black history bowl

Jackie Robinson

On April 15th 1947, he became the first African American to play major league baseball.

Ralphe Bunche

The first African American recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950.

Shirley Chisholm

She was the first Black woman elected into Congress in 1968, serving seven terms from 1969 to 1983.

Chadwick Boseman

Most famously known for his role as the Black Panther, he also starred as famous icons in biographical films about James Brown, Jackie Robinson, and Thurgood Marshall.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American writer and folklore scholar who played a key role in the Harlem Renaissance. She wrote, "Their Eyes Were Watching God."

W.E.B. DuBois

1st black to earn Ph.D. from Harvard, encouraged blacks to resist systems of segregation and discrimination, helped create NAACP in 1910.

Vanessa Williams

Who was the first Black American woman chosen as Miss America?

Toni Morrison

In 1993, she became the first black to be honored with the Nobel Prize for Literature for six novels. She is a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Beloved which became a motion picture, and in 1993 for Jazz.

The Nation

Langston Hughes was responsible for publishing what Black American magazine?

The Crucifixion

What is the name of the sculpture designed as a tribute to the four Black girls killed during a church bombing in Alabama in 1963?

The August Wilson Theatre

Formerly the Virginia Theatre, what became the first Broadway theater to bear the name of an African American in 2005?

Spike Lee

This director, screenwriter and actor was born in Atlanta but relocated to Brooklyn, where he later established a film company. Whether working with a low-budget and unknown actors or Hollywood heavyweights, his films continue to be controversial and push racial boundaries. Name him.

Paul Lawrence Dunbar

Who was the first Black American poet to be nationally recognized for his writing?

Walter Mosley

Growing up with a white Jewish mother and an African American father, who wrote Devil in a Blue Dress, A Red Death, White Butterfly, and Black Betty?

The Blues

What musical genre emerged from three heavily populated Black isolated areas, the Mississippi Delta, the Piedmont, and East Texas?

Gospel

"Go Down, Moses" and "Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen" are known as what type of songs?

The Women of Brewster Place

This first Gloria Naylor novel consisted of tales from seven black women who wound up on a dead-end street in a ghetto in the North. It was made into a television movie. What is the name of the novel?

Harlem

What New York City neighborhood saw a flowering of Black Artists in the 20th century?

Jean-Michel Basquiat

Which artist first attracted attention for his graffiti in New York City in the late 1970s, under the name SAMO?

Booker T. Washington

Who founded the National Negro Business League in 1900?

American Negro Theatre

What company was founded in Harlem in 1940 to provide opportunities for black actors, writers and directors as well as technicians?

Joseph L. Searles

Who was the first Black American to have a seat on the New York Stock Exchange?

Agriculture

In 1910 about fifty percent of black labor force was employed in what industry?

Black Star Line

What was the name of Marcus Garvey's shipping company that was owned and operated entirely by Blacks?

Beverly Johnson

Who was the first Black American to appear on the cover of Vogue magazine?

Training Day

In 2001, for what film did Denzel Washington become the second African American man to win an Academy Award for Best Actor?

Vaudeville

Classic blues singers, Gertrude "Ma" Rainey, Bessie Smith, Mamie Smith, and Alberta Hunter, were women who came out of what performance tradition?

Purple Rain

In what 1984 movie did artist Prince have a starring role?

Jimi Hendrix

What famous singer played guitar for Little Richard before starting his solo career?

The Tonight Show

Singer and actress Della Reese was the first black woman to serve as guest host of which late-night television show?

Charley Pride

This person is one of the most successful African American country singers of all time, with a career spanning over 40 years. He is also the first African American to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2000. Name him.

Sidney Poitier

In 1963, who became the first black man to win the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in the film, Lilies of the Field?

Halle Berry

Two years after she played the role of Dorothy Dandridge, the first African-American woman to earn an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, this actress actually became the first African-American woman to win the Oscar for Best Actress. What is her name?

Mamie Smith

Who was the first African-American artist to make a blues record and sell a million copies in less than a year?

Little Richard

At the very peak of his fame, this rock 'n' roll pioneer concluded that his music was the "devil's work," and became a traveling Evangelical preacher instead. When the Beatles revived several of his songs in 1964, he returned to the stage. Name him.

James Brown

This legendary singer performed in front of a televised audience in Boston the day after Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. Who is he?

Establish an orphanage and the first YMCA for African Americans in Philadelphia.

What did William L. Still organize in 1880 for Black youth?

Virginia

In what state did Nat Turner, an enslaved African-American preacher, organize and lead the four-day rebellion of enslaved and free Black people?

W.E.B. Du Bois and William Monroe Trotter

Initiated in 1905 to challenge Booker T. Washington's leadership and to protest against the lynchings and disenfranchisement of black voters, the Niagara Movement was organized in Canada by what black middle-class intellectuals?

Vermont

What state was the first to abolish slavery?

University of Kentucky Law School

The first African American lawyer for a New Jersey State Farm Insurance firm, Ollen Hinnant was the first African American inducted into what law school's Hall of Fame in 1997?

William Tucker

Who was the first black born in colonial America at Jamestown, Virginia?

William S. Whipper

Who helped form the "American Moral Reform Society," which helped Blacks acquire farms and aided runaway slaves in their escape to Canada?

William H. Gray, III

What influential Congressman became Executive Director of the United Negro College Fund?

William Carney

Who was the first Black American to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor?

Robert Smalls

During the Civil War, he was the black pilot who sailed a Confederate steamer out of Charleston, South Carolina and delivered it to the Union Navy in 1862.

Josephine Baker

Who won the French Legion of Honor award for her work in entertaining the Work War II allies?

The Free African Society of Philadelphia

In 1787 black Methodists Richard Allen and Absalom Jones established what nondenominational religious association and mutual aid society?

Margaret Murray Washington

She helped organize the National Federation of Afro-American Women in 1896 and was known as the "lady principal" of Tuskegee.

Selma to Montgomery March

What famous march helped influence the Voting Rights Acts passed in August 1965?

Freedom Riders

In 1961 groups of black and white volunteers traveled together on bus trips in the South to test desegregation of buses and restaurants. By what name was this group known?

The "Middle Passage"

What term is used to describe the second leg of the triangular slave trade between Europe, Africa and the Americas between 1520 and 1860?

the Women‟s Army Corps (or WAC)

Before the end of World War I, more than 4,000 black women had enlisted in the Army to serve in support roles. They were known collectively as what?

Phillis Wheatley

George Washington commended what Black American woman for her literary achievements?

Violette M. Anderson

Who was the first Black American female lawyer to practice before the Supreme Court?

Rebecca Lee Crumpier

Who was the first black female awarded a medical degree?

Rebecca Lee

Who was the first Black American woman doctor?

Potato Chip

Hyram S. Thomas was a chef who created what popular snack?

Physics

Shirley Ann Jackson was the first Black American to earn a PhD from M.I.T. in what subject?

Phil Brooks

Who invented the disposable syringe?

Peanuts

What did George Washington Carver use to develop shaving cream, paper, ink, rubbing oil, synthetic rubber, and instant coffee?

Ozzie Williams

Who developed the first airborne radar system that was used for locating downed aircraft?

Open heart surgery

What breakthrough medical procedure was performed by Dr. Daniel Hale Williams?

Otis Boykin

Who invented the control unit for the artificial heart stimulator?

Mammouth Cave

Born a slave, Stephen Bishop, the first African American cave explorer made a published map of what cave?

Marie Brown

What black female inventor patented a home security system?

Major Frederick D. Gregory

Who was the first Black American to pilot a space shuttle mission?

James Derham

Who was the first accredited Black American physician in the United States?

Ice Cream

August Jackson created what well-known desert?

1876

In what year was the first all-Black medical school Meharry Medical College established?

Granville T. Woods

What Black American invented the railway telegraph?

Harry Hopkins

What Black American inventor patented the hearing aid?

J.L. Love

Who invented the pencil sharpener?

Ironing Board

What household item was invented by Sarah Boone?

Gerald "Jerry" Lawson

This self-taught engineer is the creator of the video game cartridge.

Tennessee Tigerbelles

What was the name of Wilma Rudolph's relay team, which finished first at the 1960 Olympics?

Willie Mays

Who was the first Black National League baseball player to hit 600 home runs?

Sheryl Swoopes

She was a forward who scored 47 points in the final game of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) tournament in 1993. She led Texas Tech to the national championship. Who is she?

Muhammad Ali

After being denied service at a Louisville, Kentucky, lunch counter, this heavyweight fighter threw his Olympic medal into the river in protest. Name him.

Gabby Douglas

This Black female gymnast was a member of the gold winning American team at the 2011 and the 2015 World Championships, and the all-around silver medalist at the 2015 World Championships. She was part of the Final Five at the 2016 Summer Olympics, where she won gold in the team competition.

NBA

Bill Russell was the first Black American player in what professional sports league?

Negro Baseball League

Satchel Paige played for 22 years in what baseball league?

Kansas City Monarchs

Jackie Robinson played for what Negro League team?

Kareem Abdul Jabar

In 1988, what basketball player became the first NBA player to reach 37,000 career points?

Nine

How many Gold Medals did track and field athlete Carl Lewis win in his career?

Livingstone College

What team played against Biddle College in the first Black American college football game?

Rode his next horse in protest by facing backward

Jesse Stahl competed and was discriminated against in an Oregon rodeo in the early 1900s. What did he do when the judges did not award him first prize which he thought he deserved?

Reggae

For what type of music was Bob Marley famous?

Harpo Productions

What is the name of Oprah Winfrey's TV production company?

A. Phillip Randolph

He was the black leader of The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. He demanded equal opportunities in war jobs and armed forces during WWII. He helped encourage the end of segregation in the military, although that happened after the war.

Claudette Colvin

young woman who at the age of 15, in March 1955, refused to give up her seat on a Montegomery bus (before Rosa Parks)

Mongtomery Bus Boycott

a political and social protest campaign against the policy of racial segregation on the public transit system of Montgomery, Alabama.

Double V Campaign

The World War II-era effort of black Americans to gain "a Victory over racism at home as well as Victory abroad."

Great Migration

the movement of 6 million African Americans out of the rural Southern United States to the urban Northeast, Midwest, and West between 1910 and 1970.

Black Codes

Laws denying most legal rights to newly freed slaves; passed by southern states following the Civil War

March on Washington

1963 demonstration in which more than 200,000 people rallied for economic equality and civil rights

Civil Rights Act of 1964

This act made racial, religious, and sex discrimination by employers illegal and gave the government the power to enforce all laws governing civil rights, including desegregation of schools and public places.

Stokely Carmichael

Was a prominent organizer in the civil rights movement in the United States and the global pan-African movement.

Huey Newton and Bobby Seale

American political and urban activists who founded the Black Panther Party for Self Defense. The Black Panther Party worked for the right of self-defense for African-Americans in the United States.

Chicago Defender

Founded in 1905 by Robert S. Abbott and was once considered the "most important" newspaper of its kind." Abbott's newspaper reported and campaigned against Jim Crow-era violence and urged black people in the American South to settle in the north.