James Richardson Bacote was an artist, preservationist, historian and co-founder of the Geechee Kunda Cultural Center in Georgia. Bacote was born on December 18, 1948 in Brunswick, Georgia, to Sally and James Bacote Sr. He attended local schools on the Georgia Coast, as well as … Read MoreJames R. Bacote II (1948-2018)
Irene Amos Morgan Kirkaldy was a civil rights activist who won her 1946 U.S. Supreme Court case in Irene Morgan v. Commonwealth of Virginia, which declared interstate transport racial segregation to be unconstitutional, nearly a decade before the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Irene Amos was born … Read MoreIrene Morgan Kirkaldy (1917-2007)
Reby Cary, educator, community activist, politician, entrepreneur and World War II veteran, was born on September 9, 1920, in Fort Worth, Texas, to Reverend Smith and Maggie B. Cary. A graduate of I. M. Terrell High School in 1937, he received his Bachelor of Arts … Read MoreReby Cary (1920-2018)
The Clinton Desegregation Crisis of 1956 occurred at Clinton High School in Clinton Tennessee. The crisis was the result of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court which called for the desegregation of public schools across the nation. In … Read MoreThe Clinton Desegregation Crisis (1956)
Hattie Mae White holds the distinction of being the first African American elected to public office in Houston, Texas in the 20th century. Born Hattie Mae Whiting, she is the daughter of David Wendell and Hattie (Gooden) Whiting, born in Huntsville, Texas on May 22, … Read MoreHattie Mae White (1916-1993)
Marion William Dial was the first African American elected to a city-wide office in Missouri. Dial was born in Chetopa, Kansas, on June 27, 1903. After receiving bachelors and master’s degrees from the Kansas State Teachers College (now Pittsburg State University), Dial embarked on a … Read MoreMarion William Dial (1903-1972)
Anne Moody was a writer and civil rights activist best known for her memoir, Coming of Age in Mississippi (1968). In the early 1960s, while a student at Tougaloo College, she worked with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Student … Read MoreAnne Moody (1940-2015)
Katherine Carper Sawyer is one of the nearly-forgotten plaintiffs in the famous Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision in 1954. While most attention was focused on Linda Brown’s central role in the most important school desegregation case in the nation’s history, in 1952 … Read MoreKatherine Carper Sawyer (1942- )
McKinley Langford Burnett was a little-known but significant figure in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court case that theoretically desegregated public schools across the United States. Burnett was born in Oskaloosa, Kansas, a racially integrated small town, in 1897 to parents who … Read MoreMcKinley Langford Burnett (1897-1968)
Simeon Saunders Booker Jr.’s innovative career in journalism transformed how African American readers engaged with news coverage of politics and social injustices. As the first African American reporter for the Washington Post, he provided insight into the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. On August … Read MoreSimeon S. Booker (1918-2017)