The following are short descriptions of major events which have contributed to the shaping of African American history. These encyclopedia entries serve as a starting point for much more inclusive descriptions and discussions that appear in other sources. For additional information please consult the print or website sources cited in the entry.
On the morning of May 15, 1916, approximately 15,000 people gathered near Waco, Texas to witness the trial and lynching of Jesse Washington, an eighteen-year-old black man charged with the bludgeoning death of Lucy Fryer. The brutal murder of Washington provided the newly formed National Association for the Advancement of Colored People … Read MoreJesse Washington Lynching
The Cincinnati Riot was a four-day period of civil disorder that occurred in response to the shooting death of nineteen-year-old Timothy Thomas by Cincinnati Police Patrolman Stephen Roach. Officer Roach was attempting to arrest Thomas for traffic citations. The riot mostly took place in the Over the Rhine … Read MoreThe Cincinnati Riot (2001)
On August 7, 1930, a mob of ten to fifteen thousand whites abducted three young black men from the jail in Marion, Indiana, lynching Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith. Sixteen-year-old James Cameron narrowly survived after being beaten by the mob. Lawrence Beitler’s photograph of the two victims’ hanging bodies … Read MoreMarion, Indiana Lynching (1930)
In 1954, the United States Supreme Court declared public school segregation unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education. One year later, the Court reiterated its ruling, calling on school districts throughout the United States to desegregate their public schools “with all deliberate speed.” While some school districts began developing … Read MoreLittle Rock Crisis, 1957
The Charleston Church Massacre took place at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in Charleston, South Carolina on June 17, 2015. Dylann Roof, a white supremacist, killed nine people including the senior pastor and South Carolina State Senator Clementa C. Pinckney during a prayer service at the … Read MoreThe Charleston Church Massacre (2015)
The Mississippi River “Great Flood of 1927” inundated large areas in Mississippi, Arkansas, and Louisiana. However, it was in Mississippi where the embankments overflowed, drowning hundreds, perhaps a thousand people, and became one of the largest natural disasters in US history in terms of loss … Read MoreThe Mississippi River Great Flood of 1927
The Jackson State Killings took place at Jackson State College (now Jackson State University) on May 15, 1970, in Jackson, Mississippi. Around midnight on May 14, city and state police confronted a group of students and opened fire on them, killing two students and injuring … Read MoreThe Jackson State Killings, 1970
The Amistad Mutiny occurred on the Spanish schooner La Amistad on July 2, 1839. The incident began In February 1839 when Portuguese slave hunters illegally seized 53 Africans in Sierra Leone, a British colony, whom they intended to sell in the Spanish colony of Cuba. … Read MoreThe Amistad Mutiny, 1839
The Algiers Motel Incident occurred in Detroit, Michigan on July 25, 1967, two days after the Detroit Race Riot began. The incident started when Army National Guardsman Ted Thomas reported hearing gunshots at the Algiers Motel Annex. Detroit Police, Michigan State Police, and other National … Read MoreAlgiers Motel Incident (1967)
In the late nineteenth century, black Indian freedmen were uniquely affected by the Indian Severalty Acts. Black freedmen had lived in the Indian Territory since before the Civil War, with many having originally come as slaves. While the severalty acts were primarily a legislative effort … Read MoreIndian Severalty (The Dawes and Curtis Acts) and Black Indian Freedmen
