He was an American civil rights activist, leader, Pan-Africanist, sociologist, educator, historian, writer, editor, poet, and scholar. William Edward Burghardt Du Bois, better known as W.E.B Du Bois, was all these things and more. He helped found both the Niagara Movement and the NAACP, was the first African American to receive a Ph. D from Harvard, served as chairman of the Peace Information Center, and…
Read moreNAACP pamphlet, 1917 Click each image, above, to enlarge. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is the nation's oldest, largest and most widely recognized grassroots-based civil rights organization. The NAACP was formed in 1909 with the goal to secure for all people the rights guaranteed in the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the United States Constitution. Drawing in members of earlier…
Read moreAlexander Walters The National Afro-American Council was the first nationwide civil rights organization in the United States. It was organized in Rochester, New York in September 1898 by Timothy Thomas Fortune, editor of the nation's leading black newspaper The New York Age, and Bishop Alexander Walters of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. Walters is pictured above. Alarmed by ongoing violence against African Americans, especially the brutal…
Read moreA Wreath for Emmett Till by Marilyn Nelson, a Coretta Scott King honor book, uses poetic verse to describe Emmett Till; a fourteen year old boy who was lynched in 1955 for whistling at a white woman while at the grocery store. The illustrations by Philippe Lardy offer powerful, bold symbols that follow the verse. Simeon's Story: An Eyewitness Account of the Kidnapping of Emmett Till…
Read moreJessica Lamb-Shapiro is well-versed in the language of self-help. Her father is a psychologist, parenting expert, and self-help author. In Promise Land she explores the culture of American self-help, trying to find why self-help has such a strong appeal and how the self-help industry became so huge. She goes to conferences, walks on hot coals, makes a vision board, attends lectures, takes a class to…
Read moreThe new East Library is really starting to take shape! How do you think it compares to these architect renderings of the final building? Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Renderings from East Library architects Engberg Anderson. Â
Read moreThe Wisconsin State Legislature authorized the City of Milwaukee to establish a public library on February 7, 1878. Luckily, the new public library did not have to start from scratch; MPL inherited 10,000 books from the Young Men's Association. The Young Men's Association was a subscription library founded in 1847. They collected dues from members to maintain a library and members were permitted to borrow…
Read moreBy Warren K. Leffler, U.S. News & World Report Magazine [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons "I am sick and tired of being sick and tired." - Fannie Lou Hamer Fannie Lou Hamer was a central figure in the African American civil rights movement. She was the founder of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) and later the National Women's Political Caucus. The courage she demonstrated in…
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