African American

In rejecting PSA screening for prostate cancer, an influential federal panel has chipped a cornerstone of preventive medicine, declaring that it's not always best to catch cancer as early as possible. "At best, PSA screening may help only 1 man in 1,000 avoid death from prostate cancer," the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force said Monday. "Most prostate cancers found by PSA screening are slow growing, not life threatening, and will not cause a man any harm during his lifetime.

This summer, hair weaves are taking a turn for the kinky, the curly and the wavy. Why is this news? When black women first started sewing hair onto their scalps during the 1990s en masse, the resulting shoulder-length bobs were as much about achieving a smooth texture as it was about having length. Fabulous hair was defined as long and straight. However, as more black women have come to terms with their natural curl pattern, store-bought tresses are trending toward the fuzzy rather than the flat-ironed.

There has been a lot of discussion about how Ed Rendell's victory in the May primary constituted a signal of the maturation of the African-American electorate as evidenced by the fact that in a citywide campaign a white candidate could win an election where African-American voters had the option of choosing between two black candidates. I don't buy it. What Rendell's victory represented was more of the same old politics as usual, divide and conquer when it comes to the African-American vote.

Where were dozens of newspaper articles, columns and feature stories as well as radio and television commentaries about Mayor W. Wilson Goode's responsibility to appease his African-American supporters because he was Philadelphia's first African-American mayor. Racial references were dominant in virtually every story about local politics and government during Goode's tenure. Columnist Jill Porter did not write that the portrayal of Goode as an African- American, appeasing other African-Americans, was racially offensive.

Pennsylvania dropped from first to second place in 2005 in the number of African-American citizens murdered - many of them young and most killed with guns, according to a study of the latest data available, the Violence Policy Center announced yesterday. Missouri knocked us out of the No. 1 spot - but only by a little more than one-half percent. According to an analysis of FBI data by the Violence Policy Center, Missouri recorded 32.79 African-American homicide victims per 100,000 in 2005.

AS AN African-American who listens to sports-talk radio, I often wonder where is the diversity and difference of opinion when African-American athletes like Barry Bonds are constantly ridiculed. The majority of callers say Bonds should have an asterisk next to his name for breaking Babe Ruth's record after allegations that Bonds may have used steroids. How come these callers never say there should be an asterisk next to Ruth's name because he didn't play against African-American athletes?

IN THE Dec. 12 edition, we were asked to vote for our favorite Eagles cheerleader squad. Why in a city with an African-American mayor, fire commissioner, police commissioner, where the majority of residents are African-American, with an Eagles team that is at least 75 percent African-American, and the star player (Donovan McNabb) is also African- American - why is this cheerleading squad about 10 percent African-American? Did my black sisters not show up for the audition? T. Parker Sicklerville, N.J. The unplowed Northeast I was so relieved to read that Frank Keel got home safely to Montgomery County during the city's latest snowstorm.

At 9-1, the Dodgers own the top record in the majors and are off to their best start since 1981. They also, if replays are worth anything, got a huge gift Sunday night in a 5-4 win over San Diego. The Dodgers killed a Padre rally in the top of the ninth with the first 2-5-6-3 double play in major-league history. With two on in a 4-4 game, San Diego's Jesus Guzman squared to bunt, but Javy Guera's pitch came high and tight and hit Guzman's bat as he backed up from the pitch.

In 1865, a lynch mob tried to seize an African-American man named Louis Wells from the Carrollton, Ala., courthouse. The mob suddenly dispersed as a lightning storm struck. Wells' body was found the next morning on the upper story of the courthouse; he was the victim of a lightning bolt. The outline of his face was etched onto the pane of glass through which he peered at the moment of his death. The uncanny incident at Carrollton Courthouse is described in George Cantor's "Historic Black Landmarks: A Traveler's Guide" (Visible Ink Press/ $17.95)

The television set almost went out the window Tuesday night. New York City Mayor Ed Koch was on ABC's "Nightline. " The topic was the crime, violence and early burials that have made young African-American males an endangered species. The issue made national television because of the recent brutal, senseless beating and rape of a woman jogger in Central Park. The woman was a young white investment banker. Her attackers were African- American teen-age boys out for a night of "wilding," which included beating an innocent victim with a lead pipe until her head split open and blood ran from her eyes.

The 11th annual East Coast Black Age of Comics Convention celebrates the African American experience in comic books Friday and Saturday. The convention will offer an awards ceremony, film screenings, youth workshops, a parade, a comic-book marketplace, and other events at the African American Museum in Philadelphia and the Enterprise Center in West Philadelphia. Convention activities begin at 6:30 p.m. Friday at the museum, with a free reception and ceremonies for the Pioneer and Glyph comic awards.

Martin R. Delany is one of the most interesting people you've never heard of. He was, over the course of a long life (1812-85), a writer, editor, abolitionist, Harvard medical student, physician, judge, acquaintance of John Brown, and the first African American commissioned a major in the Army. He is also widely considered America's first black nationalist, the forerunner of Marcus Garvey, Paul Robeson, and Malcolm X. But unless you're a close student of African American history or 19th-century American literature, chances are very good that you don't know much about Delany, who stands in the long shadow cast by Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, and W.E.B.

Clarence Still Jr., 83, of Lawnside, a community historian who was a member of one of South Jersey's best-known African American families, died Friday, May 4, after a long illness. Still, a founder of the Lawnside Historical Society, lived on an expansive property on Oak Avenue where he hosted the Still Family Reunion, an annual event that draws family members from all over the United States. The Still family tree includes abolitionists, preachers, doctors, scientists, professors, composers, Tuskegee Airmen, and professional athletes.

Before Philadelphia's invited movers and shakers even arrived at the red-carpet premiere of Changing the Game, Rel Dowdell's urban tale of corruption and redemption, moviegoers were instructed to leave their smartphones in their cars or turn them over to security before entering the Van Pelt Auditorium at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. After all, it took Dowdell seven long years to birth his baby, and to miraculously land a nationwide distribution...

Denzel Parker-Dixon, 19, was the only one in his group of friends to sign up for college. But now at the Community College of Philadelphia, he has found a place where the staff and students have his back. That place is the Center for Male Engagement. At Montgomery County Community College, the Minority Male Mentoring Program fulfills a similar need. Both programs use guidance to try to keep their African American participants engaged in school. "Without the program, I probably would be out of school," said Parker-Dixon, a Frankford High School graduate.

At 9-1, the Dodgers own the top record in the majors and are off to their best start since 1981. They also, if replays are worth anything, got a huge gift Sunday night in a 5-4 win over San Diego. The Dodgers killed a Padre rally in the top of the ninth with the first 2-5-6-3 double play in major-league history. With two on in a 4-4 game, San Diego's Jesus Guzman squared to bunt, but Javy Guera's pitch came high and tight and hit Guzman's bat as he backed up from the pitch.

ERNEST Strother was not really a born renegade, but he couldn't stand injustice when he encountered it. That acute sense of right and wrong that guided him all his life might have had its origin in the segregated South of his childhood. It was when he was in 10th grade at Abbeville High School, in Abbeville, S.C., in the early '30s that Ernest became aware that the "separate but equal" doctrine followed by many Southern school districts was a farce. The whites-only and blacks-only schools were separate, all right, but rarely equal.

They woke up early – very, very early – to put on their Sunday Easter best. They traveled from Yeadon and Haverford and Camden and West Philadelphia, retired teachers and young professionals, grandfathers and children rubbing sleep from their eyes. At 6 a.m., while the sun, still moon-cool and pearly, backlit the stained glass windows, they filled the pews of Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church and turned to the altar. The Rev. Mark Kelly Tyler, wearing gold-embroidered white robes, greeted the nearly 100 worshippers in the hallowed structure, one of the first African-American churches in the nation.

IN HER opinion piece on the Boy Scouts, Christine Flowers writes, "Isn't it nice to know that in the town where the Constitution was written, there are some people - including some lawyers - who think it's OK to blackmail citizens into forgoing those rights, I mean, behavior?" The question was never about whether the Boy Scouts have the right to exclude openly gay members. The issue is whether an organization that excludes openly gay members has a right to remain headquartered in a city-owned building without paying any taxes.

HOW OFTEN are images and statistical facts about African-Americans mostly negative when presented publicly? I know, some are saying, "Here we go with the 'race card.' " To that I would say: Name a time when facts about African-Americans are positive. I've asked people to recite a stat that was positive - haven't received any yet. We hear about how many are in jail, how many aren't in school, how many are on welfare, how many have multiple kids, how many have AIDS. Yet we haven't heard how many are in school, how many take care of their kids, how many are in college, how many are law-abiding citizens, how many don't have AIDS.