1670 Zipporah Potter Atkins – The first free African American woman to own land in Boston
1760 Jupiter Hammon – First African American published author; poem “An Evening Thought: Salvation by Christ with Penitential Cries”
1768 Wentworth Cheswell – the first to be elected to public office. Town constable in Newmarket, NH
1773 Phillis Wheatley – first to publish a book
First African American church Silver Bluff Baptist Church, Aiken County South Carolina
1821 Thomas L. Jennings patent for the dry-cleaning process
1823 Alexander Twilight – first to receive a degree from Middlebury College In 1836 he was the first to serve in Vermont state legislature
Freedom’s Journal NYC owned & operates newspaper Rev Peter Williams Jr
1837 Dr. James McCune Smith NYC first to be formally trained
1845 Macon Allen – licensed to practice law from Boston bar