Alberta Hunter was one of the best blues and cabaret singers of her time. She was best-known for her song "Downhearted Blues," in 1922 which she wrote. Hunter was born on April 1, 1895 in Memphis, TN. At the age of eleven, she ran away from Memphis to Chicago, in hopes of working as a singer. ...

Absalom Jones was born into slavery in Sussex, Delaware in 1746.  He taught himself to read in his early teens from books he purchased by saving pennies given to him by visitors to his master’s home.  At the age of sixteen, Jones’ family was separated when his immediate family members ...

Ora Brown Stokes dedicated her life to improving the welfare of black women and girls. For twenty years, Stokes worked as a probation officer for the Richmond City Juvenile Court. She later organized the National Protective League for Negro Girls and a local chapter of the Council of Colored ...

When "wrestling" comes to mind it's often the popular sports entertainment form of professional wrestling or amateur and wrestling displayed in the Olympic Games, high school, and collegiate competition. When African/Afrikan martial arts come to mind, it's often strike-oriented styles from the ...

Vivian Osborne Marsh was one of the most influential black women in the San Francisco area. Marsh served her community as an activist and government official. Marsh was born in Houston, Texas on September 5, 1897. After high school, she applied to the University of California-Berkeley, and ...

BY WALTER OPINDE  On this day, June 14, 1931, Marla Gibbs (born Margaret Theresa Bradley) was born in Chicago, Illinois, at Cook County Hospital. Gibbs attended Wendell Phillips Academy High School in the Bronzeville neighborhood on Chicago's south side and graduated in 1949. Upon complet...

In 1790, the Brown Fellowship Society was founded. The oldest all-male funeral society in Charleston, South Carolina, it provides a historical example of how racism permeated the Black community within itself. Among the African Americans in the South Carolina community, lighter-skinned African ...

Photo credits: Andy Kropa/Invision/AP Decatur, Alabama was the birthplace of Mae Carol Jemison (1956). She is the baby child out of three siblings. Jemison’s mom worked as an elemental instructor. Her dad operated as a service assistant. Jemison and her relatives relocated to Chicago, ...

Although best known as the author of the first poem composed by an African American woman, Lucy Terry Prince was a remarkable woman whose many accomplishments included arguing a case before the Supreme Court.Lucy was stolen from Africa as an infant and sold to Ebenezer Wells of Deerfield, ...

Dr. Jessie G. Garnett was the first African American female dentist in Boston, Massachusetts. She practiced for 50 years until 1970. Garnett was born in Liverpool, Nova Scotia, in 1897. Her father died while she was still in her youth and her mother worked as a seamstress. By the age of eleven, ...

Una Winifred Atwell was a prominent Trinidadian pianist who was popular in Britain and Australia. During her professional music career, she sold over 20 million records. Atwell was best known for her series of boogie-woogie and ragtime hits, she was also the first African American woman to have a ...

John Henry Bradford was a vaudeville performer who did a song-and-dance act with Jeanette Taylor. Bradford was born in 1895 in Montgomery, Alabama and was the son of Adam Bradford and Bella (maiden name unknown), a cook. During Bradford's early years, he learned to play the piano by ear. In ...