Inoculation was introduced to America by a slave.

Few details are known about the birth of Onesimus, but it is assumed he was born in Africa in the late seventeenth century before eventually landing in Boston. One of a thousand people of African descent living in the Massachusetts colony, Onesimus was a gift to the Puritan church minister Cotton Mather from his congregation in 1706.

Onesimus told Mather about the centuries old tradition of inoculation practiced in Africa. By extracting the material from an infected person and scratching it into the skin of an uninfected person, you could deliberately introduce smallpox to the healthy individual making them immune. Considered extremely dangerous at the time, Cotton Mather convinced Dr. Zabdiel Boylston to experiment with the procedure when a smallpox epidemic hit Boston in 1721 and over 240 people were inoculated. Opposed politically, religiously and medically in the United States and abroad, public reaction to the experiment put Mather and Boylston’s lives in danger despite records indicating that only 2% of patients requesting inoculation died compared to the 15% of people not inoculated who contracted smallpox.

Onesimus’ traditional African practice was used to inoculate American soldiers during the Revolutionary War and introduced the concept of inoculation to the United States.

The Black News Channel is 24 Hours of Black News

24-Hour Black News Channel Launches
By Cheryl Wills New York City
PUBLISHED 7:00 PM ET Feb. 20, 2020

It’s been 15 years in the making, but this week, right in the middle of Black History Month, television history was made.

On February 10, the Black News Channel took to the airwaves. Veteran journalist Fred Hickman and co-anchor Laverne McGee kicked off a new era in cable news, with a network that focuses exclusively on issues surrounding the nation’s 47 million strong African American population.

Until now, no other news network in America has dedicated 24 hours a day, every day, to telling the stories that matter the most to the black community.

In Harlem, the cultural capital of black America, there was a celebration at the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network headquarters.

Sharpton introduced the new network to an audience that included government officials and social activists.

“I can say we need a 24-hour Black News Channel, and we need information, and we need real information, and the concept was one that intrigued me,” he said.

Former Republican Congressman J.C. Watts is the Black News Channel’s chairman and visionary. He said the new venture represents a platform for the community.

“It gives the African American community a voice,” he said. “It gives them a venue that they can be a part of the national dialogue, and I think it helps to show to all of America who’s interested in understanding the more comprehensive African American community.”