to find better work and support themselves. She was of an athletic nature from a young age and was a skilled table tennis player. At the age of 12, she had become New York’s women’s table tennis champion. Her family and friends recognized her talent from an early age and rallied together to gather funds for her training in lawn tennis. She acquired a junior membership to get lessons at the Cosmopolitan Tennis Club in Harlem. Because of the strict racial divide, she was not allowed to enter the club or play during daylight hours while the other members were present. As a result, she learnt at night, when the lines weren’t even clearly visible. Gibson later stated that this helped her to get a very accurate idea of where the lines were without even being able to see them, which contributed to her later professional success.

She won her first professional tournament, the American Tennis Association New York State Championship, in 1941 at the age of 14. She won again in 1944 and 1945 before losing in the final in 1946. After that she won the title for 10 straight years from 1947 to 1956. Her prowess was noted in many circles and she gained the support of a Virginian doctor named Walter Johnson, who supported her training and helped her gain access to more professional tournaments and competitions. In 1946, she moved to North Carolina where she enrolled in high school, and later Florida A&M University on a full athletic scholarship.

In 1950, she was invited to play at the United States National Championships (later renamed the U.S. Open) due to an article written in her support by Alice Marble. She made it to the second round and her participation received wide media attention. It was a huge step

Jazz trumpeter and composer Miles Davis died in Santa Monica, California from complications following a stroke. He was 65.