Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2015 November 30

= November 30 =

First African visitor
Who were the first two black subsaharan African heads of state to visit the USA? Contrib raati (talk) 13:20, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Do you mean while President? Several of the President of Liberia were born in the USA.  -- Jayron 32 13:55, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * From Liberia, I found that James Spriggs Payne visited the United States after his second term as President. He wasn't a sitting president, but an ex-president.  He, like most early Liberian Presidents, was also born in the U.S.  -- Jayron 32 13:58, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, had a State Visit to the U.S. in 1963. That seems a bit late, but then again, prior to WWII, most of Africa wasn't independent nations anyways, excepting Liberia and Ethiopia, which were among the only two nations to survive the Scramble for Africa.  Those would be your best two options for finding others as well.  -- Jayron 32 14:08, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Were there any segregation requirements between Selassie and his white hosts? Contrib raati (talk) 14:11, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Not that I know of. Here is a picture of him on the White House grounds with the Kennedy family.  Here is newsreel footage of the visit.  Here is information about the visit that shows that he stayed in the White House itself.  -- Jayron 32 16:07, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Edwin Barclay of Liberia visited the USA in 1943. You could search that website for more information.--Shantavira|feed me 14:12, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * John Brown Russwurm was the governor of Maryland in Liberia when he returned to enroll his children in school in Maine in 1850. Whether he was a head of state is a question Wikipedia doesn't seem to answer. The colony's supposed independence in 1841 is marked "citation needed" in the article. Rmhermen (talk) 23:54, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
 * One would think some African leaders would have visited the United Nations in New York at some point between 1945 and Haile Selassie's 1963 visit to Washington. I'M not sure where to find that information, however. --Xuxl (talk) 09:59, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
 * It will be in the UN documentation, but is not easy to find on their website. Bear in mind though, that as Jayron says, few African countries were independent members of the UN in the 1950s. Also, countries usually send an ambassador to the UN and not their head of state. Itsmejudith (talk) 10:11, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
 * By asking about "black subsaharian" the OP excludes South Africa (11 December 1931) and the North-African countries. Black-Africa independance dates before 1960 are: Ethiopia (never colonized), Liberia (26 July 1847), Sudan (1 January 1956), Ghana (6 March 1957), and Guinea (2 October 1958). Akseli9 (talk) 10:28, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Ethiopia may never have been colonised per se, but it was certainly occupied by Italian forces: see Second Italo-Ethiopian War. -- Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  07:32, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
 * For an Ethiopian royal visit that never was, see the Dreadnought hoax. Alansplodge (talk) 17:55, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
 * That guy Cole, also known as Lowly Selassie. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 22:14, 4 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Kwame Nkrumah (Prime Minister of Ghana) made a visit in 1958 (http://www.mountvernon.org/the-estate-gardens/famous-visitors/article/kwame-nkrumah/), a year after Ghana became independent. Looie496 (talk) 13:02, 2 December 2015 (UTC)