Educator and Sociologist Charles Eric Lincoln was born June 23, 1924 in Athens, Alabama. After he was abandoned by his parents, Lincoln was raised by his maternal grandparents. He attended the Trinity School in Athens, an institution created by the New England-based Congregational Church to … Read MoreC. Eric Lincoln (1924-2000)
Born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina on April 15, 1912, Jasper Brown Jeffries was an African American physicist and mathematician who worked on the Manhattan Project in World War II. The eldest child of Brown and Edna Jeffries, Jasper had three younger brothers, Carl, Hubert, and Robert. … Read MoreJasper Brown Jeffries (1912-1994)
Educator and civil rights advocate John A. Davis Sr. began his career in activism in the 1930s as leader of the New Negro Alliance, which pressured businesses to hire black employees. Two decades later he assisted with the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court … Read MoreJohn Aubrey Davis Sr. (1912-2002)
Canadian entrepreneur Viola Desmond was arrested in 1946 for refusing to leave a segregated section of a Nova Scotia movie theatre. She was physically injured by police in the incident but was convicted and fined by local courts. She was posthumously pardoned in 2010. Born … Read MoreViola Davis Desmond (1914-1965)
We Charge Genocide: The Historic Petition to the United Nations for Relief From a Crime of The United States Government Against the Negro People (1951) Introduction: Out of the inhuman black ghettos of American cities, out of the cotton plantations of the South, comes this … Read More(1951) We Charge Genocide
In the following article University of Oregon historian Daniel Pope briefly outlines the history of African Americans in the Advertising Industry since the beginning of the 20th Century. Paul Kinsey, a young white copywriter at a prominent advertising agency in 1961 dates an African American … Read More“Mad Men” in Black: African Americans in the Twentieth Century U.S. Advertising Industry
Leslie Uggams, actress, singer, entertainer, and recording artist, was born in New York City, May 25, 1943 and grew up in a four-room house in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan. Her father, Harold C. Uggams, worked as a train porter, elevator operator, and professional … Read MoreLeslie Uggams (1943- )
The Port Royal Experiment, the first major attempt by Northerners to reconstruct the Southern political and economic system, began only seven months after the firing on Fort Sumter. On November 7, 1861 the Union Army occupied South Carolina’s Sea Islands, freeing approximately 10,000 slaves. As … Read MorePort Royal Experiment (1862-1865)
Myles Anderson Paige, the first African American to be appointed a New York City Criminal Court Judge, was born on July 18, 1898 in Montgomery, Alabama. Paige was a star football player at Howard University, graduating from the Washington D.C. institution with a Bachelor of Arts … Read MoreMyles Anderson Paige (1898-1983)
Bryant Gumbel was the first African-American co-host of the National Broadcasting Company’s (NBC) The Today Show and is well known as a broadcast journalist and sportscaster. Gumbel was born in1948 in New Orleans, Louisiana to Rhea Alice and Richard Dunbar Gumbel, a city clerk and … Read MoreBryant Gumbel (1948- )
