BLACK HISTORY HEROS

THE REAL HIDDEN FIGURES

Three black women helped send John Glenn into orbit

When John Glenn was waiting to be fired into orbit aboard Friendship 7 in 1962, there was one person he trusted with the complex trajectory calculations required to bring him down safely from his orbital spaceflight: Katherine Johnson, an African-American mathematician who worked in Nasa’s segregated west area computers division.

The Tuskegee Airmen

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is the popular name of a group of African-American military pilots who fought in World War II. Officially, they formed the 332nd Fighter Group and the 477th Bombardment Group of the United States Army Air Forces.

Martin Luther King Jr

Three black women helped send John Glenn into orbit

When John Glenn was waiting to be fired into orbit aboard Friendship 7 in 1962, there was one person he trusted with the complex trajectory calculations required to bring him down safely from his orbital spaceflight: Katherine Johnson, an African-American mathematician who worked in Nasa’s segregated west area computers division.

Emmett Till

Three black women helped send John Glenn into orbit

When John Glenn was waiting to be fired into orbit aboard Friendship 7 in 1962, there was one person he trusted with the complex trajectory calculations required to bring him down safely from his orbital spaceflight: Katherine Johnson, an African-American mathematician who worked in Nasa’s segregated west area computers division.

Colonial Period - Africans are brought to Colonial America 

Republic Period

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1836 Texas achieves independence from Mexico and legalizes slavery. Free blacks and mulattos are forbidden from entering the state.

Early Statehood 

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is this period during 1857 The U.S. Supreme Court, in Dredd Scott vs. Sanford, denies citizenship to all slaves, ex-slaves, and descendants of slaves and denies Congress the right to prohibit slavery in the territories.

Civil War

Ends with surrender of Confederate armies. 

Slavery finally ends in Texas with Major Gen. Gordon Granger's announcement of the Emancipation Proclamation on June 19, 1865, at Galveston.

Reconstruction

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15th amendment grants African American men the right to vote.

Jim Crow Era

1896 U.S. Supreme Court issues landmark ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson upholding the constitutionality of state laws requiring racial segregation in public facilities. “Separate but equal” doctrine becomes law.

Maxwell Courtney 

There’s a statue of Maxwell Courtney on the Florida Sate University campus these days. It shows a young man with a determined expression, a book in his hand, and his head held high. During his time as an undergraduate, civil rights issues were front page news almost every day across the American south, and elsewhere. read more

The Barbara Williams Softball Complex Opened in February, 2012 on the Alabama State Campus, bringing the program home to compete on the campus for the first time.