Sister Tarpley’s column: Saluting Black Heritage and Legends

Every Spring and Fall the United States Postal Service (USPS) in conjunction with companies, family members and/or organizations celebrates the issuance of a stamp honoring the life and legacy of an African American from all walks of life.

Using Black Heritage Stamps is one way of remembering Black Heritage and Legends year round..

“Buy The Stamps!”  Is the battle cry of USPS.  Every post office may not carry Black Heritage Stamps automatically, but, you can request that the post office nearest you “order” them; then buy and use the stamps on all of your mailings and discuss all of the individuals that are honored on the stamps with children, family, co-workers, associates and friends; which could lead to discussions of other Blacks and their inventions and/or contributions.

Dr. Mark Dean, also known as (AKA) America’s High Tech “Invisible Man” in the National Hall of Inventors.  He was born March 2, 1957 and is a Black inventor and a computer engineer.  He led the team that developed the Industry Standard Architecture (ISA) bus, and he led the design team responsible for creating the first one-gigahertz computer processor chip.

Dr. Dean has also helped in the early development of the computer keyboard. He holds three of IBM’s original nine PC patents. In August 2011, writing in his blog, he stated that he now uses a tablet computer instead of a PC.  Dr. Dean is the “Architect of the Modern-Day Personal Computer.”  He holds three of the original nine patents on the computer that all PC’s are based upon.

Dr. Benjamin Carson, Sr., a pioneer in “Brain Surgical Techniques” is best known for leading the first surgical team in 1984 that successfully separated a pair of seven months old Siamese twins, who were born, joined at the head.

Born in 1951, Dr. Carson came from a poor family in Detroit.  As a child he had a difficult time in school.  Undeterred, he studied hard in high school and won a scholarship to Yale University.   He also studied at University of Michigan’s School and became the first African American accepted into the residency program at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.  After one year in Australia, Dr. Carson was promoted to Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery at John Hopkins in 1984; at 31 years old, he was the youngest doctor to hold such a position.

INVENTIONS:   Every Texans should be happy about this, the Air Conditioning Unit; and the Portable X-Ray Machine was invented by Frederick M. Jones.  The Automatic Fishing Device was invented by G. Cook in 1899.  The Gas Mask was invented in 1914; and the Automated Three Way Traffic Light in 1923 both by Garrett Morgan.

Cash Registers were invented in the 1890’s by F. A. Hilyer.  The Pillar’s Mold for Building Foundation was invented by Elbert Robertson.  Bullet Resistant Plexiglass that are used in banks and other businesses was developed by Emanual L. Logan.  The Paper Bag Machine was invented by W. B. Purvis.  The Exhaust Purification Device for cars was invented by Meredith Gourdine.

And Ozzie Williams, the first African American hired by Republic Aviation, Inc. developed the first Airborne Radar Beacon for locating Crashed aircraft.

Romare Bearden, an artist known as the “Master of Collage” (the art of covering a surface with fragments of pictures from magazines, drawing, painting, and whatever else the artist is inspired to attach.  Otis Boykin in 1955, created an electrical mechanism regulating unit for the first heart pacemaker.

Marshall “Major” Taylor, known as “The Black Cyclone” became the first African American to win a national title in any sport in 1898.  In 1896 he won the World One-Mile Sprint Championship at a Montreal meet and set a world’s record in a Chicago bicycle race.  Taylor took his motto from Booker T. Washington:  “I shall allow no man to narrow my soul and drag me down.”  He concluded his autobiography by asserting, “I am a Negro in every sense of the word.”