February 16, 1874 – Frederick Douglass elected president of Freedman’s Bank and Trust.
February 17, 1902 – Marion Anderson, internationally acclaimed opera star, born.
February 18, 1931 – Toni Morrison, winner of 1988 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, born.
February 19, 1923 – In Moore vs. Dempsey decision, U.S. Supreme Court guarantees due process of law to blacks in state courts.
February 20, 1934 – Four Saints in Three Acts, by Virgil Thompson and Gertrude Stein, premieres as the first opera performed by African Americans on Broadway.
February 21, 1965 – Malcolm X is assassinated in Harlem in New York City.
February 22, 1989 – Col. Frederick Gregory was the first African American to command a space shuttle mission.
