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1903

W.E.B. DuBois's collection The Souls of Black Folks: Essays & Sketches is published.



Maggie Lena Walker becomes Bank President of St. Luke Bank & Trust Company.



The first all African American musical on a major Broadway stage (‘In Dahomey’) is opened by Williams and Walker.



1904

August 7. Ralph J Bunche (diplomat and the first Black winner of Nobel Peace Prize) is born.



In New York City Philip Payton founds the ‘Afro-American Realty Company.’



1905

Madam C.J. Walker moves to Denver where she establishes her own hair care products company.

Madam. C. Walker invents Black hair care products and the straightening comb. 

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1908

July 2. Thurgood Marshall is born.



1909

February 12. The NAACP is founded.



September 18. Kwame Nkrumah is born in Nkroful, Ghana.

Matthew Henson reaches the North Pole.



1910

April. The National Urban League was established.



            January 30. Inventor Granville T. Woods dies.



November 1. WEB Dubois, begins publication of the NAACP monthly magazine, ‘Crisis’.



Madame C.J. Walker sets up a manufacturing plant in Indianapolis.

1911

August 13. James B. Parsons becomes the first African American appointed to a lifetime federal judgeship in the U.S.



1912

January 8. African National Congress founded.



September 27th. W. C. Handy published the first blues song, ‘Memphis Blues’.



1913

February 4. Rosa Parks is born.



Menelik II dies and is succeeded by his grandson Lej Isayu.



1914

Marcus Garvey launches ‘The Universal Negro Improvement & Conservation Association & African Communities League.’



October 13. Garret A. Morgan patents the gas mask.

1915

September 9. Carter G. Woodson founded the ‘Association for the Study of Negro Life and History.’



November 14. Booker T. Washington dies in Tuskegee, Alabama.



1916

March 23. Marcus Garvey arrives in America from Jamaica.

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1916

Madam Walker purchases property in Irvington-on-Hudson, New York. At the time this was the wealthiest residential community in America.

Madeline M. Turner patents the fruit press. 



1918

February 19-21. The First Pan-African Congress met in Paris, France.



April 25. Ella Fitzgerald is born.



January 19. John H Johnson, (publisher of ‘Ebony Magazine’ and ‘Jet’) is born.



July 18. Nelson Mandela is born in Transkei, South Africa.

Nelson Mandela links

Nelson Mandela – Biography at Nobelprize.org



Nelson Mandela Foundation



Nelson Mandela Children's Fund



ANC profile of Mandela



Time 100 profile



Mandela: An Audio History



Mandela: Son of Africa, Father of a Nation Documentary & Soundtrack

Alice Parker patents the heating furnace.



1919

May 25. Madam Walker dies.



1920

August 1-2. Marcus Garvey's ‘The national convention of ‘Universal Negro Improvement Society’ met in New York City.



W.H. Sammons patents the hot comb. 



1921

July 31. Whitney Moore Young, Jr. (Civil Rights Leader) is born.

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August 11. Alex Haley is born.

September 14. Constance Baker Motley (civil rights activist, lawyer, judge, and state senator) is born.



December 21. George and Noble Johnson founded the ‘Lincoln Motion Picture Company’. It was the first black-owned production company and produced films specifically for African Americans.



Bessie Coleman earns an International Pilot's license.

1922

The Harlem Renaissance years- until 1929.



Jack Johnson patents a theft-prevention device for vehicles.



1923

June 21. Marcus Garvey is sentenced to five years in prison.



November 20. Garret A. Morgan patents the automatic traffic signal. 



Ethiopia becomes a member of the League of Nations.



Paul Robeson graduates from Columbia Law School.



 ‘The Philosophy & Opinion of Marcus Garvey’, (two volume set) is published.



1924

March 27. Jazz singer Sarah Vaughn is born in Newark, New Jersey.

Paul Robeson stars in the lead of ‘The Emperor Jones’ in New York.



Paul Robeson stars in his first film, ‘Body and Soul.’

1925

May 19. Malcolm X is born.



Malcolm X Links

CBC Television Interview of Malcolm X

The Official Web Site of Malcolm X

Full audio of Malcolm X speeches

Minister Louis Farrakhan on the murder of Malcolm X, Malcolm X College, 1990 (video)

Ancestry of Malcolm X

A Malcom X media page

Malcolm X Reloaded: Who Really Assassinated Malcolm X

Lessons from Malcolm X: Freedom By Any Means Necessary

Malcolm X: Make It Plain. Documentary



Malcolm X's FBI file



Malcolm X - An Islamic Perspective



Malcolm X : A Profile by Det Danske Koranselskab

1926

February 7. Carter G. Woodson creates ‘Negro History Week’.

In 1976 it became Black History Month.



1927

January 30. The Harlem Globetrotters are formed.



December 2. Marcus Garvey is deported from America.

1928



April 4. Maya Angelou is born Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri.

Maya Angelou links

Official website

Maya Angelou on Oprah & Friends Radio

Oprah Interviews Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou at the Internet Movie Database

Maya Angelou biography and video interview excerpts by The National Visionary Leadership Project

Interview with David Frost on behalf of The Sun Newspaper

Lesson plans at Web English Teacher

April 15. Norma Merrick Sklarek becomes the first licensed woman architect in the U.S.



June 17. James Brown is born.



August 3. William A. Scott III founded the ‘Atlanta Daily World.’ It was the first Black daily newspaper in modern times.



Madame.C.J. Walker opens a $1,000,000 factory, office building and Movie Theater in Indianapolis.



Majorie Joyner patents the permanent hair wave machine.  

      

1929

January 15. Martin Luther King Jr. is born in Atlanta.



April 1. Morehouse College, Spelman College and Atlanta University unify.



1930

April 1. Zawditu, (the first reigning female monarch of Ethiopia) dies.



April 3. Ras Tafari becomes Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia.



May 19. Lorraine Hansberry is born.



November 22. Elijah Muhammad establishes the Nation of Islam in Detroit.



The first Temple of Islam is established in Detroit, Michigan.



Paul Robeson stars in Shakespeare's Othello in London.

1931

February 18. Toni Morrison is born.

1932



April 2. Marvin Gaye is born.

February 28. Richard Spikes patents the automatic gear shift.

1933

February 21. Nina Simone is born.

May 11. Louis Farrakhan is born.

 

September 16. Paul Robeson's first starring movie role and the first major Hollywood production starring an African American.



H. Naylor Fitzhugh becomes the first African American to graduate from the Harvard Business School.



S. H. Love patents the improved vending machine.



1934

November 7. In Chicago Arthur L. Mitchell becomes the first Black Democratic congressman.



December 15. The Spingarn Medal is awarded to William Taylor Burwell Williams for his ‘achievements as an educator’.



1935

August 31. Eldridge Cleaver is born.



October 3. Ethiopia is invaded by Italy.



October 10. Porgy and Bess premieres in New York.



December 5. National Council of Negro Women founded in New York, Mary McLeod Bethune is president.



Dr. Julian synthesized the drug ‘physotigmine’ which is used today in the treatment of glaucoma.



1936

August 9. Jesse Owens won four gold medals at the Berlin Olympics.

October 22. Bobby Seale (co-founder and former chairman of the Black Panther Party) is born in Dallas, Texas.



December 8. NAACP filed the first suit in to try to equalize the salaries of African American and white teachers.



1937

June 22. Joe Louis becomes heavyweight boxing champion of the world.



March 26. William H. Hastie becomes the first African American Federal judge. He takes up his position in the District Court in the Virgin.



1939

June 6. Marian Wright Edelman is born.

July 22. Jane Matilda Bolin becomes judge of court of domestic relations in New York City. She is the first African American woman judge.



June 27. Frederick M. Jones patents the motor.



Frederick Jones patents ticket dispensing machine.



1940

October 16. Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. becomes the first African American general in the United States Army.



February 29. Hattie McDaniel becomes the first African American to win an Oscar Award, (for her role as 'Mammy' in 'Gone with the Wind').



June 10. Marcus Garvey dies.



Dr. Charles Drew invented blood banks and established them around the world. 



1941

October 8. Jesse Jackson is born in Greenville, South Carolina.

1942

June. African Americans and whites organize the ‘Congress of Racial Equality’ in Chicago.



February 17. Huey Newton (co- founder of Black Panther Party) is born.

November1. John H. Johnson publishes ‘Negro Digest’ with a $500 loan on mother's furniture.



1943

January 5. George Washington Carver dies; this date is now celebrated as ‘George Washington Carver Day’.



February 28. Porgy and Bess opened on Broadway.



June 7. Nikki Giovanni is born.

December 15. The Spingarn Medal is awarded to William H. Hastie for his ‘distinguished career as a jurist and as an uncompromising champion of equal justice.’



1944

April 24. The ‘United Negro College Fund’ was established.



February 9. Novelist Alice Walker is born in Eatonton, Georgia.

January 26. Angela Y. Davis is born.

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January 30. Sharon Pratt Dixon, (first woman Mayor of Washington, D.C.) is born.

1945

November 1. John H Johnson publishes the first issue of ‘Ebony’ Magazine.



1946

December 5. The Spingarn Medal is awarded to Thurgood Marshall, for his ‘distinguished service as a lawyer before the Supreme Court.’



1947

April 19. Jackie Robinson becomes the first African American to play major league baseball.



1948

February 25. Martin Luther King is ordained as a Baptist minister.



Apartheid is instituted in South Africa and the supremacy of whites is promoted.



1949

January 22. James Robert Gladden becomes the first African American certified in orthopedic surgery.



October 3. The first Black-owned radio station (WERD) opened in Atlanta.

 

Frederick Jones patents the starter generator.

July 12. Frederick Jones patents the air conditioning unit. (He also invented the X-Ray Machine). 

1950

April 3. The death of Carter G. Woodson.

 

May 13. Stevie Wonder is born.



August 19. Edith Sampson becomes the first African American to be appointed as a representative to the UN.



November 28. Frederick Jones patents the two-cycle gasoline engine.



December 10. Ralph J Bunche becomes the first African American to be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize.



The U.S. government confiscates Paul Robeson's passport and tries to silence him.



Kwame Nkrumah is arrested and put in prison by the British.

Pictures of Kwame Nkrumah



Lydia Holmes invents wood toys.



1951

November 1. ‘Jet’ magazine is founded by John H. Johnson.



December 25. The Spingarn Medal is awarded to Mabel K. Staupers for her ‘leadership in the field of nursing’.



Bessie V. Griffin patents the portable receptacle. 



1952

After 71 years, Tuskegee reported that this was first year with no lynchings.



January 12. The University of Tennessee accepts its first African American student.



1953

October 22. Clarence S. Green becomes the first African American certified in neurological surgery.



1954

May 17. In Kansas, the Supreme Court overturned legal school segregation at all levels.



August 24. Philip Emeagwali (Inventor) was born in Akure, Nigeria.

1955

May 18. Mary McLeod Bethune dies in Florida.



December 1. Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat in Montgomery, Alabama.



December 5. African Americans began a boycott of the bus system.



December 5. Carl Murphy, (publisher of the Baltimore Afro-American), is awarded the Spingarn Medal for his ‘contributions as a publisher and civil rights leader’.



November 7. Baltimore bans segregation in public recreational facilities.

1956

March 11. Segregation is denounced in public schools.



May 30. A bus boycott began in Tallahassee, Florida.



June 5. Federal court ruled that racial segregation on Montgomery city buses violated Constitution.



1957

August 29. The Voting Rights Bill was the first major civil rights legislation in more than 75 years.



March 6. Ghana becomes an independent state.



July 6. Althea Gibson win’s the women's Wimbledon singles championship and becomes the first African American woman tennis champion.



September 4. Black students are banned from a Little Rock high school and the National Guard is called in to maintain order.



December 5. Martin Luther King Jr. is awarded the Spingarn Medal for his ‘leadership of the Montgomery Bus Boycott’.



December 20. Anita Baker is born.



The Eastern and Western regions of Nigeria begin internal self-government.



1958

January 18. Daniel Hale Williams (the first physician to perform open heart surgery) is born.



Chinua Achebe publishes her novel ‘Things Fall Apart’.



1959

March 11. Lorraine Hansberry's play ‘A Raisin in the Sun’ opens on Broadway.



July 17. Billie Holiday dies.



December 21. Motown Records is set up by Berry Gordy Jr.



Otis F. Boykin patents the wire type precision resistor. 



Ruth Bowen sets up the ‘Queen Booking Company’, (a talent agency) in New York City.

1960

February 1. Sit-ins in Greensboro, North Carolina set off similar protests throughout the South.



May 6. President Eisenhower signed Civil Rights Act of 1960.



October 1. Nigeria becomes independent.



I.O. Carter patents the nursery chair. 

 

Zaire (formerly Belgian Congo and the richest European colony) becomes independent from Belgium.



1961

April 27. The death of Kwame Nkrumah, (first president of Ghana).



Bob Marley, Bunny Livingston, and Peter Tosh form a group called the Rudeboys.

1962

July 27. Martin Luther King Jr. is jailed.



August 6. Jamaica becomes independent.



November 26. Paul E. Williams patents the helicopter.



Algeria wins independence from France and over 900,000 white settlers leave.



1963

April 3. Martin Luther King, Jr. leads African Americans in the campaign against discrimination in Birmingham.



June - August. Civil rights protests took place in most major urban areas.



August 16. The first African American artist to design a U.S. postage stamp.



August 27. W.E.B. Du Bois dies in Accra, Ghana.



August 28. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivers his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech.



September 15. Four African American girls are killed in the bombing of Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham.



December 12. Medgar Wiley Evers is awarded the Spingarn Medal for his ‘civil rights leadership’.



Kenya becomes independent.



1964

February 25. Cassius Clay (Mohammed Ali) becomes world heavyweight boxing champion.



March 12. Malcolm X announces that he is leaving the Nation of Islam.



June 11. Nelson Mandela is sentenced to life imprisonment.



Click here to read Nelson Mandela’s statement from the dock

Book: Autobiography of Nelson Mandela: ‘Long Walk to Freedom.’

July 18 - August 30. A racial disturbance in Harlem sets off other serious racial disturbances in more than six major cities.



June 28. Malcolm X establishes the ‘Organization for Afro-American Unity’ in New York.



October 14. Martin Luther King Jr. becomes the youngest man to win the Nobel Peace Prize.



1965

February 21. Malcolm X is assassinated.



August 11-21. The Watts riots take place.



January 12. Lorraine Hansberry dies.



March 21. Martin Luther King Jr. leads thousands of African Americans on a 54-mile march from Selma to Montgomery Alabama.



1966

July 1-9. The concept ‘Black Power’ is introduced and promoted by CORE, SNCC also adopts it. SCLC and the NAACP did not.



October. The Black Panther Party was founded by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale in Oakland, California.



January 18.  Robert C. Weaver becomes the first African American presidential cabinet member.



January 25. Constance Baker Motley becomes the first

African American woman to become a federal judge.



February 24. Kwame Nkrumah is removed from power in a military coup.



April 20. Haile Selassie visits Kingston Jamaica.



Flora Nwapa's Efuru becomes the first woman to publish a novel in Nigeria.



1967

May 1- October 1. More than 40 riots occurred in the US.



June 13. Thurgood Marshall becomes the first Black Supreme Court Justice in the U.S.



August 6. Sir Alexander Bustamante, (Jamaica's first prime minister) dies.



September 27. Washington D.C.'s Anacostia Museum opens. It showcases contributions by African Americans.

The Black Power Conference in Newark, NJ.



1968

February 23. W.E.B. Du Bois is born.



April 4. Martin Luther King is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee.



October 16. Sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos give Black Power salute during the medal ceremony at the Olympic Games in Mexico City.

The Black Power Conference in Philadelphia, PA.



Rufus Stokes patents the exhaust purifier.



1969

October 29. The Supreme Court rules that racial segregation in schools should end immediately and that unitary school systems be introduced.

The Black Power Conference in Bermuda, West Indies.



Marie V. Brittan Brown patents the security system.



1970

January. Biafra was defeated but one million die in Nigeria.

July 1. Kenneth Gibson becomes the first black mayor of an Eastern city (Newark, New Jersey).



February 16. Joe Frazier becomes world heavyweight boxing champion.

Maya Angelou publishes ‘I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.’



Portugal loses African colonies, (Angola and Mozambique).

1971



January 12. The Congressional Black Caucus is established.



February 11. Whitney Young Jr. (National Urban League director) dies.

July 6. Henry Sampson patents the cellular phone. 



Dr. Yosef A.A. ben-Jochannan publishes ‘Africa Mother of Western Civilization’.



1972

January 25. Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm starts campaigning for US President. She was the first African American Presidential nominee.



July 25. The US government admits to the ‘Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment’, (where Blacks were used in experiments with syhillis). African Americans were used as guinea pigs in this forty-year experiment.



April 24. At a White House ceremony James M. Rodger Jr becomes the first African American to be named ‘National Teacher of the Year.’

Wole Soyinka's autobiography ‘The Man Died: Prison Notes of Wole Soyinka’ is published.



1973

June 1. WGPR becomes the first television station owned by African Americans.



September 12th. Emperor Haile Selasie is overthrown by a military coup.

Gertrude E. Downing and William Desjardin patent the corner cleaner attachment. 



1974

February 7. Grenada achieves independence from Great Britain.



November 12. South Africa was suspended from the U.N. because of its racial policies.

Ethiopian peasants revolt against their exploiters.



1975

February 25. Elijah Muhammad dies.



July 5. Arthur Ashe wins the men's Wimbledon singles championship.



August 27. Haile Selassie dies.



September 29. First Black-owned station in US, WGPR-TV Detroit, begins broadcasting.



Nigerian coup: The new leader is Brigadier Murtala Muhammed.



Virgie M. Ammons patents the fireplace damper actuating tool.



1976

January 23. Paul Robeson dies.



Negro History Week becomes Black History Month.



Brigadier Murtala Muhammed is assassinated.



Alex Haley's novel ‘Roots: The Saga of an American Family’ is published.



1977

January 23- February 3. ABC-TV televises the Roots mini-series (the most watched mini-series in history), based on Alex Haley's book.

April 17. Alex Haley, author of ‘Roots’ is awarded Pultizer Prize.

1978

November 20th. National Black Consciousness Day (Zumbi Day) is established in Brazil.



1979

November 15. The Nobel Prize in economics is awarded to Professor Arthur Lewis of Princeton. He was the first African American to be awarded in a category other than peace.



November 15. Spingarn Medal awarded to Rosa L. Parks.



Alhaji Shehu Shagari becomes President of Nigeria.



Buchi Emecheta publishes ‘The Joys of Motherhood’.

Other books by Buchi Emecheta: In the Ditch, Second Class Citizen, Head Above Water, The Bride Price, The Slave Girl, Titch the Cat, Nowhere to Play, The Moonlight Bride, The Wrestling Match, On Our Freedom, Destination Biafra, Naira Power, Double Yoke, The Rape of Shavi, Adah's Story, A Kind of Marriage, Family Bargain, Gwendolen.



1980

January 25. Robert Johnson establishes Black Entertainment Television with a $15,000 loan (it starts broadcasting from Washington, DC).



September 18. Cosmonaut Arnold Tamayo, (a Cuban), becomes the first African American in space.

Manley West  discovered and developed the compound in cannabis to cure glaucoma (1980- 1987).



Freedom fighters destroy Rhodesia and the Republic of Zimbabwe is re-established.

A.P. Abourne patents the refining of coconut oil.

1981

May 23. Bob Marley dies.



July 31. Attorney Arnette R. Hubbard becomes the first woman president of the National Bar Association.



1982

May 23. Lee P. Brown is named the first African American police commissioner of Houston, Texas. 

December 10. Pamela McAllister Johnson becomes the first African American woman publisher of a mainstream paper, ‘The Ithaca Journal.’



1983

April 12. Harold Washington wins the election for mayor of Chicago.



April 18. Alice Walker wins both an American Book Award and a Pulitzer Prize for The Color Purple.



June 22. To be classed as black you would need to have1/32nd Negro blood.



November 2. President Ronald Reagan establishes a federal holiday in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.



August 30. Guion (Guy) S. Bluford, Jr. was the first African American astronaut to make a space flight on board the space shuttle Challenger.



November 3. Jesse Jackson announces that he intends to campaign to become President of the US.



Gloria Naylor wins an American Book Award for ‘The Women of Brewster Place’.



President Shagari is re-elected in Nigeria.



Major-General Mohammadu Buhari becomes president after another Nigerian military coup.



1984

April 1. Marvin Gaye dies.



Oprah Winfrey accepts a job as host of A.M. Chicago.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu receives the Nobel Peace Prize.



1985

Major-General Ibrahim Babangida rises to power in Nigeria.



1986

January 16. A bronze bust of Martin Luther King, Jr., is erected in the halls of Congress. It is the first for an African American.



January 20. The first national Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday was celebrated.



February 8. Oprah Winfrey becomes the first African American woman to host a nationally syndicated talk show.

Wole Soyinka is awarded the Nobel Prize for literature.



Books by Wole Soyinka: A Dance of the Forest, The Road, Kongi's Harvest, The Man Died, A Shuttle in the Crypt, Death and the King's Horseman and The Open Sore of a Continent.

George Alcorn patents the fabrication of spectrometer.



1987

Frederick Drew Gregory was the first African American to command a space shuttle.



August 6th. Reginald Lewis buys ‘Beatrice International Foods’ for nearly $1 billion.



September 15. Thomas ‘Hit Man’ Hearns becomes the first African American man to win boxing titles in five different weight categories.

Dr. Benjamin S. Carson is the first surgeon to successfully separate Siamese twins joined at the head.

Ivan Van Sertima pubishes ‘They came before Columbus’.

Dr. Molefi Kete Asante publishes ‘The Afrocentric Idea’.



Joan Clark patents the medicine tray.



1988

January 11. Anthropologists announce that an ancestor of Homo sapiens (‘Eve’) is the mother of the human species. The bones of ‘Eve’ were found in East Africa.



November 4. Bill and Camille Cosby donate $20 million to Spelman College. This is the largest donation ever made by a black American.



November 4. The Martin L. King, Jr. Federal Building is erected in Atlanta, Ga. It becomes the first federal building in the US to bear the name of the civil rights leader.



December 21. Jesse Jackson encourages the use of the term ‘African-American.’



Terry McMillan wins an American Book Award for her novel ‘Mama’.



Toni Morrison receives a Pulitzer Prize for her novel ‘Beloved’.



Dr. Patricia E. Bath   patents the apparatus that efficiently removes cataracts.    

       

1989

February 25. Mike Tyson wins the Heavyweight Championship.



August 10. General Colin L. Powell becomes chair of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff.



November 7. David Dinkins becomes mayor of New York.



L. Douglas Wilder becomes governor of Virginia.



August 22. Huey P. Newton is killed.



October 21. Bertram M. Lee and Peter C.B. Bynoe purchase the Denver Nuggets (basketball team) for $54 million. This made them the first African American owners of a professional basketball team.



Philip Emeagwali invents the world's fastest computer.



Bill White becomes the president of Major League Baseball’s National League.

1990

February 11. Nelson Mandela, South African Black Nationalist, is freed after 27 years in prison.

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Mandela’s Nobel Peace Prize speech

November 1. Ebony magazine celebrates its 45th anniversary.



January 13. Lawrence Douglas Wilder of Virginia becomes the first African American to be elected governor in the U.S.



February 28. Philip Emeagwali is awarded the Gordon Bell Prize for solving one of the twenty most difficult problems in the computing field.



Philip Emeagwali invents accurate weather forecasting and improved petroleum recovery. 

September 3. Jonathan A. Rodgers becomes president of CBS's television stations division. This made him the highest ranking African American in network television.



September 16. In Living Color wins an Emmy for ‘Outstanding Comedy Series’.



Charles Johnson wins a National Book Award for his novel ‘Middle Passage’.



August Wilson wins a Pulitzer Prize for his play ‘The Piano Lesson’.



George Washington Carver & Percy Julian go into the National Inventor's Hall of Fame.



1991

January 15. Roland Burris becomes the first African American attorney general of Illinois.



June 18. Wellington Webb becomes mayor of Denver, Colorado.



June 27. Thurgood Marshall announces his retirement.



July 1. Clarence Thomas becomes a Supreme Court Judge.



October 30. BET Holdings, Inc. (Black Entertainment Television) sells 4.2 million shares of stock.



Dr. Frances Cress Welsing publishes ‘The Isis Papers, The Keys to the Colors’.



1992

April 30. ‘The Cosby Show’ broadcast the final episode.



August 3. Jackie Joyner-Kersee becomes the first woman to be an Olympic heptathlon champion twice.



September 12. Mae C. Jemison becomes first African American woman in space.



November 3. Carol Moseley Braun becomes the first African American woman ever elected to the United States Senate.



February 10. Alex Haley (author of ‘Roots’) dies.



February 19. John Singleton becomes the first African American director to be nominated for an Academy Award, (best director and best screenplay) for his first film ‘Boyz N the Hood’.



April 29. The first day of the L.A riots.



Derek Walcott is awarded the Nobel Prize for literature.



Anthony T. Browder publishes ‘Nile Valley Contributions to Civilization’.



1993

September 7. M. Joycelyn Elders becomes the first African American and the first woman United States Surgeon General.



October 7. Toni Morrison becomes the first black American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.



January 20. Maya Angelou speaks at the Presidential Inauguration.



January 24. Thurgood Marshall dies.



February 6. Arthur Ashe (tennis player) dies.



November 18. South Africa approves the new democracy constitution that gives black people the right to vote and ends white minority rule.



President Babangida annuls Multi-party elections in Nigeria and resigns shortly after.



General Sani Abacha rises to power in Nigeria's seventh coup.

1994

October 21. Dexter Scott King, (the youngest son of Martin Luther King, Jr). becomes chief executive and chairman of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta.



May 10. Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela becomes the first democratically elected President of South Africa.



Llaila O. Afrika publishes Nutricide -The Nutritional Destruction of the Black Race.



A plane crash kills the leaders of Burundi and Rwanda, sparking ethnic killing. The Hutus massacre up to a million Tutsis in Rwanda; as a result of this more than a million Hutu refugees flee Rwanda.



1995

October 16. The Million Man March.

December 9. Kweisi Mfume becomes president and chief executive officer of the NAACP.



1996

April 15. South Africa's ‘Truth Commission’ begins.



September 13. Tupac Shakur is killed.



Philip Emeagwali patents the hyperball computer.



Nigeria wins the Gold Medal in 1996 Olympic Football.



1997

October 25. Million Woman March, (over one million women of African ancestry gather in Philadelphia).

January 28. Police confess to the 1977 murder of Steve Biko at South Africa's Truth Commission.



March 27. Pamela Gordon becomes Bermuda's first woman prime minister.

Kofi Annan becomes the seventh secretary-general of the United Nations.

Laurent Kabila becomes president of the Democratic Republic of Congo (ex-Zaire).



The first made-in-Nigeria saloon car (Z-600) is launched in Owerri.

Multi-party elections in Nigeria.



Ivorian Freedom Neruda & Nigerian Christine Anyanwu win International Press Freedom Prize.



Uganda becomes Africa's major coffee producer.



Folarin Sosan patents the package-park.



1998

January 15. James Farmer (Civil rights leader) was awarded the Medal of Freedom from President Clinton.



January 18. The New York Stock Exchange closed for the first time, in recognition of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr day.



Madam Walker is featured on the United States Postal Service commemorative stamps.



Five African nations play in the World Cup (Nigeria, Cameroon, South Africa, Morocco and Tunisia).



Nigeria president General Sani Abacha dies.



1999

January 13. Michael Jordan retires from basketball.



Al-Hajj Malik Shabazz is featured on the United States Postal Service commemorative stamps.