1870 to 1950 - Sharecropping (watch)
Sharecropping became widespread in the South as a response to economic upheaval caused by the end of slavery during and after...
1940s to 1950s - Ethel Waters became one of the first black actresses on TV.
Show business loved Ethel Waters, who could sing, dance, and act. But racism throttled her career in the way that still affects black...
1950s to 1960s - Daisy Bates
Daisy Bates was an African American civil rights activist and newspaper publisher who documented the battle to end segregation in...
1950s to 60s - Ethel L. Payne
One night in 1947, police arrested two dozen black men outside a bar in Ethel L. Payne’s Chicago neighborhood. When Payne tried to get...
1950 - She was one of the first black women to host a television show
Then the House Un-American Activities Committee came for her On September 22, 1950, musician Hazel Scott appeared in front of the House...
1950s onward - Louis Farrakhan
Louis Abdul Farrakhan was born on May 11, 1933 in Bronx, New York as Louis Eugene Walcott. Walcott, who grew up in Roxbury,...
1950s - The case of Ruby McCollum became national news
White townspeople would say that McCollum was trying to dodge a medical bill, but McCollum would claim that she’d been sexually...
1950 - The woman who inspired Serena Williams
In 1950, Gibson became the first black player, female or male, to compete in the U.S. Open, which was then played at Forest Hills and...
1950s to 1960s - The Real MLK
The earliest lesson I learned about Martin Luther King Jr. was that he had “a dream.” Delivered in his most well-known speech at the 1963...
1950s to 1960s - The Real Rosa Parks
Sixty years ago, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Ala. Her courageous act is now American legend. She is a...