Blind Lemon Jefferson was born in Couchman, Texas, sometime around the 1890s although the exact date is not known and several are claimed. He was the youngest of seven children and the only one of them born blind. The details of his birth and young … Read MoreBlind Lemon Jefferson (ca. 1890-1929)
Hand-picked by his American Express predecessor, CEO Harvey Golub, to lead the company upon Golub’s retirement, Kenneth Chenault is an attorney and the CEO and chairman of American Express. Named one of the fifty most powerful African American executives by Fortune magazine in 2001, Chenault … Read MoreKenneth Irvine Chenault (1951- )
William and Ellen Craft were born into slavery. William was born in Macon, Georgia to a master who sold off his family to pay his gambling debts. William’s new owner apprenticed him as a carpenter in order to earn money from his labor. Ellen was … Read MoreWilliam and Ellen Craft (1824-1900; 1826-1891)
First elected to the Congress in 1870, Josiah T. Walls became Florida’s first elected African American congressman. Walls was born a slave in Winchester, Virginia on December 30, 1842. He was conscripted by the Confederate Army and captured in Yorktown by Union forces in 1862. … Read MoreJosiah Thomas Walls (1842-1905)
Born in Arkansas City, Arkansas on January 19, 1918, publisher, philanthropist, businessman, entrepreneur, John Harold Johnson became the leading 20th Century publisher of African American news magazines. Johnson moved to Chicago in 1932 where he attended school and graduated with honors in 1936. He attended … Read MoreJohn H. Johnson (1918-2005)
In a remarkable and controversial life, Max Yergan spanned both the globe and the ideological spectrum of American politics. An early champion of racial uplift and the social gospel in South Africa, Yergan transformed into a leading figure on the radical Black Left during the … Read MoreMax Yergan (1892-1975)
Danny K. Davis was born in Parkdale, Arkansas on September 6, 1941, the son of a sharecropper. He received a B.A. in history from Arkansas A.M. & N. College in 1961 and then moved to Chicago. In 1968 he earned an M.A. from Chicago State … Read MoreDanny K. Davis (1941- )
Stanley Crouch was a tough-minded and controversial jazz critic, playwright, essayist, novelist, and percussionist. After a personal intellectual transformation in the late 1970s, Crouch became the contemporary champion of traditionalist jazz – an identity which he defined with both powerful cultural criticisms and outbursts of … Read MoreStanley Crouch (1945-2020)
Robert Colescott’s massive paintings evoke powerful emotions and thoughtful contemplation. For the past thirty years, Colescott has engaged themes of race, gender, and social inequality. His art is both highly charged and also intrinsically beautiful. In 1997, Colescott was the first African American painter to … Read MoreRobert Colescott (1925-2009)
Born into poverty, the grandson of a former slave, business executive Stanley O’Neal rose through the ranks of corporate America to become the first African American to head a major firm on Wall Street when Merrill Lynch named him chief executive officer in 2002. In … Read MoreStanley O’Neal (1951- )
