Marian Anderson broke through discrimination and racism to become one of the greatest classical singers of all time. Her exceptional talent allowed her to travel to many countries to perform, showing the world firsthand that the color of one's skin does not determine one's talent or inner strength.
Muhammad Ali is one of America's most well-known athletes. From the time he was a young boy, Ali has been devoted to fighting racism in and out of the boxing ring. Later in his life, Ali was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, but despite his illness he has not ceased to stand up for what he believes.
Eighteenth-century inventor and astronomer Benjamin Banneker was widely known and respected in his time. Most of what he knew, he taught himself. His letter to Thomas Jefferson asked the future president to reconsider his racial prejudices. Later, abolitionists would use Banneker as proof that people of any race can be equally intelligent.
Booker T. Washington rose from his slavery beginnings to become a national leader in education and civil rights. Beginning his career as a teacher and developing into a renowned speaker, Washington's influence is still felt today through Tuskegee University, which he originally founded.
Born into slavery, Frederick Douglass was struck by the unfairness and cruelty of slave life and escaped as a young man to the North. A skilled speaker and writer of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Douglass became a fierce fighter for the end of slavery and later led the early civil rights movement.
W. E. B. Du Bois was born a few years after the end of the Civil War, and he dedicated his life to the fight for racial equality. Du Bois was highly educated, and he used his knowledge to speak out against segregation and the commonly held belief that blacks were inferior to whites.
Throughout her life, Mary McLeod Bethune worked tirelessly to increase women's opportunities, from education to the military to the right to vote. Her activism led her to the White House as a consultant for several presidents. There, she helped advance important civil rights agendas.