Wednesday, February 27, 2002

by Shavaugn Lewis
Gazette Sportswriter

February 27, 1897:
Marian Anderson is born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

World renowned opera singer Marian Anderson was born in 1897
to a
working-class family. She began singing in her church’s choir
at the age
of six and, despite having to work when her father died, she
continued
singing in the choir throughout her teenage years. Between
1916 and 1918
she studied music under contralto Agnes Reifsnyder and in
1917 she started
giving solo performances. During the summer of 1919 she studied
with Oscar
Sanger at the Chicago Conservatory of Music. In 1921 she applied
to an
all-white music school in Philadelphia, but was rejected because
she was
black. She would face such racism again when the Daughters
of the American
Revolution denied her the right to sing at Constitutional
Hall in 1939. In
that same year, however, she was given the chance to sing
at the Lincoln
Memorial, a performance that won her many accolade s and was
seen as an
important accomplishment in the Civil Rights Movement.
Anderson went on to become the first African-American to sing
and the
White House and at New York’s Metropolitan Opera. These accomplishments

helped her to win the Lifetime Achievement Award from the
Kennedy
Center. The NAACP also awarded Marian Anderson the Springarn
Medal for
high achievement by a member of her race, Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt
made the
presentation. Marian Anderson died of heart failure in April
of 1993.

*****

* Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has reportedly agreed
to meet with
officials from Saudi Arabia to discuss a plan for Middle Eastern
peace. The
proposal, which was first described in a New York Times interview
with
Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, calls for all Arab states to
make peace with
Israel on the condition that it returns the West Bank, Gaza
Strip, and east
Jerusalem – which were seized in the Six-Day War of 1967.
No further
details are available, but many in the Arab world, including
Palestinian
leaders, have praised the plan. In other news out of the Middle
East,
Palestinian and Israeli security chiefs met on Monday night
to look at ways
to end the non-stop violence which has plagued the region
for the last 17
months. The results of the meeting were not known.

* Former Ennron President Jeffrey Skilling testified before
a Senate
Commerce subcommittee yesterday, telling his congressional
investigators
that he was unaware of any wrongdoing during his tenure with
the company.
Additionally, Skilling claimed that the Senators were using
top Enron
executives as scapegoats for the company’s failure, but the
lawmakers
rejected this assertion and accused Skilling of lying in his
testimony.
Skilling’s remarks conflicted with testimony provided by current
Enron
President Jeff McMahon and Enron Vice President Sherron Watkins,
who both
implicated Skilling in Enron’s fall.

* According to US officials, the war on terrorism will now
be extended to a
third front, with American troops soon traveling to the former
Soviet
republic of Georgia to train soldiers there. The US military
forces will
not be directly involved in the ongoing battles with Muslim
guerrillas, but
will play a support role, as they are currently doing in the
Phillipines.
Military experts suspect that Islamic rebels there have links
to Osama bin
Laden’s al Qaeda terrorism network.

*****

“Celebrating Growth, Building Tomorrow”
Discussion of the Latin American community in Philadelphia
by Diego
Castellanos, host of “Puerto Rican Panorama”
Scheuer Room, 4:30 p.m.

Film Screening of “Looking for Answers”
Followed by a discussion of the September 11 attack with Kathy
Bergen,
American Friends Service Committee
LPAC Cinema, 4:30 p.m.

Poetry Reading, Discussion, and Contest Announcements with
Poet Fleda Brown
Scheuer Room, 6:15 p.m.

MST3K Showing
Trotter 203, 7:00 p.m.

College Democrats Meeting
Parrish Parlor East, 8:00 p.m.

“The Ring” with Swarthmore Christian Fellowship
Mephistos Lounge, 9:00 p.m.

Film Society Film Screening
Kirby Lecture Hall, 10:00 p.m.

*****

SPORTS UPDATE

* Michael Jordan will undergo arthroscopic surgery to try
to repair the
right knee injury that has plagued him all this season. Though
the initial
diagnosis at the beginning of the season was tendonitis, Jordan
has been
forced to have fluid drained from the knee three times, and
team officials
are worried that the condition might be chronic arthritis.
This is only the
second time in his career that Jordan has been on the disabled
list. He has
already missed two games due to the injury and will miss at
least five
more, starting tonight, because of the surgery.

* Spring training injuries continue to plague baseball teams.
The latest
casualty is the World Champion Arizona Diamondbacks’ Matt
Williams, who has
a dislocated left ankle and a fractured left fibula. The ankle
injury
occurred when Williams slipped during routine fielding practice,
but the
fracture was not discovered until X-rays were performed on
the leg.
Ligaments in the leg have also been damaged, and Williams
underwent
extensive surgery on Monday night. Williams will miss the
rest of spring
training and the first part of the season, but the Diamondbacks
have not
estimated when he may return to action.

* East Carolina pulled off a huge upset last night, defeating
No. 9
Marquette, 51-46. Travis Holcomb-Faye led the Pirates with
15 points, but
the second-half defense was the real star, holding Marquette
to just six
points in the final 12 minutes. Marquette’s leading scorer,
Dwyane Wade,
scored 19 points but only four in the second half, while Cordell
Henry,
averaging 19.8 points over the last four games, was 1-for-11
from the field
with two points. This was East Carolina’s first victory over
a Top Ten team
in the team’s history, dating back to 1960.

*****

Today:
Women’s basketball hosts Delaware Valley, 7:00 p.m. – ECAC
1st Round

Tomorrow:
There are no contests scheduled for tomorrow.

****

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you
were to live forever.”
–Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

—————————*****
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Shavaugn Lewis
Pat Quinn

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