Spades
From living rooms to championship tournaments, learn how Spades became a cornerstone of Black culture.
Juneteenth
How Miss Opal Lee's persistence turned June 19th into an annual observance of freedom.
Black August
The events that led to this commemoration of radical Black activism.
Coretta Scott King
Let's explore the roles that King played to leave a lasting legacy.
Dorothy Lee Bolden
Bolden transformed domestic work from servitude to profession, creating a groundbreaking union that secured higher wages and dignity for workers.
Addie L. Wyatt
This UPWA member became the first Black woman to lead major unions, founded CBTU and CLUW, and secured equal pay provisions years before federal law.
Chris Smalls
This modern day labor organizer made history when he led workers in Staten Island to vote to form the country's first Amazon union.
Moranda Smith
This labor organizer united tobacco workers across racial lines and connected workplace rights to broader civil rights struggles.
Lucy Parsons
Known as the “Goddess of Anarchy,” Parsons was a militant writer, orator, and agitator uncompromising in her radical views.
Hattie Canty
One of the greatest strike leaders in history, Canty transformed the Las Vegas workforce and set a new precedent for unions across the U.S.
Shelton Tappes
This pioneering Black labor organizer drafted the first anti-discrimination clause in a major auto union contract.
Donald Galloway
Galloway fought for disability rights and labor rights by challenging discriminatory lawsuits and influencing politics.
Robert Lee Vann
Vann transformed the Pittsburgh Courier into a powerful voice for Black labor rights and helped drive the integration of steel industry unions.
E.D. Nixon
This union organizer and civil rights pioneer bailed out Rosa Parks and helped launch the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
Curt Flood
Flood sacrificed his baseball career to fight for free agency, transforming sport's labor history.
Fannie Lou Hamer
While known mainly for her civil rights activism, Hamer was also a labor organizer who fought for agricultural workers' rights.
Ernest Calloway
As a labor journalist and organizer, Calloway worked with the Teamsters to integrate trucking unions in the Midwest and documented labor struggles.
Charles S. Hayes
As the Vice President of the United Packinghouse Workers of America, Hayes organized Black meatpacking workers and fought for racial integration.
Marvel Cooke
This pioneering journalist and labor activist who exposed the exploitation of domestic workers and broke barriers in mainstream journalism.
Benjamin Fletcher
One of the most prominent Black members of the Industrial Workers of the World, Fletcher organized Philadelphia dock workers and made history.
Velma Hopkins
Hopkins, a tobacco worker, helped lead one of the most significant labor actions in Southern history.
Bayard Rustin
The brilliant strategist who organized many effective civil rights movements while facing discrimination for both his race and his sexuality.
Rosina Tucker
Tucker organized the wives and families of Pullman porters, creating support networks that sustained one of the most important Black labor unions.
Maggie Lena Walker and the Power of Cooperative Economics
Walker revolutionized Black economic empowerment through banking, mutual aid societies, and worker cooperatives.
William Lucy
Lucy was a powerful force for both labor and civil rights, especially through his role in the 1968 Memphis Sanitation Workers' Strike.
Isaac Myers
A labor pioneer who built one of America's first Black-led trade unions in the face of white supremacy.
A. Philip Randolph
From railroad cars to the March on Washington: the visionary who united labor rights and civil rights to transform America.