Toni Morrison was born Chloe Ardelia Wofford in an integrated neighborhood of Lorain, Ohio. At an early age, she instilled with a love for reading from her parents. In high school, Morrison was an honor student who took Latin and read many great works of European literature.

In 1949, she was accepted into Howard University and received a B.A. in English. In 1955, she earned a Master's Degree in English at Cornell University in New York. Her thesis concerned the subject of suicide in the works of William Faulkner and Virginia Woolf. After Cornell, she briefly took up a teaching position at Texas Southern University before receiving an offer to teach English at Howard University in 1957. At Howard, she met an architect named Harold Morrison and the two were married in 1958. In 1963, she left Howard University to travel in Europe before finally settling in Syracuse, New York as a senior editor to a textbook publisher.

In 1970, Morrison published her first novel, "The Bluest Eye." In 1975, her novel, "Sula," was nominated for the National Book Award. Morrison's third novel, "Song of Soloman," became the first work by an African-American author since Richard Wright to be featured in the book-of-the-month club.

Morrison was appointed to the National Council of the Arts in 1980. She also published another book entitled "Tar Baby" that received mixed reviews. However, in 1987, one of her greatest books, "Beloved" received a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and was later made into a movie starring Oprah Winfrey. She became a professor at Princeton University the following year and in 1993 she was awarded with the Nobel Prize for Literature. Morrison was the first African American woman to be awarded this high honor.

Morrison passed away in 2019 at the age of 88. In addition to "Beloved," she has written novels, nonfictions, children's stories and a play. She has been the winner of the Pearl Buck Award, National Humanities Medal, Norman Mailer Prize, a Grammy Award, several honorary doctorates and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012. Her pen and her stories have made her a great American.

Miles Davis was born in Alton, Illinois in 1926. A year after his birth, his family moved to East St. Louis, Illinois. His father was a dental surgeon and the family was very prosperous compared with most African-American families of the time. His mother was a music teacher and instilled into young Miles a love of music. When he was twelve, he began taking trumpet lessons. During his high school years, he played in local bars and gigs outside of town.

Soon after Davis graduated from high school, he was allowed to sit in with Billy Eckstine's big band in St. Louis. The band featured Dizzy Gillespie on trumpet and Charlie Parker on saxophone. He became mesmerized by the moment and he learned the bebop style of these early jazz greats. In 1944, he left the Midwest to attend the Institute of Musical Art (today known as Juilliard) in New York to study music. However, he dropped out of school to play in clubs with Charlie Parker as a full-time musician.

Davis began playing in various bands with Charlie Parker, Benny Carter and Billy Eckstine. In 1948, however, Davis created his own nine-piece band with an unusual horn section. His band angered many in the black jazz community because he had white members. The band caught the eye of Capitol Records and in 1949, the band recorded several tracks that would not be released until 1956. The album title was "The Birth of Cool," and it was the beginning of a new style to be known as "cool jazz."

Davis toured in Paris during the 1950's and fell in love with their culture and people's tolerance of blacks. In 1955, Davis, returned to New York and formed what he called his "first great quintet." John Coltrane was on the tenor saxophone in this group. They began recording albums and playing throughout the country. In 1959, Miles Davis' new sextet recorded his greatest album, "Kind of Blue."

Throughout the 1960's, Miles Davis recorded numerous albums and played throughout the world. He became a major influence on artists such as Jimi Hendrix and Sly & the Family Stone. His jazz music became "fused" with Rock and Roll. Shortly after the Woodstock Festival, he released his album "Bitches Brew," which would become his first gold record. He became the first jazz artist featured on the cover of Rolling Stone Magazine. Davis continued to experiment with different types of jazz for the next two decades.

Miles Davis is one of the most influential music artists of the 20th Century. He won eight Grammy Awards as well as a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990. In 1991, he was awarded the Knight of the Legion of Honor in France. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006. In 2009, the US House of Representatives honored the 50th anniversary of his "Kind of Blue" album. His work and innovation in music made Miles Davis a great American.