Historical Timeline

Sojourner Truth, a former slave, delivered her “Ain’t I a Woman?” speech during Women’s Rights Convention at the Old Stone Church in Akron, Ohio.

Uncle Toms Cabin published.

Abolitionist Frederick Douglass delivered the 1854 commencement address at Western Reserve College in Hudson, Ohio.

First published play by an African American: The Escape; or, A Leap for Freedom by William Wells Brown.

Abolitionist John Brown led the raid on a Federal Armory at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, to start an armed revolt of enslaved people.

The Civil War.

First African-American president of a college: Bishop Daniel Payne (Wilberforce University).

First college owned and operated by African Americans: Wilberforce University in Ohio.

First African-American woman in the United States to earn an M.D.: Dr. Rebecca Davis Lee Crumpler.

Thirteenth Amendment was adopted to end slavery as part of the United States Constitution.

First African American to earn a Ph.D.: Father Patrick Francis Healy from University of Leuven, Belgium.

First African-American woman enlistee in the U.S. Army: Cathay Williams.

First African-American woman to serve as a professor: Sarah Jane Woodson Early; Xenia, Ohio's Wilberforce University hired her to teach Latin and English.

First African American elected to the U.S. House of Representatives: John Willis Menard. His opponent contested his election, and opposition to his election prevented him from being seated in Congress.

First elected African-American Lieutenant Governor: Oscar Dunn (Louisiana).

First African-American U.S. diplomat: Ebenezer Don Carlos Bassett, minister to Haiti.

First African-American woman school principal: Fanny Jackson Coppin (Institute for Colored Youth).

First African American elected to the U.S. Senate, and first to serve in the U.S. Congress: Hiram Rhodes Revels (R–MS).

First African American to graduate from Harvard College: Richard Theodore Greener.

First African American to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives: Joseph Rainey (R-SC).

First African American to vote in an election under the 15th Amendment to the United States Constitution, granting voting rights regardless of race: Thomas Mundy Peterson.

Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution is ratified, giving African Americans the right to vote.

First African-American nominee for Vice President of the United States: Frederick Douglass by the Equal Rights Party.

Panic of 1873 Firms that heavily invested in the Northern Pacific Railroad declared bankruptcy, a financial crisis spread across the United States and Europe, causing a depression lasting from 1873 to 1879.

First African-American Speaker of the Mississippi House of Representatives, and of any state legislature: John R. Lynch.

First African American to preside over the House of Representatives as Speaker pro tempore: Joseph Rainey.

First African-American president of a major college/university: Father Patrick Francis Healy, S.J. of Georgetown College.

First African American to earn a doctorate degree from an American university: Edward Alexander Bouchet (Yale College Ph.D., physics; also first African American to graduate from Yale, 1874).

First African-American graduate of West Point and first African-American commissioned officer in the U.S. military: Henry Ossian Flipper.

First African-American police officer in Boston, Massachusetts: Sergeant Horatio J. Homer.

First African American to graduate from a formal nursing school: Mary Eliza Mahoney, Boston, Massachusetts.

First African American to command a U.S. ship: Captain Michael Healy.

First fully state-supported four-year institution of higher learning for African Americans: Virginia State University.

First African-American Woman to earn a PhD. Nettie Craig-Asberry June 12,1883 earns her doctoral degree in Music from the University of Kansas one month shy of her 18th birthday.

First known African-American woman to graduate from one of the Seven Sisters colleges: Hortense Parker (Mount Holyoke College).

First African American to play professional baseball at the major-league level: Possibly Moses Fleetwood Walker, but see also William Edward White in 1879.

First African-American woman to hold a patent: Judy W. Reed, for an improved dough kneader, Washington, D.C.

First African American to record a best-selling phonograph record: George Washington Johnson, "The Laughing Song" and "The Whistling Coon."

First African-American woman to earn a dental degree in the United States: Ida Rollins, University of Michigan.

Woman and African American to earn a military pension for their own military service: Ann Bradford Stokes.

First African-American police officer in present-day New York City: Wiley Overton, hired by the Brooklyn Police Department prior to 1898 incorporation of the five boroughs into the City of New York.

First African American named to a College Football All-America Team: William H. Lewis, Harvard University.

First African American to earn a doctorate degree (Ph.D.) from Harvard University: W.E.B. Du Bois.

First African-American woman to work for the United States Postal Service: Mary Fields.

First African American appointed to serve as U.S. Army Paymaster: Richard R. Wright.

First African American to achieve world championship in any sport: Major Taylor, for 1-mile track cycling.

First African American invited to dine at the White House: Booker T. Washington.

First African-American boxing champion: Joe Gans, a lightweight.

First African-American professional basketball player: Harry Lew (New England Professional Basketball League).

First African-American woman to found and become president of a bank: Maggie L. Walker, St. Luke Penny Savings Bank (since 1930 the Consolidated Bank & Trust Company), Richmond, Virginia.

First Broadway musical written by African Americans, and the first to star African Americans: In Dahomey.

First African American to participate in the Olympic Games, and first to win a medal: George Poage (two bronze medals).

First African-American professional American football player: Charles Follis.

First African-American heavyweight boxing champion: Jack Johnson.

First African-American Olympic gold medal winner: John Taylor (track and field medley relay team).

First intercollegiate Greek-letter sorority established by African Americans: Alpha Kappa Alpha (ΑΚΑ) at Howard University.

First African-American female to be recorded commercially: Daisy Tapley.

First African-American woman millionaire: Madam C. J. Walker.

First African-American police officer in New York City: Samuel J. Battle, following the 1898 incorporation of the five boroughs into the City of New York, and the hiring of three African-American officers in the Brooklyn Police Department. Battle was also the NYPD's first African-American sergeant (1926), lieutenant (1935), and parole commissioner (1941).

First African-American attorney admitted to the American Bar Association: Butler R. Wilson (June 1911), William Henry Lewis (August 1911), and William R. Morris (October 1911).

First intercollegiate Greek-letter fraternity established by African Americans at a historically black college: Omega Psi Phi (ΩΨΦ), at Howard University.

First African-American military pilot: Eugene Jacques Bullard.

First African American to play in a Rose Bowl game: Fritz Pollard, Brown University.