Firsts
Creating specialized hair care products in the early 1900s, she became one of the first American women to become a self-made millionaire.
Who is Madam C.J. Walker?
Maya Angelou released this best-selling memoir in 1969.
What is ‘I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings’?
This is the nickname for Aretha Franklin, R&B singer who sang the classic song “Respect” in 1967.
Who is The Queen of Soul?
This preacher and reformer from New York is credited as the first known African American suffragist.
Who is Sojourner Truth?
Issa Rae received 8 Emmy Nominations for this American comedy-drama television series.
What is Insecure?
She is the first African American woman and Howard University (HBCU) graduate to be nominated for national office by a major party.
Who is Kamala Harris?
Alice Walker won the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize in 1982 for this novel.
What is ‘The Color Purple’?
This popular legal television series featured Viola Davis as a central character.
What is ‘How to Get Away with Murder’?
In 1851, former slave Sojourner Truth delivered this famous speech at the National Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio.
What is ‘Ain’t I a Woman’?
Lorraine Hansberry wrote this Broadway play in 1959 making her the first black woman to do so.
What is "A Raisin in the Sun"?
In 2016, Channing Dungey making history in the process was named the first African American President of this broadcast television network.
What is ABC?
In the 1970s, the artist, Betye Saar, played on this theme of an age-old stereotype of the domestic black woman in her work.
What is ‘Aunt Jemima’?
Pop icon, Rihanna, launched this cosmetics brand in September 2017.
What is Fenty Beauty?
Following ratification of this Amendment, the battle for the vote ended for white women; however, for African American women the outcome was less clear.
What is the Nineteenth Amendment?
The first African American woman to receive both the Nobel Prize for Literature and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Who is Toni Morrison?
Wangari Maathai was the first African woman to receive this world-renowned award for her contributions to sustainable development, democracy, and peace in 2004.
What is the Nobel Peace Prize?
In the early 1900s, Pauline Hopkins, Albreta Moore Smith, Ella Wheeler Wilcox, and Angelina Grimké contributed to this magazine, which promoted the development of African American literature, protested injustice, and contested dominant representations of African American culture and history.
What is the Colored American Magazine?
Eartha Kitt released this song in 1953 that has become a Christmas staple.
What is “Santa Baby”?
With the end of the Civil War, this organization formed by former abolitionists and women’s rights advocates endorsed both women’s and Black men’s right to vote.
What is the American Equal Rights Association (AERA)?
Kerry Washington starred as this woman in the ABC Drama Series Scandal.
Who is Olivia Pope?
Technological patent filed by Marie Van Brittan Brown and her husband in 1966, in response to additional protection needed due to rising crime rates in New York City.
What is closed circuit TV/Modern home surveillance system/Home security system?
During the Slavery Era, Harriett Powers created African American Folk Art depicting scenes of the Bible and historic events with this textile. Her art has been preserved in the Smithsonian and Boston’s Museum of Fine Art.
What are quilts?
Halle Berry won an Academy Award in 2002 for Best Actress for her performance in this film.
What is Monster’s Ball?
She proclaimed in her closing remarks at the 1873 American Woman Suffrage Association convention, “much as white women need the ballot, colored women need it more.”
Who is Frances Ellen Watkins Harper?
She was one of the only women to sign the founding papers of the NAACP, helped to establish the National Association for Colored Women, and marched in suffrage parades.
Who is Ida B. Wells?