Arthur J. “Kelly” Williams was a prominent African American insurance executive and influential figure in Black enterprise during the mid-20th century. Born around 1904, Williams built a distinguished career in the insurance industry at a time when few African Americans held executive-level positions in major firms. His leadership at Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company helped expand the company’s reach […]

George William Gore, Jr., educator and administrator, was born in Nashville, Tennessee, on July 11, 1901, to George W. Gore, Sr., and Emma (Hambrick) Gore. By 1910, however, 8-year-old George was living with Edward W. Byrdsong and his adopted daughter, Sarah Jones. Gore’s mother, Emma, had passed away in 1902 before he was barely a year old. His widowed father […]

Born in Decatur, Alabama, in 1893, James Blaine Cashin was the youngest of Herschel Vivian Cashin and Minnie Virginia Cashin’s seven children. Herschel Cashin, himself a distinguished lawyer and Republican member of the Alabama House of Representatives during Reconstruction, was widely regarded as ‘one of the fathers of the Reconstruction in Alabama.’  James Cashin graduated from Fisk University in 1916 […]

Charles Henry Carroll was born May 10, 1877, in Tazewell, Virginia, to Charles H. and Bettee Carroll, who was already widowed by 1880. He attended Virginia State College and went on to earn a medical degree from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in 1906, where he was among the medical school’s first Black graduates.  A pioneering African American […]

Mary Elliott Hill, a pioneer, educator and inventor, is known as one of the earliest African American women in the field of chemistry and is responsible (with her husband, Carl McClellan Hill) for the development of ketene synthesis. Hill’s research on ketene synthesis is described as a building block and significant in the science and medical community. Elliott—born January 5, […]

Lucy Breckenridge, best known for her diary covering early Washington State History, was born March 18, 1857, in Staunton, Virginia. In 1870, when Lucy was 13 years old, she did domestic work at the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in Weston, Virginia. Henry Breckenridge, born October 31, 1848, was a laborer at the asylum. Lucy and Henry married on December 21, 1871, […]

Carroll Napier Langston (1881-1972), lawyer, banker, and businessman, was one of the principal founders of the One-Cent Savings Bank in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1904, it was the first Black institution of its kind and remains operational today as Citizens Savings Bank and Trust Company, the oldest continuously owned Black financial institution in the country. Langston was born in St. […]

Richard Gadson is an African American drag bike racer. He was born on March 8, 1986, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Much of Gadson’s early life is unknown, but he always had a passion for drag bike racing. Some of his earliest memories of the sport come from watching his uncle, Ricky, race in the Pro Stock Motorcycle class in the 1990s. […]

Malcolm-Jamal Warner was a talented actor, poet, musician, director, and producer, born on August 18, 1970, in Jersey City, New Jersey. He was named after the civil rights activist Malcolm X and the jazz legend Ahmad Jamal. His father, Robert Warner Jr., worked in drug intervention programs and graduated from Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. After his parents’ divorce, his mother, […]

Roscoe Dubois Draper, the last instructor of the Tuskegee Airmen, served during World War II and was a “triple-rated” Tuskegee Airmen Flight Instructor. He was born in Haverford, Pennsylvania, on May 4, 1919, to Edgar and Ethel Draper, the fourth of nine children. His siblings were Earl Draper, Cora Draper, Percy Draper, Marie Draper Pierce, Barbara Draper Newton, William Draper, […]