Gwendolyn Bennett a poet, author, educator, journalist and graphic artist, was born July 8, 1902 in Giddings, Texas, to Joshua and Maime Bennett. Her parents worked as teachers in the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Gwendolyn’s family moved to Washington, D.C. in 1906 when she was … Read MoreGwendolyn Bennett (1902-1981)
Margaret Esse Danner was an African American poet, born in Pryorsburg, Kentucky on January 12, 1915 to Caleb and Naomi Esse. Danner began writing poetry when she was in junior high school. In the eighth grade she won first place for a poem she wrote … Read MoreMargaret E. Danner (1915-1984)
Adelaide Smith Casely Hayford was a Victorian feminist who dedicated her life to the education of girls in Sierra Leone. Born on June 2, 1868, in Freetown, Sierra Leone, Casely Hayford was the second youngest of seven children of parents William Smith Jr. and Anne … Read MoreAdelaide Smith Casely Hayford (1868-1960)
Born in 1856, Martín Morúa Delgado gained prominence as an Afro-Cuban writer and Cuba’s first black Senate president after the country’s war for independence against Spanish rule in the 1890s. Son of an African-slave mother, Ines Delgado, and Spanish father, Francisco Morúa, Martín Morúa Delgado … Read MoreMartín Morúa Delgado (1856-1910)
Nineteenth Century writer Frances Anne Rollin is noted as the author of Life and Public Services of Martin R. Delany which upon appearing in 1868 became the first full-length biography written by an African American. Rollin also kept a diary in 1868, making it the … Read MoreFrances Anne Rollin (1845-1901)
Victor Séjour was a playwright born in New Orleans, Louisiana on June 2, 1817. His parents were Louis Victor Séjour Marou, a free colored man from Saint-Domingue (Haiti), and Héloise Philippe Ferrand, a quadroon from New Orleans. Although Victor was born in 1817, and his … Read MoreVictor Séjour (1817-1874)
Gertrude E.H. Bustill Mossell was a teacher, author, and journalist born on July 3, 1855 in Philadelphia. The daughter of Charles and Emily Bustill, she came from a prominent family. She attended public schools in Philadelphia and eventually the Institute for Colored Youth and the … Read MoreGertrude E.H. Bustill Mossell (1855-1948)
Scholar, African traditionalist poet, and Senegal’s first president, Léopold Sédar Senghor was born on October 9, 1906, in Joal, Senegal. His father, Basie Diogoye Senghor, was a Malinké landowner. His mother, Gnilane Bakhoum, came from a Christian Fulani family. They gave Senghor a European name … Read MoreLéopold Sédar Senghor (1906-2001)
Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, prominent Brazilian writer and first President of the Brazilian Academy of Literature, was born in 1839 in the city of Rio de Janeiro to Francisco de Assis, a mulato father, and Maria Leopoldina Machado de Assis, a white Portuguese mother. … Read MoreJoaquim Maria Machado de Assis (1839-1908)
Valenza Pauline Burke, later known as Paule Marshall, was born on April 9, 1929, in Brooklyn, New York. She was the daughter of Ada and Samuel Burke, both emigrants from Barbados, and she grew up in a neighborhood with a significant number of other families … Read MorePaule Marshall (1929-2019)
