Wallenfeldt - Black American biographies: the journey of achievement

BLACK AMERICAN BIOGRAPHIES

THE JOURNEY OF ACHIEVEMENT

AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY AND CULTURE

THE JOURNEY OF ACHIEVEMENT

EDITED BY JEFF WALLENFELDT, MANAGER, GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORY

Published in 2011 by Britannica Educational Publishing
(a trademark of Encyclopdia Britannica, Inc.)
in association with Rosen Educational Services, LLC
29 East 21st Street, New York, NY 10010.

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First Edition

Britannica Educational Publishing
Michael I. Levy: Executive Editor
J.E. Luebering: Senior Manager
Marilyn L. Barton: Senior Coordinator, Production Control
Steven Bosco: Director, Editorial Technologies
Lisa S. Braucher: Senior Producer and Data Editor
Yvette Charboneau: Senior Copy Editor
Kathy Nakamura: Manager, Media Acquisition
Jeff Wallenfeldt: Manager, Geography and History

Rosen Educational Services
Hope Lourie Killcoyne: Senior Editor and Project Manager
Nelson S: Art Director
Cindy Reiman: Photography Manager
Matthew Cauli: Designer, Cover Design
Introduction by Laura Loria

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Black American biographies : the journey of achievement / edited by Jeff Wallenfeldt.
-- 1st ed.
p. cm. (African American history and culture)
In association with Britannica Educational Publishing, Rosen Education Services
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61530-176-8 (eBook)
1. African AmericansBiography--Dictionaries, Juvenile. I. Wallenfeldt, Jeffrey H.
E185.96.B523 2011
920.0092'96073dc22

2010010373

On the cover: U.S. abolitionist, writer, and orator Frederick Douglass is among the brightest lights in the African American firmament, an august gathering most recently illuminated by the ascendancy of yet another eloquent and stirring leader, Pres. Barack Obama. Getty Images (Obama); MPI/Hulton Archive/Getty Images (Douglass)

On pages : Martin Luther King, Jr. was among the hundreds of thousands who came to the nations capital in August of 1963 to demand equal rights for black Americans. Hulton Archive/Getty Images

CHAPTER 3: EXPLORATION, EDUCATION, EXPERIMENTATION, AND ECUMENISM

From the depths of slavery to the stewardship of a nation, the 400-year-long story of African Americans has arced from extreme adversity to the ultimate in achievement. On the facing page, Pres. Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama dance at the Neighborhood Inaugural Ball, their first official dance as first couple, Jan. 20, 2009. The Washington Post/Getty Images

F or Americans, the pursuit of happiness has long been bound up with striving for excellence and achievement. But, although the Declaration of Independence found the fundamental equality of all people (or at least of men) to be self-evident and the right to liberty inalienable, for African Americans the pursuit of not just achievement and excellence but of liberty and equality was long obstructed by barriers of race and class and by the social and economic framework of life in the United States. As this book details, the black experience in America has been marked by hardship unlike that experienced by any other ethnic group in the country. Within these pages, readers will meet or rediscover a host of African Americans who have overcome these barriers to make important contributions to American political, religious, social, economic, and cultural life. In doing so, these men and women not only improved the lot of African Americans but that of all Americans.