What is Black history and culture? The story of an enslaved people who freed themselves. The sounds of poetry, oratory, and music. A long parade of workers, soldiers, artists, musicians, scholars, athletes, judges, and politicians; men and women peacefully marching right into the centers of political power. That is the story I see on Wikimedia Commons, much more than 27 images can illustrate.

• 
  Slave dance, 1780s
• 
  Head of a Negro byJohn Singleton Copley, c, 1777
• 
  The Rev.Absalom Jones painted byRaphael Peale, 1810
• 
  Jack, 1850
• 
  Dred Scott, c.1857
• 
  The Bone Player byWilliam Sidney Mount, 1857
• 
  Whipped Peter, c. 1863
• 
  Gordon, soon after he escaped slavery by entering Union lines, 1863
• 
  Flag of the 22nd Regiment, United States Colored Troops with the mottoSic Semper Tyrannis, 1865
• 
  Sojourner Truth, 1870

External videos
West End Blues,Louis Armstrong and His Hot Five

External videos
Stormy Weather, Lena Horne

• 
  African American families watch boats on the Suwannee River c 1950
• 
  Six year oldRuby Bridges desegregatinga school in New Orleans with the protection of US marshals, 1960

External videos
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,Gil Scott-Heron

External audio
March on Washington, 15 hours of radio coverage, 8/28/1963, Educational Radio Network[1]
Dr. King's speech begins at 1:30, 8/28/1963, Educational Radio Network[2]

• 
  Malcolm X, 1964
• 
  Thurgood Marshall, 1956, byBetsy Graves Reyneau

• 
  Jim Brown, 1959
• 
  Roberto Clemente, 1966
• 
  Bill Russell guardsWilt Chamberlain, 1969

• 
  Sergeant Margaret Herrera and First LadyMichelle Obama, 2009
• 
  Ruby Bridges and PresidentBarack Obama view the paintingThe Problem We All Live With, 2011