The following are short descriptions of individuals, places and 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.
Henry Washington, slave, loyalist, and colonizer, was born in Africa, perhaps in the Senegambia (present day Senegal and Gambia). Transported as a slave to America, he was bought by George Washington in 1763 to work on a project for draining the Great Dismal Swamp in … Read MoreHenry Washington (ca. 1740-ca. 1801)
In a sermon to Barbadian emigrants, at Trinity Church, Monrovia, Liberia, West Africa on May 14, 1863, Alexander Crummell calls on persons of African ancestry around the world to be actively engaged in the religious, economic and social development of the African continent. His sermon … Read More(1863) Alexander Crummell, “Emigration, an Aid to the Evangelization of Africa”
Ethiopianism is an Afro-Atlantic literary-religious tradition that emerged out of the shared political and religious experiences of Africans from British colonies during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Ethiopianism linked Africa historically to the ancient classical era, challenging the then prevailing idea that the … Read MoreEthiopianism
Elliot C. van Zandt had a major impact on the development of Italian sports from 1947 to 1959. Born in Arkansas in 1915, van Zandt lost his father at a very early age. Census records indicate that Elliot’s widowed mother, a seamstress, probably left him … Read MoreElliot C. Van Zandt (1915-1959)
African American intellectual Alexander Crummell lived in Monrovia, Liberia for nineteen years between 1853 and 1872. While there he taught at Liberia College. In a speech delivered in Monrovia on December 1, 1863, Crummell discusses the role educated young Liberian men would play in the … Read More(1863) Alexander Crummell, “The Responsibility of the First Fathers of a Country for its Future Life and Character”
Born on August 15, 1875 to a physician from Sierra Leone and an Englishwoman, musical composer and conductor Samuel Coleridge-Taylor grew-up in Holborn, England. He revealed his musical talents at the age of five, began studying the violin at the age of seven, and entered … Read MoreSamuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912)
Olaudah Equiano, whose father was an Ibo chief, was born in 1745 in what is now Southern Nigeria. At the age of 11 years, Olaudah was captured by African slave traders and sold into bondage in the New World. Equiano, given the name Gustavus Vassa … Read MoreOlaudah Equiano (1745-1797)
Marcus Mosiah Garvey, one of the most influential 20th Century black nationalist and Pan-Africanist leaders, was born on August 17, 1887 in St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica. Greatly influenced by Booker T. Washington’s autobiography Up From Slavery, Garvey began to support industrial education, economic separatism, and … Read MoreMarcus Garvey (1887-1940)
Seraphim “Joe” Fortes was born in Barbados, West Indies. He was a seaman and came to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada in 1885. There he worked as a barman at the Sunnyside Hotel. English Bay became his favourite spot as he loved the water and was … Read MoreSeraphim “Joe” Fortes (1865-1922)
John Sella Martin was born into slavery in Charlotte, North Carolina. He was carried to Georgia and escaped from there to the North in 1856. Martin lived successively in Chicago, Detroit and Buffalo, where by that point he was a minister and led a church … Read More(1867) John Sella Martin, A Speech Before the Paris Antislavery Conference
