Robert Sengstacke Abbott was born in 1870 on St. Simons Island in Georgia. Both of his parents were former slaves. His father, Thomas Abbott, died when he was an infant and his mother a German named John Sengstacke, the son of a German merchant and an American slave girl. Robert was sent to the Clafin University in Charleston, South Carolina for a short time before attending the Hampton Institute in Virginia. After college, he attended the Kent Law School in Chicago and received his law degree in 1899.

Abbott found it very difficult to practice law due to his race. He tried to start practices in Indiana, Illinois and Kansas with little success. He became increasingly convinced that he could do more good helping people through journalism than in the courtroom. He went home to learn that printing trade with his stepfather. In 1905, he returned to Chicago and set up printing equipment in the dining room of his landlady’s dining room. On May 5, 1905, he started the Chicago Defender. He sold 300 copies of his first four-page publication going door-to-door throughout the southside of Chicago.

For 15 years, Abbot struggled to keep his newspaper going. By 1920, he began to turn a profit. It became the largest African-American publication in the nation, with over 250,000 in circulation by 1929. The newspaper printed editorials demanding equality for blacks in America. The publication brought to the national spotlight the problems of segregation, discrimination and lynching. Many of the editorials encouraged blacks in the south to move to northern cities to find work and opportunities, sparking the Great Migration of the early 20th century.

Abbott died in 1940. His publication changed the course of American history. It sparked a great movement of people throughout the country into major cities. It fought for equal rights for all citizen in the country. The publication refused to use the words “Negro” or “black” in its articles because Abbott sought to unify all races. His contributions to civil rights through journalism and publication made him a great American.

Jewel Plummer Cobb was born in Chicago in 1924 and was the great-granddaughter of a freed slave. Both of her parents were college educated. Jewell graduated from high school with honors with a focus on biology. She started college at the University of Michigan in 1942, but left dissatisfied with the segregated dormitories of the university. She transferred to Talladega College in Alabama where she was to earn her Bachelor's degree in biology.

In 1945, Jewel was rejected for a teaching position at New York University because he was black, however, she so impressed the faculty there that she eventually was awarded the position. By 1947, she had earned her Master's Degree and in 1950, she had received her doctorate in cell physiology. In 1949, she was appointed an independent investigator at the Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory. She also held postdoctoral positions at Harlem Hospital Cancer Research Foundation, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, and the National Cancer Institute.

One of her greatest achievements in medicine involved her research on the treatments for melanoma. Dr. Cobb tested methotrexate and found it effective on skin, lung, and breast cancer as well as childhood leukemia.

Her work made her a role model for countless African-Americans seeking a college education. In 1993, she received a Lifetime Achievement Award by the National Academy of Science. She served as dean at two different universities and later became the President of California State University at Fullerton from 1981 to 1990. Cobb passed away in 2017. Her achievements in cancer research and education made her a great American.