Taking the kids — and learning African-American history in Boston

Crispus Attucks is buried alongside the other massacre victims at the historic Granary Burying Ground where some of America's most notable citizens lay, including John Hancock and Paul Revere...

Luther Vandross was outed as gay after his death.

From the Chicago Tribune: Sure we’ve all heard of Paul Revere and John Hancock, but what about Crispus Attucks?

It turns out Attucks, a dockworker in his 40s, was an important guy in Revolutionary War times too — the first American in fact to die in the colonists’ fight for freedom from Britain. He also happened to have been African American and Native American. He was shot during the Boston Massacre in 1770, along with four others, in an altercation between the angry colonists and British soldiers. Attucks is buried alongside the other massacre victims at the historic Granary Burying Ground where some of America’s most notable citizens lay, including John Hancock and Paul Revere.

A stop at the Granary Burying Ground is always on Boston’s famous Freedom Trail tour (www.thefreedomtrail.org), which we took recently, with a group of inner-city high school boys who live and attend school in our suburban town under the auspices of A Better Chance (www.abetterchance.org).

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