State Approves Historical Markers for Martinsville Seven, Others amren.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from amren.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Ken Conklin
In October 2009 my wife and I along with some friends (another Daleville couple) visited the Temple of Hera in Olympia, Greece, where the ancient Olympic Games took place. We were enjoying an off-ship excursion to this historic site during a Mediterranean cruise.
The Temple of Hera is where eleven women representing the Vestal Virgins start the fire that ultimately becomes the flame at the Olympics. The modern Olympic Games began in Athens in 1896 and have continued, with a few exceptions, every four years. Many aspects of the Olympics have been altered over the years in response to the economic, political and technological pressures of the time.
Five more historical figures have been hauled into the court of public opinion, found guilty of being either slaveholders, Confederates or segregationists, and sentenced to unnaming.
All five have their names affixed to Virginia community colleges, although not for much longer. Three schools are already in the process of changing their names â Lord Fairfax that operates four locations in the northern Shenandoah Valley and Piedmont, John Tyler in Chesterfield County, and Thomas Nelson in Hampton.
Two others have local boards that want to keep their names â Dabney S. Lancaster in Clifton Forge and Patrick Henry in Martinsville â which has prompted the state board to urge them to think about that again.
Letter: How to contribute to Norvel Lee marker roanoke.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from roanoke.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
His name was Norvel Lee, and weâre nearly seven decades late in recognizing him.
Lee won a gold medal in boxing in the 1952 games in Helsinki, Finland. So did another American boxer named Floyd Patterson, who went on to become even more famous as the world heavyweight champion.
Lee, unlike Patterson, never turned pro â even though he had offers â and so never became a celebrity outside boxing circles.
So why do we care about Lee today?
Hereâs why: He grew up in Botetourt County. How many other Olympic gold medalists have hailed from this part of the state? Letâs safely put the figure at ânot many.â He was also the first Black Virginian from anywhere in the state to win Olympic gold.