1901
Booker T. Washington dines with President Theodore Roosevelt at the White House
1903
W.E.B. Du Bois publishes ‘The Souls of Black Folk’, which declares that “the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line”
1905
Madame C.J. Walker develops and markets a method for straightening curly hair on her way to becoming the first black female millionaire
1906
Atlanta Baptist College expands its curriculum and is renamed Morehouse College
1908
In Springfield, IL, the hometown of Abraham Lincoln, the black community is attacked by several thousand white citizens and two elderly blacks are lynched
1914
George Washington Carver of the Tuskegee Institute reveals his experiments concerning peanuts and sweet potatoes
1929
John Hope is President of Atlanta University, the first graduate school for African Americans
1930
Benjamin Oliver Davis becomes the first black colonel in the US Army
1936
Jesse Owens wins 4 gold medals in the Olympic Games in Berlin
1939
Singer Marion Anderson performs at the Lincoln Memorial before an audience of 75000 after the Daughters of the American Revolution refused to allow her to sing at the Constitution Hall
1940
Duke Ellington leads his greatest band including Jimmy Blanton, Ben Webster, Cootie Williams and Billy Strayhorn
1945
Ebony magazine is founded by John H. Johnson of Chicago
1954
US Supreme Court rules unanimously in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka that racial segregation in public schools violates the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution
1955
Rosa Parks, Secretary of the Montgomery ,AL Chapter of NAACP, refuses to surrender her seat, leading to the Montgomery bus boycott of 1955-56
1956
Althea Gibson wins the Wimbleton double, as well as the French single and doubles, and italian singles
1957
The Southern Christian Leadership Conference is established by Rev Martin Luther King Jr.
1958
Sugar Ray Robinson wins back the boxing middleweight title
1959
Motown Records is founded in Detroit, MI by Berry Gordy Jr.
Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry, is produced on Broadway
1960
Black college students launch a sit-in movement at a lunch counter in Greensboro, NC
1963
Rev Martin Luther King Jr. writes his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”
Sidney Poitier wins the Academy Award as best actor for his performance in “Lilies of the Field”
1964
Rev Martin Luther King Jr. is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway
President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act into law
1965
The Voting Rights Act is passed following the Selma-Montgomery March
1966
The Black Panther Party for Self Defense is founded in Oakland, CA by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale
Stokely Carmichael, Chairman of Southern Christian Leadership Conference uses the phrase “black power’ at a march in Mississippi
1967
On his refusal to submit to induction into the armed forces, Muhammad Ali is convicted of violating the Selective Service Act.
1968
Rev Martin Luther King Jr. is assassinated in Memphis, TN on April 4.
Gold medal winners Tommie Smith and John Carlos give black-power salute, leading to their suspension by U.S. Olympic Committee
1974
George Foreman defeated by Muhammad Ali in Kinshasa, Zaire
1975
Arthur Ashe wins singles tennis title at Wimbleton
Elijah Muhammad, leader of Nation of Islam, dies.
1981
Andrew Young is elected Mayor of Atlanta, GA
1982
Michael Jackson presents the album Thriller
1989
Colin Powell nominated as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
1991
Justice Clarence Thomas nominated to the Supreme Court
1993
Rita Dove is chosen a poet laureate of the United States
Toni Morrison receives Nobel Prize for Literature
1995
Minister Louis Farrakhan of Nation of Islam organizes Million Man March in Washington, DC
1996
Michael Johnson excels at Olympic Games in Atlanta, GA
1997
Million Woman March in Philadelphia
Michael Jordan leads Chicago Bulls to their fifth championship
1998
Civil rights veteran, James Farmer, awarded the Medal of Freedom by President Clinton
1999
National Capital Planning Commission approves location for a national monument to MLK Jr on the mall in Washington, DC between Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument
2000
March on the State Capitol at Columbia, SC to protest the Confederate battle flag
1997-2002
Tiger Woods wins 52 tournaments, 39 of those on the PGA TOUR, including the 1997, 2001, and 2002 Masters Tournaments, 1999 and 2000 PGA Championships, 2000 and 2002 U.S. Open Championship, and 2000 British Open Championship. With his second Masters victory in 2001, Tiger became the first ever to hold all four professional major championships at the same time.
1999-2003
Venus and Serena Williams dominate the tennis scene with their victories. With the win in Wimbleton Singles in July 2003, Serena consolidated her place atop women's tennis with wins in five of the last six Grand Slam championships. In all these victories, she met big sister Venus, still one of the game's superstars, in the finals.
