Alfred Fagon: Jamaican-born Black-British Playwright
Alfred Fagon was a Jamaican-born playwright, poet and actor. He was one of the most notable Black British playwrights of the 1970s and 1980s. Fagon...
Tag : Black Firsts
Mathias De Sousa: The first African-American in Maryland
Mathias de Sousa, possibly of African and Portuguese ancestry, is considered the first known Portuguese immigrant on record to have settled in North America. He...
Paul Belloni Du Chaillu: The “African” Zoologist who became known as the first modern European to confirm the existence of gorillas
“In such a wild country as Africa one does not go far without adventures. The traveler necessarily sees what is strange and wonderful, for every...
Isaac Burns Murphy: One of the Greatest American Jockeys of All Time
Isaac Burns Murphy was an African-American Hall of Fame jockey, who is considered one of the greatest riders in American Thoroughbred horse racing history. Murphy...
Did You Know that the world’s oldest jewelry is from Africa?
Did You Know that around 75,000 years ago an African drilled tiny holes into the shells of snails and strung them as beads to make...
William Tucker: The first African American child
“Out under the moon and the stars, alone with his son…he walked to the edge of the village, lifted his baby up with his face...
William DeHart Hubbard: The first African American to win an Olympic gold medal in an individual event
[dropcap size=small]W[/dropcap]illiam DeHart Hubbard was the first African American in Olympic history to win an individual gold medal, when he won the long (broad) jump...
Jackie Ormes: The first professional African American woman cartoonist
Jackie Ormes (August 1, 1911 – December 26, 1985) was born Zelda Jackson in a small town outside Pittsburgh. She was a self-taught artist who...
Anna Mac Clarke: A Military Pioneer
Anna Mac Clarke was the first African American woman in the U.S. Army to command an otherwise all‑white unit while the military was still formally...
Ella Fitzgerald: The First Lady of Song
Ella Fitzgerald, known as the First Lady of Song, Queen of Jazz, and Lady Ella was an extraordinary jazz and song vocalist, who won 13...