With supreme sadness and heavy heart, I report the apparent suicide death of Don Cornelius.
He is and forever will be a monumental figure in black culture, music and entertainment. In our house-hold, each Saturday afternoon, Soul Train was must see TV.
To Don we salute: Love, Peace and Sooooul!
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Don Cornelius, creator of the long-running TV dance show "Soul Train," shot himself to death Wednesday morning at his Los Angeles home, police said. He was 75.
Officers responding to a report of a shooting found Cornelius at his Mulholland Drive home at around 4 a.m., police said. He was pronounced dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound at 4:56 a.m. at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, said Los Angeles County Assistant Chief Coroner Ed Winter.
"Soul Train" began in 1970 in Chicago on WCIU-TV as a local program and aired nationally from 1971 to 2006.
It introduced television audiences to such legendary artists as Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye and Barry White and brought the best R&B, soul and later hip-hop acts to TV and had teenagers dance to them. It was one of the first shows to showcase African-Americans prominently, although the dance group was racially mixed. Cornelius was the first host and executive producer.
"There was not programming that targeted any particular ethnicity," he said in 2006, then added: "I'm trying to use euphemisms here, trying to avoid saying there was no television for black folks, which they knew was for them." source
Soul Train Golden Moment: Five Stairsteps sing - Ohh Child
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