1932 — Miriam Makeba, Mama Afrika, Is Born

On March 4, 1932, Zensi Miriam Makeba was born in Prospect Township near Johannesburg. The world would come to know her as Mama Afrika. Her voice carried Xhosa and Zulu songs across the globe, winning a Grammy alongside Harry Belafonte and turning Pata Pata into a worldwide hit.

Exiled for three decades after denouncing apartheid before the United Nations, she returned triumphantly to South Africa in 1990 at Nelson Mandela's invitation. A girl from a township near Johannesburg had become a voice for a continent, singing its languages to the world, and her homecoming closed a long circle of exile and return.