A fixture in New York's Harlem Renaissance, Zora Neale Hurston would be revered as an outstanding folklorist of the powerful female-based novel "Their Eyes Were Watching God" (1937) as well as shorter...
A child of former slaves, Mary McLeod Bethune was the only child out of 17 to pursue schooling. Adamant that education was the key to racial advancement, she graduated from the Scotia Seminary...
As the first African-American to become Florida’s secretary of state, Jonathan C. Gibbs also served as a minister. Born in 1827, his parents were both free people. He earned a degree from Dartmouth...
Often called the “Black American National Anthem,” James Weldon Johnson’s “Lift Every Voice and Sing” became one of his most popular pieces of all-time. Johnson was a civil rights activist,...
Viewed as one of the best jazz vocalist, Billie Holiday had a successful jazz career before her sudden death. Holiday first got noticed for her stellar voice by a producer in a Harlem club. She would...
As the first African-American woman to earn a pilot's license, Bessie Coleman destroyed the barriers of both gender and racial discrimination making her a pioneer in her field of aviation. Denied entry...
Barack Obama made history by becoming the 44th president and the first African-American president of the United States. After graduating from Harvard Law School, Obama returned to the city of Chicago...
Coming from a poor family in a segregated area in Clearwater, Hatchett achieved his dream of becoming a lawyer. Though many obstacles stood in his way, Hatchett never gave up on his dream.
In 1956,...
Different from other African-American leaders during his time, Malcolm X served his community as a minister, activist and black nationalist leader. Malcolm X’s father, Earl Little, was a prominent...
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During the Super Bowl, Dodge Ram aired an ad that featured a quote from Martin Luther King’s “The Drum Major Instinct” sermon. People...
Before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, there was Claudette Colvin’s protest. In 1955, months before Rosa Parks, Colvin was on a bus in Alabama, where she refused to give up her seat to a...
He became the first African-American Supreme Court Justice just 13 years after the monumental case that called for the desegregation of schools. He was the lawyer in one of Supreme Court’s most well-known...
