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The Slave Inventor....... Part 1

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Benjamin Thornton Montgomery a great black hero who was born in1819 and died in 1877 he was born into slavery. His parents were taking all the way from Africa to the United States of America, they were working in a plantation in Virginia and then gave birth to a son called Benjamin Montgomery. Benjamin Montgomery was born into slavery in a particular place in Virginia called De Louden Tontine in USA. When he 18 years old in 1837,he was taken away from his parents and sold into slavery to his new master called Joseph Davis who took him far away from Virginia to Mississippi, another state in USA. His new master had a younger brother called Japhatson Davis and together they were called “the Davis Brothers”. When Benjamin arrived in Mississippi, he did not like it so he decided to escape even though he knew the penalty for escape is death. He escaped but was recaptured, his masters summoned him and asked why he did that, he said he wanted to be a freeman. The Davis brothers told hi...

The Live of a Hero Part 3...

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……… Soon after the Sharpeville massacre in 1960, Makeba learned that her mother had died, when she tried to return home for the funeral, she found that her South Africa passport had been cancelled. Two of Makeba’s family members were killed in the massacre. The incident left her concerned about her family, many of whom were still in South Africa including her only daughter Bongi Makeba.   After the Sharpeville killing, Makeba felt a responsibility to help as she had been able to leave the country whiles others had not. From this point, she became an increasingly outspoken critic of apartheid and a white-minority government. In 1962, Makeba and Belafonte sang at the birthday party of the then US President John F. Kennedy at Madison Square Garden. Makeba’s music was also popular in Europe and she travelled all around to perform. She visited Kenya in that same year in support of their Independence from the British and raised funds for its Independence leader Jomo Kenyatta. Lat...

The Life of a Hero Part 2

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…….Till the age of 21 when she finally found her calling in jazz music, Makeba partnered up with group called the Manhattan Brothers and all women group named Skylarks. They combined traditional African vocals with westernized jazz sounds, music lovers fell in love with their style of music and these two bands became trendsetters in local and western media to some extent. In 1956, Makeba’s first solo success arrived under Gallotone Records when she recorded her very first solo album titled ‘lovely Eyes’. The record was released in United State and became the first ever South African album to make it to the Billboard 200 chart. During the same year, the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa was starting to boil up, Makeba came out fully supported. She secretly appeared in a documentary film titled ‘Come Back Africa’, the film won an award at the Venice film festival where Makeba was flown to Venice film festival to personally receiver an award for the movie. The film wa...

The life of a Hero.... Part 1

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Zenzile Miriam Makeba popularly known as “Miriam Makeba”, was born on the 4 th March 1932 in a poor black household in Johannesburg, South Africa. Her Swazi mother, Christian Makeba was a traditional healer and a domestic worker and her Xhosa father, Caswell Makeba was a teacher. His father died when she was just six years. Miriam Makeba was born into a family of musicians, her mother played several traditional instruments and the father played piano. Miriam had a very tough life ever since she was conceived, her mother was arrested and sentenced to a six month jail for selling a homemade beer brewed from malt and cornmeal which was illegal to sell and produce in South Africa. As a result Miriam had to spend her first six months in jail with her mother. Miriam attended Kilnerton Training Institute in her hometown, an all-black Methodist Primary School for eight years. She started singing in the choir, sowing the seeds of a future which was filled with music in its ever...

....and the seed grew

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“I hope to have the satisfaction of seeing the renovation of liberty and justice resting on the British government, to vindicate the honour of our common nature” Olaudah Equiano (1745 – 31 March 1797), known in his lifetime as Gustavus Vassa , He was a writer and abolitionist from Nigeria the Igbo tribe of what is today southeastern Nigeria .   He was enslaved as a child, Equiano purchased his own freedom in 1766. He was a prominent abolitionist in the British movement to end the Atlantic slave trade . His autobiography, published in 1789, helped in the creation of the Slave Trade Act 1807 which ended the transatlantic slave trade for Britain and its colonies . In London, Equiano was part of the Sons of Africa , an abolitionist group composed of well-known Africans living in Britain , and he was active among leaders of the anti-slave trade movement in the 1780s. He published his autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano ...
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HEROES BEFORE OUR TIME.       A hero as defined by Marian Webster  is someone who fight for a cause. In drama, it is the principal character in a play, movie, novel or a poem. If you were born in the 80's just as me believe me you have no idea of this great heroes in Africa and what they have done for Africa. This heroes fought with their blood and made Africa a proud land today. In this piece of work and the subsequence ones to come will high light on some Hero's of Africa before our time.       He was born on 4th September 1848 to a father called George and a mother called Rebecca. He was born in Chealsea Massachusetts and he was the youngest of his siblings (4 children). He was born in the era of slavery. His father and mother were slaves from Africa, his father was been own by James B. Gray of Virginia and the mother another slave master. His father and mother met only when their slave masters go to bed or when their been sent on an errands...