Born into a slavery-ridden America at the height of the Civil War, Ida B. Wells-Barnett spent her entire life enduring the severe racist and sexist views that plagued the country. As a toddler in Mississippi when Reconstruction began, Wells-Barnett learned from her parents the tragedy of slavery and the principle of education.
At just sixteen years old, her parents and one of her brothers passed away due to a yellow fever epidemic, leaving Wells-Barnett solely responsible for her six remaining siblings. Resilient, she became a schoolteacher and furthered her education through summer sessions at Fisk University.
As Wells-Barnett aged, the nation’s response to abolition changed as well. Rising to prominence, Jim Crow laws—discriminatory laws which enforced racial segregation—met Wells-Barnett at every corner. In 1884, she bought a ticket for and attempted to board a first-class train, as she had done several times prior. Exemplifying the extensive discrimination of the time, the conductor disregarded her ticket and demanded that she move from her seat. Nevertheless, Wells-Barnett refused, and multiple white men dragged her off of the train.
Suing the train car company, she originally won in a local court; however, when the
company appealed to a federal court, the Tennessee Supreme Court overruled the initial decision.
Nearly a decade later, Wells-Barnett lost three friends to lynchings by a mob. Outraged, she turned to journalism to investigate and fight against the violence. Her published work angered many, and their threats forced her to move to Chicago, Illinois.
In Chicago, Wells-Barnett continued to speak out against discrimination and injustice. Eventually, she went on to participate in the Niagara movement, an organization led by W.E.B Du Bois seeking equal rights for African Americans. Additionally, Wells-Barnett was a part of the founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Throughout her life, Ida B. Wells-Barnett made history as a woman not afraid to speak out against injustice.