• The “Model Colored Soldier” of WWII: Sgt. Franklin Williams

    Franklin Williams To me, this 1942 photo of “Sargeant Franklin Williams, home on leave from Army duty, with his best girl Ellen Hardin, splitting a soda” (that’s the original caption, including misspellings) is one of the most iconic images of the World War II homefront ever produced. Franklin and Ellen seem to be such an…

  • African American Heroes at Omaha and Utah Beaches on D-Day in WW2

    African American Heroes at Omaha and Utah Beaches on D-Day in WW2

    D-Day and African American Soldiers Most people believe there were no Blacks among the Allied soldiers who hit the beaches of Normandy on D-Day. Historical researcher Linda Hervieux relates a conversation she had with a U.S. Army Museum archivist who stated flatly, “There were no black men at D-Day.” That archivist was wrong. There were…

  • Perry Mason: The Case of the Silent Black Judge

    Perry Mason: The Case of the Silent Black Judge

    How Perry Mason Helped Change a Nation If you watched the Perry Mason program during its original network television run (1957 – 1966), you saw a series in which all of the principle parts were played exclusively by White actors. Yet, with one subtle casting decision, the show helped to break down racial barriers in…

  • Robert Smalls: A Civil War Hero’s Fight for Racial Equality

    Robert Smalls: A Civil War Hero’s Fight for Racial Equality

    One day, some years after the Civil War, a frail, elderly woman came to the house at 511 Prince Street in Beaufort, South Carolina, and as she had done innumerable times before, went in. She was Jane Bold McKee, and she had lived in this house with her husband, Henry McKee, for many years. But…