Pop Culture
This singer became the first Black woman to win Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards for her self-titled debut album.
Whitney Houston
Howard University was founded in this year.
1867
This NAACP activist became a major figure of the Montgomery Bus Boycott after refusing to give up her seat in 1955.
Rosa Parks
This Howard University alumnus played T’Challa in Black Panther.
Chadwick Boseman
This Howard Law graduate became the first Black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
Thurgood Marshall
This landmark 1964 law outlawed segregation in public accommodations and prohibited employment discrimination.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
This 1997 film, directed by Kasi Lemmons, follows a young girl uncovering secrets about her Louisiana Creole family and starred Samuel L. Jackson and Lynn Whitfield.
Eve’s Bayou
In 1926, this Howard University historian founded Negro History Week, the predecessor to Black History Month.
Carter G. Woodson
This 1964 Mississippi voting-rights campaign brought hundreds of volunteers to the state to register Black voters and establish Freedom Schools.
Freedom Summer
This 1991 John Singleton film became the first film directed by a Black filmmaker to receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Director.
Boyz n the Hood
This Howard professor became the first Black person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
Ralph Bunche
This 1950 Supreme Court case ruled that the separate law school Texas created for Black students was unequal.
Sweatt v. Painter
This rapper became the first solo female rapper to have a platinum-certified album with her 1994 debut, Funkdafied.
Da Brat
Known as “The Man Who Killed Jim Crow,” this former Howard Law dean mentored Thurgood Marshall and developed legal strategies used to attack segregation.
Charles Hamilton Houston
This 1958 Supreme Court case protected the NAACP from being forced by Alabama to reveal its membership lists.
NAACP v. Alabama