The trial of Dr. Ossian Sweet along with ten family members and friends for murder after a mob attacked his Detroit home caught the nation’s attention in 1925 and 1926. This trial and a re-trial of Ossian Sweet’s younger brother Henry exposed racial tensions in … Read MoreOssian Sweet (1895-1960)
Reverend John Jasper is arguably one of the most famous black ministers of nineteenth-century Richmond, Virginia, who gained popularity for his electrifying preaching style and his ability to spiritually move both black and white Baptists. He began his career in the early 1840s, preaching at … Read MoreJohn J. Jasper (1812-1901)
Mercurial and gifted bassist and band leader Charles Mingus is considered by many to be one of the jazz greats of all time, and one of the 20th Century’s most important Black composers. He worked and recorded with jazz legends such as Miles Davis, Art … Read MoreCharles Mingus (1922-1979)
Louis Daniel (Louie) Armstrong is perhaps the most important and influential person in the history of jazz music, swing music, and jazz vocal styling. His virtuosic ability with the trumpet, his distinctive gravelly low vocal style, his bright personality, and his band leadership abilities helped … Read MoreLouis Armstrong (1901-1971)
Marion Motley was born June 5, 1920, in Leesburg, Georgia. Motley played football at Canton McKinley High School in Canton, Ohio, and went on to South Carolina State University and then to the University of Nevada, where he played football while participating in other collegiate … Read MoreMarion Motley (1920-1999)
Prince Whipple fought at the battles of Saratoga and in Delaware during the War for Independence. He was also one of twenty enslaved men who petitioned the New Hampshire legislature for freedom in 1779. His owner, General William Whipple, was a signer of the Declaration … Read MorePrince Whipple (1750-1796)
Jordan Hatcher was a seventeen-year-old enslaved tobacco worker in Richmond, Virginia, who in 1852 rose from obscurity to notoriety when charged with assaulting and killing white overseer William Jackson. According to newspaper accounts and trial records, Hatcher was working at the Walker & Harris tobacco … Read MoreJordan Hatcher Case (1852)
Seattle-based civil rights activist, labor leader, and lay Catholic leader Walter Hubbard envisioned a church and world without racism and worked his entire life to achieve that vision. Hubbard was born in New Orleans in 1924. He received little formal education but acquired extensive knowledge … Read MoreWalter Hubbard Jr. (1924-2007)
William “Curly” Neal helped turn a frontier western mining camp in the Santa Catalina Mountains of Arizona into a booming town that attracted businessmen and financiers, elite vacationers, and royals from around the world. His various business ventures as a teamster, passenger and freight hauler, … Read MoreWilliam “Curly” Neal (1849-1936)
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)
