Collections Assistant, Emma Johansen offers us details on the digitization work of the Sanders-Bullitt family papers. This grant project funded by the Kentucky Genealogical Society helps to create accessible records of enslaved individuals, which allows for ease in researching American Descendants of Slavery. Tune in to learn more!
A reworking of the Bullitt family papers to highlight the people enslaved by the Bullitt family on the Oxmoor plantation and the Cottonwood plantation from the late eighteenth century to the early twentieth century. One of these families includes the Sanders family, headed by Eliza Sanders and her husband, Jim Sanders. While not all people […]
Every election season in the United States revolves around a set of issues—health care, foreign affairs, the economy. In 1868, at the height of the Reconstruction, the pressing issue was Black male suffrage. When voters went to the polls that November, they were asked to decide if and how their nation's democracy should change to […]
How the Monuments Came Down is a timely and searing look at the history of white supremacy and Black resistance in Richmond, Virginia. The feature-length film — brought to life by history-makers, descendants, scholars, and activists — reveals how monuments to Confederate leaders stood for more than a century, and why they fell. Following the […]
The History Film Forum is an online series from the Smithsonian that explores history on the screen and the evolution of film as public history. The “American Masters”/PBS documentary examines how six iconic African American women entertainers—Lena Horne, Abbey Lincoln, Nina Simone, Diahann Carroll, Cicely Tyson, and Pam Grier—broke thorough and challenged an entertainment industry […]
With the support of the National Endowment for the Humanities and donations from over one hundred people and organizations, Clio is a free platform designed to help organizations create and share walking tours and thematic trails that connect people to nearby history, art, and other topics. There are now over 1400 walking tours in Clio […]
Collected is a project of the African American History Curatorial Collective at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. Centering stories curated by the Collective’s members, this podcast offers compelling and accessible journeys through topics in African American history that are particularly relevant today. The topic for the first season of Collected is Black Feminism. […]
Mammoth Life and Accident Insurance, Co. (1915-1992) was one of the largest Black-owned and operated companies in Kentucky's history. Four individuals founded Mammoth Life during the "Golden Age of Black Business" in Louisville, Kentucky: B.O. Wilkerson, Rochelle I. Smith, William H. Wright, and Henry E. Hall. By 1928, Mammoth Life opened district offices in seven […]
Henry Johnson, a Black man who had left the South as part of the Great Migration, signed up to serve his country during World War I. But the American military at the time was segregated, and Pvt. Henry Johnson and his regiment of Harlem Hellfighters were attached to a French army unit on the front […]
The National Museum of African American History and Culture is the only national museum devoted exclusively to the documentation of African American life, history, and culture. It was established by an Act of Congress in 2003, following decades of efforts to promote and highlight the contributions of African Americans. To date, the Museum has collected […]
By 21, Joan Trumpauer Mulholland had demonstrated against segregation dozens of times, been imprisoned for her work as a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and been hunted for execution by the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).
In 1921, the Tulsa Race Massacre was not an isolated incident, but part of a pattern of white mob violence against Black communities and institutions that stretched back to the founding of the United States.