The Martinsville Seven were a group of young black men executed in 1951 after being convicted of raping a white woman. Their trials and the electrocutions became a cause célèbre similar to the Scottsboro Case of the 1930s. On the evening of January 8, 1949, … Read MoreMartinsville Seven (1949-1951)
Clilan (C.B.) Powell, longtime owner of the Amsterdam News, was born in 1894 to former Virginia slaves. Very little is known about his childhood. He received his medical degree in 1920 from Howard University School of Medicine and began his career specializing in x-ray technology. … Read MoreC. B. Powell (1894-1977)
Image Ownership: Fair Use Twentieth century artist John Thomas Biggers was an educator, painter and muralist. His travels in Africa in the 1950s influenced the depiction of social and cultural themes in his work. John Thomas Biggers was born in Gastonia, North Carolina in 1924. … Read MoreJohn Thomas Biggers (1924-2001)
A former slave, Dangerfield Newby was one of several participants in John Brown’s raid on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia in October 1859. Newby was the son of his white slave master, Henry Newby, a Scots immigrant, and his slave, Ailsey/ Elsie Pollard. … Read MoreDangerfield F. Newby (1815-1859)
Charles Harmon Bullock was a prominent leader in the early 20th Century Colored Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) movement. Born in Charlottesville, Virginia, on March 2, 1875, the son of former slaves Burkley and Mary Washington Bullock, Charles Bullock later graduated as salutorian of his … Read MoreCharles H. Bullock, Sr. (1875-1950)
Historian, educator and clergyman Rev. Miles Mark Fisher was pastor of the White Rock Baptist Church in Durham, North Carolina from 1933 to 1965. He published a number of important scholarly works on African American culture and the Baptist missionary movement to Africa. In 1953 … Read MoreMiles Mark Fisher (1899-1970)
Born into slavery in Charles City County, Virginia, Lott Carey (sometimes spelled “Cary”) was one of the first African American Baptist missionaries to preach and work in Africa. Although Carey may have received Christian teachings from his father, a respected member of the Baptist church, … Read MoreLott Carey (Cary) (1780-1828)
Anderson Ruffin Abbott, Canada’s first black doctor, was born April 7, 1837 in Toronto, Ontario. He was the son of free black property owners William Ruffin Abbott and his wife Ellen (Toyer) Abbott who left Alabama after their store had been destroyed. They settled briefly … Read MoreAnderson Ruffin Abbott (1837-1913)
Horace Waymon Bivins, a Buffalo Soldier, was born on May 8, 1862, in Accomack County, Virginia. His father Severn S. Bivins and his mother Elizabeth Bivins were free black farmers on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. His parents taught Bivins to farm, and at the age of … Read MoreHorace W. Bivins (1862-1937)
