History

National Book Critics Circle 2021 Biography Finalist 53rd NAACP Image Award Nominee: Outstanding Literary Work - Biography/Autobiography "[A] riveting and timely exploration of Hamer's life. . . . Brilliantly constructed to be both forward and backward...

A Best Book of 2021 by NPR and The Washington Post   Part graphic novel, part memoir, Wake is an imaginative tour-de-force that tells the "powerful" (The New York Times Book Review) story of women-led slave revolts and chronicles scholar Rebecca...

"An enthralling story . . . A work of history that reads like a novel." -- Christian Science Monitor "As Hochschild's brilliant book demonstrates, the great Congo scandal prefigured our own times . . . This book must be read and reread." -- Los Angeles...

The classic work of political, economic, and historical analysis, powerfully introduced by Angela Davis   In his short life, the Guyanese intellectual Walter Rodney emerged as one of the leading thinkers and activists of the anticolonial...

Journalist. Suffragist. Antilynching crusader. In 1862, Ida B. Wells was born enslaved in Holly Springs, Mississippi. In 2020, she won a Pulitzer Prize. Ida B. Wells committed herself to the needs of those who did not have power. In the eyes of the FBI,...

A "daring, urgent, and transformative" (Brené Brown, New York Times bestselling author of Dare to Lead) exploration of Black achievement in a white world based on honest, provocative, and moving interviews with Black leaders, scientists, artists,...

“The fascinating story of arguably the greatest queen in sub-Saharan African history, who surely deserves a place in the pantheon of revolutionary world leaders.”―Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Though largely unknown in the West, the...

Thomas Sankara, often called the African Che Guevara, was president of Burkina Faso, one of the poorest countries in Africa, until his assassination during the military coup that brought down his government. Although his tenure in office was relatively...

A masterpiece of American literature, Frederick Douglass' "Narrative" is a powerful story of an enslaved youth coming to social and moral consciousness by disobeying his owners and secretly teaching himself to read. Achieving literacy emboldens him to...

The riveting story of the McKissack family--the founders of the leading Black design and construction firm in the United States, from its beginnings in the mid-1800s to its thriving status today--in a moving celebration of resilience and innovation...

From the beginning, even before the wagon trains, African Americans have played an essential part in building Oregon. In Marion and Polk counties, they overcame the obstacles of wilderness, prejudice, and isolation, helping to create a vibrant community...