Image Ownership: Public Domain In the essay below, Associate Professor Trysh Travis of the University of Florida’s Center for Women’s Studies and Gender Research Center explores some of the controversy surrounding Kathryn Stockett’s novel The Help, which has also become a major film of the … Read MoreIs The Help Realistic? It Depends.
The Piney Woods School is a small, private, historically African-American boarding school in rural Mississippi. It serves approximately 300 students in grades 9 through 12. In 1909, Dr. Laurence C. Jones founded the school to provide educational opportunities for the area’s poor rural black children. … Read MorePiney Woods School (1909- )
Sylvanus Alexander Tyler, mathematician and biostatistician, was born on August 21, 1914 to Daniel and Jesse Tyler. Tyler was raised in Chicago, Illinois along with his two younger brothers, Homer and Daniel, all of whom attended the city’s public schools. Tyler received his bachelor’s degree … Read MoreSylvanus Alexander Tyler Sr. (1914-1986)
The Robert Charles Riots began when whites in New Orleans, Louisiana became infuriated after Robert Charles, an African-American, shot several white police officers on July 23, 1900. A manhunt for Charles began after he fled after an altercation with New Orleans police officers. The race … Read MoreRobert Charles Riots (1900)
Donald Hamilton Barden was one of the nation’s most successful black businessmen and the first black owner of a major Las Vegas Casino. He earned most of his wealth through the casino, cable television, and real estate industries. He also started a record company, worked … Read MoreDon H. Barden (1943-2011)
Many Americans are familiar with the now iconic images of James Meredith, the black student who desegregated the University of Mississippi in October 1962, surrounded by white U.S. marshals assigned to protect him and ensure that a U.S. Supreme Court desegregation order be enforced. Few … Read MoreU.S. Marshal Luke Moore at Ole Miss, 1962
Chester Arthur Burnett, better known by his stage name Howlin’ Wolf, was a blues performer and bandleader born in White Station, Mississippi to Leon “Dock” and Gertrude Young Burnett. He was married to Lillie Burnett and is survived by two stepchildren, Barbra Marks and Bettye … Read MoreHowlin’ Wolf/Chester Arthur Burnett (1910-1976)
Civil rights leader and intellectual, Moses Carl Holman, was born to Moses and Mamie Durham Holman on June 27, 1919. Although born in Minter City, Mississippi, Holman was raised in St. Louis, Missouri, where his father worked in a steel mill. As a child Holman … Read MoreM. Carl Holman (1919-1988)
Born March 4, 1908, Theodore Roosevelt Mason Howard was a wealthy doctor, successful entrepreneur, and civil rights activist. Born and raised in Murray, Kentucky, Howard seemed destined to follow in his father’s footsteps as a tobacco twister until a white doctor at Murray’s local hospital … Read MoreT.R.M. Howard (1908-1976)
The 10th Cavalry was one of the original six regiments of the regular army set aside for black enlisted men. These were authorized by Congress in the act of July 28, 1866 reorganizing the army for post-Civil War service, mainly against native peoples in the … Read More10th Cavalry Regiment (1866-1944)
