Tuskegee Airman and later College President Roscoe Conkling Brown, Jr., was born March 9, 1922, in Washington, DC, to Roscoe Conkling Brown Sr., a dentist, and Vivian Kemp Brown, a teacher. He had an older sister, Portia Brown. Roscoe Brown graduated with honors from racially … Read MoreRoscoe C. Brown, Jr. (1922-2016)
Tuskegee Airman Edward Creston Gleed, World War II combat fighter pilot, was born on November 5, 1916, in Lawrence, Kansas, to Herbert Joseph Gleed Sr. and Carrie Syphax Joseph Gleed, a professor at Tuskegee Institute (now University). Their other son was Herbert Joseph Gleed, Jr., … Read MoreEdward Creston Gleed (1916-1990)
Tuskegee Airman Earl Roscoe Lane was born in the rural all-Black town of Red Bird, Oklahoma, on July 22, 1920 to Levi and Christine Lane. In 1930, when he was 10, his family moved to Wickliffe, Ohio. His younger sisters were Barbara Lane Martin and … Read MoreEarl Roscoe Lane (1920-1990)
Margaret Vernell James Strickland Collins was a leading scientist on termite diversity and a Civil Rights activist. She was the first professionally trained Black woman entomologist and the third Black female zoologist in the United States. She was born Margaret Vernell James on September 4, … Read MoreMargaret Vernell James Strickland Collins (1922-1996)
US Army World War II veteran Maceo Snipes was killed in 1946 in Taylor County, Georgia because he voted. Snipes was born in Taylor County Georgia on March 25, 1909. His parents, Lula and John, were landowners in Taylor County who owned 202 acres as … Read MoreMaceo Snipes (1909-1946)
Charles Richard Drew was a medical researcher, surgeon, and the first African American to be appointed as a medical examiner for the American Board of Surgery. His research and work led to the development of processing and storing plasma in blood banks. Drew was born … Read MoreCharles Drew (1904-1950)
Economist, academic scholar, and bank executive Emmett John Rice was born on December 21, 1919, in Florence, South Carolina to Ulysses Simpson Rice, a Methodist minister, and Sue Suber Pearl, a schoolteacher. However, when he was 13, the Rices moved to Harlem, New York City. … Read MoreEmmett John Rice (1919-2011)
George Metcalfe was a civil rights leader in Natchez, Mississippi, who led one of the most successful yet little-known movements in the Deep South. Metcalfe was born on September 20, 1911, in Franklin, Louisiana, to parents Ernest Metcalfe and Alberta Simon Metcalfe. He was a … Read MoreGeorge Metcalfe (1911-1989)
Hilarius Gilges is the most well-known Afro-German activist who fought against the rise of the National Socialist German Workers’ (Nazi) Party in the early interwar period. The son of a textile worker named Maria Stüttgen and an African boatman working on the Rhine, Gilges was … Read MoreHilarius Gilges (a.k.a. Lari Gilges, 1909-1933)
Screenwriter, filmmaker, actor, and social critic Carlton Moss was born in Newark, New Jersey, on February 14, 1909. The son of Frederick Douglass Moss, a coachman for an affluent family, and Sarah Vincent Moss, he grew up both in New Jersey and North Carolina. As … Read MoreCarlton Moss (1909-1997)
