Student Nurse’s Uniform and Yearbook from Homer G. Phillips Hospital School of Nursing

Pauline Brown Payne wore this uniform while attending the Homer G. Phillips Hospital School of Nursing in St. Louis, Missouri, in the 1940s. She graduated from the school in 1947 and worked as a nurse in the hospital from 1947 ...

Marian Anderson’s Outfit at 1939 Concert at the Lincoln Memorial.

On April 9, 1939, a crowd of more than 75,000 people gathered along the National Mall’s reflecting pool for an impromptu concert organized by the NAACP and the Department of the Interior. Before them, on the steps of the Lincoln ...

Muhammad Ali’s Headgear and items from the 5th Street Gym

Boxers training at Miami Beach’s historic 5^th Street Gym once used this corner stool and bell. These boxers included Muhammad Ali, who wore this training headgear while conditioning at the gym in the 1960s and 1970s.

Then known as Cassius ...

Money box used by Bishop Richard Allen

This simple wood and leather money box belonged to Bishop Richard Allen, founder of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church and one of the most important religious figures in American history.

Richard Allen is born enslaved in 1760. Separated at ...

Leah Chase Chef’s Jacket

This red chef’s jacket belonged to renowned New Orleans chef Leah Chase. Known widely as the “Queen of Creole Cuisine,” Leah Chase has served as the executive chef at her husband’s family restaurant, Dooky Chase’s, since the 1950s. Chase helped ...

Honor King/End Racism (Photos and Sign)

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and killed in Memphis, Tennessee on April 4, 1968.  On April 8, an estimated 40,000 people marched in silent protest through the streets of Memphis. Many of the participants carried signs created specifically ...

Grafton Tyler Brown Painting

Grafton Tyler Brown painted this image of Lake Okanagan, British Columbia in 1882. One of the most skilled lithographers in the American West, Grafton’s experiences in Canada motivated him to dedicate more time to painting and exploring the natural wonders ...

Ntozake Shange’s for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf

In 1974, poet and playwright Ntozake Shange debuted her groundbreaking work, For colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf, at The Bacchanal, a women’s bar in Albany, California. Using an innovative form she defined as a “choreopoem”—a ...

Doorway façade from the Baxter Terrace Housing Project, Newark, New Jersey

With the population of urban areas swelling through the first half of the 20^th century, middle and low-income families had trouble finding adequate housing. Only with the 1937 passage of the Wagner-Steagall Housing Act, did the federal government accelerate and ...

Ecuadorian Boat Seat with Spider Web

This seat represents the shared connections between the cultures of the transatlantic slave trade in the Americas. Afro Ecuadorian Deborah Azareno sat on this boat seat as she traveled in canoes along the rivers of Ecuador’s coastal Esmeraldas province. She ...