An all-White crowd heard about slavery and the Underground Railroad from an admittedly uninformed White presenter On Sunday, February 22, in honor of Black History Month, the Bloomington Historical Society and the Human Rights Commission of Bloomington, Minnesota invited the public to a free “Special Presentation” on the use of quilts by slaves seeking their freedom via the … [Read more...]
Creating Black history one Wikipedia page at a time
Though he was the first African American with a doctoral degree in educational psychology as well as editor of the Journal of Negro Education for 30 years, Charles Henry Thompson’s page on Wikipedia didn’t show much. It didn’t include his rich background of innovation and scholarship or even photography. Instead, it was a mere two sentences. That remained the case until … [Read more...]
Dr. Thomas Johnson: Black medical pioneer was also a supper club owner
It is impossible to mention medicine and health care from an African American perspective here in Minnesota without mentioning Dr. Thomas Johnson. He had established clinics starting in South Minneapolis in 1957. He stayed there until 1966, and because 80 percent of his clientele came from North Minneapolis, he moved to the corner of Plymouth and Queen Avenues North in 1966. He … [Read more...]