February 6, 2008
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Profile America for the sixth day of Black History Month. The first African-American child born in the American colonies, William Tucker, was baptized on January 3, 1624, in Jamestown, Virginia. Two hundred years later, the census counted 1.8 million African-Americans in the U.S. Today, that number is more than 40 million, about 13.5 percent of the nations residents. The largest number of this population group 3.5 million live in New York state. There are 17 other states with black populations of at least a million, including California, Florida and Texas. Mississippi, at 37 percent, has the highest proportion of its population that is African-American. This special edition of Profile America for Black History Month is a public service of the U.S. Census Bureau.