Writer, activist, and immigration rights advocate Opal Tometi is best known as one of the three founders of the Black Lives Matter movement. Tometi, born in 1984 to Nigerian parents who had illegally immigrated to the United States, grew up in Phoenix, Arizona and is the oldest of three children. Tometi … Read MoreOpal Tometi (1984- )
Alicia Garza is an activist and writer who now lives in Oakland, California. Although she has organized around issues related to health, student services, and rights for domestic workers as well as violence against trans and gender nonconforming people of color, she is best known one of three founders of … Read MoreAlicia Garza (1981- )
Rubin Carter was an American middleweight boxer, who is best known not because of his sports career but because of his murder conviction in 1967 and exoneration in 1985. Carter, born in Clifton, New Jersey on May 6, 1937, the fourth of seven children. Shortly … Read MoreRubin “The Hurricane” Carter (1937-2014)
Kyrie Andrew Irving is a professional basketball player in the National Basketball Association (NBA) who plays for the Cleveland (Ohio) Cavaliers. Since joining the NBA in 2011, Irving has established himself as one of the league’s elite point guards. His resume includes being a four-time … Read MoreKyrie Andrew Irving (1992- )
Lisa Deshaun Leslie is an American former professional basketball player who played for the Los Angeles Sparks in the Women’s Basketball Association (WNBA) for her twelve-year career from 1997 to 2009. She is a two-time WNBA champion, three-time WNBA MVP, and a four-time Olympic gold … Read MoreLisa Deshaun Leslie (1972- )
“Image Ownership: Public Domain” Leopoldine Emma Doualla-Bell Smith is the world’s first black flight attendant. Smith was born in Cameroon which, at the time, France controlled. Smith was a princess of the royal Douala family of Cameroon. She was offered a rare after-school employment opportunity … Read MoreLeopoldine Emma Doualla Bell Smith (1939– )
María Isabel Urrutia Ocoró, Olympic champion weightlifter and politician, was born in Calendaria, Department of Valle del Cauca, Colombia, on March 25, 1965. Her mother, Nelly, was a homemaker and her father, Pedro Juan, was an industrial mechanic. Sources differ, but Urrutia had at least … Read MoreMaría Isabel Urrutia Ocoró (1965- )
Formula 1 race car driver Lewis Hamilton was born January 7, 1985, in Stevenage, Herefordshire, England, to parents Carmen Larbalestier and Anthony Hamilton. His parents divorced when he was two, and as a result he lived with his mother and half-sisters. He studied at the … Read MoreLewis Hamilton (1985- )
Edward Perkins served as U.S. Ambassador on four occasions; more than all but two other African Americans. He was born Edward Joseph Perkins, Jr. on June 8, 1928 in Sterlington, Louisiana to Edward Perkins, Sr. and Tiny Estella Noble. After moving to Portland, Oregon and graduating … Read MoreEdward Joseph Perkins, Jr. (1928-2020)
In the article below, Carlton McLellan, PhD, a senior fellow at the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training (ADST), briefly describes the history of the more than one hundred and forty black women and men who have led diplomatic delegations as U.S. Ambassadors in ninety-five … Read MoreAmerica’s Black Ambassadors: A Historical Snapshot
