180 Fun Facts About Black History

Who delivered the famous 'I Have a Dream' speech during the 1963 March on Washington?

Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his iconic 'I Have a Dream' speech on August 28, 1963, calling for an end to racism and envisioning a future of racial harmony.

Who refused to give up her bus seat in Montgomery, Alabama in 1955, sparking a major boycott?

Rosa Parks' refusal to give up her bus seat on December 1, 1955 led to the Montgomery Bus Boycott, a pivotal event in the civil rights movement that lasted 381 days.

Who was the first African American president of the United States?

Barack Obama was elected as the 44th President of the United States in 2008, becoming the first African American to hold the office. He served two terms until 2017.

What was the racial segregation system enforced by statute in the American South called?

The name probably comes from a minstrel-show song called 'Jump Jim Crow'; the statutes ran from the late 19th century to the mid-20th.

Which abolitionist's 1845 autobiography was followed by My Bondage and My Freedom in 1855?

He wrote three autobiographies in all, the last being Life and Times, and after the Civil War campaigned for the rights of freed slaves.

What landmark 1954 Supreme Court case declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional?

The unanimous ruling held that segregated public schools violate the Equal Protection Clause even where facilities are equal in quality, and became a model for later impact litigation.

Which Underground Railroad conductor is known as the 'Moses of her people'?

Harriet Tubman escaped slavery in 1849 and made approximately 13 missions to rescue about 70 enslaved people using the network of safe houses known as the Underground Railroad.

Which change to the U.S. Constitution, ratified on December 6, 1865, abolished slavery?

It bans slavery and involuntary servitude except as punishment for a crime, a clause later exploited through convict leasing and the Black Codes.

Who was the first African American to play Major League Baseball in the modern era?

Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color barrier when he debuted for the Brooklyn Dodgers on April 15, 1947. His courage in facing hostility paved the way for integration in professional sports.

What 1920s New York movement celebrated African American culture, art and literature?

The movement was fueled by the Great Migration and by immigrants from the Caribbean, and ran through the 1920s and 1930s.

Which civil rights leader co-founded the NAACP in 1909?

He edited the NAACP's journal The Crisis for decades and had earlier risen to prominence as a leader of the Niagara Movement.

Which year's Civil Rights Act outlawed bias by race, religion, sex and national origin?

Lyndon B. Johnson signed it at the White House on July 2, 1964, after the House accepted the Senate's amended version.

Who wrote the novel 'Beloved,' which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988?

Toni Morrison's 'Beloved' (1987) is set after the Civil War and explores the haunting legacy of slavery. Morrison later won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993.

Which Tuskegee Institute scientist became famous for developing hundreds of products from peanuts?

Carver wanted poor farmers to grow peanuts and sweet potatoes instead of only cotton; he is often mistakenly credited with inventing peanut butter.

Which 1969 Maya Angelou autobiography covers her childhood, up to age 17?

The first of her seven autobiographical volumes, published in 1969, it stops at age 17.

In 'Hidden Figures', which mathematician's calculations were critical to NASA's early space missions?

Katherine Johnson's orbital mechanics calculations were essential to the success of the first U.S. crewed spaceflights. She verified the computer calculations for John Glenn's orbital mission in 1962.

Roughly how many Black Americans left the rural South in the Great Migration of 1910 to 1970?

It ranks among the largest and most rapid internal migrations in history, driven largely by Jim Crow segregation, discrimination and continued lynchings in the South.

Who founded the Black Panther Party in 1966?

Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense in October 1966 in Oakland, California. The party advocated for armed self-defense and community social programs.

Which African American inventor designed a three-way traffic signal in 1923?

His manually operated signal had moving arms with 'stop' and 'go' signs; he also created a protective smoke hood used in a 1916 tunnel rescue.

Which 1955 killing of a Black 14-year-old in Mississippi galvanized the civil rights movement?

His mother insisted on a public funeral with an open casket in Chicago, and images of his body published in Black magazines and newspapers rallied support across the country.

Who was the first African American woman to win an Academy Award for Best Actress?

Berry won for playing a struggling widow in Monster's Ball (2001), and remains the only Black woman to have taken the award.

The 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches helped push which federal law through Congress that same year?

After the violence of Bloody Sunday, President Johnson addressed a nationally televised joint session of Congress on March 15 asking lawmakers to pass the bill.

Medgar Evers, murdered at his home in Jackson in 1963, held which post?

His killer, Byron De La Beckwith, walked free after two hung juries in the 1960s and was finally convicted in 1994.

Which African American woman became the first self-made female millionaire in the United States?

Madam C.J. Walker (Sarah Breedlove) built a hair care empire in the early 1900s, becoming the first female self-made millionaire in America. She was also a major philanthropist supporting Black causes.

What did a white mob destroy in the Tulsa Race Massacre of May 31 to June 1, 1921?

More than 35 square blocks of one of the wealthiest Black communities in the country were burned to the ground in two days.

Who was the first African American Supreme Court Justice?

Appointed by Lyndon B. Johnson in 1967, Marshall had won 29 of the 32 civil rights cases he argued before the Court as NAACP counsel.

Which musician is known as the 'Father of the Blues'?

Handy titled his 1941 autobiography Father of the Blues; his composition 'St. Louis Blues' became one of the most recorded songs of its era.

Which group, formed by Black pastors in 1957 after the Montgomery Bus Boycott, coordinated protest across the South?

The pastors first gathered at Atlanta's Ebenezer Church in January 1957 and settled on the name at their third meeting that August.

Which African American poet wrote the poem 'Harlem' (also known as 'A Dream Deferred')?

Langston Hughes published 'Harlem' in 1951 as part of his poetry collection 'Montage of a Dream Deferred.' Its famous opening line 'What happens to a dream deferred?' became iconic in American literature.

Who was the first African American woman to travel to space?

Mae Jemison became the first African American woman in space on September 12, 1992, when she flew aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour. She is also a physician and engineer.

What did the Supreme Court hold in the 1857 Dred Scott decision?

Widely considered the worst decision in the Court's history, it inflamed sectional tensions in the years before the Civil War.

Which 1960 Woolworth's lunch counter sit-in became a landmark of the civil rights movement?

On February 1, 1960, four African American college students sat at the whites-only lunch counter at Woolworth's in Greensboro, NC. Their peaceful protest sparked a wave of sit-ins across the South.

In 1968, Shirley Chisholm became the first Black woman to achieve what?

Four years later she became the first Black candidate for a major party's presidential nomination.

What genre of music originated in the African American communities of Louisiana's largest port city in the late 19th and early 20th centuries?

Its roots draw on blues, ragtime, spirituals, marches and African rhythmic traditions, and it has been a major form of musical expression since the 1920s Jazz Age.

Which civil rights activist and journalist led an anti-lynching campaign in the 1890s?

Ida B. Wells-Barnett was a pioneering investigative journalist who documented lynching in the United States. Her pamphlet 'Southern Horrors' (1892) exposed the widespread horror of lynching to a national audience.

Who led the most significant slave rebellion in U.S. history in Southampton County, Virginia in 1831?

Nat Turner led a rebellion in August 1831 in which approximately 55-65 white people were killed. The rebellion was suppressed within two days, and Turner was captured and executed. It led to harsher slave codes across the South.

Which numbered directive, signed by Truman on July 26, 1948, desegregated the U.S. Armed Forces?

It abolished discrimination 'on the basis of race, color, religion or national origin' in the services, and the actual re-integration took place during the Korean War.

Which African American inventor improved and patented a process for making light bulb carbon filaments?

Lewis Latimer patented a method for making carbon filaments for light bulbs in 1882, making electric lighting more affordable and practical. He also worked directly with both Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison.

Which 1896 Supreme Court case established the 'separate but equal' doctrine?

The case arose from a Louisiana railroad-car law; the doctrine stood for 58 years before the Court rejected it in public education.

Who founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)?

Marcus Garvey founded the UNIA in 1914 in Jamaica and expanded it in the U.S. into the largest mass movement in African American history. He promoted economic self-sufficiency and the Back-to-Africa movement.

From what did the Niagara Movement, the 1905 civil rights group, take its name?

Its first meeting was moved at the last minute to a hotel in Fort Erie, Ontario, across the river from Buffalo, to avoid a possible racist protest.

Which African American physician pioneered blood plasma preservation and organized the first large-scale blood bank?

Dr. Charles Drew developed techniques for processing and storing blood plasma and directed the first American Red Cross Blood Bank during World War II. His research saved countless lives on the battlefield.

In November 1960, six-year-old Ruby Bridges integrated William Frantz Elementary School in which city?

Federal marshals escorted her to school; she was allowed to eat only food brought from home and could not join recess.

Which organization, founded in 1960, coordinated youth-led sit-ins and Freedom Rides?

SNCC (pronounced 'snick') was founded in April 1960 at Shaw University, led by young activists like John Lewis, Diane Nash, and later Stokely Carmichael. It was one of the most important organizations of the civil rights movement.

What did Robert Smalls do in May 1862 while still enslaved?

He steered the CSS Planter past Confederate guns to the Union blockade and later served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1875 to 1879.

The Port Royal Experiment, begun in the Sea Islands of South Carolina in 1861, involved what?

After the Union captured the islands, the white residents fled, leaving 10,000 enslaved people; Northern charities sent teachers and helped them buy land.

Which labor leader organized the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters?

A. Philip Randolph organized the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in 1925, winning recognition from the Pullman Company in 1937. He also pushed President Roosevelt to ban racial discrimination in defense industries with Executive Order 8802.

Which African American historian, the 'Father of Black History', created Negro History Week?

Woodson founded The Journal of Negro History in 1916 and was only the second African American to earn a Harvard PhD.

Bayard Rustin was the principal organizer of which 1963 civil rights event?

Rustin had helped form the Congress of Racial Equality in 1942 and was repeatedly arrested protesting British colonial rule in India and Africa.

Which African American community in Florida was destroyed by a white mob in 1923?

The Rosewood massacre occurred in January 1923 when a white mob attacked the predominantly Black town of Rosewood, Florida. At least six Black residents were killed, and the town was burned to the ground. Survivors fled and never returned.

Before Carter G. Woodson in 1912, who was Harvard's first African American PhD?

Woodson, born to formerly enslaved parents, has been called the father of Black history; the two men later clashed over how Black scholarship should be organised.

In what year did "Negro History Week," the precursor to Black History Month, officially begin?

Historian Carter G. Woodson and the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History initiated "Negro History Week" in February 1926.

Members of the Black German community began observing the month in 1990 in which city?

Programmes there have covered black Europeans, US civil rights history and apartheid in South Africa.

In the United Kingdom, Black History Month is celebrated in which month?

While the United States and Canada observe Black History Month in February, the United Kingdom celebrates it in October.

February was picked for Black History Month partly to coincide with which two figures' birthdays?

Black communities had marked both birthdays since the late 19th century; in 1897 teacher Mary Church Terrell even got Washington, D.C. schools to observe a 'Douglass Day'.

In what year did President Gerald Ford officially recognize Black History Month in the United States?

President Gerald Ford officially recognized Black History Month in 1976, urging Americans to honor the accomplishments of Black Americans.

In what year was Carter G. Woodson's Association for the Study of Negro Life and History founded?

It was founded on September 9 during the Lincoln Jubilee exposition, a decade before the first Negro History Week; it held its first convention two years later.

Who co-founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History with Carter G. Woodson?

Moorland was a Congregational minister whose private library later seeded Howard University's Moorland-Spingarn Research Center.

In Jamaica, the February observance overlaps with which celebration tied to Bob Marley's birthday?

Dennis Brown, the 'Prince of Reggae', was also born in February; Jamaica adopted the month informally by the mid-1990s.

Which MP's motion led Canada's House of Commons to recognize February as Black History Month?

Augustine, the first Black woman elected to Canada's Parliament, represented Etobicoke—Lakeshore.

ASALH, which sets each year's theme, held its first annual convention in what year?

The convention still runs every autumn; the Association of Black Women Historians was founded at the 1977 edition.

Which week of February did the ASNLH originally designate for Negro History Week?

The week bracketed February 12 and 14; the response was lukewarm at first, with only three state education departments cooperating.

Before its expansion, Negro History Week gained significant support from which type of publications?

Churches also helped distribute the literature, though the first week drew only a lukewarm response from state education departments.

In what year did Canada's House of Commons officially recognize February as Black History Month?

The Senate followed with unanimous recognition in 2008, after a motion by Senator Donald Oliver.

Which Ghanaian analyst at the GLC led the creation of the UK's Black History Month?

For the launch event the GLC invited Dr. Maulana Karenga, creator of Kwanzaa, over from the United States.

Which US President signed the 1986 resolution designating February as Black History Month?

Senate Joint Resolution 74 made the designation and asked the president to proclaim it; the official title was 'National Black (Afro-American) History Month'.

The Lincoln Jubilee inspired Carter G. Woodson's Black History Month. In what city was it held?

The summer-long Jubilee in Bronzeville marked 50 years since emancipation and drew thousands; Woodson founded the ASNLH there that autumn.

Which city issued the first Black History Month proclamation in its country, in 1979?

The proclamation followed a petition from the Ontario Black History Society; the province followed fourteen years later.

Carter G. Woodson established the Negro History Bulletin in what year?

In 1937, at the urging of Mary McLeod Bethune, Woodson established the Negro History Bulletin, which focused on the annual theme.

By the 1940s, Black communities in which state, where Woodson often spoke, celebrated a full Negro History Month?

Activist Fredrick H. Hammaurabi followed in the mid-1960s at his House of Knowledge cultural centre in the Midwest.

Black History Month Ireland, launched in 2010, began in which city?

Ireland became only the fourth country to hold the observance, and like the UK it marks it in the autumn rather than February.

In the 1930s the observance pushed back against the "lost cause" myth, which recast the Civil War as what?

Woodson's reply: "When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions."

What annual theme did ASALH set for the February observance in 2024?

ASALH has set the theme every year since Woodson's time; the 2024 choice sat alongside themes on migration, the vote and health in the same decade.

Which actor said, "I don't want a Black history month. Black history is American history"?

Others worry the month reduces complex figures to objects of hero worship; ASALH's Woodson himself wanted a study of a whole race, not a few great men.

The very first Black History Month celebration, in 1970, opened on which date?

It ran nearly two months, to February 28, with many events at Kuumba House, the Black United Students' culture centre on campus.

In what year did Carter G. Woodson's fraternity, Omega Psi Phi, introduce "Negro History and Literature Week"?

The fraternity renamed it Negro Achievement Week in 1925 before Woodson's Association took it national the following year.

Which Canadian Senator moved in 2008 to recognise February as Black History Month?

Oliver was the first Black man appointed to Canada's Senate; his 2008 motion passed unanimously.

Ford's 1975 message said the week was sponsored by the Association for the Study of what?

Woodson's association has changed its name twice; the 1975 message urged Americans to be mindful of achievements 'too long obscured and unsung'.

The UK's first Black History Month coincided with the 150th anniversary of which event?

The launch year was dubbed the African Jubilee; the same anniversary logic gave the month its autumn slot in the British calendar.

Carter G. Woodson was born in 1875 to formerly enslaved parents in which US state?

Woodson, who was born in 1875 in Virginia to formerly enslaved parents, wanted to honor the heritage and achievements of Black Americans.

Which African American intellectual persuaded a fellow ASNLH co-founder to give his library to Howard in 1914?

That library became the foundation of Howard's Moorland-Spingarn Research Center.

Which Canadian province has called February 'African Heritage Month' since 1996?

The first Black History Month in Nova Scotia was observed in 1988 and later renamed African Heritage Month in 1996.

Carter G. Woodson earned his PhD in history from which institution?

He finished the doctorate in 1912, only the 2nd African American to do so there.

The UK's first Black History Month, the 'African Jubilee', partly marked the birth centenary of which Pan-Africanist?

It was also the 25th anniversary of the Organization of African Unity, and Dr. Maulana Karenga was flown in from the US for the launch event.

When did the Ontario Black History Society get February proclaimed Black History Month?

Toronto had gone first in 1979; the province followed in 1993.

Marking 100 years since the first observance, what theme did ASALH set for 2026?

The centenary was also marked with a White House celebration on February 18, 2026.

Which late-1960s struggle helped push the week-long observance toward becoming a full month?

Freedom Schools in the South put Black history on the curriculum, and by the late 1960s campus activists were replacing the week with a month at a quickening pace.

Which group's Washington branch hired a future ASNLH co-founder as secretary in 1891?

He went on to become a senior national YMCA official working with Black troops and communities.

In what year was the Ontario Black History Society (OBHS) established?

Daniel and Donna Hill founded it with four friends; within a year it had won the country's first municipal proclamation of the month.

Which US President proclaimed February 1996 as 'National African American History Month'?

ASALH notes that every president since the mid-1970s, Democrat and Republican, has issued a proclamation endorsing its annual theme.

The UK Black History Month was first launched in the 1980s in which major city?

The UK Black History Month was first launched in the 1980s in London.

In 1828 Sojourner Truth sued a white man and won, a first for a Black woman. Over what?

Born Isabella Bomefree, she took her new name in 1843; her famous 1851 speech was in Akron, Ohio.

Booker T. Washington's 1901 autobiography carries what title?

He led Tuskegee from 1881 and gave the celebrated Atlanta Address in 1895.

Which president did Booker T. Washington dine with at the White House in 1901?

It was the first time a Black person publicly met the president on equal terms.

Phillis Wheatley's Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral was published in 1773 in which city?

She is considered the first African-American author of a published book of poetry.

Benjamin Banneker helped Major Andrew Ellicott survey the borders of what?

The self-taught astronomer also wrote a successful series of almanacs.

Crispus Attucks is traditionally regarded as the first person killed in which 1770 event?

He was a whaler and sailor of African American and Native American descent.

John Brown was hanged in December 1859 as the first American executed for what crime?

His October raid targeted the federal armory at Harpers Ferry.

Which Union general ordered final enforcement of emancipation in Texas on June 19, 1865?

Juneteenth became a federal holiday in 2021 under President Biden.

Who commanded the famed 54th Infantry Regiment of Black soldiers as its colonel?

The regiment famously assaulted Fort Wagner on July 18, 1863.

The 10th Cavalry Regiment of Buffalo Soldiers was formed in 1866 at which Kansas post?

Colonel Benjamin Grierson founded the regiment; the oldest Buffalo Soldier died in 2005 aged 111.

Which numbered Tuskegee Airmen unit was the first Black flying squadron to deploy overseas?

It reached North Africa in April 1943 before moving to Sicily and Italy.

Hiram Rhodes Revels, the first African American in Congress, represented which state in the Senate?

He served in 1870–71 and later became first president of Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College.

The bureau set up in 1865 to aid refugees and freedmen operated until which year?

It relied on the War Department, the only agency with funds and a presence in the South.

The Fourteenth Amendment, addressing citizenship and equal protection, was adopted in which year?

Its first section includes the Citizenship, Due Process and Equal Protection clauses.

Which amendment, ratified in February 1870, barred denying the vote on account of race?

It was the third and last of the Reconstruction Amendments.

Zora Neale Hurston's most popular novel, published in 1937, is titled what?

She was also an anthropologist and folklorist; Tell My Horse came out the same year.

Duke Ellington gained a national profile through his orchestra's appearances at which Harlem venue?

He was born in Washington, D.C., and later collaborated for 35 years with Billy Strayhorn.

Louis Armstrong won a 1965 Grammy for Best Male Vocal Performance for which song?

Nicknamed Satchmo, he was born and raised in New Orleans.

Jesse Owens set five world records in under an hour at the 1935 Big Ten Championships in which city?

It has been called the greatest 45 minutes ever in sport, a year before his four Berlin golds.

Joe Louis made how many consecutive heavyweight title defences, a record for all weight classes?

The Brown Bomber reigned from 1937 to 1949 and beat Max Schmeling in their 1938 rematch.

Muhammad Ali won Olympic gold in 1960 in which division?

He was 18, and beat Sonny Liston for the world heavyweight title in February 1964.

Wilma Rudolph overcame which childhood disease before winning three golds at the 1960 Olympics?

She was the first American woman to win three track and field golds at one Games.

Althea Gibson became the first Black player to win a Grand Slam event at which 1956 tournament?

She won Wimbledon and the US Nationals in both 1957 and 1958, and later joined the LPGA.

Arthur Ashe is believed to have contracted HIV from a blood transfusion during what 1983 procedure?

He remains the only Black man to win singles titles at Wimbledon, the US Open and the Australian Open.

Which organisation refused to let Marian Anderson sing to an integrated audience in Constitution Hall in 1939?

Eleanor Roosevelt helped arrange her Easter Sunday concert on the Lincoln Memorial steps instead.

Paul Robeson was twice named a consensus All-American in which sport at Rutgers?

He was class valedictorian and later earned a law degree at Columbia while playing in the NFL.

Hattie McDaniel won her Oscar for playing which character in Gone with the Wind?

She was the first African American Oscar winner and, in 2006, the first honoured on a US stamp.

Sidney Poitier grew up in the Bahamas but was born in which US city?

His parents were visiting when he was born, which granted him US citizenship.

Sidney Poitier won a Silver Bear and became the first African American nominated for Best Actor for which film?

He went on to win the Best Actor Oscar in 1964.

After his 1964 pilgrimage to Mecca, Malcolm X became known by which name?

It roughly translates to 'The Pilgrim Malcolm the Patriarch'.

Fannie Lou Hamer was vice-chair of which group at the 1964 national convention in Atlantic City?

She was its vice-chair and ran for the US House the same year.

Which Arkansas governor initially prevented the Little Rock Nine from entering Central High in 1957?

The NAACP had selected the nine students for excellent grades and attendance.

The first Freedom Ride left Washington, D.C. on May 4, 1961, bound for which city?

It challenged non-enforcement of Supreme Court rulings against segregated interstate travel.

How many girls were killed in the 1963 bombing of Birmingham's 16th Street Baptist Church?

The FBI identified four Klansmen; King called it one of the most vicious crimes against humanity.

Roughly how many miles is the highway from Selma to Montgomery marched in 1965?

Troopers attacked about 600 marchers at the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Bloody Sunday, March 7.

Loving v. Virginia (1967) struck down state laws banning what?

The Lovings had been convicted under Virginia's Racial Integrity Act of 1924.

Martin Luther King Jr. was shot on April 4, 1968, at which Memphis lodging?

James Earl Ray was arrested at London's Heathrow Airport that June and sentenced to 99 years.

Titles VIII and IX of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 are commonly known as what?

Johnson signed it on April 11, 1968, during the riots after King's assassination.

Angela Davis was fired from UCLA in 1969 for membership in which organisation?

She later ran for vice president on the party's ticket in 1980 and 1984.

Shirley Chisholm spent part of her childhood on which Caribbean island?

In 1972 she became the first Black candidate for a major-party presidential nomination.

Barbara Jordan became the first African American and first woman to give a keynote at which event, in 1976?

She had won fame for her televised statement in the Nixon impeachment hearings.

Guion Bluford became the first African American in space in 1983 aboard which orbiter?

The mission was STS-8; he flew four shuttle missions in all.

Colin Powell served as the 65th US secretary of state during which years?

He was the first Black American in the post, and earlier chaired the Joint Chiefs from 1989 to 1993.

Kamala Harris graduated from which historically Black institution?

Born in Oakland, she was California's attorney general before joining the Senate in 2017.

Ketanji Brown Jackson is the first Supreme Court justice with what prior job?

Biden nominated her in February 2022 to succeed Stephen Breyer.

Toni Morrison's first novel, published in 1970, was titled what?

She won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993 and the Pulitzer for Beloved in 1988.

Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man won which honour in 1953?

Named after Ralph Waldo Emerson, he was born in Oklahoma City in 1913.

Which 1953 James Baldwin novel did Time rank among the top 100 English-language novels?

His 1955 essay collection Notes of a Native Son cemented his reputation.

The 1977 miniseries Roots aired on ABC over how many consecutive nights?

It won nine of its 37 Emmy nominations and was based on Alex Haley's 1976 novel.

The Oprah Winfrey Show ran in national syndication for how many years?

Broadcast from Chicago from 1986 to 2011, it made her the richest African-American of the 20th century.

Jack Johnson, the first Black world heavyweight champion, was nicknamed after which Texas city?

He held the title from 1908 to 1915 and was posthumously pardoned in 2018 over a Mann Act conviction.

Bill Russell won how many NBA championships in his 13 seasons with the Celtics?

He also led the San Francisco Dons to consecutive NCAA titles in 1955 and 1956.

The Emancipation Proclamation changed the legal status of roughly how many enslaved people?

Lincoln issued it on January 1, 1863, after a preliminary version in September 1862.

The 1839 revolt aboard La Amistad was led by which Mende captive?

The US Supreme Court ruled in favour of the Mende people in 1841, restoring their freedom.

Toussaint Louverture, leader of the Haitian Revolution, was born enslaved in which French colony?

He became Governor-General-for-life before fighting Bonaparte's troops.

Which West African empire reached its territorial peak under its ninth mansa, Musa?

His wealth came largely from controlling and taxing the trade in salt and gold.

After the Late Bronze Age collapse, the Kushites re-established a kingdom centred on which city?

Napata is modern Karima, Sudan; Kush lay along the Nile in Nubia.

Great Zimbabwe, the largest stone structure in precolonial Southern Africa, was built by ancestors of which people?

Construction ran from the 11th to the 15th century over 7.22 square kilometres.

Timbuktu flourished after a visit around 1325 by which Mali ruler?

It sits 20 km north of the Niger and traded in salt, gold and ivory.

Which nation shipped more enslaved people across the Atlantic than any other?

Britain, Spain, France, the Netherlands, the United States and Denmark followed in order.

Olaudah Equiano was known for most of his life by what name?

A leading British abolitionist in the 1780s, he belonged to the Sons of Africa.

Mary Seacole was famous for nursing during which war?

She published the first autobiography by a woman of African descent in Britain and received Jamaica's Order of Merit in 1990.

Kwame Nkrumah led which colony to independence from Britain in 1957?

It became Ghana; he was overthrown in a 1966 coup and won the Lenin Peace Prize in 1962.

Kwanzaa was created by Maulana Karenga in the aftermath of which 1965 event?

First celebrated in 1966, it runs from December 26 to January 1.

Which is the oldest HBCU, founded in 1837 as the Institute for Colored Youth?

Quaker Richard Humphreys bequeathed $10,000 to found it as the Institute for Colored Youth.

The Washington HBCU founded in 1867 is named for a general who also headed which agency?

Established in 1867, it is a federally chartered university in Washington's Shaw neighbourhood.

Spelman College was founded in 1881 under what name?

It began in the basement of Friendship Baptist Church and awarded its first degrees in 1901.

How many teenagers were accused in the 1931 Scottsboro Boys case?

They were arrested at Paint Rock, Alabama, after a freight train was searched.

How many men with latent syphilis were enrolled in the Tuskegee Study?

A control group of 201 uninfected men was included; the study ran from 1932 to 1972.

Which researcher cultured Henrietta Lacks's cells to create the HeLa line?

The cells were biopsied during her cervical cancer treatment at Johns Hopkins in 1951.

Daniel Hale Williams founded which Chicago institution in 1891, the first non-segregated hospital in the US?

He is known for the first successful cardiac surgery, on the pericardium.

Percy Julian was the first person to synthesise which natural product?

His work on plant sterols laid the foundation for the steroid drug industry.

Mark Dean holds three of the nine patents for co-creating which 1981 product?

He also developed the ISA bus and led the team behind a one-gigahertz processor chip.

In 1949 Dorothy Vaughan became acting supervisor of which group at Langley?

She was the first African-American woman to supervise staff at the centre.

Bessie Coleman earned her pilot's licence in 1921 from which body?

She trained in France because no US school would take a Black woman.

Matthew Henson accompanied which explorer on seven Arctic voyages?

Their 1909 expedition claimed the North Pole; Henson said he reached it first.

York, the only African American on the 1804–06 expedition to the Pacific, was enslaved by whom?

He became the first African American to cross the continent and see the Pacific.

Estevanico, one of the first Africans to explore North America, was a native of which Moroccan town?

He was one of four survivors of the 1528 Narváez expedition.

The first Africans in Virginia landed at Point Comfort in 1619 aboard which ship?

Captain John Jope had plundered them from a Portuguese slave ship carrying people from Ndongo.

Elizabeth Freeman's 1781 lawsuit found enslavement inconsistent with which state's constitution?

Known as Mumbet, her case Brom and Bett v. Ashley was cited in Quock Walker's suit.

Richard Allen founded which denomination in 1794, the first independent Black one in the US?

He was elected its first bishop in 1816 after opening a church in Philadelphia.

Denmark Vesey bought his freedom in Charleston after doing what?

He helped found the congregation now known as Mother Emanuel in 1818.

Gabriel, who planned an 1800 slave rebellion near Richmond, worked as what?

He and 25 followers were hanged after the plot leaked.

The 1739 Stono Rebellion took place in which colony?

Its leaders were likely from the Kingdom of Kongo; the leader Jemmy was literate.

Harriet Jacobs published Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl in 1861 under which pseudonym?

Born in Edenton, North Carolina, she hid for seven years before escaping north.

Mary McLeod Bethune founded which organisation in 1935?

That year she also became the first Black woman to lead a federal agency division under FDR.

Who was the first African American to win a Pulitzer, for the poetry collection Annie Allen?

A lifelong Chicagoan, Brooks was Poet Laureate of Illinois from 1968 until her death in 2000.

Which Lorraine Hansberry play made her the first Black American woman with a play on Broadway?

The title came from Langston Hughes's poem 'Harlem'; at 29 she won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for it.

Jean Baptiste Point du Sable is recognised as the founder of which major US city?

He settled near the mouth of the Chicago River around the 1780s; the site is now a National Historic Landmark.