African American Archives

May 3, 1898: Septima Clark Born

Educator and civil rights organizer Septima Clark was born in South Carolina.

Black in Blues: How a Color Tells the Story of My People

Book — Non-fiction. By Imani Perry. 2025. 256 pages.
A meditation on the color blue and its fascinating role in Black history and culture.

Oct. 1526: First Rebellion of Enslaved Africans in What Became the United States

Enslaved Africans carried out the first recorded rebellion against slavery in what would become the United States, rising up at the short-lived Spanish colony of San Miguel de Gualdape, located in what is now Georgia or South Carolina.

Journalism and Jim Crow: White Supremacy and the Black Struggle for a New America

Book — Non-fiction. Edited by Kathy Roberts Forde and Sid Bedingfield. 2021. 360 pages.
A look at roles of the white press and Black press in the Jim Crow South.

The Stono Rebellion Marker (photo) | Zinn Education Project

Sept. 9, 1739: The Stono Rebellion

Uprising by enslaved people in South Carolina.

Teaching for Black Lives

Teaching Guide. Edited by Dyan Watson, Jesse Hagopian, Wayne Au. 2018. Rethinking Schools. 368 pages.
Essays, teaching activities, role plays, poems, and artwork, designed to illuminate the movement for Black students' lives, the school-to-prison-pipeline, Black history, gentrification, intersectional Black identities, and more.

Spottswood Thomas Bolling Jr. and his mother Mrs. Sarah Bolling of the Bolling v. Sharpe school desegregation case, decided on the same day as Brown v. Board. Image: © The Washington Post by permission from the Washingtoniana Division.

May 17, 1954: Brown v. Board Ruling

After decades of organizing and strategic efforts by parents, teachers, lawyers, and more — the U.S. Supreme Court issued the unanimous decision in Brown v. Board of Education on school segregation.

A Wichita Beacon article lists the ground rules for the game.

June 21, 1925: Black Baseball Team Beats Klan Players

The Wichita Monrovians bested a squad fielded by the white-supremacist Ku Klux Klan terrorist organization at the height of Jim Crow apartheid.

Oct. 17, 1837: Petition to Repeal Black Codes in Ohio

The first general convention of African American Ohioans met in Columbus and pledged to continue raising their voices in order to repeal the Black Codes.

May 10, 1740: The South Carolina Negro Act is Passed

Passed in response to the Stono Rebellion, this law made it illegal to teach enslaved people to read or write, aiming to prevent further insurrections.

Freewater

Book — Historical fiction. By Amina Luqman-Dawson. 2023. 416 pages.
A lyrical, accessible historical middle-grade novel about two enslaved children‘s escape from a plantation and the many ways they find freedom.

May 12, 1968: The Poor People’s Campaign Began

The Poor People’s Campaign was a multiracial effort to gain economic justice for poor people.

May 19, 1918: Mary Turner Lynching

Mary Turner, a young African American woman who was eight months pregnant, was lynched in Lowndes County, Georgia.

May 13, 1985: Philadelphia Police Bomb MOVE

The Philadelphia Police Department dropped a C-4 bomb on the home of the MOVE organization, killing eleven people (including five children) and wiping out half a city block.

Sept. 29, 1943: Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary Hunger Strike

Conscientious objectors began a hunger strike at Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary.

Race to Incarcerate: A Graphic Retelling

Book — Non-fiction. By Marc Mauer and Sabrina Jones. 2013. 128 pages.
Based on the popular book Race to Incarcerate, this graphic adaptation is a key resource to introduce a study of U.S. prison system to middle school readers and above.

Ruth and the Green Book

Picture book. By Calvin Alexander Ramsey with Gwen Strauss. Illustrated by Floyd Cooper. 2010. 32 pages.
Story for young readers about an African American family travelling during the Jim Crow era and the networks of support and services listed in The Green Book.

Flint Sit-Down Strike, 1936-1937

Poster. By Dylan Miner.
Informational poster about Roscoe Van Zandt and the Flint Sit-Down Strike.

Boycott

Film. By Clark Johnson. 2001. 120 minutes.
Dramatic account of the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

May 18, 1896: Plessy v. Ferguson Ruling

Plessy v. Ferguson upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation laws for public facilities.

Schomburg: The Man Who Built a Library

Picture book. By Carole Boston Weatherford and Eric Velasquez. 2017. 48 pages.
This picture book is a tribute to Arturo Schomburg, the Afro Puerto Rican historian collector and activist who chronicled the Black history of the Diaspora.

May 15, 1970: Jackson State Killings

College student Phillip Lafayette Gibbs (21) and high school student James Earl Green (17) were killed by the police during an anti-war protest at Jackson State College.

June 13, 1866: 14th Amendment Passed

The 14th Amendment to the constitution was passed, granting citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States.”

June 17, 2015: Charleston Church Massacre

Nine African American churchgoers were gunned down inside a church in an act of white supremacist terrorism.

How Red Lines Built White Wealth: A Lesson on Housing Segregation in the 20th Century

Teaching Activity. By Ursula Wolfe-Rocca. Rethinking Schools.
The mixer role play is based on Richard Rothstein’s The Color of Law, which shows in exacting detail how government policies segregated every major city in the United States with dire consequences for African Americans.

Teaching Activity by Ursula Wolfe-Rocca

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