A history of Black America

The unbroken line — from the first Africans to their descendants today.

Two timelines you can zoom from centuries down to a single day. Choose the history of struggle and resistance, or of achievement and excellence.

Culture, invention, and triumph

The timeline

1500s1600s1700s1800s1900s2000s

Move across the timeline to focus a decade · click to open it

Each century is titled by what defined it. Click to zoom into decades, years, and days.

Son of two of the 1619 arrivals, baptized in Jamestown — the first documented child of African descent born in the English colonies.

The first Black voices in American letters and science.

The formerly enslaved become America's conscience.

Black America remakes the world's culture.

From the White House to the world stage.

Featured trail

Follow the chain from a Cold War proxy war to the prison cells of Black America — a connection rarely taught as a single story.