9 Extraordinary Black Women Who Changed History

February is Black History MonthBut the contributions of the legendary women on this list resonate every month of the year.

These exceptional women represent only a small portion of the amazing Black women who have changed history for the better, and of course, history is also full of Black women whose accomplishments were not publicly recognized but also impacted countless people.

However, each woman on this list has undoubtedly left an indelible mark on countless systems, institutions, and lives. From Rosa Parks to Ida B. Wells, these women’s legacies span history, science, politics, and art. Each of them has triumphed over incredible odds, and their lives are a reminder of how powerful and influential one person’s dreams can be.

1. Harriet Tubman
2. Sojourner truth
3. Rosa Parks
4. Fannie Lou Hamer
5. Shirley Chisholm
6. Ida B. Wells
7. Katherine Johnson
8. Mary McLeod Bethune
9. Maya Angelou

Harriet Tubman

Perhaps no name is more synonymous with liberation and courage Harriet Tubmanwho led the famous More than 70 slaves To freedom via 13 trips along 650 miles of the Underground Railroad. She fought for civil rights throughout her life even after the Civil War, tirelessly supported women’s rights and gave what she had to help others, and in her final years, she also converted part of her property into a home for elderly black Americans.

Sojourner truth

Sojourner truth She spent most of her early life as a slave, but in 1843, she changed her name and began life as an abolitionist activist, devoting her life to achieving freedom and justice for all. Her many accomplishments included being the first black woman to successfully sue a white man, and publishing an article the biography Which outlined her vision for the abolition of the death penalty and women’s equality.

She was an accomplished preacher and influential public figure, declaiming the legendary “Ain’t I a Woman?” She braided a vision of women’s equality with the racial equality and equity she had fought for all her life. Her many additional accomplishments included working with organizations that helped formerly enslaved people find jobs and advocating for land grants to freed Americans, and she also reached out to Abraham Lincoln, Susan B. Anthony, and other leaders of the time, all to realize her vision of a better world.

Rosa Parks

Few women are more synonymous with challenge and courage Rosa Parkswhose simple refusal to give up her seat on the bus helped fuel a wave of change that extended from the protests of the civil rights movement to the courts and the daily lives of all Americans.

The day she was rejected is the stuff of legend. On December 1, 1955, Parks refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. She was arrested, and later ended up losing her job. She said in an interview with the magazine, “I did it because I felt violated as a human being. I had had a hard day at work, (I was) physically tired and mentally disturbed. I was tired of the kind of things we had to endure as a people because of our race.” BBC.

However, her defiance helped spur the Civil Rights Movement, which helped dismantle segregation across America. In 1999, she received the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest honor bestowed by the US Congress, and was titled “Mother of the Civil Rights Movement.”

Fannie Lou Hamer

Fannie Lou Hamer He grew up in a sharecropper family in the early 1900s. In 1962, when she was 45, she attended a meeting led by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and learned that she could register to vote. The next day, she took the bus to Indianola to register, and returned again and again until she passed the difficult test, despite threats, intimidation and violence from white supremacists.

She eventually founded the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party along with other activists, and later spoke of her difficulties registering to vote and the beatings she endured in prison at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. “Is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave, where we have to sleep with our phones off the hook because our lives are threatened daily because we want to live as decent human beings, in America?” she said in the nationally televised speech that made her famous.

She went on to run for the Mississippi House of Representatives, helped launch the National Women’s Political Caucus, and founded a 640-acre farm that provided economic security for blacks called the Freedom Farm Cooperative. Her courage and tireless activism made her a civil rights icon and the embodiment of leadership and commitment to justice.

Shirley Chisholm

In 1968, Shirley Anita St. Hill Chisholm became the first black woman to win a seat in Congress. The daughter of immigrant parents, she began her career as a school teacher and earned a master’s degree in early childhood education. She soon joined the board of a number of organizations, including the League of Women Voters and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and became the first black woman in the New York State Legislature in 1964 before gaining her seat in Congress.

During her seven terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, she served More than 50 pieces Legislated and fought for racial and gender equality. In 1972, she decided to run for President of the United States and, despite difficult odds, received 152 delegate votes at the Democratic National Convention. She later co-founded the National Political Conference of Black Women. “I want people to remember me as a woman…who dared to be a catalyst for change,” she said of her legacy, and she certainly does.

Ida B. Wells

born into slavery, Ida B. Wells She became one of the most revolutionary journalists ever during her career. After the Civil War ended and Reconstruction began, Wells began pursuing higher education, but after the death of her parents, she became the primary caregiver for her siblings at the age of sixteen. In 1884, Wells was forcibly removed from a train after refusing to move to a smoking car despite having purchased a first-class ticket; She ended up suing the Chesapeake, Ohio & Southwestern Railroad for harassment.

The decision was later overturned, but Wells remained a staunch advocate for justice throughout her life. She began her career as editor of a local newspaper in Memphis, and later became the owner of two newspapers: Memphis Free Speech and Headlight and Free Speech. Throughout her career, many of her stories have focused on investigating lynchings and advocating for anti-lynching legislation. She also founded and co-founded several civil rights organizations, including the NAACP and the National Association of Colored Women, and was a passionate advocate for gender and racial equality. She was awarded a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for her work in 2020.

Katherine Johnson

Born in 1918, Katherine Johnson He was a mathematician whose extraordinary abilities helped many spacecraft take flight and even helped send astronauts to the moon. In 1953, she began working on the then-segregated National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), and joined a team of black female engineers known as the West Computers, whose work was integral to launching the American space program.

She also co-authored 26 research papers during her career, and in 1961, she calculated the trajectory of Freedom 7, which was the first spacecraft to carry an American astronaut into space. She also helped calculate the launch of the Apollo 11 mission in 1969, and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015.

Mary McLeod Bethune

Born to formerly enslaved parents, Mary McLeod Bethune A passionate and influential advocate for education, she began her career by opening a boarding school after her marriage ended and she needed to support her son. The school became a college called Bethune-Cookman College in 1923.

Bethune also led voter registration drives, founded and led several organizations supporting women’s rights, and was the founding president of the National Council of Negro Women. In 1936, she became the highest ranking black woman in politics when she was appointed Director of the Division of Negro Affairs of the National Youth Administration by President Franklin Roosevelt. She also worked to end lynching and discrimination, and organized a conference on the problems of Negro youth and Negroes, among many other accomplishments. Additionally, she was the only black woman to appear in the American delegation to the founding conference of the United Nations in 1945, and her contributions to business, equality, and activism left an indelible impact on American society and the world at large.

Maya Angelou

Writer and civil rights activist, Maya Angelou Contributions to the fields of literature and social justice cannot be underestimated. Angelou overcame enormous hardship and violence early in her life, and went on to write seven autobiographies. Her career began to flourish with the publication of her autobiography I know why the caged bird sings In 1969, she was also a successful singer, dancer, Grammy-nominated screenwriter, and Pulitzer Prize-nominated poet. Her works have explored racial oppression and sexual violence, but are always infused with a message of healing and hope that continues to impact the world today.