People, Locations, Episodes

Pauline Hopkins, Writer, and Editor born

*The birth of Pauline Hopkins in 1859 is celebrated on this date. She was a Black playwright, journalist, novelist, short story writer, biographer, and editor.

Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins was the daughter of Northrup Hopkins and Sarah Allen. From Portland, Maine, she was raised in Boston, Massachusetts. Her skill as a writer gained recognition in 1874, when, at the age of fifteen, she received first prize in a contest for her essay titled “Evils of Intemperance and Their Remedy.”

The First Novel by a Black Author is Published in America

On this date in 1859, the first novel by an African American was published in the United States.

“Our Nig; or Sketches from the Life of a Free Black, In a Two Story White House North, Showing that Slavery’s Shadow Falls Even There,” by Harriet E. Adams Wilson, was published in Boston. She was living alone at the time of the writing, having been abandoned by her husband.

The novel was lost for over 100 years until reprinted with a critical essay by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., in 1983.

Joseph Seamon Cotter, Poet born

*Joseph Seamon Cotter, Sr., was born on this date in 1861. He was a Black poet, educator, and playwright.

Josephine Henderson Heard, Poet, and Teacher born

*On this date in 1861, we mark the birth of Josephine Henderson Heard, a Black teacher and poet.   Josephine Delphine Henderson was born the daughter of two enslaved parents in Salisbury, North Carolina. After her Emancipation, she set a goal to become a teacher. At age 21, she married William Henry Heard in 1882. She held […]

Carrie Williams Clifford, Writer born

*The birth of Carrie Williams Clifford in 1862 is celebrated on this date. She was an Black writer, editor and activist.

Journal of Resistance on a Georgia Plantation in 1838-1839 is Published

*On this date in 1863, the book Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation in 1838–1839 was published. This is an account by Fanny Kemble of the time spent on her husband’s plantation in Butler Island, Georgia. The account was not published until 1863 after her marriage had ended and the American Civil War had begun. According to PBS, she […]

Emma Durham Kelley-Hawkins, Writer born

*Emma Dunham Kelley-Hawkins was born on this date in 1863. She was a Black writer and author. Emma Dunham Kelley was born in Dennis, Massachusetts, and raised by her widowed mother in Rhode Island. Kelley married Benjamin Hawkins, an inventor, in 1893. The couple had two children, Gala and Magda. Royalties from Emma’s two novels, […]

Thomas Dixon Jr., Segregationist, and Author born

*The birth of Thomas Dixon is marked on this date in 1864. He was a White American novelist, segregationist and minister.

Lena Mason, Minister, and Poet born

Lena Mason, a Black minister and poet, was born on this date in 1864.

She was born in Quincy, Illinois of parents, Reida and Vaughn, who were stanch Christians. Young Mason became a Christian at a very early age, attending the Douglass High School of Hannibal, MO. She also attended Professor Knott’s School in Chicago. She married George Mason in 1883, had six children with only one daughter surviving to adulthood. Mason entered the ministry at the age of 23. During her first three years of ministry she preached to whites exclusively.

Robert Kerlin, Minister, and Soldier born

*Robert Kerlin was born on this date in 1866.  He was a white-American minister, author, soldier, and activist.  From Harrison County, MO., Robert Thomas Kerlin’s parents were from Kentucky and were owners of several small farms.  They raised and sold Berkshire Hog and Southdown Sheep.  Confederate properties were seized due to the American Civil War, […]

W.E.B. Du Bois, Sociologist born

*This date marks the birth of W.E.B. Du Bois in 1868. He was an African American sociologist, one of the most important Black protest leaders in the United States during the first half of the 20th century.

Adelaide Casely-Hayford, Writer born

*Adelaide Casely-Hayford was born on this date in 1868.  She was a Black African Creole cultural nationalist, educator, writer, and feminist.   Adelaide Smith was born to an elite family in Freetown, British Sierra Leone.  to a mixed-race father (William Smith Jr, of English and royal Fanti parentage) from the Gold Coast and a Creole mother, Anne Spilsbury, of English, Jamaican Maroon, and Sierra Leone Liberated African ancestry. She was the second […]

Sol White, Baseball Player, and Author born

*”Sol” White was born on this date in 1868. He was a Black professional baseball infielder, manager, writer, and executive, and one of the pioneers of the American Negro Leagues. Born in Bellaire, Ohio, King Solomon White’s early life is not well-documented. According to the 1870 and 1880 U.S. Census, his family (parents and two […]

Olivia Bush, Writer, and Drama Coach born

Olivia Ward Bush-Banks, an African American writer and drama instructor, was born on this day in 1869.

Born in Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York, Olivia was the daughter of Eliza Draper and Abraham Ward, both of whom were of African and Montauk descent. Ward’s mother died when was about one year old. She and her father moved to Providence, R.I., where he married again, but he handed young Ward over to her mother’s sister, Maria Draper, who reared Olivia as her own child.

Edward N. Harleston, Poet and Journalist born.

*Edward N. Harleston was born on this date in 1869. He was a Black poet and journalist. Born in Charleston, South Carolina, Edward Nathaniel Harleston worked as a carpenter machinist and owned a funeral home early in his life. After his first wife, Mattie Gadsen, died in 1895, he moved to Atlantic City and became superintendent of […]