Black power: History's greatest black achievers - Part 1

[Oneword]

When I paged through this thought-provoking article and its impressive list of people, I inevitably thought of how many names we could add - names from our own view; names that are as important to us in Namibia/Southern Africa as those already on the list to the UK.

Let's see who we can add .... and why ....... The International Slavery Museum opened its doors in Liverpool, UK, last year with an exhibition naming history's greatest black achievers.

Some are household names, others barely known. All are extraordinary.

Playwright Kwame Kwei-Armah introduces the list in full
Published: 17 August 2007

On Slavery Remembrance Day 2007, a day that commemorates the uprising of enslaved
Africans on the island of St Domingo (modern Haiti and the Dominican Republic),
Liverpool opened the doors of the new International Slavery Museum, at the heart of
National Museums Liverpool. At last, a serious tribute to the tens of millions of lives
affected by this barbaric trade; an interactive monument that says that we can talk about
this, study this subject – intelligently, artistically, truthfully, without guilt, without
denial, without fear.

If just one young person can be inspired by the achievements of any of the people on this wall, the International Slavery Museum can call itself a roaring success. The International Slavery Museum, Liverpool, opened on 23 August (Liverpool museums - International Slavery Museum homepage)

Muhammad Ali - Boxer, born 1942
Widely considered to be the greatest athlete of all time. Not only did Ali dominate the world
of boxing (the BBC and Sports Illustrated hailed him "Sportsman of the Century" in 1999), he was also a key figure in the civil- rights movement after refusing to fight in Vietnam because of how blacks were treated in America.

Shirley Bassey - Singer, born 1937
Arguably the greatest Welsh singer of all time,Bassey is the only artist to perform three James Bond themes. The Cardiff-born diva has recently made a popular revival (she was made a Dame in 2000) and can apparently count the Queen as a fan.

Steve Biko - Activist, 1946-77
A leading campaigner against apartheid in South Africa and co-founder of the Black People's Convention, Biko suffered a fatal head injury while in policy custody. Richard Attenborough turned Biko's struggle for equality into the feature film Cry Freedom.

Stokely Carmichael - Civil rights activist,1941-98
Born in Trinidad and Tobago, Carmichael moved to Harlem at 11. He was leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, bringing black students together to protest against segregation. One of the first activists to use the term " Black Power".

George Washington Carver - Botanist,1864-1943
Dubbed a " black Leonardo" by Time magazine, Carver – born into slavery himself – developed revolutionary farming techniques that helped former slaves in Alabama become self-sufficient. His methods helped to restore the South after the Civil War.

Fred D'Aguiar - Writer, born 1960
Poet, novelist and playwright, regarded as one of the great British writers of his generation. He focuses on the role of the immigrant in Britain, slavery, colonisation and his Guyanese and British heritage. His works have been translated into 12 languages.

Oscar D'Leon - Musician, born 1943
Performing and recording for 30 years, D'Leon is a superstar in the world of salsa. Born in Venezuela, he started singing and performing while earning a living driving taxis. Partly due to his underprivileged background, he is an idol in his home country.

Viv Anderson - Footballer, born 1956
Anderson went down in the history books in 1978 as the first black player to appear in a full international for England. He won the European Cup twice with Nottingham Forest as well as domestic titles. In 1999, he was appointed MBE for services to football.

Maurice Rupert Bishop - Politician, revolutionary, 1944-83
Creator of the People's Revolutionary Government in Grenada, leader of a bloodless coup against the government and inspired by figures such as Fidel Castro and Che Guevara. He was overthrown and assassinated by members of his own government.

Maya Angelou - Author, poet, playwright, born 1928
A great voice of black literature. Angelou's memoirs expose the difficulties of growing up as a black woman in St Louis. Her achievements are many and varied, and she was the first African-American woman admitted to the Directors Guild of America.

Aimé Césaire - Writer, born 1913
Born in Martinique, the co-founder of the literary and political movement Négritude is one of the Caribbean's most popular writers. A campaigner against African colonies, Césaire also published Une Tempête in 1968, a radical adaptation of The Tempest.

Susana Baca de la Colina - Singer, born 1944
Baca has played a major role in the resurgence of Afro-Peruvian music. Inspired by the music she heard as a child, she has founded the Centro Experimental de Musica Negrocontinuo (Institute of the Black Continuum), dedicated to the genre.

Learie Constantine - Cricketer, politician, lawyer, 1901-71
One of the finest all-rounders in cricket, Constantine moved to England from the West Indies to play professionally. He became involved in politics, fighting discrimination. He was the first black Governor of the BBC and the first black life peer.

Benedita da Silva - Politician, born 1942
Born in a Brazilian shantytown, Benedita Souza da Silva Sampaio is a key political figure, fighting for the rights of the underprivileged. In 1994, she became Brazil's first black woman Federal Senator, and she has served as Governor of the State of Rio de Janeiro.

Frederick Douglass - Abolitionist, writer, statesman, 1818-95
A former slave, Douglass became one of the primary abolitionists in America. His books
and speeches focused on his experiences. He started The North Star, a newspaper edited and written by black people. He later campaigned for the rights of women.

Kofi Annan - Diplomat, born 1938
Annan was the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations. His role in working for global peace was recognised when he and the UN were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001. He helped to reform the UN and strengthen its peacekeeping abilities.

John Archer - Campaigner, 1863-1923
In 1913, John Archer was elected Mayor of Battersea, the first person of African descent to reach such a position in the UK. An equality campaigner, he chaired the Pan- African Congress in London in 1921 and was president of the African Progress Union.

Paul Bogle - Cleric, 1822-65
A hero in Jamaica, Bogle was a Baptist deacon who used his education and wealth to help the black community. He led the Morant Bay Rebellion, in which many were killed by British troops sent to quell the uprising. He was hung by the British.

John Conteh - Boxer, born 1951
Boasting a record of 34 wins, one draw and four losses, John Conteh is considered one of the greatest ever English boxers. Born in Merseyside, he won the WBC Light Heavyweight Championship in 1974 and a gold medal at the 1970 Commonwealth Games.

William Cuffey - Activist, 1788-1870
Cuffey was the son of a former slave and a leading figure in the Chartist movement that opposed the imbalance of the distribution of wealth in Britain. The reformist movement is considered the first major working-class movement in the world.

Charles Drew - Scientist, 1904-50
An African-American physician, he revolutionised the science – and politics – of blood transfusions. Along with developing blood storage techniques and improved means of transfusing, Drew opposed the practice of racial segregation in blood donation.

WEB Du Bois - Sociologist, activist, 1868- 1963
The first African American to gain a PhD from Harvard, Du Bois wrote several studies on American black society. He later became a key figure in the civil rights movement and co-founded the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Bussa - Slave leader, died 1816
A national hero of Barbados, Bussa led around 400 slaves in a revolt against slave owners in 1816. Although Bussa was killed in battle and the revolt failed, he is remembered as one of the key figures in the emancipation of the slaves.

Quince Duncan - Writer, born 1940
The West Indian grew up under racial oppression in the Costa Rican city of San José. His fiction highlights the experiences of the black African in South America, and gained an international reputation as a human-rights leader promoting tolerance.

Gilberto Gil - Musician, born 1942
A Grammy-award winning musician who sings about social activism, Gil is also Brazil's current minister of culture. He founded the Tropicalia movement in the 1960s and was treated as a political threat by the Brazilian government of the time.

Félix Eboué - Politician, 1884-1944
Eboué became the first black man to be appointed governor in the French colonies, in Guadeloupe; as governor of Chad, he joined the Free French in their struggle against the Nazis and persuaded other French-African countries to follow.

Pastor G Daniel Ekarte - Minister, social activist, 1896-1964
Pastor Ekarte founded the African Churches Mission in Liverpool which, from 1945-1949, looked after "brown babies": the unwanted offspring of black American GIs and the city's white women. Hundreds of residents lined the streets for his funeral.

Nicolás Guillé* - Poet, 1902-89
A leading figure of " poesia égra" ("black poetry"), the Afro-Cuban poet, writer and journalist was also an influential campaigner for social justice. His work examines what it was like to be poor and black in Cuba.

Roi Ankhkara Kwabena - Cultural anthropologist, born 1956
Born in Trinidad, Kwabena – who calls himself a "cultural activist" – produces art on a variety of platforms, addressing issues such as racism and immigration. He is a poet, musician, storyteller, historian and publisher, and has performed around the world.

Lewis Howard Latimer - Inventor, 1848- 1928
The son of escaped slaves, Latimer is considered one of the greatest black inventors, notably due to his improvement of carbon filaments in light bulbs. He worked with Thomas Edison and Alexander Bell and secured many different patents.

Sir William Arthur Lewis - Economist, 1915-91
In 1979, Sir Arthur Lewis became the first black person to win the Nobel Prize for Economics. He advised major nations around the world while his research on economic development in emerging countries was pioneering.

Toussaint-L'Ouverture - Rebel slave leader, 1743-1803
Born a slave in Haiti (then the French colony of St Dominique), Toussaint successfully led a slave rebellion against the colonisers. A brilliant general, he went on to help France drive out the British and Spanish from the country.

Patrice Lumumba - Politician, activist,1925-1961
An African anti-colonial activist, Lumumba played a major role in gaining the Democratic Republic of the Congo's independence from Belgium, and was elected its first Prime Minister. He was assassinated after an army- supported coup.

Toni Morrison - Author, born 1931
In 1988, Morrison's fifth novel, Beloved, won the Pulitzer Prize; five years later, she became the first black woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. She acts as a mentor for many writers and is on the editorial board of The Nation magazine.

Nanny - Maroon leader, active 1720-34
A national heroine of Jamaica, Queen Nanny was a famous Maroon leader who frequently attacked British troops and is believed to have
freed hundreds of slaves. A symbol of Maroon resistance, she is thought to have been killed by British forces.

Kwame Nkrumah - Politician, 1909-72
The first President of Ghana, Nkrumah ledthe movement that gained independence from Britain in 1957. An influential Pan-Africanist, he believed in uniting Africa under one government. He died in exile after his government was overthrown in 1966.

Jesse Owens - Athlete, 1913-80
At the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Owens defied Nazi propaganda and won four gold medals on the track. When he died, the US President Jimmy Carter said: "Perhaps no athlete better
symbolised the human struggle against tyranny, poverty and racial bigotry."

George Padmore - Scholar, activist, 1902-1959
Padmore is seen as one of the 20th century's greatest social theorists and played a large role in the decolonisation of the Caribbean and Africa. A prominent Pan-Africanist, he
inspired many black leaders and established the Internatio nal African Service Bureau.

Philip Emeagwali - Scientist, born 1954
A winner of the Gordon Bell prize in 1989, the Nigerian-born computer scientist and geologist is a symbol of African achievement. Emeagwali, voted the 35th greatest African of all time in The New African, played a role in the birth of the internet.

Olaudah Equiano - Writer, explorer, 1745-97
Equiano's autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, is one of the most important works to address abolition. A former slave who bought his freedom, he toured the UK talking about his experiences.

Frantz Fanon - Writer, psychiatrist, 1925-61
Born in the French colony of Martinique, Fanon's writing highlights violence as the only method by which colonial repression can be overturned. His work had a great influence across America and Europe and inspired numerous civil rights activists.

Marcus Garvey - Civil rights activist, 1887-1940
Garvey became an inspiration for future civil rights activists by travelling across America
urging African-Americans to be proud of their heritage and to return to the continent. He founded the Black Star Shipping Line and United Negro Improvement Association.

Howard Gayle - Footballer, born 1958
When he became the first black footballer to play for Liverpool in 1977, Gayle was seen as a trailblazer in a sport that was almost all white. His pride in his background led him to being labelled as a troublemaker; today he campaigns against racism in football.

Kelly Holmes - Athlete, born 1970
Holmes became the first British woman to win two gold medals after winning both the 800m and 1,500m at the 2004 Athens Olympics. She was named BBC Sports
Personality of the Year in 2004 and made a dame in 2005.

Jaime Hurtado - Politician, died 1999
Hurtado founded Ecuador's Democratic Popular Movement, a political party that fought for the welfare of the working classes. He was the first Afro-Ecuadorian to be elected to Congress and the first to run for President. He was assassinated in 1999.

CLR James - Writer, socialist theorist, 1901-89
James is famous for seminal writings both on cricket and colonialism, most notably his book The Black Jacobins. He campaigned for African and West Indian independence, and
wrote the first novel by a Caribbean author to be published in the UK.

Jamaica Kincaid - Writer, born 1949
The celebrated African-American author also teaches creative writing at Harvard University. She left Antigua to escape her family's lack of ambition for her, and often writes about the country's narrow-minded nature and the effects of British colonialism.

Martin Luther King - Civil rights activist,1929-68
The figurehead of the American Civil Rights Movement, King became a national hero after leading the successful Montgomery bus boycott. In 1964 he received the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his work. He was assassinated on 4 April 1968.

Miriam Makeba - Musician, activist, born
1932 Known as " Mama Africa", Makeba became one of the first musicians to bring African music to the rest of the world. She was exiled by the South African government in 1960 after speaking out against apartheid in an address at the United Nations.