Ernest J. Gaines, a MacArthur fellow best known for the book The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, died at his…
John Witherspoon, the “Pops” and “Grandad” of Black Hollywood, has died at the age of 77. The actor-comedian died…
Earth has just gotten a little less beautiful.
Louie Rankin, the Jamaican dancehall singer (known as the “Original Don Dada”) and film actor has died, following a…
Jessye Norman, the internationally celebrated soprano, died surrounded by loved ones Monday, of complications…
Robert Gabriel Mugabe, the former Zimbabwean president whose promising emergence eventually steered his country into…
In describing the literary greatness of Toni Morrison—winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize in literature, the first…
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Jackie Robinson may have been the broken the color barrier in Major League Baseball overall when he took to the…
Pernell “Sweet Pea” Whitaker, the former world champion boxer who embarrassed opponents with his elusive defense and…
Bushwick Bill (born Richard Stephen Shaw), the hip-hop legend and co-founder of the iconic Houston group Geto Boys,…
Grammy-winning jazz drummer Lawrence Leathers died Sunday in New York City. He was 37.
Harlem kingpin Frank Lucas, who inspired the 2007 feature film American Gangster with Denzel Washington, has died.
Melvin Edmonds, older brother of legendary hitmaker Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds and a founding member of the R&B group…
Unita Blackwell, a veteran of the civil rights movement and winner of a MacArthur “genius” grant who was the first…
His eldest child, an 11-year-old girl named Denise McNair, was brutally taken from him and their family by a group…
It was a sad Mother’s Day for Rashida and Kidada Jones after the death of their mother, actress Peggy Lipton, on…
She was known as the Queen of Swing, a dancer who helped make famous the lindy hop, a fast-paced, acrobatic dance…
Judge Damon J. Keith, a civil rights icon who became the sixth black person in U.S. history to serve on the federal…
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R&B singer-producer Andre Williams, whose indelible musical journey included collaborative efforts with Stevie…