Preserving Black history in Philadelphia is an evolving dynamic of the city’s legacy. Martin Luther King Jr. was in attendance at Marian Anderson’s Lincoln Memorial performance on Easter Sunday, 1939. This location served as the inspiration for King’s March on Washington address, says Jillian Patricia Pirtle, CEO of the Marian Anderson Museum and Historical Society. (Image: University of Pennsylvania/Marian Anderson Collection of Photographs)
Marian Anderson was at her Philadelphia home at 762 S. Martin St. when first lady Eleanor Roosevelt called, asking her to sing at the White House. In 1935, she became the first Black artist to do so. Four years later, Anderson sang at the Lincoln Memorial to 75,000 people dressed in their Easter Sunday best after the Daughters of the American Revolution, despite Roosevelt’s advocacy on the singer’s behalf, denied Anderson the right to sing in their Constitution Hall auditorium. Anderson s
“This lack of clarity and ambition is a grave disservice to the country’s children,” said a Bloomberg Opinion editorial, which cites evidence that schools are not necessarily hotbeds for COVID-19 and that the pace of vaccination particularly for teachers is accelerating.
“A school that’s giving in-person instruction once a week isn’t open. Distance learning doesn’t work, and the resulting educational deficit is going to inflict terrible and possibly irreparable damage on the poorest and most disadvantaged children,” the editorial said.
“The biggest impediment to getting this right is the resistance of teachers’ unions. Biden and his soon-to-be-confirmed secretary of education need to make the case more forcefully in addition to getting funds out the door and into schools. The president’s respect for the teaching profession is well-known, but that doesn’t justify submitting to plainly unreasonable demands or causing such harm to the nation’s children,
NEW BEDFORD As part of Black History Month, British Consul General in Boston, Dr. Peter Abbott, OBE, traveled to New Bedford s Nathan and Polly Johnson House to highlight American abolitionist and statesman Frederick Douglass and his connections to the U.K.
“We enjoy the opportunity to talk about (Frederick) Douglass, and talk about his impact in England and Ireland,” said New Bedford Historical Society President Lee Blake on Thursday. She welcomed Abbott and state Senator Mark C. Montigny into the historic house, while live on the British Consulate Boston’s official Twitter.
“People need to know these stories,” she said. Blake has significant ties to New Bedford not only as a former high school African American Studies teacher but, as she pointed out, the “great-great-great-great-great granddaughter” of the Whaling City’s William and Amelia Piper. In the mid 1800s, the Pipers were members of the abolitionist movement and the Underground Railroad.