In April 1787, Rev. Richard Allen and Rev. Absalom Jones co-founded the Free African Society (FAS) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As two of the earliest African Americans to become ordained Christian priests, Allen and Jones sought to create a kind of community outreach organization with the FAS. It helped black Philadelphians satisfy some of their basic [...]
In March 1827, Rev. Samuel Cornish and John Russwurm co-founded Freedom’s Journal in New York City. It served as the first African-American newspaper in the United States and commemorated the 50th anniversary-year of the first American anti-slavery statutes in the 1777 Vermont Constitution. One of their primary objectives in starting Freedom’s Journal was to combat [...]
With the publication of Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (London, 1773) [AAS online catalog record], Phillis Wheatley became the first published African American poet. Because of her status as a house slave in Boston, Massachusetts, she achieved high literary recognition in the years following publication. Prominent political figures like George Washington and Thomas [...]
Clerk and the City, 1849 Schoolmarm, 1870
