Search
When I got my first library card in 1993, I did not yet know that one day a Black man would be the president of the United States of America — or that I would grow up to become the mayor of the city I grew up in.
This photograph shows the men of the Independent Battery, U.S. Colored Light Artillery, positioned in front of the guard house at Fort Leavenworth. The battery, organized in June 1864, was one of just a handful of Union units led by African American officers. Its commander, Captain H. Ford Douglas, worked tirelessly to better the conditions under which his men served. Of the 208 enlisted men in the battery, more than 160 were recruited from Leavenworth. Others came from Fort Scott, Kansas, and the Wyandotte and Quindaro communities in what is now Kansas City, Kansas.
Article
Battle of Island Mound
This illustration from the March 14, 1863, issue of Harper’s Weekly magazine — titled “A Negro Regiment in Action” —
depicts the Battle of Island Mound, Missouri, in October 1862.
Article
Hiram Young
Hiram Young was born about 1812 in Tennessee. In 1847, Young obtained freedom
and with his wife moved to Independence, Missouri. Taking advantage of his location
near the Oregon and Santa Fe trails, he built wagons for western emigrants. By 1860,
Young was turning out thousands of yokes and between 800 and 900 wagons a year.
Article
William Messley
First Sergeant William A. Messley (also known as Measley) of Company C, 62nd United States Colored Troops, posed for this portrait shortly after his enlistment in late 1863. The 62nd originated as the 1st Regiment Colored Infantry, Missouri Volunteers.
Article
William D. Matthews
Lt. William Dominick Matthews was an African American officer of the Independent Battery, U.S. Colored Light Artillery, at Fort Leavenworth.
Article
Cathay Williams
Cathay Williams was the first African American woman to enlist in the U.S. Army — in a time when women were
prohibited from serving.
Article
Lafayette A. Tillman
Lafayette Alonzo Tillman is remembered most for being one of Kansas City’s first African American police officers.
Article
Josephine Silone Yates
An inspiring teacher and passionate communicator, Josephine Silone Yates devoted
her life to fighting racial prejudice.
Article
Tom Bass
Tom Bass broke down color barriers as a world-class equestrian and trainer of show
horses over a career that spanned half a century.
Article
Anna H. Jones
Anna H. Jones was born in Canada and graduated from Oberlin College, a private Ohio school noted for having been the first American institution of higher learning to regularly admit Black students.
From their first steps onto Diasporic soil, Africans in America, now African Americans, have recognized the importance of obtaining an education. In most places in the United States, it was illegal to teach an enslaved person how to read or do arithmetic unless it benefitted the owner. With these skills, enslaved men (and some women, who learned clandestinely) could then help with market sales, measurements, and making goods. The number of Black people who were literate grew as they shared their knowledge with others in their community.
When I started at the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum as a volunteer 27 years ago, I considered myself very much a baseball fan. But I would quickly discover that the four decades of baseball history the museum preserves and conveys — the four decades of American history it represents — was a chapter that I really did not know very much about.
We stand at a pivotal time, not only for our county but also for our state and especially our community. This summer people from across Kansas City came out to protest the predominant systemic racism and white supremacy in our country. We must change the system or we will continue to see the killing and disparaging of Black people nationally and locally, right here in our community.
In this book, we celebrate those African Americans on whose shoulders we stand.