People, Locations, Episodes

Edgar Daniel Nixon, Alabama Union Activist born

*Edgar D. Nixon was born on this date in 1899. He was an African American civil rights leader and union organizer.

Ruth Ellis, Lesbian Printer and Activist born

*Ruth Ellis was born on this date in 1899. She was a Black lesbian printer, photographer, and LGBT rights activist. Ruth Charlotte Ellis was born in Springfield, Illinois, the youngest of four children and the only daughter. Her parents were from Tennessee. Ellis’ mother, Carrie Farro Ellis, died when she was a teen, while her father, Charles […]

Modjeska Simkins, Social Reformer born

*On this date in 1899, Mary Modjeska Monteith Simkins, an important leader of African American public health reform, social reform, and the civil rights movement in South Carolina, was born in Columbia.

She was the first of eight children. Her parents, Henry and Rachel Monteith, named her after a favorite Polish actress Helena Modjeska. The Monteiths were a prosperous couple who encouraged their children in academic studies.

Martin Luther King Sr., Pastor born

*Martin Luther King Sr. was born on this date in 1899. He was a Black Baptist pastor, missionary, and early figure in the 20th-century American Civil Rights Movement.   He was born Michael King in Stockbridge, Georgia, the son of Delia Linsey and James Albert King. He was a member of the Baptist Church and decided to become a preacher after being inspired […]

C. L. Dellums, Union Activist born

*C. L. Dellums was born on this date in 1900. He was a Black labor activist. Born in Corsicana, Texas, Cottrell Laurence Dellums “had chosen San Francisco as the ideal place for a Negro to live in 1923.” Dellums stated, “I wanted to be a lawyer, and the University of California had the best law […]

Black History and the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union

*Black history and the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (ILGWU) are affirmed on this date in 1900. The ILGWU, whose members were in the women’s clothing industry, was once one of the largest labor unions in the United States, one of the first U.S. unions to have a primarily female membership and influence in the […]

Black Nationalism in America, a story

*Black Nationalism in America was affirmed on this date in 1900. It is a category of racial nationalism or pan-nationalism that embraces the belief that black people are a race and seeks to develop and maintain a black racial and national identity. Black nationalist activism revolves around the social, political, and economic empowerment of black […]

Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, Woman’s Rights Activist born

*Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti was born on this date in 1900. Frances Abigail Olufunmilayo Thomas, also known as Funmilayo Anikulapo-Kuti, was a Nigerian educator, political campaigner, suffragist, and women’s rights activist. Frances Abigail Olufunmilayo Olufela Folorunso Thomas was born in Abeokuta, Ogun State, Nigeria, to Chief Daniel Olumeyuwa Thomas, a member of the aristocratic Jibolu-Taiwo family, and Lucretia […]

Mohammad Helmy, Physician, and Activist born

*Mohammed Helmy was born on this date in 1901. He was a North African Egyptian doctor and an activist during WW II. Helmy was born to an Egyptian army major and a Sudanese mother in Khartoum, Sudan. He went to Berlin in 1922 to study medicine. He would work as head of the urology department […]

Artishia Wilkerson Jordan, Educator born

*Artishia Wilkerson Jordan was born on this date in 1901. She was a Black educator and clubwoman. Artishia Garcia Wilkerson was born in Louisville, Kentucky, the daughter of Bernard Orange Wilkerson and Artishia Garcia Gilbert Wilkerson. Her father was an attorney; her mother was a medical doctor who died soon after childbirth in 1904. Young […]

Roy Wilkins, Journalist, and Administrator born

On this date, Roy Wilkins, an African American journalist and civil rights activist, was born.

Louise Thompson Patterson, Activist, and Professor born

*Louise Alone Thompson Patterson was born on this date in 1901.  She was a Black social activist and college professor.    From Chicago, Illinois, Patterson became a professor at Hampton Institute, a historically black college (HBCU) in Virginia, by age twenty-two.  She worked there for five years before moving to Harlem, New York, where she pursued social work but eventually became a central figure in the […]

Louis L. Redding, Lawyer born

Louis L. Redding, prominent African American lawyer and civil rights pioneer, was born on this date in 1901.

Dora Tamana, South African Activist born.

*Dora Tamana was born on this date in 1901. She was a Black South African activist.   She was born Dora Ntloko at Nqamakwe, in Hlobo, Transkei, near Dutywa, then part of Cape Colony, South Africa. Her grandfather was a Methodist preacher, but as a teenager, she converted, with her family, to the Israelite denomination. […]

Mabel Hampton, Dancer, and Activist born

*Mabel Hampton was born on this date in 1902.  She was a Black lesbian activist, a dancer, and a philanthropist.  Born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Hampton was only two months old when her mother died. She was then raised by her grandmother, who died when Hampton was seven.  In 1909, the seven-year-old Hampton was put on a train to New York […]