Vandals defaced a highway marker in Neshoba County, Miss., that memorialized the 1964 killings of three civil rights workers by the Ku Klux Klan.
The sign, on Mississippi Highway 19, was painted with the letters KKK, reports Clarionledger.com.
A previous marker – a repeated target of vandals – was removed in March after it was painted black.
The sign honors the June 21, 1964, deaths of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, whose slayings helped fuel the civil rights movement in Mississippi and across the nation.
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President Obama was named the world’s most powerful man Thursday by Forbes magazine.
Others making the eclectic list included Wal-Mart CEO Mike Duke at No. 8, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin at No. 3, Pope Benedict XVI at No. 11, Mexican drug lord Joaquin Guzman at No. 41 and media personality Oprah Winfrey at No. 45.
In compiling its first World’s Most Powerful People list, magazine editors asked whether a person has influence over lots of people, reviewed the financial resources controlled by the individual and determined if the individual was powerful in multiple spheres.
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Black firefighters in Philadelphia filed a federal lawsuit accusing the city’s firefighters union of being “racially harassing and abusive” to blacks, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
The lawsuit said union leadership was dominated by members of a predominantly white firefighters organization dedicated to ending a 25-year-old federal consent decree that paved the way for the hiring of many black firefighters.
Members of that group, the Concerned American Fire Fighters Association (CAFFA), have pushed their agenda at the union, the lawsuit said. It noted that the union’s December bargaining proposal to the city included the request that “any and all quota-based hiring practices” be eliminated.
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Darius Rucker, former lead singer for Hootie and the Blowfish, brought home the New Artist of the Year award at the 2009 Country Music Association Awards.
Only one African-American had ever won a major CMA individual award. Rucker won for New Artist of the Year.
He expressed gratitude during his acceptance speech: “What a year! First of all, to the fans, thank y’all for accepting me. And I think most importantly, to country radio, you took a chance on a pop singer from Charleston, S.C. Thank you so much for that!”
