She excelled at golf and tennis, and was the first African American woman to win a Grand Slam tennis tournament.

• Althea Gibson

• Rosa Parks

• Sojourner Truth

• Shirley Chisholm

First African American woman to be elected to the House of Representatives.

• Hattie McDaniel

• Shirley Chisholm

• Madame C.J. Walker

• Sojourner Truth

Lawyer for the NAACP in Brown v Board, he went on to become the first African American Supreme Court Justice.

• Carter G. Woodson

• A. Philip Randolph

• Booker T. Washington

• Thurgood Marshall

First African American to earn his PhD at Harvard University; Author of, "The Souls of Black Folk," he believed that African Americans should take action to end discrimination, segregation, and inequality.

• Booker T. Washington

• W.E.B. DuBois

• Frederick Douglass

• Richard Allen

He founded Tuskegee Institute to educate African Americans. His "Atlanta Compromise" speech suggested African Americans should concentrate on education - and proving their worth to society - rather than actively battling discrimination and inequality.

• Richard Allen

• W.E.B. DuBois

• Booker T. Washington

• Joseph B. Tuskegee

He was the first African American to be elected to the Senate, representing the state of Mississippi.

• Frederick Douglass

• Hiram Rhodes Revels

• Jack Johnson

• Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Her civil disobedience (She refused to follow the law and give up her seat to a white man.) helped start the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and she became a symbol of the Civil Rights Movement of the 20th Century.

• Rosa Parks

• Althea Gibson

• Madame C.J. Walker

• Sojourner Truth

Founder of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, and a life-long civil rights leader.

• A. Philip Randolph

• Booker T. Washington

• Richard Allen

• W.E.B. DuBois

This organization was founded by civil rights activists at the turn of the 20th Century. It has worked towards equality on behalf of African American citizens ever since. One of its biggest victories was the Brown v Board decision in 1954.

• The ACLU

• The United Way

• The NAACP

• The Thurgood Marshall Fund

First African American woman to win an Academy Award for her role in Gone with the Wind.

• Althea Gibson

• Madame C.J. Walker

• Shirley Chisholm

• Hattie McDaniel