September 1, 2012 - September 1, 2012, www.afro.com
Volume 121 No. 4
A1 $1.00
The Afro-American
Former AFRO Paperboy Celebrates 80th Birthday B1
Opinion
SEPTEMBER 1, 2012 - SEPTEMBER 7, 2012
Marching for the Sake of Marching By Julianne Malveaux
1912 Republican National Convention Revisited A3
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Republican Convention: Diversity Facade By Yolanda Woodlee Special to the AFRO In an effort to showcase African Americans in the Republican Party and attempt to appeal to Black voters, the GOP trotted out a lineup of Black speakers at the Republican National Convention, including
former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice; Mia Love, the mayor of Saratoga Springs, Utah, and a candidate for the House of Representatives; and Artur Davis, the newly converted Republican who has drawn the ire of many Blacks on Capitol Hill. The Black speakers took to the podium as news
circulated that a NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has miniscule support among Blacks. The poll put Obama’s lead over Romney among Black voters at 94 percent to zero percent. Despite having a smattering of Blacks in his corner, the poll results Continued on A4
Democratic National Convention Preview
Photos by John A. Moreno
(from left) Artur Davis; Romney and Condoleeza Rice; the RNC crowd
Mentally Ill Homeless Veteran Slain by Baltimore City Police By Alexis Taylor Special to the AFRO
According to people who knew him, Rudy Bell Sr. never
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caused anybody any trouble. A homeless veteran in his mid 60s who suffered from schizophrenia, he spent his days and nights sheltering in an abandoned row house that neighbors say he only left occasionally. It was in this vacant home in the 1600 block of West Lexington St. where he was fatally shot Aug. 20 in a conflict with two Baltimore Police officers. According to police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi, Bell died as a result of a bullet fired into his upper body. Guglielmi told the AFRO that officers were responding to a burglary call when they Photo by Alexis Taylor encountered Bell on the Signs of protest hang on the second floor of the vacant door of the vacant building property around 12:30 where Rudy Bell Sr. died.
p.m. When police arrived, he said, they announced themselves. Then, according to what the officers told their superiors, Bell lunged at one of the officers, cutting his face with either a knife or a bottle. The officer “at that point, in defense and in fear for his life, fired at least one round, striking Mr. Bell after he was attacked,” said Guglielmi. “Mr. Bell died on the scene as a result of his injuries and the officer was treated at Mercy Hospital for non-life threatening lacerations to the face.” Officer John Kosko, 24, the officer who fired at Bell after allegedly being
Laura Mackay Phillips, AFRO Librarian, Dies at 92 By AFRO Staff Retired AFRO Librarian Laura Mackay Phillips, whose rich knowledge of Baltimore and its residents proved invaluable to the development of the newspaper’s library, passed away Aug. 25 at Seasons Hospice in Sinai Hospital. She died after a brief illness, her daughter Sheila at her side. She was 92. In 1966, she was asked to come temporarily and straighten out files that were used extensively by editorial staff in researching and writing articles. Her uncanny ability to take a few facts and then produce historical
Laura Mackay Phillips records from the files was legendary. Over the course of 18 years, Mrs. Phillips had chronicled, cross-referenced, and organized thousands of documents, microfiche, and newspaper bound volumes
By Zenitha Prince Special to the AFRO
About 35,000 “fired up” Americans are expected to converge on Charlotte, N.C. the Democratic National Convention, Sept. 3-6 as the party seeks to hold on to the White House and regain control of Congress. The massive undertaking, which happens every four years during a presidential election year, is not merely to officially nominate President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden as the Democratic nominees for president and vice president, but to energize party faithful to make a final push toward winning the presidency in November. “There is a tremendous excitement being generated, not only by the people at the convention but [also] by the people who tune in [online and by television] that we are renominating Barack Obama to the presidency of the United States,” said Rep. Elijah Cummings, a delegate from Maryland. He added, “Not only will it be exciting to African Americans [to re-nominate the country’s first Black president], but to other people, because it shows what we’ve become as a nation.” But in addition to demonstrating the racial progress that Obama represents, the convention will seek to show how his administration has helped and will help the nation moving forward. “It gives us an opportunity to show the clear distinction between the path the Republicans want to take the country in and the direction we (Democrats) want to take,” Cummings said. To that end, speakers in day two and three of the convention
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that today are known as the AFRO Archives. AFRO Archivist John B. Gartrell commenting on her passing noted, “A great deal of care was given preserving these records and if it had not been for people like Mrs. Phillips, we would not have a true sense of how extensive the AFRO history really is.” One of ten children born to Mabel Henson Mackay and Otho Mackay in Baltimore, she graduated from Frederick Douglass High School in 1938 and began her lifelong love of reading and poetry.Married to AFRO photographer I. Henry Phillips for 53 years when he passed
MLK Memorial Turns One
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Copyright © 2012 by the Afro-American Company
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