98 Fun Facts About Black History & Culture

Which Alabama city's bus boycott began after a Black woman was arrested for refusing to give up her seat?

Montgomery's boycott ended only when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a ruling that segregated seating on its buses was unconstitutional.

Which civil rights leader won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize?

Martin Luther King Jr. gave away the prize money, sharing it among leading civil rights groups instead of keeping it.

What genre originated in New Orleans' African American communities around 1900?

Jazz star Louis Armstrong learned to play cornet properly in a New Orleans boys' home, where he was sent after an arrest on New Year's Eve 1912.

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

Barack Obama lost a 2000 congressional primary to incumbent Bobby Rush by two to one, eight years before he won the presidency.

Which whites-only Harlem venue had Duke Ellington's orchestra as its house band?

The Cotton Club's live radio broadcasts carried Duke Ellington's orchestra across the country and made him a national star.

Before the first American orbital flight, its astronaut asked which NASA mathematician to check the electronic computer's numbers by hand?

Katherine Johnson ran the same equations on a desk calculator, and she recalled Glenn saying that if she said the numbers were good, he was ready to go.

What name was given to the statutes that enforced racial segregation across the American South after Reconstruction?

Jim Crow laws were upheld in 1896, when the Supreme Court's Plessy v. Ferguson ruling accepted 'separate but equal' facilities.

Which African American athlete broke Major League Baseball's color barrier in 1947?

Jackie Robinson debuted for the Brooklyn Dodgers on April 15, and every April 15 all MLB players now wear his number 42 on Jackie Robinson Day.

Which landmark Supreme Court case ruled that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional?

Brown v. Board of Education was unanimous, yet a year later Brown II ordered desegregation only 'with all deliberate speed', and many Southern leaders resisted.

Which author wrote the novel "Beloved" (1987), a story about the haunting legacy of slavery?

Toni Morrison drew on Margaret Garner, who fled slavery to Cincinnati in 1856 and killed her daughter as the family was being recaptured.

What does the holiday Juneteenth commemorate?

Emancipation being enforced in Texas in 1865 came through General Gordon Granger's order, about two and a half years after the Proclamation took effect.

Which city is considered the birthplace of hip-hop music?

Hip-hop originated in the Bronx, New York City, in the 1970s. DJ Kool Herc is widely credited with pioneering the genre at a back-to-school party in 1973.

Garrett Morgan patented an early version of which roadway device in 1923?

Garrett Morgan sold his traffic signal patent to General Electric, and in 1916 his smoke hood let him rescue men trapped in a tunnel beneath Lake Erie.

Which African American poet wrote "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings"?

Maya Angelou's 1969 memoir has repeatedly been among the books most challenged in US schools and libraries, over its sexual content and racism.

Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale founded their radical party in 1966 in which California city?

Oakland was where the party first drew attention, as members openly carried guns on patrols to monitor the police.

Which soul singer is known as the "Queen of Soul"?

Aretha Franklin turned Otis Redding's 'Respect', a husband demanding respect at home, into a 1967 hit later embraced as a feminist anthem.

What was the Underground Railroad?

A network of secret routes and safe houses for escapees operated in defiance of federal fugitive slave laws, and many who used it fled as far as Canada.

Turned away by Maryland's segregated law school, Thurgood Marshall studied law at which historically Black university?

Howard University is where Charles Hamilton Houston mentored Marshall, insisting students be 'social engineers rather than lawyers'.

What traditional African American dish, made from pig intestines, is considered a soul food staple?

Chitlins, or chitterlings, must be washed rigorously, which also tames their natural odor, yet the smell of them cooking remains notorious.

Which Alabama institute scientist developed hundreds of uses for peanuts and sweet potatoes?

George Washington Carver designed a mobile classroom, the Jesup wagon, to take his farming lessons out to the farmers themselves.

Which 1977 miniseries based on Alex Haley's novel became one of the most-watched broadcasts in US history?

Roots aired on ABC over eight consecutive nights in January 1977. Its final episode drew 100 million viewers, and an estimated 130 to 140 million watched the miniseries overall — more than half the U.S. population at the time.

What is the 1921 destruction of 'Black Wall Street' by white mobs called?

The Tulsa Race Massacre destroyed Greenwood, yet Black Tulsans rebuilt it despite city efforts to force them out.

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

Halle Berry won for Monster's Ball and dedicated the moment to every nameless, faceless woman of color who now had a chance.

Which Harlem Renaissance poet wrote the poem "The Negro Speaks of Rivers"?

Langston Hughes launched his literary career when The Crisis published the poem in 1921.

Which African American sprinter won four gold medals at the 1936 Berlin Olympics?

Jesse Owens got a ticker-tape parade in New York, yet had to ride a freight elevator to his own reception at the Waldorf hotel.

What seven-day celebration of African heritage did Maulana Karenga create in 1966?

Kwanzaa was created by Dr. Maulana Karenga in 1966 and is based on seven principles (Nguzo Saba) including unity, self-determination, and creativity.

Which abolitionist, born into slavery in Maryland, published a bestselling 1845 Narrative of his life?

Frederick Douglass then spent almost two years speaking in Britain and Ireland to avoid recapture, and supporters there bought his freedom.

Which African American surgeon improved blood plasma storage and organized the first large-scale blood bank?

Charles Drew's blood bank program at first excluded Black donors, so its leading expert was ineligible to take part, and he protested the policy.

Which 2018 Marvel Studios film was the studio's first directed by an African American filmmaker?

Black Panther's star Chadwick Boseman died in 2020, and Marvel said the sequel would not use a digital double of him.

What was the Great Migration?

Black Americans leaving the rural South for northern cities numbered about six million from 1910 to 1970, escaping racial violence and seeking work.

Inventor Sarah Boone patented a narrow, curved version of which household item, shaped to fit sleeves?

Sarah Boone's ironing board was reversible, so both the inside and outside seams of a sleeve could be ironed.

Which protest method did students use at Greensboro's Woolworth's lunch counter in 1960?

The sit-in spread to other college towns, and the protests pushed Woolworth to drop its segregation policy in the South.

Which bebop pioneer was nicknamed 'Bird'?

Charlie Parker, as a teenager at Kansas City's Reno Club, was driven off the stage when drummer Jo Jones threw a cymbal at his feet.

What was the name of the all-Black fighter pilot unit that served with distinction in World War II?

After Truman desegregated the armed forces in 1948, veteran Tuskegee Airmen went on to long careers in the new US Air Force.

Which woman is called the 'Mother of the Civil Rights Movement' for refusing to give up her bus seat?

Rosa Parks was a longtime NAACP activist, and local leaders saw her arrest as the legal test case they had been seeking.

Which Alvin Ailey work, set to traditional spirituals, is one of the most performed ballets in the world?

Revelations drew on Ailey's memories of Baptist church services in Texas, and it moves from the depths of grief to the holiest joy.

In 1619, the White Lion's captain traded the first recorded Africans in English Virginia for what?

The captain sold them for food, having seized them at sea from a slave ship bound for Mexico.

Which label founded in 1959 brought The Supremes, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye to the mainstream?

Motown Records began as Tamla, launched with an $800 loan from Berry Gordy Jr.'s family, and the Motown name came afterward.

Which activist, born with the surname Little, rose to national prominence in the Nation of Islam?

Malcolm X came back from his 1964 pilgrimage to Mecca as el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz, with a more moderate outlook on race.

Which 1857 Supreme Court decision denied that African Americans could be US citizens?

Dred Scott v. Sandford's opinion said Black people 'had no rights which the white man was bound to respect', and it moved the nation closer to civil war.

Which hair care entrepreneur is known as America's first self-made female millionaire?

Madam C.J. Walker, born Sarah Breedlove to formerly enslaved parents, donated to causes such as the NAACP and the Black YMCA.

Which Texas congresswoman opened her 1974 impeachment statement with 'My faith in the Constitution is whole'?

She was the first African American elected to the Texas Senate since Reconstruction, and in 1976 the first African American and first woman to keynote a Democratic National Convention.

Which abolitionist led a band of scouts and spies for the Union Army?

Harriet Tubman's intelligence helped free enslaved people, and many of the freed men joined Black Union regiments.

Which boxer was stripped of his heavyweight title for refusing to be drafted during the Vietnam War?

Muhammad Ali stayed out of prison while he appealed, and the U.S. Supreme Court overturned his draft conviction in 1971.

Which gospel singer performed at the 1963 March on Washington?

Mahalia Jackson sang at fundraisers for the civil rights movement, and she also sang when John F. Kennedy was inaugurated in 1961.

What was the Freedmen's Bureau?

A federal agency aiding formerly enslaved people, the Bureau also helped found schools and performed marriages for freed couples.

Which addition to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1865, formally abolished slavery?

The 13th Amendment passed the Senate in 1864 but stalled in the House until Lincoln pressed for it, and it finally passed in January 1865.

Which three-time Grand Slam champion was the first Black player selected for the US Davis Cup team?

Arthur Ashe is believed to have contracted HIV from a blood transfusion after heart surgery, and he spent his last years educating people about AIDS.

Nearest Green, an enslaved distiller, taught his craft to the founder of which whiskey brand?

Jack Daniel's founder learned distilling from Green as a boy, then hired him as the distillery's first master distiller. Green is the first African-American master distiller on record.

Aerospace engineer Lonnie Johnson invented which water gun, first sold in 1990 as the Power Drencher?

Super Soaker grew out of a heat pump Johnson was tinkering with. His day job included developing the nuclear power source for the Galileo mission to Jupiter.

Despite the name, the Harlem Globetrotters were formed in 1926 in which Midwestern city?

Chicago's South Side is where all the original players grew up. Promoter Abe Saperstein put Harlem in the name while touring the team through small towns in Illinois and Iowa.

The send-off 'Bye, Felicia' comes from which 1995 Ice Cube comedy set in South Central Los Angeles?

Friday has Ice Cube's Craig wave off a mooching neighbor, spelled Felisha in the film, with the line. Ice Cube, who co-wrote the script, calls it the phrase to get anyone out of your face.

Which 'Lady Marmalade' singer's sweet potato pies sold out at Walmart in 2015 after a viral fan video?

Patti LaBelle's pies were selling one every second at Walmart after vlogger James Wright raved about them on YouTube.

James Hemings, an enslaved chef trained in Paris, is credited with introducing which dish to America?

Mac and cheese grew out of the 'macaroni pie' Hemings prepared. He won his freedom in 1796 only after training his brother Peter to replace him as chef.

Which American-born star of 1920s Paris, famous for a banana skirt, later spied for the French Resistance?

Josephine Baker carried notes written in invisible ink on her sheet music. In 2021 she became the first Black woman inducted into the Panthéon in Paris.

Which Barry Jenkins film won Best Picture in 2017 moments after 'La La Land' was announced by mistake?

Moonlight was named only after a 'La La Land' producer stepped forward to correct the error. Presenter Warren Beatty had been handed a duplicate of the Best Actress envelope.

Which rock and roll pioneer's 'Johnny B. Goode' travels through space on the Voyager Golden Record?

Chuck Berry made the cut over the objection of folklorist Alan Lomax, who called rock music adolescent. Carl Sagan replied that there are a lot of adolescents on the planet.

Which astronaut, the first Black woman in space, later appeared in an episode of 'Star Trek: The Next Generation'?

Mae Jemison played Lieutenant Palmer in 1993, becoming the first real-life astronaut to appear on the show. Aboard the shuttle Endeavour she had opened her shifts with 'Hailing frequencies open'.

On 'The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air', which actor played Carlton Banks, who dances to Tom Jones's 'It's Not Unusual'?

Alfonso Ribeiro had real dance credentials: he first won notice as a child in the Broadway musical The Tap Dance Kid. His routine as Will's preppy cousin became known as 'The Carlton'.

Which TGIF sitcom about the Winslows made a star of nerdy neighbor Steve Urkel, played by Jaleel White?

Family Matters brought Urkel in midway through its first season for what was meant to be a one-off appearance. He quickly became the focus of the series, itself a spin-off of Perfect Strangers.

Which spin-off of 'The Cosby Show' followed Denise Huxtable to Hillman College, a fictional historically Black school?

A Different World ended in 1993. Between the 1984 debut of 'The Cosby Show' and that finale, enrollment at historically Black colleges rose 24 percent.

Which 1990s sitcom starred Queen Latifah as Khadijah James, publisher of Flavor magazine, in a Brooklyn brownstone?

Living Single creator Yvette Lee Bowser set out to write a show about herself and her friends. It ranked in the top five among African-American viewers in all five of its seasons.

Which Keenen Ivory Wayans sketch show launched Jim Carrey and featured Jennifer Lopez as a 'Fly Girl' dancer?

In Living Color pulled in 20 million viewers with a live episode aired against the 1992 Super Bowl halftime show. The stunt pushed the NFL to book A-list halftime acts, starting with Michael Jackson.

In 'Coming to America', Eddie Murphy's Prince Akeem is heir to the throne of which fictional African nation?

Zamunda's crown prince swaps palace life for an entry-level job at McDowell's, a McDonald's knockoff whose owner is dodging trademark accusations.

In which 2017 Jordan Peele horror film is the hero hypnotized into a dark void called 'the Sunken Place'?

Get Out won Peele the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Within three weeks it had passed $100 million in the US, a first for a Black writer-director's debut film.

Which hardworking New Orleans waitress became Disney's first Black princess in 'The Princess and the Frog'?

Tiana was first written as a chambermaid named Maddy. Disney changed both the name and the job after critics said 'Maddy' sat too close to a derogatory term.

Which actress was the first African American to win an Academy Award, for playing Mammy in 'Gone with the Wind'?

Hattie McDaniel spent the ceremony at a segregated table at the side of the room. Her wish to be buried in Hollywood Cemetery was later refused because it, too, was segregated.

Which former homesteader, regarded as the first major African American feature filmmaker, made 'Within Our Gates'?

Oscar Micheaux turned to writing after his South Dakota homestead failed, and that experience fed his first novels and films. He went on to produce more than 40 pictures.

Which hymn, begun by James Weldon Johnson as a poem for Lincoln's birthday, is known as the Black national anthem?

Lift Every Voice and Sing was first performed by 500 schoolchildren in 1900, and the poet's brother Rosamond set it to music. By 1919 the NAACP was calling it the 'Negro national anthem'.

The Electric Slide is danced to 'Electric Boogie' by Marcia Griffiths, once a backing singer for which reggae star?

Bob Marley & the Wailers were backed from 1974 to 1981 by the I Threes, the vocal trio Griffiths belonged to. Her dance-floor favorite took off with a 1989 remix.

Which 2007 song spawned a popular line dance and has been compared to DJ Casper's 'Cha Cha Slide'?

Cupid Shuffle later let its own singer down: he performed it at a 2012 TV talent-show audition and not one of the four judges turned a chair for him.

Which 1981 Maze song, written by frontman Frankie Beverly, is a staple of Black American gatherings and parties?

Before I Let Go began as a ballad about Beverly's conflicted feelings for a woman he loved while he was with someone else. Beyoncé covered it for her 2019 film Homecoming.

Which festival did Beyoncé headline in 2018 with a full marching band, in a tribute to historically Black colleges?

Coachella had never had a Black woman as a headliner, and the 2018 edition was nicknamed 'Beychella'. After the show she expanded her scholarship fund for HBCU students.

MC Hammer's 1990 hit 'U Can't Touch This' is built on the opening riff of which Rick James single?

Super Freak runs through the whole of Hammer's track, which led Rick James to sue for copyright infringement. He ended up with a songwriting credit on it.

Which former Fugees member's 1998 solo debut made her the first hip-hop artist to win the Grammy for Album of the Year?

Lauryn Hill took home five Grammys that night, the first woman to win so many at one ceremony. She also became the first rapper to appear on the cover of Time magazine.

Which singer recorded the anti-lynching protest song 'Strange Fruit' in 1939 after her own label declined to record it?

Billie Holiday's label, Columbia, feared the reaction of record retailers in the South. It released her for a single session so she could cut the song for the small Commodore label instead.

Which gospel guitarist, the 'Godmother of Rock and Roll', sold 25,000 tickets to her own 1951 wedding in a stadium?

Sister Rosetta Tharpe influenced Little Richard, Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash, who called her his favorite singer as a child. She entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2018.

Which folk-blues singer advised listeners to 'stay woke' in the spoken afterword to his 1938 song 'Scottsboro Boys'?

Lead Belly said he had met the nine falsely accused Alabama youths and their lawyer, and he told anyone passing through Scottsboro to 'keep their eyes open'.

Which Southern dish of black-eyed peas and rice is eaten on New Year's Day to bring a year of good luck?

Hoppin' John peas stand for pennies or coins, and some cooks drop a real coin into the pot. Leftovers eaten the next day go by the name Skippin' Jenny.

Which Southern dish probably takes its name from a Bantu word for okra, one of its traditional thickeners?

Gumbo is the official state cuisine of Louisiana. Cooks who skip the okra thicken it with filé, the dried and ground sassafras leaves long used by the Choctaw.

Kamala Harris belongs to which sorority, founded in 1908 and known for its colors of salmon pink and apple green?

Alpha Kappa Alpha became the first African-American sorority to incorporate nationally, in 1913. Its members have marked Ivy Day by planting ivy since 1909.

Which Atlanta school, begun in a church basement in 1881, is the oldest private historically Black college for women?

Spelman opened as the Atlanta Baptist Female Seminary. It took the Spelman name in 1884 to honor the family of Laura Spelman Rockefeller, whose husband John D. had become its patron.

Kente cloth, used for the stoles many African American graduates wear, originated in which West African country?

Ghana's Asante oral tradition places the origin of kente in the town of Bonwire. In one folk tale, the first weavers were copying the web patterns of Anansi the spider.

Which Jamaican-born leader's UNIA adopted the red, black and green Pan-African flag at a 1920 convention?

Marcus Garvey wanted one banner to unite people of African descent. The flag also answered a racist hit song from around 1900 that mocked Black Americans for having no flag.

Which historian, a former coal miner called the 'father of Black history', launched Negro History Week in 1926?

Carter G. Woodson went on from the mines to become the second African American to earn a PhD from Harvard. His week, set in February, grew into today's Black History Month.

At which Harlem theater do Amateur Night hopefuls rub a tree stump for luck on their way to the stage?

The Apollo lets its audience do the judging, and an 'executioner' with a broom sweeps flops off the stage. It began as a burlesque house that admitted only white patrons.

Which formerly enslaved deputy US marshal, credited with over 3,000 arrests, even brought in his own son?

Bass Reeves is one possible inspiration for the Lone Ranger: a biographer points to his Native American partners and the silver dollars he is said to have handed out.

Which future 'Shark Tank' investor mortgaged the family home to fund FUBU, the streetwear label he co-founded in 1992?

Daymond John turned half of the house into a factory. FUBU stands for 'For Us, By Us', a phrase LL Cool J slipped into a 1997 Gap commercial while wearing one of the label's hats.

Where were the 1968 Olympics at which Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised black-gloved fists on the medal podium?

Mexico City also saw the two sprinters take their medals shoeless, in black socks, to represent Black poverty. They were suspended from the US team and banned from the Olympic Village.

Which tennis champion won the 2017 Australian Open, her 23rd major singles title, while already pregnant?

Serena Williams passed Steffi Graf's Open Era record with that win. She also took 14 major women's doubles titles, every one of them alongside her sister Venus.

Which tennis player, the first Black winner of a Grand Slam title in 1956, later joined the LPGA golf tour?

Althea Gibson learned her game through paddle tennis in Harlem, where neighbors took up a collection to pay for her lessons. Her Grand Slam breakthrough came at the French Open.

Which travel guide, published from 1936 by a mail carrier, listed lodgings and gas stations that served Black drivers?

The Green Book ran until 1966 and eventually sold around 15,000 copies a year. Esso service stations stocked it, which was unusual for the oil industry at the time.

Whose cancer cells, taken without her knowledge in Baltimore in 1951, became the first immortal human cell line?

Henrietta Lacks died that same year, but her HeLa cells kept reproducing in laboratories. By 1954 Jonas Salk was using them in the research behind the polio vaccine.

Shut out of American flight schools, which manicurist learned French and earned her pilot's license in France in 1921?

Bessie Coleman became the first African-American woman to hold a pilot's license. She caught the bug from World War I pilots who told their flying stories in the barber shop where she worked.

Which nickname, said to come from Native American foes, was given to the Black US Army cavalry regiments of 1866?

Buffalo Soldiers also served among the first national park rangers, patrolling Yosemite and Sequoia in 1899. Accounts differ on which nation coined the name: Cheyenne, Comanche or Apache.

Which Caribbean nation, independent since 1804, is the only country in history established by a slave revolt?

Haiti had to buy French recognition of its independence with a payment of 150 million francs. The generals who won that independence included Jean-Jacques Dessalines and Henry Christophe.

Which student choir, formed in 1871 to rescue a Nashville college from debt, sang spirituals for Queen Victoria?

Fisk Jubilee Singers set out as two quartets and a pianist and came home with the full $20,000 their director had promised. They sang 'Steal Away to Jesus' for the queen in 1873.

Which filmmaker created and plays Mabel 'Madea' Simmons, the gun-toting grandmother of 'Diary of a Mad Black Woman'?

Tyler Perry based Madea on his own mother and aunt, calling her exactly the PG version of the two. She first appeared in his stage play I Can Do Bad All by Myself.