history
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Ending Bondage With a Display of Humanity
This image is part of a weekly series that The Root is presenting in conjunction with the Image of the Black in Western Art Archive at Harvard University’s W.E.B. Du Bois Research Institute, part of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research. In a lush tropical setting, a large group of nearly naked…
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The Black Roots of Memorial Day
Editor’s note: For those who are wondering about the retro title of this black-history series, please take a moment to learn about historian Joel A. Rogers, author of the 1934 book 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro With Complete Proof, to whom these “amazing facts” are an homage. Amazing Fact About the Negro No. 81: What was “Freedom’s Fort,”…
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How Can I Get the Most Out of Online Genealogy Sites?
I believe I have discovered that I come from free black mulattoes who lived in Tyrrell County, N.C., in the 1700s to 1800s. Their last name is Hill. The last people I have confirmed in my family tree on that side are Charles Hill (born circa 1827), Joyce Bryant (born circa 1831) and her father,…
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What if Du Bois’ Talented Tenth Replaced Isolation With Hope?
Theodore R. Johnson is a writer and naval officer who describes himself as an “upper-middle-class black male.” He recently claimed in The Atlantic that an unintended consequence of a burgeoning group of “college-educated, middle-class black folks”—whom W.E.B. Du Bois called the Talented Tenth—has been their break from the wider black community while still not being accepted…
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When Affirmative Action Was White
Editor’s note: For those who are wondering about the retro title of this black-history series, please take a moment to learn about historian Joel A. Rogers, author of the 1934 book 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro With Complete Proof, to whom these “amazing facts” are an homage. Amazing Fact About the Negro No. 80: Who were the first…
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NAACP LDF Honors the 60th Anniversary of Brown v. Board
It’s been 60 years since the iconic U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declared racial segregation in schools unconstitutional. And yet as celebrations and commemorative pats on the back all cheer the successes, an audience gathered at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., was being reminded that the overall war has not been won. Speaking…
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Was My Ancestor the Only Civilian Killed at Appomattox?
My great-great-grandmother Leah Ballard Ancrum Williams was born circa 1840 and died in 1917 in Camden, Kershaw County, S.C. It was said that she bore 18 children, some before and some after slavery ended. We recently discovered her 1917 death certificate listing her mother’s name as Hannah Reynolds. This was great news to us, since…
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How the Black Press Covered Brown v. Board of Education
The ruling now universally known as Brown v. Board of Education was hailed in the black press of the day as the most significant event in the freedom struggle since the Emancipation Proclamation. It was essentially a do-over, providing an opportunity for the U.S. Supreme Court to set right what it got wrong in 1896…
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Why Coins With a Black Man’s Face Were Valued
This image is part of a weekly series that The Root is presenting in conjunction with the Image of the Black in Western Art Archive at Harvard University’s W.E.B. Du Bois Research Institute, part of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research. Struck from a set of hand-engraved dies in an ancient mint,…
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Who Was Black America’s 1st Investigative Journalist?
Editor’s note: For those who are wondering about the retro title of this black-history series, please take a moment to learn about historian Joel A. Rogers, author of the 1934 book 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro With Complete Proof, to whom these “amazing facts” are an homage. Amazing Fact About the Negro No. 79: Who was the first…