W.E.B. Du Bois

Ellison, Keith M. (1963- )

Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison was born on August 4, 1963 in Detroit, Michigan. He was raised Catholic in a middle class family which included five sons to a father who was a psychiatrist and a mother who was a social worker. Since childhood Ellison was involved with the civil rights

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Source: Black Past

Aug

4

1963

Alvin Ailey

Born to a teen mother whose husband left her early on, Alvin Ailey grew up in the small Texas town of Navasota with a family that was facing financial difficulties. Drawing inspiration from the black church services and the music at the local dance hall, Ailey left for Los Angeles at the age of 12

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Source: Black History Resources

Perry, Cynthia Shepard (1928- )

Cynthia Shepard Perry, a Republican and 25 year career diplomat, has served three Republican presidents. President Ronald Reagan appointed her as Chief of Education and Human Resources of the U.S. Agency for International Development where she served from 1982 to 1986, and named her Ambassador to

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Source: Black Past

Mar

21

1999

Battle, Kathleen (1948- )

American soprano Kathleen Battle was born on August 13, 1948 in Portsmouth, Ohio. Battle’s father was a steelworker and her mother was an active participant in the gospel choir at the family’s local African Methodist Episcopal Church. Battle attended Portsmouth High School and upon graduation was

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Source: Black Past

Aug

13

1948

U.S. Marshal Luke Moore at Ole Miss, 1962

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 of us are

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Source: Black Past

NAACP leader Edward Daniel Nixon dies

Edward Daniel Nixon, former president of the Georgia NAACP, died at age 87.

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Source: Blackfacts.com

Feb

25

1987

The New York newspaper Amsterdam News is founded.

The New York newspaper Amsterdam News is

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Source: Blackfacts.com

Dec

4

1909

Roy Wilkins is elected NAACP executive secretary

Roy Wilkins is elected NAACP executive secretary following the death of Walter White

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Source: Blackfacts.com

Apr

11

1955

Josephine Baker

Josephine Baker was a dancer and singer who later became a Civil Rights activist. Her birth name was Freda Josephine McDonald and she was born on June 3, 1906, in St. Louis, Missouri. Her mother used to be a dancer as well, but she gave up her aspirations in order to raise her children. Her father

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Source: Black History Resources

Jun

3

1906

(1900) W.E.B. Du Bois, “To the Nations of the World,”

W.E.B. Dubois would eventually emerge as a founder of the NAACP, a leading human rights activists and the most important African American intellectual of the 20th Century. However those developments lay in the future when the 32-year-old DuBois gave the closing address at the first Pan African

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Source: ThoughtCo

Jul

25

1900

Dill, Augustus Granville (1881-1956)

Augustus Granville Dill, sociologist, business manager, musician, and colleague of National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) co-founder W.E.B. Du Bois, is best known for his work overseeing the publication of Du Bois’s journal, The Crisis, between 1913 and 1928. He also

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Source: Black Past

Adams, John Quincy ["J. Q."] (1848-1922)

Educator, newspaper publisher and politician John Quincy Adams is best known as the editor of the Western Appeal/The Appeal of St. Paul, Minnesota. He held the position from 1886 to

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Source: Black Past

Medgar Evers

Myrlie Evers-Williams was the first woman chair of the NAACP (1995-98)… Evers was interred at Arlington Military Cemetery… In Beckwith’s first two trials, the juries were all white; in his last trial, the jury had eight blacks and four whites… For Us, The Livingwas adapted by Ossie Davis and made

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Source: Fact Monster - Black History

Anderson, Marian (1897-1993)

Marian Anderson, renowned contralto and one of the most celebrated singers of the 20th Century, was born on February 27, 1897 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Anderson was the daughter of John Berkley Anderson, a small business owner, and Annie Delilah Rucker Anderson, a former Virginia

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Source: Black Past

Cooper, J. Gary (1936– )

J. Gary Cooper, military, government, and business leader, was appointed United States Ambassador to Jamaica by President Bill Clinton in 1994. He was the first African American to occupy the position. Prior to his appointment, he had a distinguished military

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Source: Black Past

Oct

2

1936

Dexter Avenue Baptist Church [Montgomery] (1883-- )

The Dexter Avenue Baptist Church was built in 1883 on the corner of Dexter Avenue and Decatur Street in Montgomery, Alabama. The church served as a meeting place and planning hub for some of the most influential actions of the Civil Rights movement throughout the first half of the twentieth

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Source: Black Past

Perspective Articles Guidelines

Revised August 6, 2012

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Source: Black Past

Aug

6

2012

Winfrey, Oprah (1954 - )

Repeatedly on Time magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people in the world, Oprah Winfrey is a television host, media mogul – in television, radio, film, and print – and philanthropist. Forbes magazine included her in its 2003 list of America’s billionaires, the first African American

fave

Source: Black Past

Jan

30

1954

Dixon, Julian (1934-2000)

Born in Washington, D.C. on August 8, 1934, Julian Dixon represented part of Los Angeles in the U.S. House of Representatives for twenty-two years. After serving in the U.S. Army from 1957 to 1960, Dixon attended California State University, Los Angeles. He earned a bachelor’s degree in 1962 and

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Source: Black Past

Aug

8

1934

Trotter, William Monroe (1872-1934)

WilliamMonroe Trotter was a major early twentieth century civil rights activist knownprimarily for launching the first major challenge to the political dominance ofTuskegee Institute founder Booker T. Washington and as an inspiration for the formation of theNational Association for the Advancement

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Source: Black Past

Apr

7

1934

Seattle School Boycott (1966)

On Thursday March 31 and Friday April 1, 1966, thousands of Seattle Public School students boycotted schools in the Central District, Seattle Washington’s African American community, to protest the de facto segregation that they believed was racially

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Source: Black Past

Duncan, Todd (1903-1998)

Born Robert Todd Duncan in Danville, Kentucky in 1903, Todd Duncan was the first African American to perform in an otherwise all-white cast in the New York City Opera’s production of

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Source: Black Past

Mar

2

1998

(1953) Thurgood Marshall, “Argument Before the U.S. Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education”

Many historians and legal scholars consider the U.S. Supreme Courts 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education to be one of the most important and far reaching pronouncements in the history of the Court. On December 8, 1953 Thurgood Marshall, the chief legal counsel of the National Association

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Source: Black Past

Dec

8

1953

Oldest Intergration Law Suit Settled

The oldest intergration law suit in the US was settled in 1989 when the St. Helena Parish schools were officially integrated. The suit was originally filed by a John Hall and the NAACP in 1952.

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Source: Blackfacts.com

Jan

8

1989

Wells, Barry L. (1942- )

Ambassador Barry L. Wells has had an extensive career in international affairs with the United States Foreign Service after an earlier period as a university professor and administrator. Wells was born in 1942 in Columbus, Ohio and graduated from East High School in that city in 1959. He received

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Source: Black Past

Youth from the NAACP Council begins sit-ins at lunch counters in Oklahoma City,

Youth from the NAACP Council begins sit-ins at lunch counters in Oklahoma City, 1963

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Source: Blackfacts.com

Aug

19

1963

Death of Mary McLeod Bethune, educator/activist

Death of Mary McLeod Bethune (79), educator and civil rights leader, Daytona

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Source: Blackfacts.com

May

18

1955

Pearman, Raven-Symoné Christina (1985- )

Raven-Symoné Christina Pearman, better known as “Raven-Symoné,” is an American actress and recording artist. Her entertainment career began when she starred in advertisements for well-known brands such as Jell-O and Cool Whip and as a young model for the Ford Modeling

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Source: Black Past

Dec

10

1985

The San Fernando Valley’s Multiethnic Past: Unexpected Communities of Color in “America’s Suburb”

In the article below historian Jean-Paul R. deGuzman briefly introduces the multiethnic history of Southern California’s San Fernando Valley, a popular region that one local chronicler calls nothing less than “America’s Suburb.” The narrative that follows, part of deGuzman doctoral

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Source: Black Past

Savannah State University (1890- )

Savannah State University, a historically black university in Savannah, Georgia, is the oldest state supported black institution of higher education in the state of Georgia. It was the first black public land grant college established in the state after the Morrill Act of 1890. Originally named

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Source: Black Past

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