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Shirley Jackson
b. 8-5-1946; Washington, DC
Physicist Shirley Jackson, the first African-American to earn a Ph.D from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, worked at Fermilab, CERN, and Bell Laboratories. She has taught at Stanford, Aspen Center for Physics, and Rutgers, currently serving as President of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Jackson is also the first woman and first African-American to serve as Chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
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William James
b. 1-11-1842; NYC, NY
d. 8-26-1910; NH
William James, recognized as a pioneering psychologist and philosopher wrote extensively of education, religious experience and pragmatism, perhaps drew on his own personal experience of physical ailments and bouts of depression. James, who also became a Harvard professor, was the son of Swedenborgian theologian Henry James, Sr. and brother of author Henry James and diarist Alice James, was also the godson of Ralph Waldo Emerson.
William James quotes ~
• “A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.”
• “Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.”
• “A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, and life is after all a chain.”
• “Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing.”
• “An act has no ethical quality whatever unless it be chosen out of several all equally possible.”
• “Could the young but realize how soon they will become mere walking bundles of habits, they would give more heed to their conduct while in the plastic state.”
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Émile Jaques-Dalcroze
b. 7-6-1865; Switzerland
d. 7-1-1950
Swiss composer, musician and music educator Émile Jaques-Dalcroze developed eurhythmics, a method of learning and experiencing music through movement. The Orff Schulwerk pedagogy, which is common in public school music education throughout the United States, was influenced by eurhythmics.
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James Weldon Johnson
b. 6-17-1871; Jacksonville, FL
d. 6-26-1938; Maine (car accident)
James Weldon native-americans-n-o-p-q.html Johnson was an author, educator, lawyer, politician, diplomat, critic, journalist, poet, anthologist, and songwriter, an early civil rights organizer and activist.
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Lyndon B. Johnson (D)
(36th President, 1963-1969)
b. 8-27-1908; Stonewall, TX
d. 1-22-1973; Johnson City, TX
Lyndon B. Johnson earned a teaching certificate and taught in several schools in Texas.
• “I shall never forget the faces of the boys and the girls in that little Welhausen Mexican School, and I remember even yet the pain of realizing and knowing then that college was closed to practically every one of those children because they were too poor. And I think it was then that I made up my mind that this nation could never rest while the door to knowledge remained closed to any American.”
• “I am concerned about the whole man. I am concerned about what the people, using their government as an instrument and a tool, can do toward building the whole man, which will mean a better society and a better world.” Lyndon B. Johnson
• Civil Rights Posters
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Dr. Samuel Johnson
b. 9-18-1709; England
d. 12-13-1784
Samuel Johnson, one of England's best known literary figures, was a noted essayist, poet, biographer, lexicographer and critic; he also was a teacher for a time. It is said he is the single most quoted English writer after Shakespeare.
Much is known of Johnson's life as he was he subject of “the most famous single work of biographical art in the whole of literature”: James Boswell's The Life of Samuel Johnson.
Johnson was long time friend with actor David Garrick - together they formed “The Club” with friend and painter Joshua Reynolds that included Oliver Goldsmith and philosopher Edmund Burke. He was also acquainted with Hannah More and Fanny Burney.
Samuel Johnson, who suffered from a variety of maladies which included tuberculosis, gout, cancer, depression, weakened eyesight, and with what was later identified as Tourette syndrome, spent many years living in the home of diarist Hester Thrale and her husband.
• Samuel Johnson: The Major Works
• “Clear your mind of can't” quote poster
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Barbara Jordan
b. 2-21-1936; Houston, TX
d. 1-17-1996
Poster Text: Barbara Jordan liked to tell people that when she was born she already had three strikes against her. She was born poor, black and female at a time when to ba any one of those things was to be almost totally without power in America. Yet Barbara Jordan eventually took her place among the most powerful people in the nation. Barbara Jordan strongly believed that it is not enough just to have power – you must use it to benefit others.
Barbara Jordan was born in a poor section of Houston on February 21, 1936. At that time, segregation – of whites and blacks – was still an accepted way of life in the South. Blacks could not eat in the same restaurants as whites. They had to drink from separate “Coloreds Only” water fountains. And they were expected to sit in the back of the bus, and give up their seat if a white person wanted it. But Barbara's parents didn't stress how difficult life could be for blacks in America. Instead, they constantly told their children to become educated. As Barbara's father told her: “No man can take away your brain.” In high school, Barbara joined the debate team and discovered the special gift that would serve her throughout her life: a rich, powerful speaking voice.
Barbara decided she wanted to become a lawyer. She went to Texas Southern University near her home, and then on to Boston University Law School. After graduation, she moved back to Texas, setup a law office and ran for the Texas state legislature. Twice in a row she lost to a wealthier, better-known white candidate. But Ms. Jordan didn't give up, and in 1966 she was elected to the Texas state senate – making her the first black woman ever elected to a state office in Texas. In 1972, she was elected to the U.S. congress as a member of the House of Representatives. And in 1976, she received another great honor when she became the first black woman ever chosen to give the “keynote” speech of the Democratic National Convention.
In 1978, Rep. Jordan retired from politics and accepted an offer to become a teacher at the University of Texas. She took the job because she wanted to go back to Texas and help the people who had helped her first get elected 12 years earlier. All of her life, Barbara Jordan worked to make life better for other people – especially poor black people. When she died in 1996, she was eulogized as a hero. But she only wanted to be remembered as “someone who made a difference.” - text from no longer available poster
• more Famous African American Women
Barbara Jordan quotes ~
• “Art has the potential to unify. It can speak in many languages without a translator. Art does not discriminate - it ignores external irrelevancies and opts for quality, talent and competence.” 1993
• “Do not call for black power or green power. Call for brain power.”
• “I felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake. But through the process of amendment, interpretation, and court decision, I have finally been included in ‘We, the people.’ ”
• “My faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total, and I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution.”
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