Inventors, Science, Technology
This scientist & inventor is best known for the more than 300 uses he devised for the peanut, including the invention of peanut butter.
Who is Geroge Washington Carver (c.1864-1943)?
Note: Also: was a nutritional advisor to Mahatma Gandhi
These two members co-founded the Black Panther Party.
Who are Huey P. Newton (1942-1989) and Bobby Seale (1936-)?
She has won 23 major singles titles, the most by any man or woman in the Open Era. The Women's Tennis Association ranked her world No. 1 in singles on eight separate occasions between 2002 and 2017. She has competed at three Olympics and won four gold medals.
Who is Serena Williams (1981-present)?
Anthropologist, folklorist, civil rights activist and author, Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960) is one of the leading African American writers of the twentieth century. She is remembered most for this, her second novel.
What is Their Eyes Were Watching God?
This person became America's first self-made female millionaire in 1910 by creating, manufacturing and distributing a line of beauty and hair care products for black women.
Who is Madame C.J. Walker (1867-1919).
This chemist developed the first successful treatment for leprosy (Hansen's disease).
Who is Alice Ball (1892-1916)?
This actor and pillar of the civil rights movement was honored for his contribution and legacy by the National Civil Rights Museum with its Freedom Award in 2001.
Who is Sydney Poitier (1927 - 2022)?
In 1981, Charles Chapman became the first African American athlete to swim across which water region?
What is the English Channel?
This Isabel Wilkerson book exposes the struggles the United States has experienced due to the preservation of the constraints and legacy of slavery that still leaves its mark on our modern society.
What is Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent?
In this year, Congress passed ‘National Black History Month’ into law proclaiming that ‘the foremost purpose of Black History Month is to make all Americans aware of this struggle for freedom and equal opportunity’.
What is 1986?
Benjamin Banneker taught himself astronomy and mathematics. He was able to predict events such as solar eclipses, sunrises and sunsets leading to his development of this annual calendar in 1792.
What is the Almanac?
Lil' Bobby Hutton (Robert James Hutton) was the first recruit and first treasurer of the Black Panther Party. He became a member at this age.
What is 16 years old?
While recording Just as I Am, he was still working for an aircraft company installing toilets on Boeing 747s.
Who is Bill Withers? (1938-2020)
The first published African American author and poet in the U.S.
Who is Phillis Wheatley (1753-1784)?
This “pharaoh of fabulosity" and former Vogue editor got his start in fashion with an unpaid apprenticeship to Diana Vreeland at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute. He also served on the judging panel for America's Next Top Model.
Who was André Leon Talley? (1948 - 2022)
Noteworthy inventions from this researcher include a wire precision resistor used in televisions and a control unit for the pacemaker. When he died in 1982, he had 26 patents in his name.
Who is Otis Boykin (1920-1982)?
Archbishop Desmond Tutu (1931-2021), won the Nobel Peace Prize in this year for his efforts in resolving and ending apartheid in South Africa.
What is 1984?
Bob Johnson became the first African American billionaire by selling this network to Viacom in 2006.
What is BET (Black Entertainment Television)?
Alex Haley wrote The Autobiography of Malcolm X in 1965. He later followed up with this Pulitzer Prize winning novel.
What is Roots?
This woman founded the #MeToo Movement long before Hollywood co-opted it.
Who is Tarana Burke?
Note: The Pew research group has estimated that the #MeToo hashtag was used more than 19 million times on Twitter alone during the movement’s peak in 2017.
As Director of the Hayden Planetarium he removed Pluto from the display of planets and classified it as a dwarf planet which invoked a strong response from some visitors. While some asked for the planet Pluto back, the International Astronomical Union followed his lead in 2006. The organization officially labeled Pluto as a dwarf planet.
Who is Neil Degrasse Tyson (1958-)?
The civil rights Freedom Movement leader Ella Baker (1903 - 1986) was co-founder of this organization.
What is the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)?
Note: Founded in 1996, the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights in Oakland was named after her.
Gordon Parks (1912–2006) was an American photographer, musician, and writer who became prominent in U.S. photojournalism in the 1940s through 1970s — particularly in issues of civil rights, poverty and equality for African Americans. What publication did he work for?
What is Life Magazine?
W.E.B. DuBois, author of Souls of Black Folk, was the first African American to receive a Ph.D. this ivy league institution.
What is Harvard?
In this year British taxpayers stopped paying off incurred government debt to compensate slave owners due to the abolition of slavery.
What is 2015?
Note: The original £20 million loan was eventually incorporated into another gilt that was set to be repaid in 1957 at the very earliest. It was then finally repaid in 2015 as part of government restructuring of its debt.