Madam C. J.Walker was born as Sarah Breedlove in Delta, Louisiana on December 23, 1867. She was one of six children born to Owen and Minerva Breedlove. As her parents and older siblings were were born into slavery, “The Madam”... Read More
Shirley Chisholm on November 30, 1924, as Shirley Anita St. Hill. She was an African-American politician, educator, and author. In 1968, she became the first African-American woman elected to the U.S. Congress and represented New York’s 12th Congressional District from... Read More
James Zwerg was born on November 28, 1939, in Appleton, Wisconsin. He was member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (also known as SNCC) and the Freedom Riders movement to desegregate interstate travel. Being white, he’s a perfect illustration of how the civil rights cause touched the... Read More
Diane Judith Nash was born on May 15, 1938, in Chicago, Illinois. She was a leader and strategist in the African-American civil rights movement in the 1960’s. Nash initially attended historically-black Howard University in Washington, D.C., then transferred to Fisk University, another... Read More
Walter Francis White was born on July 1, 1893, in Atlanta, Georgia. He was an American civil rights activist. From 1931 to 1955, he led the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (also known as the NAACP), the nation’s... Read More
Charles B. Brooks was an African-American inventor, born in Virginia in 1865. He eventually moved to Newark, New Jersey, in the 1980’s. It 1896, he invented the street sweeper, a truck which had revolving brushes attached to the front fender. He... Read More