Franklin McCain was born on January 3, 1941 in Union County, North Carolina. He grew up in Washington, D.C. but returned to his native North Carolina to attend college at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. McCain and his roommate, David Richmond, had followed … Read MoreFranklin Eugene McCain (1941-2014)
Forrest Oran Wiggins was born in 1907 to Charles and Cora Cosby Wiggins. A native of Vincennes, Indiana, Wiggins attended public schools in Vincennes and Indianapolis. In 1928 Wiggins received his B.A. from Butler University and in the following year earned a certificate in French … Read MoreForrest Oran Wiggins (1907-1982)
With expertise in the mechanisms and kinetics of the oxidation of transitions metals, and in agricultural chemistry, Fillmore Freeman has become one of the three most frequently cited African American chemists in the nation (the other two being Donald J. Darensbourg at Texas A&M University … Read MoreFillmore Freeman (1936- )
In 1797 Abraham Johnstone, a former slave born in Delaware was convicted in Glocester County, New Jersey of murdering Thomas Read, another free African American and sentenced to be hanged. When the court asked for a statement from Johnstone after it announced his conviction, he … Read More(1797) Abraham Johnstone, “Address To The People Of Color”
Five years after his presentation at Charles Town, Prince Hall again addresses his fellow Masons. In an address delivered to the African Lodge at West Cambridge, Massachusetts on June 24, 1797, Hall challenges those Masons to work for the elimination of slavery and the establishment … Read More(1797) Prince Hall Speaks To The African Lodge, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Barbadian-born Prince Hall spent the first thirty-five years of his life enslaved. Twenty-one of those years he was owned by William Hall who brought him to Boston in 1765. Prince Hall was finally manumitted in 1770. He quickly became a leader of the small African … Read More(1792) Prince Hall, “A Charge Delivered to the Brethren of the African Lodge”
We don’t know the name of one of the earliest orators against slavery. He was a West Indian who apparently was a former slave fortunate enough to be educated. He was also intimately familiar with slavery and the slave trade in that region. The themes … Read More(1789) An Unknown Free Black Author Describes Slavery In 1789
One of the less known of the tiny group of African American science fiction writers and one of the first black authors to publish in that genre, John M. Faucette, Jr. grew up in New York’s Harlem. A contemporary of the celebrated black science fiction … Read MoreJohn M. Faucette, Jr. (1943-2003)
Ezzard Charles, also known as “The Cincinnati Cobra,” was a quiet, modest individual who went on to become a relatively unheralded world heavyweight champion. Born in Lawrenceville, Georgia on July 7, 1921, Ezzard moved to Cincinnati at the age of nine to live with his … Read MoreEzzard Mack Charles (1921-1975)
Born in New Orleans, Louisiana on October 9, 1929, Ernest “Dutch” Morial grew up in the city’s English and French-speaking Seventh Ward. His father was a cigar maker and his mother was a seamstress. Graduating from Xavier University, a historically black Catholic institution in 1951, … Read MoreErnest Nathan Morial (1929-1989)
