Black History in Newspapers

“Negro Leagues” Baseball

The “Negro leagues” were organized circuits for professional Black baseball teams, functioning most successfully between 1920 through the 1940s in the United States’ East, Midwest, and South. Early History After the American Civil War, baseball became increasingly popular in the United States, and professional teams and leagues began to emerge. Initially, there were some instances …Read More

Amistad Case

Background In 1839, a group of Africans from Sierra Leone were abducted and shipped to Havana, Cuba, to be sold and enslaved. When they arrived in Cuba, two Spanish plantation owners, Pedro Montes and Jose Ruiz, illegally purchased 53 to be enslaved on their Caribbean plantation. They loaded the Africans aboard the Cuban schooner Amistad. …Read More

Birmingham Church Bombing

The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing was an act of white supremacist terrorism which occurred at the African American 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, on Sunday, September 15, 1963, when four members of the Ku Klux Klan planted at least 15 sticks of dynamite attached to a timing device beneath the steps located …Read More

Booker T. Washington

Booker Taliaferro Washington (April 5, 1856 – November 14, 1915) was an American educator, author, and speaker. One of the most influential Black leaders of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Washington was also a pivotal figure at the Tuskegee Institute. Childhood & Education Booker was born in Virginia in 1856 to an enslaved …Read More

Double V Campaign

The Double V Campaign was an Black American initiative, led by the Pittsburgh Courier newspaper, that aimed to achieve a double victory (“Double V”) during World War II. The two objectives were victory in the war abroad and victory against discrimination on the home front. How did it start? The inspiration for the campaign came …Read More

Emancipation Proclamation

The Emancipation Proclamation, or Proclamation 95, was a presidential proclamation and executive order issued by United States President Abraham Lincoln effective January 1, 1863. It changed the legal status under federal law of more than 3.5 million enslaved African Americans in the Confederate states from slave to free. As soon as a slave escaped the …Read More

Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass (c. 1818 – February 20, 1895) was an American activist, speaker, and author who advocated for the abolition of slavery, for women’s rights, and for other causes. Early Life, Enslavement & Escape Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey was born into slavery on Maryland’s Eastern Shore around 1818 and was raised primarily by his maternal …Read More

George Washington Carver

George Washington Carver (1860s – January 5, 1943) was an American botanist and inventor. He actively promoted alternative crops to cotton and methods to prevent soil depletion. Apart from his work to improve the lives of farmers, Carver was also a leader in promoting environmentalism. In an era of very high racial polarization, his fame …Read More

Harlem Renaissance

The Harlem Renaissance was an American Black cultural movement that started in the years following World War I and ended in the mid-1930s. It was most vibrant during the 1920s and was centered in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. This period saw an explosion in Black cultural arts such as music, literature, poetry, …Read More