Milestones: Monday, August 28, 2023

August 28, 2023 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

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MARCH ON WASHINGTON — MORE THAN 250,00 PEOPLE CONVERGED ON WASHINGTON D.C. 60 years ago, on Aug. 28, 1963 for the March on Washington for Freedom and Jobs. Among the noteworthy leaders gathered near the Reflecting Pool at the Lincoln Memorial were Washington Archbishop Patrick O’Boyle, who gave the invocation at the beginning of the program, and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. whose “I Have a Dream” address became one of the event’s landmark speeches. Labor leader A. Phillip Randolph (Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters) and Roy Wilkins, executive secretary of the NAACP, had conceived of the March on Washington, and the idea then expanded into a collaborative effort amongst major civil rights groups and icons of the day who had grown angry over society’s racial inequities.

Dr. King’s dream was realized the next year, when President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and then the National Voting Rights Act of 1965, outlawing discrimination, racially-biased local voting policies and allowing Black people a say in their own representation.

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DOCTOR OF THE CHURCH — THE FEAST DAY ST. AUGUSTINE, a Doctor of the Church, is observed each year on Aug. 28, the date on which he died in 430 A.D. Born as an ethnic Berber in what is now Algeria, he is considered the first African bishop of Hippo Regius, a North African coastal city. Having experienced a conversion, Augustine wrote “Confessions” and “The City of God.” St. Augustine was given the honorific Doctor of the Church in 1298 and was one of a few saints so recognized, for having made a significant contribution to theology or doctrine, and conversion and sanctity of life. Augustine is recognized as a saint in the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Lutheran Churches and the Anglican Communion.

The honor Doctor of the Church is conferred through special decree of the Pope or an Ecumenical Council. Other Doctors of the Church are St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Ambrose of Milan, and St. Francis de Sales.

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FIRST U.S.-BORN CATHOLIC SAINT— Elizabeth Ann Bayley (later, Seton), born in New York City on Aug. 28, 1774, became the first American-born saint beatified by the Roman Catholic Church. She married a shipping magnate, William Magee Seton who, though wealthy, later suffered financial collapse and died, as did their eldest daughter nine years after that. Raised an Episcopalian, Elizabeth Ann Seton gravitated to the Roman Catholic Church and received her first Holy Communion in 1805. She began teaching to support her family and, espousing the idea of free education for girls and boys, she established the nation’s first Catholic school in Baltimore. After taking the traditional religious vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, she founded the Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph. She was beatified in 1963 and canonized as a saint in 1975.

A church in Lower Manhattan, near the ferry stops, is named in her honor, as is Seton Hall in New Jersey.

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PRE-EMINENT GERMAN WRITER — JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE, born Aug. 28, 1749, in Frankfurt, was a German author, poet, dramatist and philosopher. His best-known novels are “The Sorrows of Young Werther”, “Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship” and the play “Faust.” Goethe was also a polymath — gifted in the sciences and arts, and is acclaimed as the German language’s greatest and most influential writer, with a universal impact on Western literary, political, and philosophical thought.

A favorite tradition in the Goethe home as young Johann grew up were puppet shows. Puppets and a theater troupe later became a significant theme in his second novel, titled “Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship.”

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MET HIS FUTURE WIFE IN BROOKLYN — WRITING IN AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT VEIN WAS JACK KIRBY, born Aug. 28, 1917 in New York City’s Lower East Side as Jacob Kurtzberg. Jack Kirby became one of the foremost and prolific comic book artists of the Golden Age and Silver Age, and was the creator or co-creator of “Captain America,” “Incredible Hulk,” “Thor,” “Iron Man,” “Fantastic Four,” “X-Men,” “New Gods” and “Kamandi.” During the comic book industry boom of the 1930s and ‘40s, he worked for comic book packager Eisner & Iger, which created comics on demand for publishers.

Although born in Manhattan, Jack Kirby did eventually find his way to Brooklyn, where he met his future wife, Roz Goldstein in the same apartment building; they courted and got married on May 23, 1942. While he was on military duty, Roz lived with her mother in Brighton Beach.

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FIRST RADIO AD WAS FOR REAL ESTATE— RADIO COMMERCIALS GOT THEIR START on Aug. 28, 1922, when broadcasters realized they could profit from the sale of air (advertising time). The first station to do so was WEAF, which broadcast a “commercial spot,” by the Queensboro Realty Corporation of Jackson Heights. The realty wanted to promote its apartment complex named Hawthorne Court. The ad rate: $100 for 10 minutes; reportedly the Queensboro Realty ad lasted 15 minutes.

Nowadays, radio ads last at the most a minute, with some running only 15 seconds. Today’s average cost per spot ranges from $200 to $5000 per week, with peak hours bringing in the most revenue.

See previous milestones, here.