Jonathan Luther Jackson is a United States congressman representing Illinois’ 1st Congressional District, elected in November 2022 and taking office in January 2023. Jackson is an advocate for civil rights, a former professor of business studies at Chicago State University, and a fervent social justice … Read MoreJonathan L. Jackson (1966 – )
Josephine Ebaugh Jones was a community activist and possibly the first Black woman in management at a Fortune 500 company. Born to sharecroppers Anna Nance and Scott Ebaugh on July 30, 1920, in Cross Hill, South Carolina, Josephine arrived in New York City in 1946 … Read MoreJosephine Ebaugh Jones (1920-2017)
Marie Walker Johnson was a Black Creole civil rights activist in Oakland, California, during the 1960s. A mother of five and a nurse, she also played a crucial role in multiple grassroots groups in the East Bay area. In these organizations, she marched, wrote letters, … Read MoreMarie Clara Delpit Walker Johnson (1921-1974)
Chokwe Lumumba was a civil rights attorney and the former mayor of Jackson, Mississippi, where he served from July 2013 until his death on February 24, 2014. He was born Edwin Finley Taliaferro in Detroit, Michigan, the second of eight children of Lucien Taliaferro, from … Read MoreChokwe Lumumba (1947-2014)
Gabrielle Gorman is a film writer, producer, director, and activist. Gorman was born on March 7, 1998 in Los Angeles, California, and is the twin sister of poet Amanda Gorman. The sisters and their sibling were raised by single mother Joan Wicks, a sixth grade … Read MoreGabrielle Gorman (1998- )
What happened with and Who was Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was born in Atlanta, Georgia on January 15, 1929. King grew up in the African American Baptist church. After graduating from Morehouse College in Atlanta, he studied at Crozer Theological Seminary … Read MoreMartin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968) [Children’s Edition]
Activist, writer, and educator Margaret Just Butcher was born on April 28, 1913, in Washington, DC, to Dr. Ernest E. Just, the renowned scientist and advisor and incorporator of the Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc. from Charleston, South Carolina, and Ethel Highwarden, one of the … Read MoreMargaret Just Butcher (1913-2000)
Alfre Ette Woodard, an American actress, producer, and political activist, was born on November 8, 1952 in Tulsa, Oklahoma to Marion H. Woodard, an interior designer/ wildcat oil driller and Constance “Connie” B. Robinson Woodard, a homemaker. Woodard’s parents once operated a nursing home. She … Read MoreAlfre Woodard (1952- )
Frances B. North was a Seattle civic leader known for her role uniting the business sector, public schools, and city government to end segregation. Her life transformed racial and gender barriers. As a member of Mount Zion Baptist Church from 1943 to 2017, her faith … Read MoreFrances B. North (1919-2017)
Myrlie (Beasley) Evers-Williams is a civil rights activist, a journalist, author, and a former chair of the National Association of the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). She was born in Vicksburg, Mississippi on March 17, 1933. She was raised by her grandmother, Annie McCain Beasley, a schoolteacher, after her parents separated … Read MoreMyrlie Louise (Beasley) Evers-Williams (1933- )
