In 1958, Barbara Ann Posey, then a high school student, emerged as one of the most important youth leaders in the campaign which began that year to desegregate the major public accommodations in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Posey’s public stand against racial injustice began when she … Read MoreBarbara Ann Posey Jones (1943- )
Born in Indianapolis, Indiana, in March 1860, Charles Henry Harvey was the youngest of nineteen children of Albert and Elsy (Brewer) Harvey. Albert and Elsy were married on Valentine’s Day in 1839 in Halifax County, North Carolina, where their first child, Jesse, was born a … Read MoreCharles Harvey (1860-1937)
An activist, politician, and leader of her community, Sharon Sayles Belton was the first African American and first woman mayor of the city of Minneapolis, Minnesota. A St. Paul native, Belton was born on May 13, 1951. For most of her life she fought for … Read MoreSharon Sayles Belton (1951- )
Whitney Moore Young, Jr. was born July 31, 1921 in Lincoln Ridge, Kentucky on the campus of Lincoln Institute where his father was President. Young received a Bachelor of Science degree from Kentucky State College for Negroes in 1941. Upon graduation, Young joined the Army … Read MoreWhitney M. Young Jr. (1921-1971)
America. Born free in North Carolina in 1854, Price attended Lincoln University in Pennsylvania where he garnered numerous oratorical prizes and graduated as valedictorian in 1879. Two years later as a delegate of the A.M.E. Zion Church to the World’s Ecumenical Conference of Methodism, held … Read More(1890) Joseph C. Price, “Education and the Problem”
Forrest Oran Wiggins was born in 1907 to Charles and Cora Cosby Wiggins. A native of Vincennes, Indiana, Wiggins attended public schools in Vincennes and Indianapolis. In 1928 Wiggins received his B.A. from Butler University and in the following year earned a certificate in French … Read MoreForrest Oran Wiggins (1907-1982)
Born John Linwood Fox on April 2, 1907 in Indianapolis, Indiana (some say Minnesota), Fox earned the moniker “Tiger Jack” early in his career and boxed under the name Tiger Jack Fox. He claimed that he got his start in boxing when he was picked … Read MoreTiger Jack Fox (1907-1954)
Roy Wilkins, one of the leading US civil rights activists of the twentieth century, was born in St. Louis, Missouri. Wilkins’ mother died of tuberculosis when he was four; he and his siblings were then raised by an aunt and uncle in a poor but … Read MoreRoy Wilkins (1901-1981)
Born in Orangeburg, South Carolina on July 11, 1877, McCants Stewart, the eldest son of the southern black leader, T. McCants Stewart, was molded from childhood by his father for leadership in both his family and in the African American community. McCants spent his formative … Read MoreMcCants Stewart (1877-1919)
John A. Coleman was born a slave in 1852 in Talladega County, Alabama. After he received his freedom at the end of the Civil War, Coleman attended the newly established Talladega College for three years. He worked on a Mississippi River steamboat and then migrated … Read MoreJohn A. Coleman (1852-?)
