Biographies of Major Figures

A biography of historian Carter G. Woodson, who founded the field of African-American history.

A biography of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Biographies of prominent and influential African Americans.

A profile of Crispus Attucks, an African-American sailor who was the first killed in the 1770 Boston Massacre.

A description of the life of African-American inventor, George Washington Carver, from About.com guide Mary Bellis.

Read a short biography of Frederick Douglass, famed abolitionist, from PBS.org.

Marcus Garvey came to the United States in the midst of the Harlem Renaissance, a flowering of African-American culture. He founded the UNIA, urging African Americans to be proud of their African heritage.

A brief biography of Rosa Parks who started the Montgomery Bus Boycott, from About.com guide Jone Johnson Lewis.

A profile of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old boy who was killed for whistling at a white woman in Mississippi in 1955.

Harriet Tubman was a former slave who helped over 200 others escape from slavery to the North during the 19th century.

The Niagara Movement was an instrumental organization that was established in 1905 by journalist William Monroe Trotter and W.E.B. Du Bois in opposition to Booker T. Washington's philosophy as an accommodation.

Lugenia Burns Hope worked tirelessly to improve the lives of African-Americans in Georgia through various initiatives.

This page offers biographical information on the African-American writer, James Weldon Johnson. The profile features a biography, family information and various texts published by the author.

Claude McKay was one of the most prolific poets of the Harlem Renaissance--writing sonnets that exposed the harsh realities of African-American life in the United States.

William Monroe Trotter opposed everyone--from government officials to Booker T.Washington--for not believing that African-Americans deserved immediate equality in American society.

Historian, sociologist, writer, educator and sociopolitical activist, W.E.B. Du Bois fought throughout his career to uplift African-Americans through a variety of methods.

The American Negro Academy promoted the work of African-American scholars in the late 19th, early 20th century.

Booker T. Washington was the most influential African-American leader from 1895 until his death in 1915.

Paul Laurence Dunbar was the most prominent African-American literary figure prior to the Harlem Renaissance.