Black History Month interesting facts

1. Phillis Wheatley was only 12 when she became the first female African American author published.

2. Martin Luther King Jr improvised the most iconic part of his “I Have a Dream” speech.

3. Hattie McDaniel, the first African American to win an Oscar, wasn’t allowed to attend Gone With the Wind‘s national premiere.

4. The ban on interracial marriage in the U.S. was overturned because of one couple in 1967.

5. Matthew Henson was a key member of the first successful expedition to the North Pole and made seven separate voyages to the Arctic.

6. Madam C.J. Walker was an African American entrepreneur who became America’s first female self-made millionaire.

7. Billie Holiday’s famous “Strange Fruit” was originally a poem written by a school teacher.

8. Benjamin Banneker taught himself astronomy and math to become America’s “First Known African American Man of Science”

9.Arthur Ashe remains the only African-American male tennis player to win Wimbledon, the U.S. Open, or Australian Open.

10. Usain Bolt is the most successful athlete of the World Championships, he was the first athlete to win four World Championship titles in the 200 m and is the joint-most successful in the 100 m with three titles. Bolt currently holds the 100 m (9.58s) and 200 m (19.19s) world record.