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Sunday, August 22, 2021
Friday, August 20, 2021
Thursday, August 19, 2021
Who Needs a Hair Appointment?
From In the Know -
LINWOOD DARKIS WANTS TO CHANGE WHAT’S TAUGHT IN COSMETOLOGY SCHOOL
By Katie Mather
Fuddruckers Owned by HBCU Alum
An excerpt from Essence -
The Fuddruckers Franchise Is Now Owned By A Black HBCU Alum
THE ACQUISITION MAKES NICHOLAS PERKINS THE LARGEST FRANCHISE OWNER AND THE FIRST AFRICAN AMERICAN TO HAVE TOTAL OWNERSHIP OF A NATIONAL BURGER BUSINESS.
BY CHANEL STEWART
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COURTESY: NICHOLAS PERKINS |
If there’s anything that Black HBCU grads are going to do, it’s take over corporate America.
Nicholas Perkins acquired the Fuddruckers franchise for an estimated $18.5 million dollars, making him the largest franchise owner and the first African American to have total ownership of a national burger business. Perkins’ Black Titan Franchise Systems LLC reached a deal with Luby’s earlier this summer to take over ownership of the Fuddruckers brand from Luby’s, a Houston-based reported cafeteria chain that last year began liquidating its assets and dissolving the company.
“We’re excited to be purchasing Fuddruckers and look forward to working with Fuddruckers’ many dedicated, highly capable franchisees to further build this brand,” Perkins said. “As a Fuddruckers franchisee, I have a vested interest in ensuring that all Fuddruckers franchisees have the resources, infrastructure, and operational and marketing support they need to maximize their return on investment. This strategic alignment, when combined with the fact that we sell the ‘World’s Greatest Hamburgers’™, will ensure the long-term success of the brand and our franchisees.”
Multilingual Siblings
An excerpt from Black Enterprise -
MEET THE SIBLINGS WHO ARE TEACHING OTHER KIDS HOW TO SPEAK UP TO 8 DIFFERENT LANGUAGES
by Black Enterprise
Cleveland, OH — Meet 4-year old Emilio, 6-year old Amora, 8-year old Rosie, 10-year old LaLa, 12-year old Anita, 16-year old Malachi, 18-year old Kimoni, 20-year old Mina, and baby Makalo. These young homeschoolers have created a YouTube channel called Multilingual Stars Academy that offers fun and exciting content to help children learn the basics of different languages.
He Gets My Support
An excerpt from the Washington Post -
An Alabama doctor watched patients reject the coronavirus vaccine. Now he’s refusing to treat them.
By Timothy Bella
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Dr. Jason Valentine |
In Alabama, where the nation’s lowest vaccination rate has helped push the state closer to a record number of hospitalizations, a physician has sent a clear message to his patients: Don’t come in for medical treatment if you are unvaccinated.
Jason Valentine, a physician at Diagnostic and Medical Clinic Infirmary Health in Mobile, Ala., posted a photo on Facebook this week of him pointing to a sign taped to a door informing patients of his new policy coming Oct. 1.
“Dr. Valentine will no longer see patients that are not vaccinated against covid-19,” the sign reads.
Valentine wrote in the post, which has since been made private but was captured in online images, that there were “no conspiracy theories, no excuses” stopping anyone from being vaccinated, AL.com reported. The doctor, who said at least three unvaccinated patients have asked him where they could get a vaccine since he posted the photo, has remained resolute to those who have questioned his decision in recent days.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/08/18/alabama-doctor-unvaccinated-patients-valentine/
Black-Owned Food & Drink Brands
An excerpt from HuffPost -
17 Black-Owned Food And Drink Brands You Can Shop Online
August is National Black Business Month. Here are delicious ways to show your support.
By Shontel Horne
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HuffPost |
More than 124,000 businesses identify as Black-owned, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Every day is a good day to support Black-owned businesses, but with National Black Business Month taking place in August, now is an especially great time to get familiar with and continue to support Black-owned brands — particularly in food and drink.
The 17 food and beverage brands below are sure to become staples in your kitchen for years to come. Add them to your shopping list and stock up on everything from olive oil to vegan cheese.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/black-owned-food-drink-businesses_l_610bead9e4b041dfbaa65821
Wednesday, August 18, 2021
What Kind of Driver Are you?
An excerpt from Upworthy -
Awesome chart shows you how far you can drive on empty
By Tricia Leigh Zeigenhorn
There are two types of people in this world – those who panic and fill up their cars with gas when the needle hits 25% or so, and people like me who wait until the gas light comes on, then check the odometer so you can drive the entire 30 miles to absolute empty before coasting into a gas station on fumes.
https://www.upworthy.com/awesome-chart-shows-you-how-far-you-can-drive-on-empty
Click on the link for a better view of the chart. - Faye
Snoop and Kevin react to Jade Carey's gold medal | Olympic Highlights wi...
Tuesday, August 17, 2021
Young Black Aspiring Doctors
An excerpt from Black Enterprise -
YOUNG BLACK ASPIRING DOCTORS IN NYC GETTING GUIDANCE THROUGH MENTORSHIP PROGRAM #BLACKBUSINESSMONTH
by Jeroslyn Johnson
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These 45 Black youths got an inside view of medicine through a new, week long medical internship. (Erskine Isaac ivisionphoto.com) |
The Whitewashing of Black Music
An excerpt from Far Out Magazine -
The whitewashing of Black music: Five singles made popular by white artists
By Mick McStarkey
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Big Mama Thornton was a pioneering musician. (Credit: Alamy) |
This week marks the anniversary of the date that Big Mama Thornton first recorded the iconic single ‘Hound Dog’ in 1952. The song is widely regarded as one of the most iconic tracks in rock and roll history. Since Thornton’s original was put to wax, the song has been covered well over 250 times. In this sense, the blues staple can be considered to be in the same category as what ‘Greensleeves’ is to folk: a key standard, setting out its defining features.
The chances are that many of you will not have even heard of Big Mama Thornton, or the fact that she was the first artist to perform the now-iconic track. Written by the duo Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller for Thornton, it is quite telling that Elvis Presley was the one who popularised the song in 1956. His version is often thought of as being the original, which is not the case.
In 1999, Rick Kennedy and Randy MacNutt perfectly captured the impact Thornton’s original had on music. They argued that it helped to “spur the evolution of Black R&B into rock music”. The transformative effect of this cross-pollination cannot be underestimated.
The irony of the song is that when Thornton initially sang it, she did so in the form of a ballad. However, Leiber and Stoller believed that the song should be more up-tempo, as they had forged it specifically “to suit her personality—brusque and badass”. Thus, Leiber sang it, accompanied by Stoller on the piano, conveying to Thornton how they thought it should be performed.
Luckily Thornton agreed, and the song the trio recorded the number became one of the most important hits ever captured. The track is so influential that Maureen Mahon, a professor of music at New York University, claimed that the original is “an important (part of the) beginning of rock and roll, especially in its use of the guitar as the key instrument”. The song would reach number one on the R&B chart and be popularised in the appropriate musical community. However, the song remained relatively unknown in the mainstream until Elvis Presley put his own spin on it.
What made Elvis’ version so popular and Thornton’s not? After all, one would wager that Thornton’s is the best version out of all of them, a swaggering, sexualised number that was just as groundbreaking lyrically as it was musically. So why then does the ‘King of Rock and Roll’ still take all the plaudits?
Unfortunately, the reasons are all too familiar. Firstly, we need to cast our mind’s back to the era, 1950s America. Thornton, being the larger-than-life Black woman that she was, was clearly up against it in her fight for success, the measure of which was relevant to the time. Thornton’s original preceded the desegregation of schools by a year, and Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Malcolm X wouldn’t truly make their voices of civil rights protest heard until the ’60s.