Author Description

A comprehensive and engaging account of the most significant events, individuals, terms, ideas, and social movements that make up the dazzling canvas of African American history—from the National Book Award–winning author of The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke “An indispensable aid for the study of Black American History.”—Clarence E. Walker, professor of history, University of California, Davis Distinguished historian and National Book Award winner Jeffrey C. Steward illuminates the famous and the obscure, people like Estevanico, the first African explorer in America, and Sojourner Truth, one of the few Black women to participate in both the abolitionist and women’s rights movements. He tells us how the former slave Peter Salem dispatched the hated British major at the battle of Bunker Hill, and how Colin Powell earned his medals in Vietnam. And he reminds us of the artistic contributions of filmmaker Oscar Micheaux, dancer Katherine Dunham, and actor Ira Aldridge. Here is a fact-filled trip through five hundred years of African American history, divided into six broad sections: Great Migrations; Civil Rights and Politics; Science, Inventions and Medicine; Sports; Military; Culture and Religion. So if you want to know who invented the gas mask or dominated college lacrosse in the mid 1950s, or became the first Black cowboy to write his own autobiography, or even who invented the disc jockey technique of “scratching” you’re sure to find it in 1001 Things Everyone Should Know About African American History.