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Early Years Cook was born into slavery in King William County. The names of his parents and the name of the family who owned him are not known, nor is it clear when or under what circumstances he acquired or took his surname. He was described several times as being of mixed-race ancestry. On January 23, 1847, Fields, as he then identified himself, began writing a narrative of his life, one of the longest manuscripts known to have been composed by an enslaved Virginian. The first thirty-two pages of the memoir survive and in 1902 were deposited in the Library of Congress. He recorded that he s...

Baptist churches became popular among African Americans in the South in part because they offered more membership rights than other denominations. Until the nineteenth century, and unlike the more-elite Episcopal church, Baptist churches routinely offered free and enslaved blacks full membership, and sometimes roles like exhorter or deacon, in their congregations; they restricted leadership roles like elder and pastor to whites. Until 1831, blacks were also free to lead their own separate Baptist congregations, providing a level of autonomy for African American communities nonexistent in mos...

Mystery, a black newspaper, from 1843 until 1847, and co-editing with Frederick Douglass the North Star from 1847 until 1849. Douglass and the prominent abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison generally counseled peace and patience for slaves and integration for freed blacks. When, in 1852, Delany wrote his manifesto, The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States, Politically Considered, calling for emigration from the United States to Central America, it was viewed as a decisive break from mainstream abolitionism and, according to some scholars, t...

Black Inventors Who Changed The World: Garrett Morgan Garrett Augustus Morgan Sr. was a trailblazing inventor who was born Paris, Kentucky in 1877. His father,  Sydney Morgan, was a former slave and the son of Confederate General John H. Morgan. In his early teens, Garrett moved to Cincinnati to work as a handyman. Four years later, he married and settled in Cleveland, where he remained till his death. He went to work for the Root and McBride Company for $5 a week and taught himself how to fix sewing machines. Before long, he'd become their only Black machine adjuster. Garrett was the ...

Celebrate Black History Month by looking back on Kentucky history makers Kentucky Center for African American Heritage, Special to Louisville Courier Journal © Courtesy of Kentucky Center for African American Heritage Carter Godwin Woodson Editor's note: The Kentucky Center for African American Heritage will provide The Courier Journal with a Black History Maker each day during Black History Month. The center’s goals are to enhance the public’s knowledge about the history, heritage and cultural contributions of African Americans in Kentucky and the heritage we share wi...