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- )
Noel C. Taylor became the first African American mayor of Roanoke, Virginia. He held office from 1976 to 1992, and was the city’s longest serving mayor. Taylor was widely considered one of the most influential leaders in the city’s history. A Republican, he was elected mayor in 1976 after … Read MoreNoel C. Taylor (1924-1998)
Image Ownership: Public domain James Homer Garrott was an African American modernist architect. He was pivotal to the creation of many historic buildings in the Los Angeles, California area, designing more than 200 buildings throughout the city, including municipal buildings, schools, medical buildings, and over 25 churches … Read MoreJames H. Garrott (1897-1991)
Vernon Napoleon Johns was an American minister and civil rights activist. Johns was best known as the predecessor to Martin Luther King Jr. as pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, from 1948–1953. Johns was born in Darlington Heights, Prince Edward County, … Read MoreVernon Napoleon Johns (1892-1965)
James and Lydia Sims “Image Courtesy of Ron Sims” Lydia Teresa Sims, civic and civil rights leader in Spokane, Washington, was born November 18, 1920, in Penn’s Grove, New Jersey, to Clifton and Helen Elvira Williams. Lydia’s family, including her five sisters, lived most of … Read MoreLydia Teresa Sims (1920–2012)
“Image Ownership: Public Domain” Ivanhoe Donaldson, one of the leaders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), was born on October 17, 1941, in Harlem and raised in the Bronx, New York. He was the son of New York policeman, and his mother was a … Read MoreIvanhoe Donaldson (1941–2016)
Image Courtesy of the African American Museum and Library, Oakland, California Attorney, civil rights leader, and judge Donald Pitts McCullum was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, to Charles A. McCullum and Irene Pitts McCullum on January 28, 1928. He earned a bachelor of arts degree … Read MoreDonald Pitts McCullum (1928-1988)
“Image Ownership: Public Domain” Political scientist and civil rights activist Ronald Walters was born in July 20, 1938 in Wichita, Kansas to parents Gilmar, a veteran and jazz musician, and Maxine Fray Walters, a civil rights investigator. In the summer of 1958 he organized the … Read MoreRonald Walters (1938-2010)
(Image Courtesy of the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley) Nathaniel Sextus Colley, the first African American attorney in Sacramento, California, was born on November 21, 1918 in Carlowsville, Alabama. The youngest of six brothers, Colley grew up in Snow Hill, Alabama, and graduated from … Read MoreNathaniel Sextus Colley (1918-1992)
