Christina Proenza-Coles

The cover of the book American Founders: How People of African Descent Established Freedom in the New World. The image is a black and white portrait of a woman, seated in garden, wearing a military bodice and full skirt, gazing directly at the viewer. Some believe the woman is Susie King Taylor.

Black Americans continuously encouraged the US to live up to its ideals not only through the revolts & revolutions that brought slavery to an end throughout the hemisphere, but also as they defended the principles of democracy before & after slavery, on battlefields, in courts, in print & in deed.

Ambulance EMTs Are Routine Today. These Black Medics Helped Pave the Way.

The Black medics of the Freedom House Ambulance Service were the most highly trained field practitioners of emergency medical care in the country & revolutionized how we do emergency medicine in the US.

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/20/u...

Oil painting of three gentlemen wearing silks, gold, ruffs, and holding hats and spears. Made by the native Ecuadorian artist Andrés Sánchez Gallque in Quito in 1599, the painting is now held in the Museo de América in Madrid and part of the permanent collection of El Prado. It is the oldest known signed and dated paining from the Americas.

This 1599 portrait is Don Francisco de Arobe & his sons who ruled an independent settlement of self liberated Africans on Ecuador's coast. Like settlements of the self-liberated in Panama, Mexico, Colombia, Jamaica, Cuba, Suriname, Guyana & Florida, the state recognized it as an autonomous town.

This portrait of the Washington Family, George, Martha, Martha's grandchildren from her first marriage, and possibly enslaved body servant, Christopher Sheels, was made by Edward Savage & hangs in the National Portrait Gallery. Christopher Sheels was owned by Martha's estate & it's likely that George Washington Parke Custis inherited the ownership of this person (depicted here as instrumental to their intimate family life) upon Martha's death.

Portrait of the Washington family c. 1789. The identity of the Black gentleman is uncertain (see ALT). George Washington Parke Custis (bottom left) fathered children with 2 enslaved women from Mount Vernon - which is why at least 2 of Martha Washington’s great-granddaughters were born enslaved.

Pioneering American film performers kissing onscreen in black and white. This clip known as The Kiss was discovered in an archive & added to the US national film registry in 2018. A slightly longer version of the 28 second clip was found in Norway’s National Library in 2021.

Gertie Brown & Saint Suttle embrace in a silent film from 1898.

Grainy black and white photo of a man and woman, gazing toward the viewer, squinting in the sunlight.

The Jones family helped to preserve the Florida Keys. Israel from NC & Mozelle from the Bahamas (pictured) met in Miami & began purchasing & farming land in the Keys in 1897. Their son, Lancelot, sold their 277 acres to the NPS for preservation in 1970 despite much higher offers from developers.

Thank you for sharing this. I would love to see his documentary.

Black and white photo of 16 men, women, and children, beautifully dressed, posing in a line.

This photograph from 1895 includes some of the Bahamian families who helped to establish Coconut Grove, the founding neighborhood of what is now the city of Miami, Florida. The woman holding the child is Mariah Brown. She built one of the first homes in Miami in 1890; it’s now a historic landmark.

This portrait of the Washington Family, George, Martha, Martha's grandchildren from her first marriage, and possibly enslaved body servant, Christopher Sheels, was made by Edward Savage & hangs in the National Portrait Gallery. Christopher Sheels was owned by Martha's estate & it's likely that George Washington Parke Custis inherited the ownership of this person (depicted here as instrumental to their intimate family life) upon Martha's death.

Portrait of the Washington family c. 1789. The identity of the Black gentleman is uncertain (see ALT). George Washington Parke Custis (bottom left) fathered children with 2 enslaved women from Mount Vernon - which is why at least 2 of Martha Washington’s great-granddaughters were born enslaved.

Black and white portrait of a young woman in a light colored high necked dress wearing an elegant hat.

Nannie Helen Burroughs, educator, entrepreneur, women’s rights advocate, daughter of formerly enslaved parents, founded a school in Washington DC in 1901. She observed, “Education & justice are democracy’s only life insurance.”

“The way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them.”

~Ida B. Wells.

Image: University of Chicago Library, Special Collections Research Center.

“Capers’ experience in the American Revolution is… representative of those of a generation of arms-bearing Black Patriots who fought & bled to help achieve American independence.”

Black & white photo of a man wearing fur

Explorer Matthew Henson reached the North Pole in 1909. The expedition included Robert Peary and four Inuit men. Henson and his wife are buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Dr. Gladys West, Mathematician Whose Work Made GPS Possible, Dies at 95 ALEXANDRIA, VA — Dr. Gladys West, the pioneering mathematician whose work laid the foundation for modern GPS technology, has died. She passed away

Dr. Gladys West, the pioneering mathematician whose work laid the foundation for modern GPS technology, has died. She was 95.

This bright abstract watercolor of vivid concentric circles reflects the artists mastery of color theory.

In 1924, Alma Thomas was the 1st graduate of Howard University’s Fine Arts program & the 1st woman in the US to hold bachelor’s degree in art. Her work has been collected by the Smithsonian, Metropolitan Museum of Art, & the White House. This piece sold at a Christie’s auction for 2.6 million USD.

Black and white portrait of a woman in military uniform.

Renowned performer Josephine Baker was a WWII hero & the 1st American woman awarded the Croix de Guerre. As an operative for the French Resistance, she collected intelligence, carried coded messages (in invisible ink on her musical scores), & sheltered Jewish refugees & resistance fighters.

Black and white photo of man in a shirt and tie, wearing glasses, raising one eyebrow as he gazes directly at the viewer.

“If we desire a society of peace, then we cannot achieve such a society through violence.”

Bayard Rustin

I loved this show and this cast.

Photo of monument honoring Juana Ramirez "La Avanzadora" - a statue of commanding and regal woman raising her arms, holding a sword, standing atop a gold sphere in Plaza La Avanzadora, Maturín, Monagas, Venezuela.

Juana Ramírez was born in Venezuela in 1790. The daughter of an enslaved African woman & a Spanish general, she commanded an all-female artillery unit in 1813 “instrumental in resisting Spanish soldiers’ attempts to reconquer independent Venezuela” & is interred in the National Mausoleum of Heroes.

A man wearing an elegant suit.

Born in Trinidad, Dr. John Alcindor earned his MD in Scotland in 1899 & was a physician, political activist, & senior district medical officer in London. He was awarded a Red Cross medal for his work treating the wounded in WWI. His great-nephew is Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Yes, there were several independent Black communities in Florida that were very successful during this period.

Happy Emancipation Day and Happy Happy Haitian Independdence Day!

Men in suits and hats playing instruments walking down the street. The man in the center is on a bicycle. Women wearing dresses are walking. There's an American flag flying in the upper left corner.

Emancipation Day parade in Lincolnville, Florida, January 1, 1920 - image by photographer Richard Twine who was born there in 1896, a town formed by formerly enslaved people after the Civil War & a vigorous, dynamic Black community despite legalized segregation in early 20th century Florida.

As Kevin Levin observes, on January 1, 1863, when the Emancipation Proclamation was announced, an interracial crowd had gathered in Port Royal, SC, where Black Union soldiers had trained to serve & save the nation. Upon hearing the announcement, the crowd began singing ‘My Country tis of Thee.’

Now I’m thinking my source meant to write 1874.

Two men posing in a studio with a sign that reads "1879 Happy New To All." There is a Dalmatian lying at their feet and a portrait of a woman in the frame. See John Jezierski, Enterprising Images.

Wallace and William Goodridge were pioneers of the medium of photography. Here the Goodridge brothers are posing in the photography studio they established in Michigan in 1847 bidding Happy New Year to All.

Black and white photograph of a father sitting on a sled with his daughter surrounded by another young son and daughter and a baby in a carriage. They are beautifully dressed, wearing hats, and surrounded by snow. Mrs. Rose Schuyler of VT is not pictured. This image is from the Clark University Bullard Experience exhibited at the Worchester Art Museum.

Raymond Schuyler & Four of His Children c. 1904 in Worcester, MA. Portrait made by photographer William Bullard. Mr. Schuyler was an active member of All Saints Episcopal Church, the Masons, the Knights of Pythias, & the NAACP.

"They pulled her out of Clinton High and moved to Los Angeles at the urging of an uncle of hers who lived there. After finishing school, she began a long career as a pediatric nurse in California."

Dec. 25, 1521: Enslaved People Revolt in Santo Domingo Enslaved people on a Santo Domingo sugar plantation owned by the son of Christopher Columbus attempted to free themselves and take over the land in the earliest recorded slave uprising in the Americas...

#tdih 1521: enslaved Africans on a Santo Domingo sugar plantation owned by Christopher Columbus's son attempted to free themselves and take over the land.

This was the earliest recorded slave uprising in the Americas. ⬇️🧵
www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/en...

And a Merry Biscuits Eve to you!