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 Narrative was followed by My Bondage and My Freedom in 1855, the second of his three autobiographies?

Frederick Douglass, whose Narrative was a bestseller that exposed him as a fugitive, so he left for Britain until supporters bought his freedom. Life and Times, the third book, came in 1881.

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 amendment to the US Constitution, ratified on 6 December 1865, abolished slavery except as punishment for a crime?

13th: that exception clause was exploited for decades through convict leasing and the Black Codes, a story Ava DuVernay told in the 2016 documentary 13th.

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 Harlem Renaissance, centred on Manhattan's Harlem neighbourhood in the 1920s, produced writers such as Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston and was fuelled by the Great Migration of Black Southerners to northern cities.

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?

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969) is the first of Maya Angelou's seven autobiographical volumes, ending with the birth of her son when she was 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?

About six million Black Americans left the rural South between 1910 and 1970, one of the largest internal migrations in history, driven by Jim Crow segregation, violence and northern factory jobs.

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?

Garrett Morgan patented his three-position traffic signal in 1923 and sold the rights to General Electric; his earlier safety hood was used in the 1916 Cleveland waterworks tunnel rescue.

Which 1955 killing of a 14-year-old from Chicago, visiting relatives in Mississippi, galvanised the civil rights movement after an open-casket funeral?

The lynching of Emmett Till, whose mother Mamie insisted the world see what had been done to her son; Jet magazine's photographs did the rest. Rosa Parks later said she thought of him when she kept her seat that December.

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

Halle Berry won Best Actress at the 2002 ceremony for Monster's Ball (2001), playing the widow Leticia Musgrove, the first Black woman to take the award.

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

The Voting Rights Act, signed by Lyndon Johnson on 6 August 1965, followed the Selma marches; after Bloody Sunday he urged Congress to pass it in a televised address on 15 March.

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

Medgar Evers was the NAACP's first field secretary for Mississippi from 1954; his killer, Byron De La Beckwith, escaped two hung juries in 1964 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?

Thurgood Marshall, appointed by Lyndon B. Johnson, who had won 29 of the 32 civil rights cases he argued before the Court as NAACP counsel. Clarence Thomas succeeded him in 1991.

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 Southern Christian Leadership Conference grew from a January 1957 meeting at Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church; Martin Luther King Jr. served as its first president.

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?

Dred Scott v. Sandford ruled that Black people could not be U.S. citizens and struck down the Missouri Compromise; it is widely considered the worst decision in the Court's history.

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?

Jazz emerged in New Orleans around 1900, blending blues, ragtime, spirituals and brass-band marches; cornetist Buddy Bolden is often cited as its first bandleader.

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?

Executive Order 9981 declared equality of treatment and opportunity in the armed services regardless of race, colour, religion or national origin; units were largely integrated 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?

Du Bois said the name stood for the 'mighty current' of change the group sought; its first meeting, in July 1905, was at a hotel in Fort Erie, Ontario, near Niagara Falls.

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?

Bayard Rustin was the chief organizer of the 28 August 1963 March on Washington, assembling some 250,000 people in eight weeks; he had earlier helped found the Congress of Racial Equality in 1942.

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.

Which singer first recorded the anti-lynching song 'Strange Fruit' in 1939?

Billie Holiday first recorded 'Strange Fruit', Abel Meeropol's protest song about lynching, for Commodore Records in April 1939 after Columbia declined to release it.

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.

In which city did Black Germans begin observing Black History Month in 1990?

Black History Month in Germany began in Berlin in 1990, organised by members of the Black German community; its programmes 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?

October, since 1987, chosen partly because it is the start of the school year and a time of harvest festivals in much of Africa. Ireland followed suit in October too.

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

Woodson chose the second week of February to span Abraham Lincoln's birthday (12 February) and Frederick Douglass's chosen birthday (14 February), both long marked by Black communities.

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 which year did Carter G. Woodson found the ASNLH, parent of Negro History Week?

1915: Woodson founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History on 9 September 1915, during the exposition marking fifty years since emancipation, with Dr George Cleveland Hall among the founders.

Which Black historian wrote the 1947 survey From Slavery to Freedom?

John Hope Franklin published From Slavery to Freedom in 1947; it became the standard survey of African American history and was revised through many later editions.

Which month-long Jamaican celebration, tied to Bob Marley's birthday, shares February with Black History Month?

Reggae Month, declared by Jamaica's government in 2008, runs through February because Bob Marley (6 February) and Dennis Brown (1 February) were both born in the month.

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.

Which Chicago newspaper, founded by Robert Abbott in 1905, urged Black Southerners to move north?

The Chicago Defender, founded by Robert S. Abbott in 1905, was carried south by Pullman porters and promoted the 'Great Northern Drive' of 1917, fuelling the Great Migration.

In 1926 Carter G. Woodson's ASNLH declared Negro History Week in which week of February, bracketing two famous birthdays?

Second, because it bracketed two birthdays Black communities had long celebrated, on February 12 and 14. The response was lukewarm at first, with only three state education departments taking part.

In its early years, Negro History Week gained crucial support from which kind of publications, alongside the Black churches?

African-American newspapers, which carried the week to readers the state education departments ignored; Woodson's own Journal of Negro History was the scholarly side. Churches helped distribute the literature.

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

Canada's House of Commons recognised February as Black History Month in December 1995 after a motion from a Toronto-area MP; the Senate followed with unanimous recognition in March 2008.

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

Akyaaba Addai-Sebo, a Ghanaian-born coordinator of special projects at the Greater London Council, organised the first UK Black History Month in October 1987 and invited Kwanzaa creator Maulana Karenga to the launch.

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

Ronald Reagan signed Public Law 99-244 in February 1986, enacting Senate Joint Resolution 74, which designated 'National Black (Afro-American) History Month' and asked the president to proclaim it.

Who founded Ebony magazine in 1945?

John H. Johnson launched Ebony in Chicago in November 1945, three years after Negro Digest; Johnson Publishing added Jet in 1951 and made him the first Black person on the Forbes 400.

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

Toronto issued Canada's first Black History Month proclamation in 1979 after a petition from the newly formed Ontario Black History Society.

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?

West Virginia, where Woodson had taught at Douglass High School in Huntington and often spoke, had Black communities marking a full Negro History Month by the 1940s.

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

Black History Month Ireland was launched in Cork in October 2010 by the city's African community and, like the UK, is marked in the autumn rather than February.

Which society, founded in 1816, settled free Black Americans in what became Liberia?

The American Colonization Society, formed in 1816, began settling free Black Americans at Cape Mesurado in 1822; the colony declared independence as Liberia in 1847.

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

ASALH's 2024 theme was 'African Americans and the Arts'; it followed 'Black Resistance' in 2023 and 'Black Health and Wellness' in 2022, continuing annual themes begun in 1928.

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?

January 2: Black United Students at Kent State University staged the first Black History Month celebration from 2 January to 28 February 1970, a year after proposing it.

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

In 1924 Omega Psi Phi launched Negro History and Literature Week, renamed Negro Achievement Week in 1925, before Woodson's Association took the idea national.

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?

Afro-American Life and History: the Association adopted that name in 1972 and became 'African American Life and History' in 2001; Ford's 1975 message urged Americans to honour achievements 'too long obscured and unsung'.

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

Caribbean emancipation: the launch year, 1987, was promoted as 'African Jubilee Year', marking 150 years since the end of slavery in the British Caribbean; the first event was held in October.

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 Howard University scholar persuaded Jesse Moorland to give his library to the university in 1914?

Kelly Miller, dean of Howard's College of Arts and Sciences, persuaded Jesse Moorland to donate his private collection on Black history and Africa in 1914; it seeded the 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.

In which North Carolina city did a white mob overthrow the elected biracial government in 1898?

Wilmington's coup of 10 November 1898 saw white supremacists led by Alfred Waddell burn the Black-owned Daily Record, kill dozens of Black residents and force the elected Fusionist government to resign.

Which English city saw a 1963 bus boycott that ended the colour bar on its buses?

Bristol: the 1963 Bristol Bus Boycott, led by Paul Stephenson and the West Indian Development Council, forced the Bristol Omnibus Company to drop its refusal to employ Black crews.

In which year did Ontario's provincial government proclaim February as Black History Month?

1993: the Ontario Black History Society, which had already won a municipal proclamation, persuaded the province of Ontario to recognise February as Black History Month in 1993.

Who was the first Black woman to serve in the United States Senate?

Carol Moseley Braun won Illinois's Senate seat in November 1992 and served from 1993 to 1999, the first Black woman in the US Senate.

Which record label did Berry Gordy found in 1959?

Motown, founded by Berry Gordy in Detroit in January 1959 with an $800 family loan, launched the Supremes, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye.

Which group's Washington branch hired Jesse Moorland as its 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?

1978: Daniel G. Hill and Donna Hill founded the Ontario Black History Society to promote the study of Black Canadian history; its petitions later secured Black History Month proclamations.

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

Bill Clinton issued the February 1996 proclamation under the title 'National African American History Month'; presidents of both parties have issued such proclamations each February.

Which ship's arrival at Tilbury in June 1948 came to symbolise post-war Caribbean migration to Britain?

HMT Empire Windrush docked at Tilbury on 22 June 1948 carrying hundreds of Caribbean passengers; the 'Windrush generation' became the name for post-war Caribbean migrants to Britain.

Over what did Sojourner Truth successfully sue a white man in 1828?

Recovering her son: Truth sued after her five-year-old son Peter was illegally sold to Alabama and won his return, one of the first such victories by a Black woman against a white man.

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

Up from Slavery, serialised in Outlook magazine and published in book form in 1901, recounts Washington's rise from enslavement to leading Tuskegee Institute.

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

Theodore Roosevelt hosted Washington for dinner on 16 October 1901, weeks after taking office; the invitation drew furious condemnation from Southern politicians and newspapers.

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

London: after failing to find enough Boston subscribers, Wheatley's collection was printed in London in 1773 under the patronage of Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon.

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

The District of Columbia: in 1791 Banneker assisted Andrew Ellicott in surveying the federal territory's boundaries using astronomical observations; he published almanacs from 1792 to 1797.

Crispus Attucks, a sailor of African and Native American descent, is regarded as the first person killed in which 1770 event?

The Boston Massacre, which makes him, by tradition, the first American killed in the Revolution. John Adams, defending the British soldiers in court, won acquittals for most of them.

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

Treason: Virginia convicted Brown of treason against the Commonwealth after his October 1859 raid on the Harpers Ferry armory, and hanged him at Charles Town on 2 December 1859.

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

Gordon Granger issued General Order No. 3 at Galveston on 19 June 1865, announcing that all enslaved people in Texas were free; the date is celebrated as Juneteenth.

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

Robert Gould Shaw, the 25-year-old son of Boston abolitionists, led the 54th Massachusetts and was killed in its assault on Fort Wagner on 18 July 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?

The 99th Fighter Squadron reached North Africa in April 1943, flew its first combat mission over Pantelleria in June, and later joined the 332nd Fighter Group in Italy.

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

Mississippi's legislature elected Revels in January 1870 to fill a Senate seat left vacant since secession; he served until March 1871 and then became first president of Alcorn A&M.

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

1872: the Freedmen's Bureau, created in March 1865 under the War Department, lost most functions in 1869 and was formally closed in June 1872 after Congress declined to renew it.

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

1868: the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified on 9 July 1868; its first section contains the Citizenship, Due Process and Equal Protection clauses.

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

The Fifteenth Amendment, ratified 3 February 1870, was the last of the three Reconstruction Amendments; Southern states later evaded it with poll taxes and literacy tests.

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

Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937) follows Janie Crawford through three marriages in Florida; Hurston wrote it in seven weeks while doing fieldwork in Haiti.

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

The Cotton Club: Ellington's orchestra became its house band in December 1927, and the club's radio broadcasts carried his music nationwide before he left in 1931.

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

'Hello, Dolly!' topped the Billboard Hot 100 in May 1964, knocking the Beatles off number one, and won Armstrong the Grammy for Best Vocal Performance, Male at the 1965 awards.

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

Ann Arbor: at Michigan's Ferry Field on 25 May 1935, Owens tied the 100-yard record and set world marks in the long jump, 220 yards and 220-yard hurdles, the last two also counting as 200-metre records.

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?

Light heavyweight: Cassius Clay, aged 18, beat Poland's Zbigniew Pietrzykowski in the Rome final; he won the world heavyweight title from Sonny Liston in February 1964.

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

Polio: Rudolph contracted polio at four and wore a leg brace as a child, yet in Rome 1960 she won the 100 m, 200 m and 4x100 m relay.

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?

Heart bypass surgery: Ashe had a second bypass operation in 1983 and learned in 1988 that a transfusion had infected him with HIV; he went public in April 1992.

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

The Daughters of the American Revolution barred her from Constitution Hall; Eleanor Roosevelt resigned from the DAR and helped arrange the Easter Sunday 1939 concert on the Lincoln Memorial steps.

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

Football: Robeson was named All-American end in 1917 and 1918 at Rutgers, graduated as valedictorian, and earned a Columbia law degree while playing in the NFL.

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

Mammy: McDaniel's Best Supporting Actress award in February 1940 made her the first African American Oscar winner; she appeared on a US postage stamp in 2006.

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

Miami: Poitier was born prematurely in Miami on 20 February 1927 while his Bahamian parents were there to sell tomatoes, which gave him US citizenship.

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

The Defiant Ones (1958), in which Poitier and Tony Curtis play escaped convicts chained together, brought him the Berlin Silver Bear and the first Best Actor nomination for a Black performer.

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

El-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz: 'El-Hajj' marks a Muslim who has completed the pilgrimage to Mecca, which Malcolm X made in April 1964 after leaving the Nation of Islam.

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

The Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party sent Hamer to Atlantic City, where her televised testimony about being beaten in a Winona jail embarrassed the Democrats into offering two at-large seats.

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

Orval Faubus sent the Arkansas National Guard to block the nine on 4 September 1957; President Eisenhower responded by federalising the Guard and sending the 101st Airborne.

Outside which Alabama town was a Freedom Riders' Greyhound bus firebombed on 14 May 1961?

Anniston: on 14 May 1961 a mob attacked a Greyhound carrying Freedom Riders outside Anniston, Alabama, slashing its tyres and firebombing it after it stalled.

How many girls were killed in the 1963 Ku Klux Klan bombing of Birmingham, Alabama's 16th Street Baptist Church?

Four: Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Carol Denise McNair, aged 11 to 14, on a Sunday morning. Spike Lee's 4 Little Girls tells their story; the last bomber was convicted only in 2002.

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

54 miles: the marchers covered the route along US Route 80 in five days, 21 to 25 March 1965, after troopers attacked about 600 people at the Edmund Pettus Bridge on 7 March.

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?

The Lorraine Motel, where King was shot on its second-floor balcony outside room 306, is now the National Civil Rights Museum; James Earl Ray was arrested at Heathrow that June.

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

The Fair Housing Act barred discrimination in the sale, rental and financing of housing; Johnson signed it on 11 April 1968, a week after King's assassination.

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

Communist Party USA: the UC Regents, urged by Governor Reagan, dismissed Davis in September 1969 for her party membership; she later ran as its vice-presidential candidate in 1980 and 1984.

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

Barbados: Chisholm lived with her grandmother in Barbados from 1929 to 1934, and credited its British-style schooling for her strong early education.

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

The Democratic National Convention of 1976 in New York, where Jordan's keynote followed her famous 1974 House Judiciary Committee statement on the Nixon impeachment inquiry.

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

Challenger: Bluford flew on STS-8, launched 30 August 1983 in the shuttle programme's first night launch; he flew four shuttle missions in all.

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

2001 to 2005: Powell served under George W. Bush as the first Black secretary of state, having chaired the Joint Chiefs from 1989 to 1993.

Kamala Harris graduated from which historically Black institution?

Howard University: Harris graduated in 1986 with a degree in political science and economics, and pledged Alpha Kappa Alpha there; she later earned her law degree at UC Hastings.

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

Federal public defender: Jackson worked as an assistant federal public defender in Washington from 2005 to 2007; Biden nominated her in February 2022 to succeed Stephen Breyer.

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

The Bluest Eye (1970), set in Morrison's hometown of Lorain, Ohio, follows Pecola Breedlove, a Black girl who longs for blue eyes.

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

The National Book Award for Fiction went to Invisible Man in 1953, making Ellison the first African American to win it; the novel was his only one published in his lifetime.

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

Go Tell It on the Mountain (1953), Baldwin's semi-autobiographical debut about a Harlem teenager and his preacher stepfather, was named to Time's 2005 list of 100 best English-language novels since 1923.

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

Eight: Roots ran on ABC on consecutive nights from 23 to 30 January 1977; its finale drew about 100 million viewers, and it won nine of 37 Emmy nominations.

Which player won 23 Grand Slam singles titles between 1999 and 2017?

Serena Williams won her first major at the 1999 US Open and her 23rd at the 2017 Australian Open, the most by any woman in the Open era.

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

Galveston: Johnson was born there in 1878 and fought as the 'Galveston Giant'; 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?

11: Russell won 11 championships with Boston between 1957 and 1969, the last two as player-coach, after leading the San Francisco Dons to NCAA titles in 1955 and 1956.

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

3.5 million: the proclamation of 1 January 1863 declared free the enslaved people in Confederate-held areas, over 3.5 million, while leaving slavery untouched in the loyal border states.

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

Sengbe Pieh, known as Joseph Cinqué, led the July 1839 uprising; the Supreme Court ruled in March 1841 that the Mende captives had been illegally enslaved and were free.

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

Saint-Domingue, the French colony that became Haiti; Louverture rose to Governor-General for life in 1801 before Bonaparte's expedition captured him in 1802.

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

Mali: under Mansa Musa (reigned c. 1312 to 1337) the empire stretched from the Atlantic to the Niger bend, its wealth built on taxing the salt and gold trade.

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?

Shona: ancestors of the Shona built Great Zimbabwe between the 11th and 15th centuries; its Great Enclosure walls rise 11 metres over a site of 7.22 square kilometres.

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

Musa: returning from his 1324-25 pilgrimage to Mecca, Mansa Musa had the Djinguereber mosque built and made Timbuktu a centre of Islamic scholarship and the salt-gold trade.

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

Portugal, with its Brazilian colony, carried about 5.8 million of the roughly 12.5 million Africans embarked in the Atlantic trade; Britain was second with about 3.3 million.

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

Gustavus Vassa: Equiano used the name a Royal Navy master gave him in the 1750s for the rest of his life, and his 1789 Narrative carried both names on its title page.

Mary Seacole was famous for nursing during which war?

The Crimean War: Seacole built her 'British Hotel' near Balaclava in 1855 to feed and nurse soldiers, and published Wonderful Adventures of Mrs Seacole in Many Lands in 1857.

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

The Gold Coast became independent as Ghana on 6 March 1957 with Nkrumah as prime minister; he was overthrown in a 1966 coup while abroad.

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

The Watts riots of August 1965 prompted Karenga to create Kwanzaa in 1966 as a celebration of African heritage; it runs from 26 December to 1 January.

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

Cheyney University of Pennsylvania traces to 1837, when Quaker Richard Humphreys' $10,000 bequest founded the Institute for Colored Youth in Philadelphia; it moved to Cheyney in 1902.

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?

Atlanta Baptist Female Seminary opened on 11 April 1881 in the basement of Friendship Baptist Church; it was renamed Spelman Seminary in 1884 after John D. Rockefeller's in-laws.

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

Nine: the Scottsboro Boys, aged 12 to 19, were taken off a freight train at Paint Rock, Alabama, in March 1931 and falsely accused of raping two white women.

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

399: the US Public Health Service enrolled 399 Black men with latent syphilis and 201 uninfected controls in Macon County, Alabama, in 1932, withholding treatment until the study was exposed in 1972.

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

George Otto Gey, head of tissue culture research at Johns Hopkins, grew the cells biopsied from Lacks's cervical tumour in February 1951 into the first immortal human cell line.

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

Provident Hospital, opened in 1891 on Chicago's South Side with an interracial staff, also ran the first US nursing school for Black women; Williams performed an early open-heart operation there in 1893.

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

Physostigmine: Julian completed its total synthesis at DePauw in 1935, beating Oxford's Robert Robinson; his later work on soybean sterols founded the steroid drug industry.

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

The IBM personal computer: Dean holds three of its nine original patents, co-developed the ISA bus, and led the IBM team that produced a one-gigahertz processor chip in 1999.

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

West Area Computers, the segregated unit of Black women mathematicians at Langley; Vaughan became its acting head in 1949 and was confirmed in 1951, the first Black supervisor there.

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

The Fédération Aéronautique Internationale issued Coleman's licence on 15 June 1921 after she trained at the Caudron school in Le Crotoy, France, no US school having accepted a Black woman.

Matthew Henson accompanied which explorer on seven Arctic voyages?

Robert Peary: Henson was Peary's companion on seven Arctic expeditions from 1891; on the 1909 push Henson, Peary and four Inuit claimed the Pole, and Henson said he got there first.

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

William Clark: York, enslaved by Clark since childhood, travelled with the Corps of Discovery from 1804 to 1806, voting in the November 1805 decision on where to winter.

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

Azemmour: Estevanico was born there around 1500 and sold into Spanish slavery; he was one of four survivors of the 1528 Narváez expedition with Cabeza de Vaca.

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

The White Lion, an English privateer under Captain John Jope, landed '20 and odd' Africans at Point Comfort in late August 1619, taken from the Portuguese ship São João Bautista.

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

Massachusetts: Freeman's suit, Brom and Bett v. Ashley, argued that the 1780 state constitution's declaration that all men are born free and equal outlawed slavery; she won in August 1781.

Richard Allen founded which denomination in 1816, the first independent Black one in the US?

African Methodist Episcopal: Allen opened Bethel church in Philadelphia in 1794 and in 1816 united Black Methodist congregations into the AME Church, becoming its first bishop.

Denmark Vesey bought his freedom in Charleston after doing what?

Winning a lottery: Vesey won $1,500 in a Charleston lottery in 1799 and paid $600 for his freedom, then worked as a carpenter; he helped found the Emanuel AME congregation in 1818.

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

A blacksmith: Gabriel, enslaved by Thomas Prosser, was a literate blacksmith hired out in Richmond; after rain and informers foiled the August 1800 plot, he and 25 others were hanged.

The 1739 Stono Rebellion took place in which colony?

South Carolina: the rebellion began near the Stono River on 9 September 1739, led by a literate man called Jemmy; its leaders were probably Catholics from the Kingdom of Kongo.

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

Linda Brent: Jacobs, born in Edenton, North Carolina, hid for nearly seven years in her grandmother's attic before escaping north, and wrote Incidents under the pseudonym Linda Brent.

Mary McLeod Bethune founded which organisation in 1935?

The National Council of Negro Women, founded by Bethune in December 1935 to unite Black women's groups; in 1936 she became director of the National Youth Administration's Division of Negro Affairs.

Who became the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize, in 1950, for the poetry collection Annie Allen?

Gwendolyn Brooks, a lifelong Chicagoan and Poet Laureate of Illinois from 1968 until her death in 2000. Her best-known poem, 'We Real Cool', is eight lines long.

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.