Aretha Franklin, The Queen of Soul - I never Loved A Man(the Way I love You)

  Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul , passed away in Detroit,  Michigan,  on August 16, 2018. She is known as one of the greatest signer of soul, gospel and other music genres. Aretha Franklin once said:  "I always felt rock and roll was very, very wholesome music."  Her music inspired people from all over the World for over 6 decades and left them feel whole.

Michaela DePrince, an accomplished ballerina

Her life is beyond remarkable. It is an epitome of pain, suffering, hope, survival, overcoming, and success. Most of all, it is a testimony to humanity winning over human evil, and transforming  human perseverance into a victory against all odds.  

Goree Island, Senegal, June 27, 2013

Next week, on January 20th, 2017  we will say goodbye to President Barack "Baraka" Obama. Baraka means blessings in Swahili. He has been blessed. We all have been blessed to have him as our president.  Back in 2004, even before he became president, AfroAmerica Network made him AfroAmerica Network Black Man of Year 2004.

Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings

Soul singer Sharon Jones, died on Friday, November 19, 2016  at age 60 after a long battle with pancreatic cancer. Known as the James Brown of Soul, Sharon Jones' success after a long music career, came into her her 40s. She found success with her  band, the Dap-Kings. 

By her side until her death, the Dap-Kings band backed her up during her tours and performances. Commenting on her death, Dap-King's Gabriel Roth said that Sharon Jones, " was the strongest person any of us had ever known, and she just kept singing. She didn't want to stop singing."

Sharon Jones was diagnosed with  cancer in 2013. She never stopped performing even during treatment. Asked by Associated Press  recently, why she never stopes she said: "It's therapy, I know I need rest and sleep. But I want to work and that is our job.. You got to be brave. I want to use the time that I have. I don't want to spend it all laid up, wishing I had done that gig."

Her bravery will surely inspire many. She will be missed!

Katherine Coleman Goble Johnson, NASA mathematician, physicist, and scientist. Credit NASA

Katherine Coleman Goble Johnson is known as the NASA mathematician, physicist, and scientist who used her math genius to guide to and land Apollo 11 on the moon and bring it back to earth. As  NASA chief Charles Bolden, in a Vanity Fair Magazine article,  recently put it, Katherine "advanced Human Rights with a slide rule and a pencil", and the "frontier of human achievement at the same time."

Yet, at the time of her birth, on August 26, 1918,  the odds of reaching such a human achievement were remote at the best, if not impossible. It was the time when women were not encouraged to pursue high degrees or math and sciences. Moreover, Katherine Johnson was a Black woman, born in a segregated America. Hence,

Gaudence Habimana Nyirasafari, President Juvenal Habyarimana and Jeanne Habyarimana

 "If I die, it will be my day. And remember that no one can escape his destiny,"  the late Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana said on the evening of April 05, 1994, the eve of his assassination. President Habyarimana made the prediction at his residence in Kanombe, when walking out some of the guests he had entertained that evening. Among the guests were Mrs. Gaudence Habimana Nyirasafari and her husband, Phocas Habimana.

 Mrs. Gaudence Nyirasafari was one of the prominent Rwandan politicians and perhaps the highest ranking and most recognizable woman in the Rwandan politics, over more than 2 decades. She is also known as the first Rwandan woman to have obtained the most advanced university degree, that she earned from a Belgian university in early 1960s. Known for her integrity, she was well admired by Rwandan intellectuals and common people and trusted by Western diplomats in Rwanda and by governments around the World, especially the United States.

With the support from  the United States government, she was entrusted with the most important program funded by the Unites States, Family