Civil Rights & Activism
Who is the Black woman writer and anthropologist best known for her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, written during the Harlem Renaissance?
Zora Neale Hurston.
This artist created one of the best-selling albums of all time in the late 1980's
Who is Michael Jackson?
Thriller, the album, is heavily played during Halloween, particularly the title track "Thriller," which is considered the ultimate Halloween anthem.
Who was the first black woman to travel in space?
Who is Dr. Mae Jemison?
Dr. Jemison served as a mission specialist aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour, joining NASA's astronaut corps in 1987. She was selected to serve for the STS-47 mission, during which she orbited the Earth for nearly eight days in September of 1992. Dr. Jemison earned her medical degree from Cornell University and served as a Peace Corps doctor and a general practitioner before applying to NASA. After leaving NASA, she founded a technology research company and later formed a non-profit educational foundation. Dr. Jemison has also written several books for children and appeared in a 1993 episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
The first two rappers to win a Grammy Award for their hit single "Parents Just Don't Understand"
Who is DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince (Will Smith).
The first African American to play in the MLB.
Who is Moses Fleetwood Walker?
While he was the first openly Black player in the major leagues in 1884, he was also the last African-American to participate on the major league level before Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color line in 1947.
Who was the 15-year-old activist who refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus nine months before Rosa Parks?
Who is Claudette Colvin?
She was an American pioneer of the 1950s civil rights movement and a nurse aide. On March 2, 1955, she was arrested at the age of 15 in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus.
Lorraine Hansberry's play, the first by a Black woman on Broadway, is this.
What is A Raisin in the Sun?
Known for his work with soybeans, he developed over 300 products, including synthetic milk and paints.
Who is George Washington Carver?
Berry Gordy Jr. founded this iconic Detroit record label in 1959.
What is Motown Records?
This abolitionist famously led enslaved people to freedom via the Underground Railroad.
Who is Harriet Tubman?
What is the biggest Civil Rights Movement in history?
What is the March on Washington?
On August 28, 1963, hundreds of thousands of people arrived in Washington, D.C., for the largest non-violent civil rights demonstration that the nation had ever seen: The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
The 1920s and 1930s ushered in a period of intellectual and cultural revival of African American music, dance, art, fashion, literature, theater, and politics centered in Harlem, in New York City. What was it called?
What is The Harlem Renaissance?
The movement also included new African American cultural expressions across the urban areas of the Northeast and Midwest United States, shaped by renewed militancy in the broader struggle for civil rights for African Americans that followed the civil rights struggles in the then-still-segregated US Armed Forces.
The Harlem Renaissance was further inspired by the NAACP, the Garveyite movement, and the Russian Revolution, combined with the Great Migration of African American workers fleeing the racist conditions of the Jim Crow Deep South. Harlem was the final destination of the largest number of those who migrated north. Although it was centered in Harlem, many francophone black writers from African and Caribbean colonies living in Paris were also influenced by the movement.
This pioneering neurosurgeon became the first Black woman to become a neurosurgeon in the U.S. in 1980, saving thousands of children's lives
Who is Dr. Alexa Canady?
In 1953, the song “Hound Dog” was released by this blues singer before Elvis Presley’s 1956 version.
Who is Big Mama Thornton?
She was not only a vocalist—she also played the drums and the harmonica. Her version of “Hound Dog” was a great success. In 1953, the song peaked at #1 on the R&B charts and resided there for a lengthy seven weeks. In 1965, she recorded “Ball N’ Chain,” which would famously be covered by Janis Joplin in 1968.
This African American woman is recorded as the first black self-made millionaire in the U.S. Who is she?
Who is Madam C. J. Walker
Ms. Walker made her fortune by developing and marketing a line of cosmetics and hair care products for black women through the business she founded, Madam C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company. She was also known for her philanthropy and activism. She made financial donations to numerous organizations and became a patron of the arts. Villa Lewaro, Walker's lavish estate in Irvington, New York, served as a social gathering place for the African-American community.
Co-founder of the Black Panther Party with Bobby Seale, this activist advocated Black empowerment.
Who is Huey P. Newton?
Langston Hughes published his first poetry collection, The Weary Blues, in this decade.
What is the 1920s?
Alexander Miles patented an improvement for this common household item in 1887.
What is the elevator?
The first Black Disney Princess featured in a movie set in New Orleans.
Who is Princess Tiana?
Shirley Chisholm was the first Black woman elected to this legislative body.
What is Congress?
Which Supreme Court case, decided in 1965, dealt with the exclusion of Black citizens from juries in Alabama?
What is Swain v. Alabama?
Swain, a Black man sentenced to death by an all-white jury in Alabama, challenged his conviction on the grounds that Black jurors were systematically excluded, noting that although 26% of eligible jurors were Black, none had served on a petit jury since 1950, and all Black jurors in his case were struck by the prosecution. In a 6–3 decision, the Supreme Court rejected this claim, holding that the evidence did not establish a prima facie case of racial discrimination under the Fourteenth Amendment, despite a dissent arguing the exclusion was unconstitutional.
This singer/actress, the first Black woman to star in a leading film role (Carmen Jones), was a vaudeville star.
Who is Dorothy Dandridge?
This inventor created a rotary blade lawnmower in 1899 designed to prevent the mower from being blocked by thick grass.
Who is John Albert Burr?
Whose 1939 Easter Sunday concert at the Lincoln Memorial broke racial barriers and was seen as an important moment in the struggle for civil rights?
Who is Marian Anderson?
She was denied the opportunity to perform at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C. because of a “White Performers Only” policy enforced by the Daughters of the American Revolution, who owned the venue. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt withdrew from the organization in protest and helped organize the Easter Sunday concert, which was attended by 75,000 people. NBC’s radio coverage of the concert was added to the National Recording Registry in 2008
This individual beat the Nazis in their own Olympics?
Who is Jesse Owens?