#Black history facts

[afriblaq]

Did you know that in South Carolina, you didn't have to pass the bar to practice law until Black Americans started graduating from law schools?

[mimi-0007]

[cinamun]

Your Sims Black History Fact

Thanks to @riverofjazzsims and @jenplayssims we now know that the first Black premade character in the Sims franchise was Melissa Roomies! First introduced with her roommate Chris when The Sims was released on February 4th, 2000.

24 years ago today.

[alwaysbewoke]

[metalheadsforblacklivesmatter]

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRs4LS5E/

-fae

[alleannaharris]

Today's Black History Month illustration is of Josephine Baker. She was a world famous entertainer, WWII spy, and activist.

Freda Josephine McDonald was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1906. Her parents were both vaudeville performers, but Baker would have to take on odd jobs to help support her family.

At the age of 15, she ran off and joined a dance troupe from Philadelphia. She also got married, took her husband’s last name, dropped her first name and started going by the name Josephine Baker. After acting and dancing in musicals, she moved to New York City and was soon performing at the Plantation Club where she became a crowd favorite.

In 1925, Baker went to Paris to dance at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in La Revue Nègre. When the Revue closed, she was given her own show and her career skyrocketed.

She was the first Black woman to star in a motion picture and one of the first Black entertainers to achieve acclaim on screen and stage.

Baker became a citizen of France in 1937. When the Germans occupied France during WWII, she worked with the Red Cross and the French Resistance by transporting confidential information by writing with invisible ink on her sheet music. She was awarded the Croix de Guerre and the Legion of Honor with the rosette of the Résistance.

Baker traveled many times to the US to participate in the civil rights movement. She was the only woman who spoke at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1968.

Her time at home forced her to confront segregation and discrimination that she didn’t experience overseas. She often refused to perform for segregated audiences and club owners were forced to integrate for her shows.

She continued to perform until her death in 1975, during the celebration of the 50th anniversary of her Paris debut.

I’ll be back on Monday with the last illustration and story!

[cyarsk52-20]

[kcyars520]

[mimi-0007]

African American history is American History!! You can't hide it!! Can't sweep it under the rug!!

[cinamun]

UPDATE!! SEE REPLIES!!

Y'all don't understand that for 2 days I've been trying to find out if there were any Black premades in the Sims 1 because I never played it lmfao

Why? Because I got stuck/hyperfixated wanted to pay homage to the first Black premade during this, the Blackest month of the year.

So unless someone can show me otherwise, Darren Dreamer was the first Black premade to enter the franchise when the Sims 2 was released on September 14th, 2004.

[blackmail4u]

Tressie Souders:  The First Known African American Woman To Direct A Feature Film Director

Welcome To Black Mail! Where we bring you Black History, Special Delivery. Tressie Souders (1897-1995) was an African American film director. She is the first known African American female to direct a feature film. She was born in Frankfort, Kansas, to Robert Souders and Leuvenia Ann Bryant, who emigrated to Kansas as part of the Exoduster movement. The couple split, and Leuvenia remarried…

[akonoadham]

[alleannaharris]

Today's Black History Month illustration is of Paul R. Williams, the first Black member of the American Institute of Architects.

Paul Revere Williams was born in Los Angeles in 1894 and was orphaned at four years old. Immediately after high school, he landed internships and jobs at local architecture firms despite the racial prejudice. Williams took classes at the Los Angeles Beaux-Arts School and then attended USC’s School of Engineering. He became a certified architect in 1915.

In 1920, Williiams was appointed to the first Los Angeles City Planning Commission, and the year after, he received a license to practice architecture in California and started working for John C. Austin. In 1922, he opened his own firm and served as an architect for the Navy during WWII. In 1923, Williams became the first Black person inducted into the American Institute of Architects.

He was an outstanding draftsman, and had the skill of rendering drawings upside down. He developed the skill so that his white clients (who might have been uncomfortable sitting next to a black architect) could see his drawings right side up across the table from him.

Williams designed over 2,000 homes, including the homes of Lucille Ball & Desi Arnaz, Frank Sinatra, Cary Grant, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.

Along with designing homes for the wealthy and the stars, he designed affordable homes, public housing, civic, commercial and institutional buildings. Williams was also part of the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) planning and design team.

Some of his works include the Golden State Mutual Life building in LA, St. Jude Children’s Hospital in Memphis, and the Los Angeles Superior Court.

He spearheaded the redesign of the Beverly Hills Hotel, a renovation which cost $3 million. The cursive letters on its sign are based on his own handwriting. Outside of LA, he remodeled buildings and spaces for Howard University (dentistry school, architecture and engineering college.)

He received many awards including the NAACP Spingarn Medal and USC’s Distinguished Alumni Award. In 1957, he became the first African American to become an AIA Fellow. In 2017, Williams was posthumously awarded the AIA Gold Medal, America’s highest honor for an architect. He was the first Black architect to receive the Gold Medal.

Williams passed away in 1980 at 85, leaving a mark on West Coast architecture and aspiring Black architects.

I’ll be back tomorrow with another illustration and story!