Yahoo Web Search

Abbott laid the foundation for what would eventually birth many Black publications including Ebony, Jet,Essence, Black Enterprise, Right On!, Sheen Magazine, and more. In 1905, Abbott founded the Chicago Defender, a weekly newspaper. The paper started out with a 25-cent investment and a four-page pamphlet, increasing circulation with every edition....

Chisholm kicked the door in for African American women holding major roles in government. She first served as an educational consultant for New York City’s Bureau of Child Welfare and ran for New York State Assembly in 1964. Chisholm was elected in 1968 as the first African American Congresswoman. She served from 1969 to 1983 representing New York’...

Hailed as one of the most influential Black media publishers, Johnson got his start working for Supreme Life Insurance Company collecting weekly news clippings for his manager, which sparked his idea for his first publication, Negro Digest. In 1942, with a $500 loan and $6,000 raised through subscriptions, Johnson launched his dream project which l...

Height has been called the matriarch of the civil rights movement and often worked behind the scenes. After receiving two degrees from New York University in the 1930s, Height worked for the New York City Welfare Department and then became the assistant executive director of the Harlem Y.M.C.A. She was involved in anti-lynching protests, brought pu...

With a distinctive baritone and demanding stature, Don Cornelius helped to shift Black culture into the spotlight with the creation of the show Soul Train. The “Hippest Trip in America” was picked up for national syndication in 1971 with its first episode featuring performers Gladys Knight & The Pips, Eddie Kendricks, Bobby Hutton, and Honey Cone. ...

Coachman became the first African American woman from any country to win an Olympic Gold Medal at the 1948 Summer Olympics in London. She set the record for the high jump at the Olympics, leaping to 5 feet and 6 ⅛ inches. Four years later, she became the first Black female athlete to endorse an international consumer product when she signed on as a...

The landscape of Hollywood has the work of many Black women from Ava DuVernay, Issa Rae, and Shonda Rhimes to name a few. Williams paved the way as the first Black woman to produce, write, and act in her own silent crime movie in 1923, The Flames of Wrath. To distribute the film, she formed the Western Film Producing Company and Booking Exchange wi...

Waters first entered the entertainment business in the 1920s as a blues singer, before making history. Waters was the first to integrate Broadway appearing in Irving Berlin’s As Thousands Cheer and eventually became the highest-paid performer on Broadway. In addition to becoming the first African American to star in her own television variety show ...

Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is usually credited for the iconic March on Washington in August 1963, but it was actually Rustin who organized the historical event. The march brought more than 200,000 peaceful protestors of varying races and religions together to hear King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. As a gay man who had controversial ties to c...