Music/Entertainment
Known as the “King of Pop” this figure was known for his musical talent from a young age that influenced generations of music after him
Michael Jackson
This prominent figure led the civil rights movement including the March on Washington and the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Which athlete broke the modern color barrier in Major League Baseball in 1947?
Jackie Robinson
Which Black scholar was the first African American to earn a PhD from Harvard University?
W.E.B. Du Bois
This figure made history by serving as the 46th President of the United States
Barack Obama
Which Black singer is known as the “Queen of Soul”?
Aretha Franklin
Which Black teenager’s murder in 1955 helped spark national outrage and energized the modern Civil Rights Movement after his mother insisted on an open-casket funeral?
Emmett Till
Which Black woman became the first to win a Grand Slam tennis title in the Open Era in 1968?
Althea Gibson
Which 19th-century Black educator founded Tuskegee Institute and emphasized vocational education?
Booker T. Washington
This President signed the Civil Rights Act in 1964, officially ending segregation in the United States.
President Lydon B. Johnson
Which Black composer and bandleader was known as the “King of Ragtime” and helped bring syncopated music into American popular culture in the early 1900s?
Scott Joplin
What grassroots organization, founded in 1960 after the Greensboro sit-ins, focused on youth-led activism and direct action?
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
Which NFL player famously raised his fist during the U.S. national anthem at Super Bowl XXII in 1988?
Doug Williams
Which Black woman founded the National Council of Negro Women and served as an advisor to multiple U.S. presidents?
Mary McLeod Bethune
This figure made history by becoming the first black woman to serve on the U.S Supreme Court in 2022.
Ketanji Brown Jackson
Which Black artist became the first rapper to win a Pulitzer Prize?
Kendrick Lamar
Which Black woman was the first to run for President of the United States in 1972?
Shirley Chisholm
Which boxer was the first to win the heavyweight championship three separate times?
Muhammad Ali
Which Black woman was the first to earn a PhD in mathematics in the United States?
Euphemia Lofton Haynes
This figure was the lead attorney in Brown v. The Board of Education which ended segregation in public schools.
Thurgood Marshall
Which 1970s television miniseries, based on Alex Haley’s book, brought the history of slavery into millions of American homes?
Roots
This female figure was one of the key organizers of the freedom riders and let student sit-ins
Diane Nash
Which Black Olympic athlete was stripped of his medals after giving a Black Power salute at the 1968 Mexico City Games?
Tommie Smith (also John Carlos—accept either)
Which Supreme Court Justice wrote the majority opinion in Brown v. Board of Education?
Chief Justice Earl Warren
This woman was the first black woman to serve in a Presidential cabinet under President Jimmy Carter in 1977
Patricia Roberts Harris