Floyd C. Covington was a leader in Los Angeles’s black community for more than fifty years. A native of Denver, Colorado, Covington endured many traumatic experiences during his childhood. The 1910 manuscript census indicates that Covington’s father did not live with his family. Covington’s mother … Read MoreFloyd C. Covington (1901-1989)
THE SEATTLE OPEN HOUSING CAMPAIGN, 1959-1968: Housing Segregation and Open Housing Legislation Anne Frantilla Seattle Municipal Archives Seattle’s African-American population increased dramatically between 1940 and 1960, making the community the city’s largest minority group. As blacks moved north and west during and after World War … Read MoreHistory of the Seattle Open Housing Campaign, 1959-1968
THE SEATTLE OPEN HOUSING DEBATE, 1963 The linked audio tapes provided exclusively to TheBlackPast.org by the Seattle Municipal Archives chronicle the story of Open Housing in Seattle. The tapes linked below are of the Open Housing Hearing conducted by the Seattle City Council on October … Read MoreThe Seattle Open Housing Debate
Musicologist, playwright, novelist and political activist Lola Shirley Graham, born in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1896, became the second wife to W.E.B. Du Bois in 1951. Lola Shirley Graham was taught at a young age to stand up to injustice. She wrote her first editorial to … Read MoreShirley Graham Du Bois (1896 – 1977)
Washington (State) Omnibus Civil Rights Act of 1957 CHAPTER 37. H. B. 25. 7 CIVIL RIGHTS LAW AGAINST DISCRIMINATION. AN ACT relating to civil rights, amending section 1, chapter 183, Laws of 1949 and ROW 49.60.010; amending section 12, chapter 183, Laws of 1949 and … Read More(1957) Washington (State) Omnibus Civil Rights Act of 1957
A writer, an economist and an advocate for affirmative action, Andrew Felton Brimmer is best known as the first African American to hold a governorship on the United States Federal Reserve Bank. Born in Newellton, Louisiana on September 13, 1926, Brimmer moved to Bremerton, Washington … Read MoreAndrew F. Brimmer (1926-2012)
William Owen Bush was the eldest son of George and Isabella Bush. George Bush was a mixed-race settler who came with his large family to what is now the Tumwater, Washington area in 1845. The Bushes and their sons, William Owen, Joseph Tolbert, Rial Bailey, … Read MoreWilliam Owen Bush (1832-1907)
Carl Brooks was an outspoken civil rights activist, labor leader, and member of the Communist Party (CP) in the state of Washington. Born in 1908 and raised in Seattle, by the mid 1930s he was active in the Northwest branch of the Communist Party’s League … Read MoreCarl Brooks (1908-?)
Marjorie Edwina Pitter King, the youngest of the Pitter sisters, was born March 8, 1921, to Edward A. Pitter and Marjorie Allen Pitter, in Seattle, Washington. When she graduated from Garfield High School, she joined her sisters at the University of Washington to study for … Read MoreMarjorie Edwina Pitter King (1921-1996)
Founded on Aug. 9, 1917 in Spokane, Washington, the Washington State Federation of Colored Women (WSFCW) confederated several social and civic clubs organized by African American women during the early 1900s. The African American women’s club movement in Washington State began in 1908 with the … Read MoreWashington State Federation of Colored Women (1917- )
