Wilton Norman Chamberlain was an African American basketball player who played in the National Basketball Association (NBA) for the Philadelphia/San Francisco Warriors, the Philadelphia 76ers, and the Los Angeles Lakers. Chamberlain is known as one of the greatest basketball players of all time, being selected … Read MoreWilton Norman Chamberlain (1936-1999)
Physician and businessman Dr. Midian Othello Bousfield was a leader in Chicago’s insurance industry. His diverse career included work in medicine and in the military, advocating for African American health care and for the training of black medical personnel. He was the first black person … Read MoreMidian Othello Bousfield (1885–1948)
Alonzo Franklin Herndon was an African American entrepreneur who founded and was the first president of Atlanta Life Insurance Company. Herndon was born on June 26, 1858 in Walton County, Georgia to Frank Herndon, a white farmer, and Sophenie, his slave. By the time of … Read MoreAlonzo Franklin Herndon (1858–1927)
Dr. Levi Watkins Jr. was a cardiac surgeon who, in 1980, performed the first implantation of an automatic defibrillator into a human heart. He was also a professor of cardiac surgery and associate dean at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland. Watkins … Read MoreLevi Watkins Jr. (1944-2015)
The Savings Bank of the Grand Fountain United Order of True Reformers in Richmond, Virginia was the first bank owned by African Americans in the United States. It was founded on March 2, 1888 by Reverend William Washington Browne and opened on April 3, 1889. … Read MoreThe True Reformers Bank (1888-1910)
Carole Anne-Marie Gist, the first African American woman to win the Miss USA title, was born on May 8, 1969 in Detroit, Michigan. Gist, the daughter of Joan Gist and David Turner, is of African American and Cherokee heritage. Her parents divorced when she was … Read MoreCarole Ann-Marie Gist (1969- )
Hiram Young of Independence, Missouri manufactured freight wagons and equipment in the 1850s. Born about 1812 in Tennessee, he entered Missouri as a slave and worked for George Young of Greene County. In 1847, Young obtained freedom, either from his owner or possibly as a … Read MoreHiram Young (1812-1882)
During its brief and rocky tenure from 1918 to 1924, pianist Gertrude Harvey Wright was one of four women in Seattle’s first black musicians’ union, the American Federation of Musicians’ Local 458. Wright, Virginia Hughes, a “Mrs. Austin,” and (Edythe) “Turnham,” all worked with their … Read MoreRace, Gender, Jazz & Local 493: Black Women Musicians in Seattle: 1920-1955
Big Joe Turner, known by many as the “Boss of the Blues,” was born Joseph Vernon in Kansas City, Missouri, on May 18, 1911. Turner is considered a major contributor to the development of the sound of Kansas City Jazz, and the early development of … Read MoreJoseph Vernon “Big Joe” Turner (1911-1985)
Nicodemus Kansas, 1885 “Image Courtsey of Kansas Historical Society” In the article below independent historian Charlotte Hinger explores the concept of racial uplift, black electoral power and reparations for slavery in the ideals of three early citizens of Nicodemus, the most famous 19th Century black … Read MoreRacial Uplift, Black Power, and Reparations on the Kansas Frontier: Abram T. Hall, Edward P. McCabe, and John W. Niles
