Fannie Hurst. [New York Public Library Digital Collections, Billy Rose Theatre Collection, TH-22169]

Fannie Hurst, the daughter of Rose Koppel and Samuel Hurst, was born at the home of her…

Lonnie Johnson performing in 1965 at the Folk Festival Show, Palisades Amusement Park, New Jersey. [Cornell University Library, Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Amsterdam News Photograph Archive, #8084]

Alonzo “Lonnie” Johnson was an extraordinarily gifted blues guitarist and talented singer…

Joseph James Jones, circa 1937. [Smithsonian Institution, Archives of American Art, Forbes Watson Papers, 1840–1967, 2976]

The biography of Joseph James Jones is both the story of the life of an American artist and…

Scott Joplin. [New York Public Library, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Photographs and Prints Division, 1692841]

Known during his lifetime as the “King of Ragtime Writers,” Scott Joplin was an African…

Theodore Link, circa 1890. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Collection, N27617]

Theodore Carl Link is best known as the architect of St. Louis’s Union Station, but if he…

Mary Elizabeth Mahnkey. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Mary Kathy Dains Photograph Collection, P0300]

Mary Elizabeth Mahnkey was a lifelong newspaper and magazine journalist, and a regional…

Patricia and Fredrick McKissack

Patricia C. McKissack dedicated her career as a writer to showcasing black voices through children’s books and…

Louis Miller. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Lynn Morrow Papers (R1000)]

Louis Miller was an influential builder-architect who lived in Arcadia, in Iron County, and…

William Rockhill Nelson. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Missouri Press Portraits Collection, P1196-014545]

Of British, Quaker, and Huguenot heritage, William Rockhill Nelson was born five miles west…

Howard Nemerov. [Washington University Libraries, Special Collections, Howard Nemerov Papers]

Howard Nemerov was born on February 29, 1920, in New York City, and died on July 5, 1991,…