African American history

The Supreme Court issued a ruling on March 9, 1841, freeing the remaining thirty-five survivors of the Amistad mutiny. Although seven of the nine justices on the court hailed from Southern states, only one dissented from Justice Joseph Story’s majority opinion. Private donations ensured the Africans’ safe return to Sierra Leone in January 1842. BTW, Connecticut Congregationalists formed the Amistad Committee, which organized a legal…

Read More Today in History: Survivors of Amistad Mutiny Released

Charlayne Hunter-Gault, a living connection to this history and a prominent name in television and radio news, worked on the MacNeil/Lehrer Report on PBS starting in 1978, later worked in South Africa for National Public Radio and then CNN. Her work won two Emmys and two Peabody Awards. She’d made history of her own just…

Read More Charlayne Hunter-Gault

Celebrating Artists’ Portraits at the Library of Congress for African American History Month blogs.loc.gov/picturethis/2021/02/celebrating-artists-portraits-at-the-library-of-congress-for-african-american-history-month/ The Family Life of Ralph Ellison blogs.loc.gov/catbird/2021/02/the-family-life-of-ralph-ellison/ Honoring African American Contributions in Medicine: Midwives blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams/2020/06/honoring-african-american-contributions-in-medicine-midwives/ Katherine Dunham’s Ethnographic Research in the Caribbean blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2021/02/katherine-dunham-in-the-caribbean/ Frederick Douglass Newspapers, 1847-1874: Now Online blogs.loc.gov/headlinesandheroes/2020/01/frederick-douglass-newspapers-1847-1874-now-online/ Sojourner Truth and the Power of Copyright Registration blogs.loc.gov/copyright/2020/12/sojourner-truth-and-the-power-of-copyright-registration/ The Beauty Entrepreneur: Madam C. J. Walker  blogs.loc.gov/inside_adams/2020/03/madam-c-j-walker/…

Read More Celebrating Black History: Blog Posts from Around the Library of Congress

Fully virtual this year for the first time, ASALH’s 95th annual Black History Month festival will examine the theme “The Black Family: Representation, Identity and Diversity.” Events open to the public include an author talk with the former astronaut Mae Jemison, a discussion on “How African-American Families Have Been Portrayed in the Media” and music…

Read More Association for the Study of African-American Life and History’s Virtual Festival

Lyric soprano Leontyne Price was born on February 10, 1927, in Laurel, Mississippi. Price debuted on Broadway in April 1952. Her successful career took her to leading opera houses around the world and brought eighteen Grammy awards as well as the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In 1985, Price gave her final performance at New York’s Lincoln Center in the title role…

Read More Leontyne Price

Home Security System: Marie Van Brittan Brown was the inventor of the first home security system. Her patent also laid the groundwork for the modern closed-circuit television system that is widely used for surveillance, home security systems, push-button alarm triggers, crime prevention, and traffic monitoring. Talk about Multi-function!!

Read More Marie Van Brittan Brown

October 29, 2020 By Jessica Mendoza Multimedia reporter; Samantha Laine Perfas Story Team Leader [This is one of a series of articles/podcasts in the Christian Science Monitor.] As Tulsa, Oklahoma, gears up to commemorate the 1921 race massacre, a new generation of Tulsans are finding ways to make the story of Black Wall Street their own. What can the country…

Read More Tulsa’s Black Wall Street burned. These artists have a new vision (audio).

BY DAN C. GOLDBERG  MAY 19, 2020 3:00 PM A black man had graduated the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1877 and the Army had its first black general in 1940. But when World War II began, African Americans were not even allowed to enlist in the Navy’s general service. […] 16 African American…

Read More How the U.S. Navy’s First Black Officers (The Golden Thirteen) Helped Reshape the American Military

Read more about women’s history here. Do You Know Claudete Colvin, Aurelia Browder, Susie McDonald and Mary Louise Smith? Read more about these true pioneers here. Colvin’s stand was part of a long history of African-American resistance, as acts of resistance on segregated transportation had been going on for more than century. Frederick Douglass was kicked out of…

Read More Women’s History / American History