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Past DID YOU KNOW... Postings

DID YOU KNOW? - a biweekly feature from PLATO's Diversity Awareness Committee highlighting the many contributions by non-mainstream individuals you might not have learned or read about. A brief fact will be posted in PLATO's Tuesday WEEKLY UPDATE email and more background on the individual and their accomplishments will be provided on the Social Justice webpage.

Past Did You Know? postings will be available on this archive page.

  • August 29, 2023 7:31 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for August 29 – September 18, 2023 

    Alice H. Parker (1895 – ?) an African American inventor, revolutionized home heating during the 1920’s by patenting a central heating system using natural gas, paving the way for modern central heating systems. Most homes were still reliant upon wood or coal to heat their homes – which made staying warm indoors a laborious task. Parker’s invention utilized natural gas through a network of ducts and vents that distributed heat through the entire home. Her design also offered users the ability to adjust heat to meet individual preferences.

    Learn more at:
     
    https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/parker-alice-h-1895/

  • August 14, 2023 11:25 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for August 15 – 28, 2023 

    Frederick McKinley Jones (May 17, 1893 – February 21, 1961) invented the first successful system of mobile refrigeration which eliminated the use of ice and salt to preserve food for transport, contributing to the modernization of food transportation services. Jones was the first African-American to be awarded the National Medal of Technology and he patented more than sixty inventions during his prolific lifetime. 


    Learn more at:  https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/jones-frederick-mckinley-1893-1961/


    AND


    https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2012/02/21/how-one-mans-invention-changed-food-access-world-wide


  • August 01, 2023 9:02 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for August 1 – August 14, 2023

    Dr. Lonnie Johnson ((born October 6, 1949), a NASA engineer and founder and president of Johnson Research and Development, invented the Super Soaker while working on spacecraft system designs at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “I was working on a new type of heat pump that would use water as a working fluid instead of freon and I was experimenting…and I machined these nozzles and, I’d hook them up to the sink in my bathroom, and I was looking at the stream of water coming out of a nozzle, and I turned and shot the stream across the bathroom, and I thought jeez it would be neat to have a really powerful toy water gun,” explained Dr. Johnson

    Learn more: https://www.becauseofthemwecan.com/blogs/culture/meet-lonnie-johnson-the-man-who-made-a-splash-in-the-toy-industry-by-inventing-the-super-soaker

  • July 10, 2023 1:35 PM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for July 10 – 24, 2023 

    Cecilia Payne (May 10, 1900 ­ – December 7, 1979) was the first person to earn a Ph.D. in astronomy from Radcliffe College, with what Otto Strauve called “the most brilliant Ph.D. thesis ever written in astronomy.” And in 1950’s, Payne became the first female professor and chair of the Astronomy Department at Harvard. Payne’s work is foundational to the modern study of variable stars. She was also awarded the Henry Norris Russell Prize from the American Astronomical Society.

    Learn more here: 
    https://www.amnh.org/learn-teach/curriculum-collections/cosmic-horizons-book/cecilia-payne-profile 

  • June 26, 2023 5:18 PM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for June 26 – July 10, 2023 

    Patricia Roberts Harris (May 31, 1924 – March 23, 1985)
    was the first Black woman to sit on the board of a large U.S. public company. With accolades including service as U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg, U.S. secretary of housing and urban development, and as U.S. secretary of health and human services, Harris made history when she was elected to the board of IBM in 1971. The organization Black Women on Boards recently shed light on Harris’s history-making directorship and this remarkable achievement is now the subject of the documentary OnBoard.

    Learn more...

    The Patricia Roberts Harris Wikipedia page.

    Lila MacLellan, author of Fortune‘s Modern Board newsletter, writes about OnBoard in a new Fortune piece.

  • June 12, 2023 1:23 PM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for June 13 – 26, 2023 

    Zitkala-ŠaLakota for Red Bird, aka Gertrude Simmons Bonnin (February 22, 1876 – January 26, 1938) was a political activist who found work wearing many hats – as a Yankton Dakota writer, editor, translator, musician, and educator. Zitkala-Ša recounted her struggles with cultural identity, emphasizing the friction between the majority culture in which she was educated and the Dakota culture into which she was born and initially raised. Her work helped bring traditional Native stories to a mainstream audience and influenced Congress to pass the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934.

    Learn more….

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zitkala-Sa

  • May 30, 2023 9:16 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for May 30 – June 12, 2023

    Alice Ball (July 24, 1892 – December 31, 1916) was a black chemist in Hawaii who at the age of 23 in 1915 discovered a way of treating leprosy before antibiotics. Unfortunately, others claimed credit for it. Scholar Paul Wermager explains, “Not only did Alice Ball overcome the racial and gender barriers of her time to become one of the very few African American women to earn a master’s degree in chemistry, [but she] also developed the first useful treatment for Hansen’s disease. Her amazing life was cut too short at the age of 24. Who knows what other marvelous work she could have accomplished had she lived.” 

    Learn more…

    https://www.biography.com/scientists/alice-ball

  • May 08, 2023 4:21 PM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for May 9 – 22, 2023

    The Indian Citizenship Act, established on June 2, 1924, was enacted by Congress to grant citizenship to all Native Americans born in the United States. However, some states barred Native Americans from voting until 1957. Learn more about the Indian Citizenship Act and its precursor, the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887, which had devastating on Native American people and their culture.

    Learn more…

    https://www.loc.gov/item/today-in-history/june-02/

  • April 25, 2023 11:02 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for April 25 – May 8, 2023

    Florence Lois Weber (June 13, 1879 – November 13, 1939) was an American silent film actress, screenwriter, producer and director. In 1914, Weber became the first American woman to direct a full-length feature film and in 1917, she became the first American woman director to own her own film studio. Weber has been noted as one of "the most important and prolific film directors in the era of silent films".

    Learn more…

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois_Weber


  • April 04, 2023 10:55 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

    DID YOU KNOW? for April 4 – 24, 2023

    Dr. Anna Wessels Williams (March 17, 1863 – 1954) was an American pathologist who became the first woman to be elected chair of the laboratory section of the American Public Health Association in 1932. She contributed to the advancement of vaccines and diagnostic tests for many diseases. Williams was hailed as "a scientist of international repute" by New York City mayor Fiorello La Guardia upon her retirement.

    Learn More….

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Wessels_Williams



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