Coppin State University is a historically black college in Baltimore, Maryland. The school has its origins in a one-year program to train the city’s black elementary school teachers, established around 1900 in the Colored High School and Training School. The school’s name has changed several … Read MoreCoppin State University (1900- )
Darwin Theodore Troy Turner was an African American literature critic, a poet, and an English professor who was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on May 7, 1931. His grandfather, Charles H. Turner, was the first African American psychologist; his father, Darwin Romanes Turner, was a pharmacist; … Read MoreDarwin T. Turner (1931-1991)
The Civil Rights Movement and investigative journalism combined in the early 1960s, inciting a nation to address the growing problem of poverty in America. A 1963 New York Times series on Appalachian poverty and Michael Harrington’s The Other America (1962) inspired discontent young Americans as … Read MoreWar on Poverty
Elected to Congress in 2008, Donna Edwards was a Democratic member of U.S. House of Representatives, representing the 4th Congressional District of Maryland. Donna Edwards was born on June 28, 1958 in Yanceyville, North Carolina. Her father served in the U.S. Air Force, so Edwards … Read MoreDonna F. Edwards (1958- )
Crystal Bird Fauset, the first African-American female state legislator in the United States, was born on June 27, 1894 in Princess Anne, Maryland. She grew up in Boston, Massachusetts but spent most of her adult and political life in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Between 1914 and 1918 … Read MoreCrystal Bird Fauset (1894-1965)
The Afro-American Council (AAC) was established in Rochester, New York, in September 1898 by newspaper editor T. Thomas Fortune and Bishop Alexander Walters of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. They envisioned the organization as a revival of the earlier National Afro-American League (NAAL), which … Read MoreAfro-American Council (1898-1907)
Emmett Chappelle, inventor, was born in Phoenix, Arizona on October 25, 1925. His scientific research and the 14 United States patents he received for his inventions make Chapelle’s contributions vital to the scientific world. Much about Chappelle’s earlier life cannot be ascertained. He attended the … Read MoreEmmett Chappelle (1925-2019)
Iota Phi Theta Fraternity, Inc. (Iota), the most recently formed black Greek-letter organization, was founded on September 19, 1963 on the campus of Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland. Established by twelve men who were active in the local civil rights movement, early Iota members … Read MoreIota Phi Theta Fraternity (1963)
The National Pan-Hellenic Council, Inc. (NPHC) is the collaborative effort of nine historically African American Greek-lettered fraternities and sororities, also known as the Divine 9. The Council was founded at Howard University in Washington, D.C., on May 10, 1930, and chartered by Alpha Kappa Alpha … Read MoreNational Pan-Hellenic Council (1930 – )
Alexander Thomas Augusta was the highest-ranking black officer in the Union Army during the Civil War. He was also the first African American head of a hospital (Freedmen’s Hospital) and the first black professor of medicine (Howard University in Washington, D.C.). Augusta was born in … Read MoreAlexander T. Augusta (1825-1890)
