James Milton Turner was an African American Missourian who was a prominent politician, education advocate, and diplomat in the years after the Civil War. Turner was born a slave in St. Louis, Missouri sometime in 1840. His father, John Turner (also known as John Colburn), … Read MoreJames Milton Turner (1840-1915)
Anna Julia Haywood Cooper was a writer, teacher, and activist who championed education for African Americans and women. Born into bondage in 1858 in Raleigh, North Carolina, she was the daughter of an enslaved woman, Hannah Stanley, and her owner, George Washington Haywood. In 1867, … Read MoreAnna Julia Haywood Cooper (1858-1964)
William Saunders Scarborough, born in 1852 in Macon, Georgia, the son of a free black father and an enslaved mother eventually became the first graduate of Atlanta University and at 23 a professor of Latin and Greek at Wilberforce University in Ohio. In 1908 he … Read More(1894) William Saunders Scarborough, “The Ethics of the Hawaiian Question”
Sojourner Truth (c. 1797-1883) was arguably the most famous of the 19th Century black women orators. Born into slavery in New York and freed in 1827 under the state’s gradual emancipation law, she dedicated her life to abolition and equal rights for women and men. … Read More(1851) Sojourner Truth “Ar’nt I a Woman?“
Peter Humphries Clark, principal of the Colored High School in Cincinnati, Ohio, was one of a small number of 19th Century African American Socialists. Grandson of William Clark of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, schoolteacher and later Principal of the Colored High School in Cincinnati … Read More(1877) Peter H. Clark, “Socialism: The Remedy for the Evils of Society“
William J. Seymour was born in Centerville, Louisiana, to former slaves Simon and Phillis Seymour, who raised him in the Baptist church. While living in Cincinnati, Ohio, he was influenced by holiness teachings, and then he moved to Houston, Texas, where he heard Charles Fox … Read MoreWilliam J. Seymour (1870-1922)
In January 1856, Sara G. Stanley, representing the Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society of Delaware, Ohio, addressed the all-male Convention of Disfranchised Citizens of Ohio who met at the Columbus City Hall. She called upon the forty delegates who included among their ranks John Mercer Langston, Peter … Read More(1856) Sara G. Stanley Addresses The Convention Of Disfranchised Citizens Of Ohio
Lucy Stanton was probably the first African American woman to complete a four-year collegiate course of study. Stanton, the daughter of John Brown, a Cleveland barber active in the Underground Railroad, enrolled in nearby Oberlin Collegiate Institute (now Oberlin College) in northern Ohio. The institution … Read More(1850) Lucy Stanton, “A Plea for the Oppressed”
The National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) was created in 1966 to fight for greater assistance and control over welfare regulations. In the 1950s, politicians and journalists drew attention to the rapid increases in the welfare rolls, especially among African American single mothers. Punitive laws were … Read MoreNational Welfare Rights Organization (1966-1975)
Malcolm X, one of the most influential African American leaders of the 20th Century, was born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska on May 19, 1925 to Earl Little, a Georgia native and itinerant Baptist preacher, and Louise Norton Little who was born in the West … Read MoreMalcolm X (1925-1965)
