Robert “Whirlwind” Johnson
Robert “Whirlwind” Johnson is considered the Godfather of Black Tennis. The Lynchburg, Virginia physician was a tennis master who taught black tennis champions. Johnson’s sports...
Category : History
Walter Moses Burton
02008
Walter Moses Burton holds the distinction of being the first black elected sheriff in the United States. Burton was also a State Senator in Texas....
William Harvey Carney
01825
William Harvey Carney was born on February 29, 1840, in Norfolk, Virginia, as a slave. He learned to read and write secretly from a local...
The 54th Massachusetts Infantry
01762
The 54th Massachusetts Infantry was the first Northern black volunteer regiment enlisted to fight in the Civil War. Its accomplished combat record led to the general...
The Freedmen’s Bureau
01782
The Freedmen’s Bureau, formally known as the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, was a groundbreaking federal agency established in the aftermath of the...
Rosewood riot of 1923
01859
Though it was originally settled in 1845 by both Black and white people, black codes and Jim Crow laws in the years after the Civil...
Ruth Carol Taylor
02072
Ruth Carol Taylor became the first African American airline flight attendant in the United States when she joined Mohawk Airlines in 1958. While she is...
Jill Elaine Brown
0991
Jill Elaine Brown became the first African American woman to serve as a pilot for a major U.S airline when she was hired by Texas...
Charles L. Gittens
01041
Charles L. Gittens was an American Secret Service agent. He joined the Secret Service in 1956, becoming the agency’s first African American agent. An Army...
Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield
01401
Born a slave in 1819 in Natchez, Mississippi, Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield had little reason to dream of the life that would eventually become her own. ...