Oscar Robertson was the 1st black person to win a major national player of the year award in college basketball; United States Basketball Writers Association, 1959.

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John Coltrane was a black jazz saxophonist and composer, who helped pioneer the use of modes and was later at the forefront of free jazz, 1950’s.

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Vonetta Flowers is the 1st black person to earn a gold medal in bobsledding at the Winter Games, 2002.  

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Dorie Miller was the first black to be awarded the Navy Cross, the third highest honor awarded by the US Navy at the time, after the Medal of Honor and the Navy Distinguished Service Medal, 1941.

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Fanny Jackson Coppin was the 1st black female school principal, Institute for Colored Youth, Philadelphia, PA, 1869.  

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Benjamin O. Davis, Sr was the 1st black general, 1940.

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Andrew Young was the 1st black U.S. Representative to the UN, 1977.

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Tarea Hall Pittman, a black woman and civil rights activist, helped desegregate the Oakland Fire Department in 1952.

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Amy Sherald is the 1st black female artist commissioned for US first-lady portrait to be displayed in the Smithsonian, 2018.

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Vinnette Justine Carroll was the 1st woman Broadway director; Don’t Bother Me, I Can’t Cope, 1972.

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