*John Rock was born on this date in 1825. He was a Black lawyer, teacher, and abolitionist. From Salem County, New Jersey, at an early age, John Stewart Rock had an insatiable appetite for learning. Although his parents were poor, they committed to sending young Rock to school. At eighteen, Rock began to teach at […]
learn more*Alexander G. Clark was born on this date in 1826. He was a Black laborer, barber, lawyer and activist.
He was born in Washington County, Pennsylvania, to John Clark, a former slave, and Rebecca Darnes Clark. At 13, he moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, to learn barbering from an uncle, who also made sure the boy was well-schooled in other areas. Clark left Cincinnati in October 1841, working for a few months as a bartender on the steamboat George Washington before arriving, at 16, in Muscatine (then called Bloomington, in Iowa Territory). It was May 22, 1842.
learn more*On this date in 1828, the American Democratic Party was founded. Sometimes called the Democratic Farmer Labor Party (DFL), they are a center-left political party in the United States. One of the major parties of the U.S., it is the world’s oldest active political party. Its main adversary since the 1850s has been the right-wing […]
learn more*Ignacio Zaragoza was born on this date in 1829. He was a Mexican government administrator, soldier, and abolitionist. He was born in the Mexican province of Texas, in the village of Bahía del Espiritu Santo, in Coahuila y Texas (now Goliad, Texas). He was the son of Miguel G. Zaragoza and María de Jesús Seguín. […]
learn moreThis date marks the birth in 1829 of John Mercer Langston, an African American abolitionist, attorney, educator, and political activist.
Langston was born free to a white plantation owner John Quarles and Lucy Jane Langston, a slave. He was the youngest of four children. His older brother, Charles Henry, became noted abolitionist Charles Henry Langston, and John was the great-uncle of renowned poet Langston Hughes.
learn more*Edward Walker’s birth is celebrated on this date in 1830. He was a Black artisan and attorney. Edward Garrison Walker was the son of Eliza and David Walker, an abolitionist who wrote an appeal in 1829 calling for the end of slavery. Born in Edgefield, SC, he received training in working with leather as a young man. He […]
learn more*Oliver Howard was born on this date in 1830. He was a white-American soldier and spiritual base administrator. Oliver Otis Howard was born in Leeds, Maine, the son of Rowland Bailey Howard and Eliza Otis Howard. Rowland, a farmer, died when Oliver was nine years old. Oliver attended Monmouth Academy in Monmouth, North Yarmouth […]
learn moreOn this date in 1832, Joseph Hayne Rainey was born. A former slave, he was the first Black man to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives (1870-79).
learn more*The birth of James Lewis is celebrated on this date in 1832. He was a Black soldier and Republican Party politician in Louisiana. James Lewis was born into slavery in Wilkinson County, Mississippi. His father was a white planter, his master, and his mother was an enslaved mulatto woman. He was raised in Bayou Sara, […]
learn more*This date marks Independence Day for the African Country of Zanzibar in 1961. We chose this date to affirm the birth of Tippu Tip, who was born around 1832. He was a Swahili Zanzibar slave owner and slave trader to European colonists. It is believed that Tippu Tip was born in Zanzibar; his birth name […]
learn more*James M. Williams was born on this date in 1833. He was a white-American lawyer, soldier, and merchant. James Monroe Williams was from Lowville (Lewis County), New York. Before the American Civil War, he was employed as a lawyer in his hometown. On July 12, 1861, Williams entered the Union Army as a captain in the 5th Kansas Cavalry Regiment and was appointed commander […]
learn moreEbenezer Don Carlos Bassett, a Black diplomat, was born on this date in 1833.
He was born in Litchfield, CT, he was also of Pequot Indian descent. Bassett was educated at the Connecticut Normal School and worked for 14 years as a teacher in Philadelphia. He was United States minister to Haiti from 1869 to 1879.
This appointment made Bassett the first black diplomat in America. He also became the Haitian consul in New York City. He was a great friend of Frederick Douglass and they exchanged correspondence in French for many years.
learn moreOn this date, Alonzo Jacob Ransier was born in 1834. He was an African American politician known for his honesty.
Born free in Charleston, South Carolina, he received a limited education, becoming a shipping clerk at the age of 16. After the Civil War, he was appointed as that state’s registrar of elections.
Ransier’s activity in gaining equality for Blacks was based on equal rights. He traveled to Washington with a petition from a Charleston meeting of the Friends of Equal Rights, pushing for more consideration for the rights of blacks.
learn more*Frederic Bartholdi was born on this date in 1834. He was a white-French artist and sculptor who designed the Statue of Liberty for France as a gift to the United States of America. Frederic Auguste Bartholdi was born in Colmar, France, to a family of Italian and German Protestant heritage. Bartholdi was the youngest of […]
learn moreOn this date we mark the birth of Thomas Chester in 1834, in Harrisburg, PA. He was an Black lawyer and editor.
Thomas Morris Chester was the son of a slave woman who had escaped from Baltimore in 1825 and thus her son was born free. His father was an oyster salesman and restaurant owner who was part of the inner circle of political and social functions of Harrisburg. Educated at Allegheny Institute, Chester became an abolitionist and colonizationist.
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