People, Locations, Episodes

Fri, 09.22.1950

The First Black Person Receives the Nobel Peace Prize

*On this date in 1950, Ralph Bunche received the Nobel Prize. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace for successfully mediating a series of armistice agreements between the (then) new nation of Israel and four Arab neighbors, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria.

It was the first and one of the few times that all the parties to the Middle East conflict signed armistice agreements with Israel.  In being awarded the Peace Prize, Bunche became the first black and the first non-white in the world to be so honored.

At the time of the presentation, he was a Professor at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA., a Director of the UN Division of Trusteeship, and an Acting Mediator in Palestine.

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Poetry Corner

They shall go down unto life’s Borderland, Walk unafraid within that Living Hell, Nor heed the driving rain of shot and shell That round them falls; but with uplifted hand Be one with... SONNET TO NEGRO SOLDIERS by Joseph Seaman Cotter Jr.
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