Independent Historian

A proud native of Detroit, Michigan, Sibrina Collins is an organometallic chemist and earned her Ph.D. from The Ohio State University (2000) under the direction of Professor Bruce Bursten. Her research efforts focused on the low temperature matrix photochemistry of ruthenium cyclopentadienyl dicarbonyl dimers. She later completed a postdoc at Louisiana State University with Professor Isiah Warner.  Between 2003 and 2006, Dr. Collins was an assistant professor of chemistry at Claflin University, Orangeburg, South Carolina.  Her research efforts at Claflin University focused on the crystal-engineering of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), which have many potential applications as electronic materials. Dr. Collins has also worked as a writer and editor for the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Washington, DC. From May 2006 to May 2008, she served as the University of Washington Director of Graduate Diversity Recruiting and most recently a faculty member in the Department of Chemistry, The College of Wooster, Ohio from 2008-2014. At Wooster, Dr. Collins focused on the development of anticancer drugs containing transition metal centers. She is now Director of Education at The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit, Michigan. In this new role, she focuses on the science education programming for the Wright Museum.

Jasper Brown Jeffries (1912-1994)

Born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina on April 15, 1912, Jasper Brown Jeffries was an African American physicist and mathematician who worked on the Manhattan Project in World War II. The eldest child of Brown and Edna Jeffries, Jasper had three younger brothers, Carl, Hubert, and Robert. … Read MoreJasper Brown Jeffries (1912-1994)

Nathaniel Oglesby Calloway (1907-1979)

A native of Tuskegee, Alabama, Nathaniel Oglesby Calloway was a pioneer in the field of chemistry. As a child growing up in Tuskegee, he spent time with George Washington Carver, a well-known soil chemist and faculty member at Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University). In 1930, … Read MoreNathaniel Oglesby Calloway (1907-1979)