AP African American Studies Resource Archive | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

The image is a sepia-toned portrait of Ida B. Wells, the African American journalist, activist, and anti-lynching crusader. She is shown from the chest up, wearing a high-collared, intricately embroidered lace dress with ruffled details. Her hair is styled in an elegant updo, and she has a composed, determined expression while gazing slightly to the side. The soft lighting and classic photographic style suggest it was taken in the late 19th or early 20th century.

The Persistence of Ida B. Wells: Reform Leader and Civil Rights Activist

by Kristina DuRocher

Learn more about Wells’s fight against lynching, her journalism, and her leadership in the civil rights movement.

Essay

A black-and-white photograph of a Black man wearing a dark hat, jacket, pants, and boots, behind a plow pulled by a horse through a field.

From Slavery to Sharecropping

with Jo Von McCalester

Examine the shift in Black labor after emancipation.

Video