Enlightened Free Thinking Nubian Kings And Queens

San Diego businessman and community leader George Ramsey was born in Pasadena, California, one of eight children of George S. Ramsey, a railroad porter and barber, and Eva M. Ramsey. Most sources say that he arrived in San Diego in 1913 as the valet of a prominent amusement park developer, but Ramsey himself recalled selling newspapers on the streets of the city in 1904. And at one time a stowaway, and a hobo. Among other jobs he claimed to have tried were ranch hand, boxing manager, bootblack, and salesman. By 1916 Ramsey resided in downtown San Diego and had started a career managing bars, cafes, hotels, and boarding houses that catered mainly to African Americans, sometimes in partnership with other businesspersons.  During the early 1920s, he was prosperous enough to indulge his passion for breeding and racing horses and betting on them at Tijuana, Mexico’s Caliente Race Track. Most successful and significant was Ramsey’s partnership with the married couple Robert and Mabel ...

Walter Arthur Gordon, attorney and civil rights activist was born on October 10, 1894, in Atlanta, Georgia, to Henry B. and Georgia Bryant Gordon.  He was the son of a Pullman porter and the grandson of slaves. His family moved to Riverside, California, in 1904. He graduated from Riverside Polytechnic High School in 1913. In 1914, Gordon entered the University of California at Berkeley. He was an intercollegiate boxer and wrestler, winning the state championship in both categories. He also played every position except center on the offensive and defensive lines of the varsity football team. Gordon was named to the annual football All-American team in 1918, the second African American to receive the award. Walter Gordon graduated from UC Berkeley in 1918. The following year, Chief August Vollmer invited him to join the Berkeley Police Department, where he became the city’s first black officer. While doing police work, Gordon earned a degree in 1922 from Boalt Hall Schoo...

Emmanuel Francis (E.F.) Joseph was the first professional African American photographer in the San Francisco Bay area of California. Born on November 8, 1900 on the Caribbean island of St. Lucia, Joseph would later move to the United States and attend the American School of Photography in Chicago, Illinois. After graduation in 1924, Joseph moved to Oakland, California, where he apprenticed in a photography studio.  In the early 1930's, Joseph began his career as a photojournalist. He worked for numerous Bay Area newspapers, including the California Voice, The Oakland Post, San Francisco Examiner, and the nationally distributed Pittsburgh Courier from Pennsylvania.   Joseph also ran a photography studio initially out of his home in West Oakland. He took photos of babies, children, men, women, couples, and families. He also captured the contours of community life, snapping photos at events held by churches, schools, nightclubs, social clubs, and lodges. He recorded c...

Andraé Edward Crouch, was born on 1 July, 1942, in  Los Angeles, California . Crouch’s 70's legacy is one of the richest in the gospel genre, yet he has never appealed to the music’s purists. The conservative elements in gospel music have seen his incorporation of rock n roll showmanship and riffs as inappropriate at best, and blasphemy at worst. A gifted singer, songwriter and keyboard player, Crouch undertook a traditional apprenticeship by playing piano and singing in church. For son-of-a-preacher man Andrae, 'playing church' was a childhood equivalent of playing cowboys and Indians. By the age of eight brother and sister were amusing themselves with a pie tin for a tambourine and a commode for a platform. The games came to an abrupt end when one particularly exuberant 'service' ended with the commode breaking! At nine Andrae was converted through the preaching of his father. He remembers, "I sat there in the audience listening. When he gave the...

Egbert Austin "Bert" Williams was born in New Providence, Nassau on November 12, 1874.  was one of the pre-eminent entertainers of the Vaudeville era and one of the most popular comedians for all audiences of his time. He was by far the best-selling black recording artist before 1920.  At the age of 11, Bert permanently immigrated with his parents from The Bahamas to Florida and then to Riverside, California, where he later graduated from Riverside High School. In 1893, while still a teenager, he joined different West Coast minstrel shows, including Martin and Selig's Mastodon Minstrels, where he first met his future partner, George Walker. He and Walker later became known as  Williams and Walker - Two Real Coons . They performed song-and-dance numbers, comic dialogues and skits, and humorous songs. They fell into stereotypical vaudevillian roles: originally Williams portrayed a slick conniver, while Walker played the "dumb coon" victim of Williams' ...

The first African American U.S. Marines were trained at Camp Montford Point, in Jacksonville, North Carolina.  African Americans, from all states, were not sent to the traditional boot camps of Parris Island, South Carolina or San Diego, California. Instead, African American Marines were segregated - experiencing basic training at Montford Point - a facility at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. Approximately twenty thousand (20,000) African American Marines received basic training at Montford Point between 1942 and 1949. On June 25, 1941,  President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802, which barred government agencies and federal contractors from refusing employment in industries engaged in defense production on the basis of race, creed, color, or national origin. The order required the armed services, including the Marine Corps, to recruit and enlist African Americans. With the beginning of World War II African Americans would get their chance to serve in the previou...

Aja L. Brown  (born April 17, 1982)  currently serves as Mayor of  Compton, California . On June 4, 2013, Aja Brown made history as Compton's youngest mayor ever to be elected. She won the election by a landslide, defeating both incumbent mayor  Eric J. Perrodin  and former mayor  Omar Bradley . Aja Brown grew up in  Altadena, California . Her mother, Brenda Jackson, raised her and her twin brother as a single parent. While attending  University of Southern California , she began working for the City of  Gardena, California  in 2004 as an Economic Development Analyst. She soon graduated in 2004 with a Bachelor's Degree in Public Policy, Urban Planning and Development. Just a year later in 2005, she earned a Master's Degree in Urban Planning with a concentration in Economic Development. In 2006, Brown began working for the City of  Inglewood, California  as an Urban Planner. In 2009, she began working for the city of ...

During the period that Los Angeles was part of Mexico (1821-1840), blacks were fairly integrated into society at all levels. Mexico abolished slavery much earlier than the US, in 1820. In 1831, Emanuel Victoria served as California's first black governor. Alta, California's last governor, Pío de Jesus Pico, was also of mixed black ancestry. The US won the Mexican-American War and in 1850 California was admitted to the United States. Although one of America's so-called "free states," discriminatory legislation was quickly enacted to restrict and remove the civil rights of blacks, Chinese, and Native Americans. For example, blacks (and other minorities) couldn't testify in court against white people. Pío de Jesus Pico is one of California’s most remarkable historical figures. He witnessed, shaped and influenced nearly a century of California history in the 1800’s. Pío Pico was the governor of California in 1832 and again in 1846 before and during the ...

In a strong defense of digital age privacy, a unanimous Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that police may not generally search the cellphones of people they arrest without first getting search warrants. Cellphones are powerful devices unlike anything else police may find on someone they arrest, Chief Justice John Roberts said for the court. Because the phones contain so much information, police must get a warrant before looking through them, Roberts said. "Modern cellphones are not just another technological convenience. With all they contain and all they may reveal, they hold for many Americans the privacies of life," Roberts said. The message to police about what they should do before rummaging through a cellphone's contents following an arrest is simple. "Get a warrant," Roberts said. The court chose not to extend earlier rulings that allow police to empty a suspect's pockets and examine whatever they find to ensure officers' safet...