On this Day in Black History

1526 - St. Benedict, the Black born
1626 - Natives sold Manhattan Island for $24 in cloth and buttons.
1891 - Daniel Hale Williams opened Provident Hospital
1896 - Cowboy Bill Pickett earned the title of inventor of Bull Dogging.
1897 - J.W. Smith patented Lawn sprinkler (Patent# 581,785)
1904 - Sigma Pi Phi, the first black Greek letter organization, was formed
1919 - Elizabeth Duncan Koontz born
1929 - Audrey Hepburn (Edda van Heemstra Hepburn-Rusten) born
1931 - Ethel Waters stared in "Rhapsody in Black".
1937 - Mel Edwards born
1937 - Ron Carter born
1938 - Tyrone Davis born
1942 - Nicholas Ashford born
1950 - Mississippi Valley State University founded
1961 - James Farmer of the Congress of Racial Equality and thirteen others take the first freedom ride, a bus from Washington to New Orleans.
1969 - Charles Gordone's "No Place to be Somebody" (1970 Pulitzer Prize Winner) opened
1970 - Ohio National Guardsmen open fire on student protesters at Kent State University, killing four and wounding nine others.
1972 - Angela Davis was acquitted of murder and kidnapping.
1981 - Paul Green died
1987 - Paul Butterfield died
1991 - Phil Collins and Al Jarreau received Honorary DMus Degrees from Berklee College of Music
1992 - Dudu Mntowaziwayo Ndlovu (Dudu Zulu), of Johnny Clegg & Savuka, died of a gunshot wound