Today In Black History: Nat Love
"Deadwood Dick" was a famous and accomplished American cowboy
Issue #617 Today In Black History, Tuesday, May 28, 2024
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Today’s Black History WOW!
Nat Love was born enslaved in Tennessee in 1854, Love eventually gained his freedom after the Civil War and set out to pursue a life of adventure as a cowboy. As a child, he learned to read and write from his father, an unusual accomplishment during slavery.
Love traveled to Dodge City, Kansas, where he found work as a cowboy with cattle drivers. According to his autobiography, Love fought cattle rustlers and trained himself to become an expert marksman and cowboy. In 1872, Love moved to Arizona, where he met Pat Garrett, Bat Masterson, Billy the Kid, and others while working the cattle drives in Arizona.
At a rodeo, Love said he won the rope, throw, tie, bridle, saddle, and bronco riding contests. It was at this rodeo that Love claims friends and fans gave him the nickname "Deadwood Dick", a reference to a literary character created by Edward Lytton Wheeler, a dime novelist of the day.
In 1889, Love married a woman named Alice and they lived in Denver, Colorado. He took a job in 1890 as a Pullman Porter, overseeing sleeping cars on the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad, before finally moving to southern California.
In 1907, Love published his autobiography titled Life and Adventures of Nat Love, Better Known in the Cattle Country as 'Deadwood Dick,' by Himself. He spent the latter part of his life as a courier and guard for a securities company in Los Angeles, where he died there in 1921 at the age of 66.
Today In Black History
In 1863, the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, the 1st Black regiment, left Boston to fight in the Civil War.
In 1917, white workers marched through Black neighborhoods in East St. Louis, Illinois, beating people and burning buildings. The governor called in the National Guard to restore order.
In 1963, the home of civil rights activist Medgar Evers was firebombed. Evers was murdered in his driveway two weeks later.
In 1986, Black explorer Matthew Henson, the first person to reach the North Pole, was commemorated on a U.S. postage stamp.
In 1998, 12-year-old Jody-Ann Maxwell from Kingston, Jamaica, won the 71st annual Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee, becoming the first Black person and 1st non-American to win the competition.
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