Ridgefield Allies

Today in “Hidden” History is a daily listing of important but little-known events illustrating the range of innovators, contributors, or incidents excluded from formal history lessons or common knowledge. Hidden history is intended not as an exhaustive review, but merely as an illustration of how popular narratives "hide" many matters of fundamental importance. Bookmark this page and check daily to quickly expand your knowledge. Suggest entries for Today in “Hidden” History by clicking the Contact Us link. Entries for July 10:

Date	Type	Event
1875		Educator, stateswoman, philanthropist, humanitarian, womanist, and civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune is born. Bethune founded the National Council for Negro Women in 1935, established the organization's flagship journal Aframerican Women's Journal, and resided as president or leader for myriad African American women's organizations including the National Association for Colored Women and the National Youth Administration's Negro Division. She also was appointed as a national adviser to president Franklin D. Roosevelt, whom she worked with to create the Federal Council on colored Affairs, also known as the Black Cabinet. She is well known for starting a private school for African-American students in Daytona Beach, Florida; it later continued to develop as Bethune-Cookman University. Bethune was the sole African American woman officially a part of the US delegation that created the United Nations charter, and she held a leadership position for the American Women's Voluntary Services founded by Alice Throckmorton McLean. For her lifetime of activism, she was deemed "acknowledged First Lady of Negro America" by Ebony magazine in July 1949 and was known by the Black Press as the "Female Booker T. Washington". She was known as "The First Lady of The Struggle" because of her commitment to gain better lives for African Americans. Learn more.
1893		African American surgeon Dr. Daniel Hale Williams performs the first documented, successful heart surgery. The patient had been stabbed the night before and Dr. Williams decided to operate in response to continued bleeding, cough and "pronounced" symptoms of shock. He performed the surgery without the benefit of penicillin or blood transfusion, at Provident Hospital, Chicago. He undertook a second procedure to drain fluid. About fifty days after the initial procedure, Cornish left the hospital and survived another 20 years. Dr. Williams had founded Provident Hospital, the first non-segregated hospital in the United States and also founded an associated nursing school for African Americans. In 1913, Williams was elected as the only African-American charter member of the American College of Surgeons. Learn more.
1943		American professional tennis player Arthur Ashe Jr., the first Black player selected to the United States Davis Cup team and the first Black man to win the singles title at Wimbledon, the US Open, and the Australian Open, is born. Learn more.
1966		The Chicago Freedom Movement, also known as the Chicago Open Housing Movement, holds a rally at Soldier Field in Chicago. As many as 60,000 people attend. Co-founded and led by Martin Luther King Jr., James Bevel, and Al Raby. the Chicago Freedom Movement was supported by the Chicago based Coordinating Council of Community Organizations (CCCO) and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). The movement issued demands to the City of Chicago in regard to open housing, quality education, transportation and job access, income and employment, health, wealth generation, crime and the criminal justice system, community development, tenants rights, and quality of life. Operation Breadbasket in part led by Jesse Jackson sought to harness African-American consumer power. The Chicago Freedom Movement was the most ambitious civil rights campaign in the North of the United States, lasted from mid-1965 to August 1966, and is largely credited with inspiring the 1968 Fair Housing Act. Learn more.