Monroe Nichols IV, born on September 24, 1983, is an American politician who was elected the first Black Mayor of Tulsa, Oklahoma. He assumed office on December 1, 2024, and is serving a four-year term. Nichols grew up in Waco, Texas, and is the son of Ramona Curtis, Ph. D., and Monroe Nichols III. His father and uncle were both […]

Andre Hill, a 47-year-old unarmed African American man became another Black Lives Matter victim when he was shot and killed by a white police officer, Adam Coy, of the Columbus, Ohio Police Department on December 22, 2020. Coy responded to a non-emergency call from a neighbor who reported suspicious activity involving someone sitting in an SUV and turning the vehicle […]

The story of Orville and Wilbur Wright and their first airplane flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina in 1903 is known to millions around the world. What is not known is that they had a rival in African American inventor Charles Frederick Page. See Page’s remarkable story, written by historian Kelly McCoy here. Charles Frederick Page Charles Frederick Page of […]

An active Texas frontier Army post between 1867 and 1889, Fort Concho at various times posted units from the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry Regiments and the Twenty-Fourth and Twenty-Fifth Infantry Regiments, outfits commonly identified today as Buffalo Soldiers. Established in 1867 near the convergence of the Main and North Concho Rivers in contemporary San Angelo, Texas, the fort was surrounded, […]

Olivette Miller, a harpist, vocalist, and actress, was born in New York City on February 2, 1914. Her parents were Flournoy Eakin Miller, an actor and playwright from Columbia, Tennessee, and Bessie Oliver Miller, an early 1900s chorus girl and a respected actress. Olivette, an only child, was reared in the Harlem’s famous Striver’s Row now known as the St. […]

In November 2023 Dontae Payne was elected mayor of Olympia, Washington. He is the first African American and openly gay mayor in Olympia’s 164 year history. Payne was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Soon after his birth the family moved to Allentown, Pennsylvania where Payne attended local schools. After graduating from high school Payne enlisted in the United States army. He […]

The first popularly elected African American mayor of Flint, Michigan, James A. Sharp, Jr. was born in New York City on May 28, 1933. His parents were James Alfred Sharpe and Clementine Banks Sharpe. At the age of 18, James Sharp joined the United States Marines and remained with them until his retirement in 1977. Sharp saw military action in […]

Pamela Goynes-Brown, the first African American major of North Las Vegas, was born in 1962 on a Navajo Indian Reservation in Utah. Her parents were Theron and Naomi Goynes. In 1964 the family moved to North Las Vegas so they could pursue careers in education. Pamela Goynes attended local schools in North Las Vegas but after high school graduation she […]

The Freedom House Ambulance Service was an emergency medical service (EMS) founded in 1967 to provide medical services to the predominantly African American Hill District of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The service was staffed entirely by African Americans. The Freedom House Ambulance Service was also the first EMS in the United States to be staffed by paramedics with medical training beyond first […]

The Wiley debate team’s history goes back to 1924 when Melvin Beaunorus Tolson took a job teaching English and speech at Wiley College (now Wiley University). Tolson also served as the football coach and speech and debate coach. On October 28, 1924, he founded the Forensic Society of Wiley College debate team. In early 1930, the Wiley Debate Team debated […]