1787

The New York Manumission Society founded the African Free School in Manhattan in 1787, providing formal education to Black children, both free and enslaved. By 1820 the school enrolled over 500 students. Its alumni included James McCune Smith, Henry Highland Garnet, Ira Aldridge, and Samuel Ringgold Ward — a remarkable generation of Black intellectual leaders.

The New York Manumission Society founded the African Free School in New York City, one of the earliest schools established specifically to educate Black children in the United States. The school eventually grew to educate hundreds of students and produced notable graduates including abolitionist Henry Highland Garnet and actor Ira Aldridge.

Jupiter Hammon, considered the first published Black writer in America, delivered 'An Address to the Negroes of the State of New-York' before the African Society of New York City, calling for the gradual emancipation of enslaved people. Though constrained by his own enslaved status and cautious in tone, the address was a significant early public statement by a Black American advocating for freedom.

Richard Allen and Absalom Jones found a Philadelphia mutual-aid society that seeds the independent Black church movement.