This year, February fogelsonblog posts will review some of the winners of the Spingarn Medal. Most of the posts will be about the artists who have won the medal, but this first post is about
Rosa Parks who was born February 4, 1913, on hundred years ago.
THE SPINGARN MEDAL was instituted in 1914 by the late J.E. Spingarn (then Chairman of the NAACP Board of Directors), who gave annually until his death in 1939, a gold medal to be awarded for the highest or noblest achievement by an American Negro during the preceding year or years. A fund sufficient to continue the award was set up by his will to perpetuate this award.
The purpose of the medal is twofold: first to call the attention of the American people to the existence of distinguished merit and achievement among American Negroes and secondly to serve as a reward for such achievement, and as a stimulus to the ambition of colored youth.
The medal is presented annually to the man or woman of African descent and American citizenship who shall have made the highest achievement during the preceding year or years in any honorable field of human endeavor. The Committee of Awards is bound by no burdensome restrictions, but may decide for itself each year what particular act or achievement deserves the highest acclaim. The choice is not limited to any one field, whether of intellectual, spiritual, physical, scientific, artistic, commercial, educational or other endeavor. It is intended primarily that the medal shall be for the highest achievement in the preceding year. If no achievement in one year seems to merit it, the Committee may award it for work achieved in preceding years, or may withhold it. The medal is usually presented to the winner at the annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and the presentation speech is delivered by a distinguished citizen.
A nine person Committee of Award is selected by the NAACP Board of Directors.
[From http://www.naacp.org/pages/spingarn-medal ]
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| Rosa Parks, with Dr King in the background, about 1958. |
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| Here is the police report dated December 1, 1955. |
February 4 is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Rosa Parks. See the White House's commemoration here. You can read about Mrs. Parks in the items on display near the entrance of Fogelson Library, or at biography.com.
Here are some other links for your information
Photos are from commons.wikimedia.org, and are in the public domain.
On Monday, February 4, a commemorative postage stamp honoring Rosa Parks was unveiled in Detroit Michigan.
Nearly 500 people, both dignitaries and ordinary citizens, packed the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History to honor civil rights legend Rosa Parks and witness the unveiling of a postage stamp in her honor.
"When she sat down, she made the whole country stand up for what is right," said U.S. Rep. Gary Peters, D-Mich., one of several local and national officials who spoke at the unveiling. See the entire Detroit Free Press article.
Huffington Post article
US Postal Service announcement
On Monday, February 4, a commemorative postage stamp honoring Rosa Parks was unveiled in Detroit Michigan.
Nearly 500 people, both dignitaries and ordinary citizens, packed the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History to honor civil rights legend Rosa Parks and witness the unveiling of a postage stamp in her honor.
"When she sat down, she made the whole country stand up for what is right," said U.S. Rep. Gary Peters, D-Mich., one of several local and national officials who spoke at the unveiling. See the entire Detroit Free Press article.
Huffington Post article
US Postal Service announcement
