Resources by Subject: Civil Rights & Black History
Resources, links, and subject pages for research topics and teacher's projects
Civil Rights Nonfiction Books
The Civil Rights Act Of 1964 by
Before the Civil Rights Act was passed, African Americans faced widespread discrimination. This book captures the societal turmoil in America during the civil rights movement as African Americans began demanding their constitutional protections. With the use of primary source images, engaging sidebars, and well-written text, we see first hand the features of the movement, how presidents Kennedy and Johnson sought ways to guarantee their rights to African Americans, and just how life has changed in America since the passage of this important legislation.
Call Number: 342.73 WRIISBN: 1404204555Publication Date: 2005-12-30
The Civil Rights Movement by
When Rosa Parks decided not to get out of her bus seat in 1955, African Americans across the United States were treated like second-class citizens. Sometimes they were not even considered citizens. They were not allowed to use "white-only" restaurants or hotels. They were kept out of public schools, parks, and swimming pools. And perhaps most importantly, they were not allowed to vote. Over the course of the next decade, African Americans and their white supporters organized a movement that changed American society profoundly. They marched. They sat-in. They lobbied for new laws. They fought in the courts. It took incredible courage. While the activists tried to be non-violent, their efforts were often met with beatings and even murder. But in just a few years, the United States was a different country. The "Jim Crow" system that prevented African Americans from being full citizens of their own country was gone. It is a remarkable story, full of heroes known and unknown. Book jacket.
Call Number: 323.093 MUR / also eBookISBN: 1584154012Publication Date: 2005-05-01
Double Victory by
Winner of: 2014 Amelia Bloomer Top Ten List "Allow all black nurses to enlist, and the draft won't be necessary. . . . If nurses are needed so desperately, why isn't the Army using colored nurses?" "My arm gets a little sore slinging a shovel or a pick, but then I forget about it when I think about all those boys over in the Solomons." Double Victory tells the stories of African American women who did extraordinary things to help their country during World War II. In these pages young readers meet a range of remarkable women: war workers, political activists, military women, volunteers, and entertainers. Some, such as Mary McLeod Bethune and Lena Horne, were celebrated in their lifetimes and are well known today. But many others fought discrimination at home and abroad in order to contribute to the war effort yet were overlooked during those years and forgotten by later generations. Double Victory recovers the stories of these courageous women, such as Hazel Dixon Payne, the only woman to serve on the remote Alaska-Canadian Highway; Deverne Calloway, a Red Cross worker who led a protest at an army base in India; and Betty Murphy Phillips, the only black female overseas war correspondent. Offering a new and diverse perspective on the war and including source notes and a bibliography, Double Victory is an invaluable addition to any student's or history buff's bookshelf.
Call Number: 940.53 MULISBN: 1569768080Publication Date: 2013-01-01
Failure Is Impossible! by
Supports the national curriculum standards Culture; Time, Continuity, and Change; Individual Development and Identity; Individuals, Groups, and Institutions; Power, Authority, and Governance; Production, Distribution, and Consumption; and Science Technology and Society as outlined by the National Council for the Social Studies.
Call Number: 305.42 KENISBN: 0822517442Publication Date: 2005-01-01
The Greensboro Lunch Counter by
On February 1, 1960, four young Black men sat down at a Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, and staged a nonviolent protest against segregation. At that time, most lunch counters in the South did not serve Black people. Soon, thousands of students were staging sit-ins across the South. In just six months, the Greensboro Woolworth's lunch counter was integrated. How did it become a symbol of civil rights? Find out the answer to this question and more about what an artifact can tell us about history.
Call Number: eBookISBN: 9781977158437Publication Date: 2021-04-15
Hidden Figures Young Readers' Edition by
The uplifting, amazing true story--a New York Times bestseller! This edition of Margot Lee Shetterly's acclaimed book is perfect for young readers. It's the powerful story of four African-American female mathematicians at NASA who helped achieve some of the greatest moments in our space program. Before John Glenn orbited the earth, or Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, a group of dedicated female mathematicians known as "human computers" used pencils, slide rules, and adding machines to calculate the numbers that would launch rockets, and astronauts, into space. This book brings to life the stories of Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson, and Christine Darden, who lived through the Civil Rights era, the Space Race, the Cold War, and the movement for gender equality, and whose work forever changed the face of NASA and the country.
Call Number: 510.92 SHEISBN: 9780062662378Publication Date: 2016-11-29
Little Rock by
A moving re-creation of the painful integration of the public school in Little Rock, Arkansas, its background, and the aftermath.
Call Number: 323 ONISBN: 1562943545Publication Date: 1994-10-01
Locked up for Freedom by
In 1963, more than 30 African-American girls ages 11 to 16 were arrested for taking part in Civil Rights protests in Americus, Georgia. They were taken without their families' knowledge to a Civil War-era stockade in Leesburg, Georgia, where they were confined in unsanitary conditions and exposed to brutal treatment. Over the following weeks, their commitment to the fight for equality was put to the test. Combining historical research and personal interviews with several of the girls, Heather E. Schwartz brings this true story of the Civil Rights Movement to life.
Call Number: 323.1196 SCHISBN: 9781467785976Publication Date: 2017-08-01
March: Book One by
Congressman John Lewis (GA-5) is an American icon, one of the key figures of the civil rights movement. His commitment to justice and nonviolence has taken him from an Alabama sharecropper's farm to the halls of Congress, from a segregated schoolroom to the 1963 March on Washington, and from receiving beatings from state troopers to receiving the Medal of Freedom from the first African-American president. Now, to share his remarkable story with new generations, Lewis presents March, a graphic novel trilogy, in collaboration with co-writer Andrew Aydin and New York Times best-selling artist Nate Powell (winner of the Eisner Award and LA Times Book Prize finalist for Swallow Me Whole). March is a vivid first-hand account of John Lewis' lifelong struggle for civil and human rights, meditating in the modern age on the distance traveled since the days of Jim Crow and segregation. Rooted in Lewis' personal story, it also reflects on the highs and lows of the broader civil rights movement. Book One spans John Lewis' youth in rural Alabama, his life-changing meeting with Martin Luther King, Jr., the birth of the Nashville Student Movement, and their battle to tear down segregation through nonviolent lunch counter sit-ins, building to a stunning climax on the steps of City Hall. Many years ago, John Lewis and other student activists drew inspiration from the 1958 comic book "Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story." Now, his own comics bring those days to life for a new audience, testifying to a movement whose echoes will be heard for generations. Coretta Scott King Author Honor Books selection- recognizing an African American author and illustrator of outstanding books for children and young adults- "March- Book One," written by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin, illustrated by Nate Powell, and published by Top Shelf Productions.
Call Number: graphics LEWISBN: 9781603093002Publication Date: 2013-08-13
The March Against Fear by
James Meredith's 1966 march in Mississippi began as one man's peaceful protest for voter registration and became one of the South's most important demonstrations of the civil rights movement. It brought together leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Stokely Carmichael, who formed an unlikely alliance that resulted in the Black Power movement, which ushered in a new era in the fight for equality. The retelling of Meredith's story opens on the day of his assassination attempt and goes back in time to recount the moments leading up to that event and its aftermath. Readers learn about the powerful figures and emerging leaders who joined the over 200-mile walk that became known as the "March Against Fear." Thoughtfully presented by award-winning author Ann Bausum, this book helps readers understand the complex issues of fear, injustice, and the challenges of change. It is a history lesson that's as important and relevant today as it was 50 years ago.
Call Number: 323 BAUISBN: 9781426326660Publication Date: 2017-01-03
Race Relations by
The United States has a long and difficult history of race relations. Although slavery was ended after the American Civil War in 1865, its legacy continues today in education, employment, housing, and the criminal justice system. This book examines the roles that society and government could play in changing attitudes toward race and creating a country where people are judged on the content of their character, rather than the color of their skin. The Contemporary Issues Pro-Con series is to give young readers a better understanding of major social issues today. Each book examines four key questions related to a controversial topic, with essays that detail the most commonly heard arguments on both sides of the discussion. The arguments contained within are supported by data from experts as well as nonpartisan reports, allowing to reader to make his or her own informed decision on the issue.
Call Number: 305.8 BURISBN: 9781422244005Publication Date: 2019-01-01
Revolution in Our Time: the Black Panther Party's Promise to the People by
A National Book Award Finalist A Coretta Scott King Author Award Honor Book A Michael L. Printz Honor Book A Walter Dean Myers Honor Book With passion and precision, Kekla Magoon relays an essential account of the Black Panthers--as militant revolutionaries and as human rights advocates working to defend and protect their community. In this comprehensive, inspiring, and all-too-relevant history of the Black Panther Party, Kekla Magoon introduces readers to the Panthers' community activism, grounded in the concept of self-defense, which taught Black Americans how to protect and support themselves in a country that treated them like second-class citizens. For too long the Panthers' story has been a footnote to the civil rights movement rather than what it was: a revolutionary socialist movement that drew thousands of members--mostly women--and became the target of one of the most sustained repression efforts ever made by the U.S. government against its own citizens. Revolution in Our Time puts the Panthers in the proper context of Black American history, from the first arrival of enslaved people to the Black Lives Matter movement of today. Kekla Magoon's eye-opening work invites a new generation of readers grappling with injustices in the United States to learn from the Panthers' history and courage, inspiring them to take their own place in the ongoing fight for justice.
Call Number: eBookISBN: 9781536223422Publication Date: 2021-11-08
Stamped from the Beginning by
Kendi, Ibram X.
Stamped from the beginning the definitive history of racist ideas in America
Call Number: 305.8/00973
(0)
Follett Audiobook
OVERVIEW
"A comprehensive history of anti-black racism focuses on the lives of five major players in American history, including Cotton Mather and Thomas Jefferson, and highlights the debates that took place between assimilationists and segregationists and between racists and antiracists"--OCLC.
Call Number: Digital AudiobookISBN: 9781518940934Publication Date: 2017
TV Exposes Brutality on the Selma March by
On-point historical photographs combined with strong narration bring the story of the civil rights marches to life. Kids will learn about the way in which Southern states kept African Americans from voting and the history that led to nonviolent civil rights marches to fight for the right to vote guaranteed by the Constitution. As an added bonus, readers will learn about how this played out on TV and galvanized the civil rights movement, leading to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Seeing the brutality on TV turned the fight for voting rights in the South into a national cause. Accompanying video will show readers what viewers saw at the time.
Call Number: 323.1196 SMIISBN: 9780756560010Publication Date: 2019-08-01
Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow:
What can you do?
The Black Lives Matter Movement by
Black Lives Matter was born in July 2013 after a jury exonerated the killer of an unarmed black youth named Trayvon Martin. Since that time it has become known as a formidable, often controversial, civil rights movement that seeks equality and fair treatment of black citizens by law enforcement and by society as a whole.
Call Number: 313.119 PARISBN: 9781682822852Publication Date: 2017-08-01
Lifting As We Climb by
For African American women, the fight for the right to vote was only one battle. This Coretta Scott King Author Honor book tells the important, overlooked story of black women as a force in the suffrage movement--when fellow suffragists did not accept them as equal partners in the struggle. Susan B. Anthony. Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Alice Paul. The Women's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls. The 1913 Women's March in D.C. When the epic story of the suffrage movement in the United States is told, the most familiar leaders, speakers at meetings, and participants in marches written about or pictured are generally white. That's not the real story. Women of color, especially African American women, were fighting for their right to vote and to be treated as full, equal citizens of the United States. Their battlefront wasn't just about gender. African American women had to deal with white abolitionist-suffragists who drew the line at sharing power with their black sisters. They had to overcome deep, exclusionary racial prejudices that were rife in the American suffrage movement. And they had to maintain their dignity--and safety--in a society that tried to keep them in its bottom ranks. Lifting as We Climb is the empowering story of African American women who refused to accept all this. Women in black church groups, black female sororities, black women's improvement societies and social clubs. Women who formed their own black suffrage associations when white-dominated national suffrage groups rejected them. Women like Mary Church Terrell, a founder of the National Association of Colored Women and of the NAACP; or educator-activist Anna Julia Cooper who championed women getting the vote and a college education; or the crusading journalist Ida B. Wells, a leader in both the suffrage and anti-lynching movements. Author Evette Dionne, a feminist culture writer and the editor-in-chief of Bitch Media, has uncovered an extraordinary and underrepresented history of black women. In her powerful book, she draws an important historical line from abolition to suffrage to civil rights to contemporary young activists--filling in the blanks of the American suffrage story. "Dionne provides a detailed and comprehensive look at the overlooked roles African American women played in the efforts to end slavery and then to secure the right to vote for women." --Kirkus Reviews, starred review
Call Number: 323.34 DIOISBN: 9780451481542Publication Date: 2020-04-21
One Person, No Vote (YA Edition) by
In her New York Times bestseller White Rage, Carol Anderson laid bare an insidious history of policies that have systematically impeded black progress in America, from 1865 to our combustible present. With One Person, No Vote, she chronicles a related history- the rollbacks to African American participation in the vote since the 2013 Supreme Court decision that eviscerated the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Known as the Shelby ruling, this decision effectively allowed districts with a demonstrated history of racial discrimination to change voting requirements without approval from the Department of Justice. Focusing on the aftermath of Shelby, Anderson follows the astonishing story of government-dictated racial discrimination unfolding before our very eyes as more and more states adopt voter suppression laws. In gripping, enlightening detail she explains how voter suppression works, from photo ID requirements to gerrymandering to poll closures. And with vivid characters, she explores the resistance- the organizing, activism, and court battles to restore the basic right to vote to all Americans as the nation gears up for the 2018 midterm elections.
Call Number: 324.6 ANDISBN: 9781547601073Publication Date: 2019-09-17
A Primary Source Investigation of Women's Suffrage by
When the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution authorized women's suffrage in 1920, it was the culmination of decades of work by women who had fought to be considered equal to men under the law. Accompanied by primary source documents, this resource chronicles the birth of the women's rights movement at Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848; the suffragists' sometimes-contentious partnership with the abolitionist movement; and the slow build toward national suffrage. The efforts of Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and other important leaders are recognized.
Call Number: 324.623 DAYISBN: 9781499435191Publication Date: 2015-07-15
Taking Action for Civil and Political Rights by
Do you ever worry about people being treated unfairly? Do you wish you could help make things better? The civil rights activists profiled in this book do that every day. One teenager organized a hunger strike and a protest of 120,000 people to demand voting rights. Three friends started the Black Lives Matter movement by commenting on social media. Another activist started a petition that asked teen magazines to stop altering photos of girls' bodies. And a farmworker organized other farmworkers and consumers to ask for higher wages and better working conditions. Explore the stories of these inspiring kids and adults, and learn how to start making a difference yourself.
Call Number: 323 BRAISBN: 9781467793940Publication Date: 2016-08-01
The Talk by
Thirty diverse, award-winning authors and illustrators invite you into their homes to witness the conversations they have with their children about race in America today in this powerful call-to-action that invites all families to be anti-racists and advocates for change. As long as racist ideas persist, families will continue to have the difficult and necessary conversations with their young ones on the subject. In this inspiring collection, literary all-stars such as Renée Watson (Piecing Me Together), Grace Lin (Where the Mountain Meets the Moon), Meg Medina (Merci Suárez Changes Gears), Adam Gidwitz (The Inquisitor's Tale), and many more engage young people in frank conversations about race, identity, and self-esteem. Featuring text and images filled with love, acceptance, truth, peace, and an assurance that there can be hope for a better tomorrow, The Talk is a stirring anthology and must-have resource published in partnership with Just Us Books, a Black-owned children's publishing company that's been in operation for over thirty years. Just Us Books continues its mission grounded in the same belief that helped launch the company: Good books make a difference. So, let's talk. Featured contributors: Selina Alko, Tracey Baptiste, Derrick Barnes, Natacha Bustos, Cozbi A. Cabrera, Raul Colón, Adam Gidwitz, Nikki Grimes, Rudy Gutierrez, April Harrison, Wade Hudson, Gordon C. James, Minh Lê, E. B. Lewis, Grace Lin, Torrey Maldonado, Meg Medina, Christopher Myers, Daniel Nayeri, Zeke Peña, Peter H. Reynolds, Erin K. Robinson, Traci Sorell, Shadra Strickland, Don Tate, MaryBeth Timothy, Duncan Tonatiuh, Renée Watson, Valerie Wilson Wesley, Sharon Dennis Wyeth "Project[s] love and support." --The New York Times "The go-to book for talking to kids about race and privilege. . . . A must-read for every family." --Ellen Oh, editor of Flying Lessons & Other Stories and cofounder of We Need Diverse Books "May this magnificent collection inspire us to move from dialogue to deep action." --Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review
Call Number: 305.8 TALISBN: 9780593121627Publication Date: 2020-08-11
We Are Not yet Equal by
This young adult adaptation of the New York Times bestselling White Rage is essential antiracist reading for teens. An NAACP Image Award finalist A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year A NYPL Best Book for Teens History texts often teach that the United States has made a straight line of progress toward Black equality. The reality is more complex: milestones like the end of slavery, school integration, and equal voting rights have all been met with racist legal and political maneuverings meant to limit that progress. We Are Not Yet Equal examines five of these moments: The end of the Civil War and Reconstruction was greeted with Jim Crow laws; the promise of new opportunities in the North during the Great Migration was limited when blacks were physically blocked from moving away from the South; the Supreme Court's landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision was met with the shutting down of public schools throughout the South; the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 led to laws that disenfranchised millions of African American voters and a War on Drugs that disproportionally targeted blacks; and the election of President Obama led to an outburst of violence including the death of Black teen Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri as well as the election of Donald Trump. Including photographs and archival imagery and extra context, backmatter, and resources specifically for teens, this book provides essential history to help work for an equal future.
Call Number: 923 ANISBN: 9781547602520Publication Date: 2019-10-29
Civil Rights Biographies
Child of the Dream by
An incredible memoir from Sharon Robinson about one of the most important years of the civil rights movement. In January 1963, Sharon Robinson turns thirteen the night before George Wallace declares on national television "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever" in his inauguration speech as governor of Alabama. It is the beginning of a year that will change the course of American history. As the daughter of baseball legend Jackie Robinson, Sharon has opportunities that most people would never dream of experiencing. Her family hosts multiple fund-raisers at their home in Connecticut for the work that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is doing. Sharon sees her first concert after going backstage at the Apollo Theater. And her whole family attends the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. But things don't always feel easy for Sharon. She is one of the only Black children in her wealthy Connecticut neighborhood. Her older brother, Jackie Robinson Jr., is having a hard time trying to live up to his father's famous name, causing some rifts in the family. And Sharon feels isolated-struggling to find her role in the civil rights movement that is taking place across the country. This is the story of how one girl finds her voice in the fight for justice and equality.
Call Number: B ROBISBN: 9781338282801Publication Date: 2019-09-03
Dark Sky Rising by
Henry Louis Gates, Jr. presents a journey through America's past and our nation's attempts at renewal in this look at the Civil War's conclusion, Reconstruction, and the rise of Jim Crow segregation. This is a story about America during and after Reconstruction, one of history's most pivotal and misunderstood chapters. In a stirring account of emancipation, the struggle for citizenship and national reunion, and the advent of racial segregation, the renowned Harvard scholar delivers a book that is illuminating and timely. Real-life accounts drive the narrative, spanning the half century between the Civil War and Birth of a Nation. Here, you will come face-to-face with the people and events of Reconstruction's noble democratic experiment, its tragic undermining, and the drawing of a new "color line" in the long Jim Crow era that followed. In introducing young readers to them, and to the resiliency of the African American people at times of progress and betrayal, Professor Gates shares a history that remains vitally relevant today.
Call Number: 973 GATISBN: 9781338262049Publication Date: 2019-01-29
The Girl from the Tar Paper School by
Before the Little Rock Nine, before Rosa Parks, before Martin Luther King Jr. and his March on Washington, there was Barbara Rose Johns, a teenager who used nonviolent civil disobedience to draw attention to her cause. In 1951, witnessing the unfair conditions in her racially segregated high school, Barbara Johns led a walkout--the first public protest of its kind demanding racial equality in the U.S.--jumpstarting the American civil rights movement. Ridiculed by the white superintendent and school board, local newspapers, and others, and even after a cross was burned on the school grounds, Barbara and her classmates held firm and did not give up. Her school's case went all the way to the Supreme Court and helped end segregation as part of Brown v. Board of Education. Barbara Johns grew up to become a librarian in the Philadelphia school system. The Girl from the Tar Paper School mixes biography with social history and is illustrated with family photos, images of the school and town, and archival documents from classmates and local and national news media. The book includes a civil rights timeline, bibliography, and index. Praise for The Girl from the Tar Paper School "An important glimpse into the early civil rights movement." --Kirkus Reviews "Based largely on interviews, memoirs, and other primary source material, and liberally illustrated with photographs, this well-researched slice of civil rights history will reward readers who relish true stories of unsung heroes." --The Bulletin of The Center for Children's Books
Call Number: B POWISBN: 9781419707964Publication Date: 2014-01-07
March Forward, Girl by
From the legendary civil rights activist and author of the million-copy-selling Warriors Don't Cry comes an ardent and profound childhood memoir of growing up while facing adversity in the Jim Crow South. Long before she was one of the Little Rock Nine, Melba Pattillo Beals was a warrior. Frustrated by the laws that kept African-Americans separate but very much unequal to whites, she had questions. Why couldn't she drink from a "whites only" fountain? Why couldn't she feel safe beyond home--or even within the walls of church? Adults all told her: Hold your tongue. Be patient. Know your place. But Beals had the heart of a fighter--and the knowledge that her true place was a free one. With emotive photos, this memoir paints a vivid picture of Beals's powerful early journey on the road to becoming a champion for equal rights, an acclaimed journalist, a best-selling author, and the recipient of this country's highest recognition, the Congressional Gold Medal. Includes a Q&A with Melba and bonus audio clip.
Call Number: B BEAISBN: 9781328603920Publication Date: 2019-12-24
Streetcar to Justice by
Starred reviews hail Streetcar to Justice as "a book that belongs in any civil rights library collection" (Publishers Weekly) and "completely fascinating and unique" (Kirkus). An ALA Notable Book Bestselling author and journalist Amy Hill Hearth uncovers the story of a little-known figure in U.S. history in this fascinating biography. In 1854, a young African American woman named Elizabeth Jennings won a major victory against a New York City streetcar company, a first step in the process of desegregating public transportation in Manhattan. This illuminating and important piece of the history of the fight for equal rights, illustrated with photographs and archival material from the period, will engage fans of Phillip Hoose's Claudette Colvin and Steve Sheinkin's Most Dangerous. One hundred years before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, Elizabeth Jennings's refusal to leave a segregated streetcar in the Five Points neighborhood of Manhattan set into motion a major court case in New York City. On her way to church one day in July 1854, Elizabeth Jennings was refused a seat on a streetcar. When she took her seat anyway, she was bodily removed by the conductor and a nearby police officer and returned home bruised and injured. With the support of her family, the African American abolitionist community of New York, and Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Jennings took her case to court. Represented by a young lawyer named Chester A. Arthur (a future president of the United States) she was victorious, marking a major victory in the fight to desegregate New York City's public transportation. Amy Hill Hearth, bestselling author of Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years, illuminates a lesser-known benchmark in the struggle for equality in the United States, while painting a vivid picture of the diverse Five Points neighborhood of Manhattan in the mid-1800s. Includes sidebars, extensive illustrative material, notes, and an index.
Call Number: B GRAISBN: 9780062673602Publication Date: 2018-01-02
The Voice That Challenged a Nation by
2005 Sibert Medal Winner A 2005 Newbery Honor Book "A voice like yours," celebrated conductor Arturo Toscanini told contralto Marian Anderson, "is heard once in a hundred years." This insightful account of the great African American vocalist considers her life and musical career in the context of the history of civil rights in this country. Drawing on Anderson's own writings and other contemporary accounts, Russell Freedman shows readers a singer pursuing her art despite the social constraints that limited the careers of black performers in the 1920s and 1930s. Though not a crusader or a spokesperson by nature, Marian Anderson came to stand for all black artists -- and for all Americans of color -- when, with the help of such prominent figures as Eleanor Roosevelt, she gave her landmark 1939 performance on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, which signaled the end of segregation in the arts. Carefully researched, expertly told, and profusely illustrated with contemporary photographs, this Newbery Honor and Sibert Medal-winning book is a moving account of the life of a talented and determined artist who left her mark on musical and social history. Through her story, Newbery Medal-winning author Russell Freedman, one of today's leading authors of nonfiction for young readers, illuminates the social and political climate of the day and an important chapter in American history. Notes, bibliography, discography, index.
Call Number: B ANDISBN: 9780618159765Publication Date: 2004-05-25
Smithsonian National Museum of American History
- Civil Rights Treasures In the mid-20th century, African Americans launched a renewed struggle to claim the civil rights that had long been denied to them. As they moved to end racial segregation, they called on the nation to live up to its ideals of freedom, equality, and democracy. Through peaceful yet determined action, they brought attention to injustice, achieved major victories, and inspired other groups to mobilize for equal rights.
Greensboro Lunch Counter, 1960
On February 1, 1960, four African American college students protesting segregation entered a Woolworth’s store in Greensboro, North Carolina, sat down at this “whites-only” lunch counter, and politely asked to be served. When their request was denied, the students refused to leave.
Find out more at Smithsonian's American History Museum Website
Civil Rights Websites
A list of selected websites
- African American Odyssey: The Civil Rights Era Two-part Library of Congress presentation covers significant events in the fight for equality for African American citizens, with quality images and succinctly detailed accounts that are ready to use in the classroom. Read about President Truman's ending military segregation, Daisy Bates and the Little Rock Nine, the Greensboro lunch counter sit-in, the 1963 march on Washington, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
- PBS-Civil Rights Resources The page offers background information on the entire movement including leaders and organizers, white resistance, legal strategies, protests, community organizing, and more. The page also offers lesson plans looking at Brown vs. Board of Education, Campaigning, and understanding white supremacy during the Civil Rights Movement.
- We the Teachers: Civil Rights Leaders and Speeches Seminar (Free to attend) The Civil Rights Movement in America has endured a difficult and tumultuous path. The Emancipation Proclamation ended the institution of slavery. The Fourteenth Amendment should have guaranteed freedoms, equality, and civil rights for all men; however, it would take many generations of hardships and court cases for that reality to be achieved. This seminar addresses the complicated road endured by African Americans. This Seminar will focus on significant leaders and the messages they conveyed during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s as the struggle for equality gained momentum following WWII. TAH seminars are conducted as a Socratic discussion, using primary source documents as the readings, and a Discussion Leader facilitating the conversation. Registrants, therefore, are encouraged to read all the documents in advance and come ready with questions. All attendees will receive a Letter of Attendance at the end of the seminar. REGISTER TO ATTEND: http://go.teachingamericanhistory.org/l/556702/2022-01-05/k2nrvf May 3, 2022 - May 3, 2022 TIMES 8:30 AM EST 2:15 PM EST
Civil Rights Fiction
A Good Kind of Trouble by
From debut author Lisa Moore Ramée comes this funny and big-hearted debut middle grade novel about friendship, family, and standing up for what's right, perfect for fans of Angie Thomas's The Hate U Give and the novels of Renée Watson and Jason Reynolds. Twelve-year-old Shayla is allergic to trouble. All she wants to do is to follow the rules. (Oh, and she'd also like to make it through seventh grade with her best friendships intact, learn to run track, and have a cute boy see past her giant forehead.) But in junior high, it's like all the rules have changed. Now she's suddenly questioning who her best friends are and some people at school are saying she's not black enough. Wait, what? Shay's sister, Hana, is involved in Black Lives Matter, but Shay doesn't think that's for her. After experiencing a powerful protest, though, Shay decides some rules are worth breaking. She starts wearing an armband to school in support of the Black Lives movement. Soon everyone is taking sides. And she is given an ultimatum. Shay is scared to do the wrong thing (and even more scared to do the right thing), but if she doesn't face her fear, she'll be forever tripping over the next hurdle. Now that's trouble, for real. "Tensions are high over the trial of a police officer who shot an unarmed Black man. When the officer is set free, and Shay goes with her family to a silent protest, she starts to see that some trouble is worth making." (Publishers Weekly, "An Anti-Racist Children's and YA Reading List")
Call Number: FIC RAM Realistic FictionISBN: 9780062836687Publication Date: 2019-03-12
I Am Alfonso Jones by
The Hate U Give meets The Lovely Bones in this unflinching graphic novel about the afterlife of a young man killed by an off-duty police officer, co-illustrated by New York Times bestselling artist John Jennings. Alfonso Jones can't wait to play the role of Hamlet in his school's hip-hop rendition of the classic Shakespearean play. He also wants to let his best friend, Danetta, know how he really feels about her. But as he is buying his first suit, an off-duty police officer mistakes a clothes hanger for a gun, and he shoots Alfonso. When Alfonso wakes up in the afterlife, he's on a ghost train guided by well-known victims of police shootings, who teach him what he needs to know about this subterranean spiritual world. Meanwhile, Alfonso's family and friends struggle with their grief and seek justice for Alfonso in the streets. As they confront their new realities, both Alfonso and those he loves realize the work that lies ahead in the fight for justice. In the first graphic novel for young readers to focus on police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement, as in Hamlet, the dead shall speak-and the living yield even more surprises. Foreword by Bryan Stevenson, Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative and author of Just Mercy
Call Number: graphics MEDISBN: 9781620142639Publication Date: 2017-10-10
Loving vs. Virginia by
From acclaimed author Patricia Hruby Powell comes the story of a landmark civil rights case, told in spare and gorgeous verse. In 1955, in Caroline County, Virginia, amidst segregation and prejudice, injustice and cruelty, two teenagers fell in love. Their life together broke the law, but their determination would change it. Richard and Mildred Loving were at the heart of a Supreme Court case that legalized marriage between races, and a story of the devotedcouple who faced discrimination, fought it, and won.
Call Number: FIC POW Historical FictionISBN: 9781452125909Publication Date: 2017-01-31
My Year in the Middle by
In a racially polarized classroom in 1970 Alabama, Lu's talent for running track makes her a new best friend - and tests her mettle as she navigates the school's social cliques. Miss Garrett's classroom is like every other at our school. White kids sit on one side and black kids on the other. I'm one of the few middle-rowers who split the difference. Sixth-grader Lu Olivera just wants to keep her head down and get along with everyone in her class. Trouble is, Lu's old friends have been changing lately - acting boy crazy and making snide remarks about Lu's newfound talent for running track. Lu's secret hope for a new friend is fellow runner Belinda Gresham, but in 1970 Red Grove, Alabama, blacks and whites don't mix. As segregationist ex-governor George Wallace ramps up his campaign against the current governor, Albert Brewer, growing tensions in the state - and in the classroom - mean that Lu can't stay neutral about the racial divide at school. Will she find the gumption to stand up for what's right and to choose friends who do the same?
Call Number: FIC WEA Historical FictionISBN: 9780763692315Publication Date: 2018-07-10
One Crazy Summer by
In this Newbery Honor novel, New York Times bestselling author Rita Williams-Garcia tells the story of three sisters who travel to Oakland, California, in 1968 to meet the mother who abandoned them. "This vibrant and moving award-winning novel has heart to spare."* Eleven-year-old Delphine is like a mother to her two younger sisters, Vonetta and Fern. She's had to be, ever since their mother, Cecile, left them seven years ago for a radical new life in California. But when the sisters arrive from Brooklyn to spend the summer with their mother, Cecile is nothing like they imagined. While the girls hope to go to Disneyland and meet Tinker Bell, their mother sends them to a day camp run by the Black Panthers. Unexpectedly, Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern learn much about their family, their country, and themselves during one truly crazy summer. This moving, funny novel won the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction and the Coretta Scott King Award and was a National Book Award Finalist. Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern's story continues in P.S. Be Eleven and Gone Crazy in Alabama. Readers who enjoy Christopher Paul Curtis's The Watsons Go to Birmingham and Jacqueline Woodson's Brown Girl Dreaming will find much to love in One Crazy Summer. This novel was the first featured title for Marley D's Reading Party, launched after the success of #1000BlackGirlBooks. Maria Russo, in a New York Times list of "great kids' books with diverse characters," called it "witty and original." *Brightly, in Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich's article "Knowing Our History to Build a Brighter Future: Books to Help Kids Understand the Fight for Racial Equality"
Call Number: FIC WIL Historical FictionISBN: 9780060760885Publication Date: 2010-01-26
Revolution by
*A 2014 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST* It's 1964, and Sunny's town is being invaded. Or at least that's what the adults of Greenwood, Mississippi, are saying. All Sunny knows is that people from up north are coming to help people register to vote. They're calling it Freedom Summer. Meanwhile, Sunny can't help but feel like her house is being invaded, too. She has a new stepmother, a new brother, and a new sister crowding her life, giving her little room to breathe. And things get even trickier when Sunny and her brother are caught sneaking into the local swimming pool--where they bump into a mystery boy whose life is going to become tangled up in theirs. As she did in her groundbreaking documentary novel COUNTDOWN, award-winning author Deborah Wiles uses stories and images to tell the riveting story of a certain time and place--and of kids who, in a world where everyone is choosing sides, must figure out how to stand up for themselves and fight for what's right.
ISBN: 0545106079Publication Date: 2014-05-27
Black History Month Resources
February is African American History Month The Library of Congress, National Archives and Records Administration, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Gallery of Art, National Park Service, Smithsonian Institution and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum join in paying tribute to the generations of African Americans who struggled with adversity to achieve full citizenship in American society..
Check out this link for a full calendar of free events and attend virtually: African American History Month
28 Ways to Celebrate Black History Month
Black History Month from History.com
Celebrate Black History Month from PBS
34 Black History Month Activities for February and Beyond from We Are Teachers
- 28 Ways to Celebrate Black History Month Celebrate Black History Month with these twenty-eight ideas, one for each day of February, that recognize the heritage, accomplishments, and culture of African Americans in the United States.
It's February, so many teachers and schools are taking time to celebrate Black History Month. According to Stanford historian Michael Hines, there are still misunderstandings and misconceptions about the past, present, and future of the celebration. In this installment of Tiny Lectures, Hines talks about the beginnings and evolution of Black History Month.
Michael Hines is an assistant professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education. He teaches courses on the history of education, and specifically the history of African American education, in the United States.
Explore the answers to How Black History Month started, what it honors, and Black History Month today.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
- AFRICAN-AMERICAN HEROES Hero for All: Martin Luther King, Jr. from National Geographic for Kids Hero for All: Martin Luther King, Jr. Civil Rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., never backed down in his stand against racism. Learn more about the life of this courageous hero who inspired millions of people to right a historical wrong.