Photographs and stories that changed the world

A collaboration of and

1990s

The Irony of Racial Uplift

Despite Anita Hill accusing Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment in 1991, the controversy surrounding him now is mainly about his politics. Yet, the story of Justice Thomas exemplifies a longstanding irony of racial uplift efforts: the elevation of Black figures who perpetuate the silencing or mistreatment of Black women.

Henry Ossian Flipper

Once enslaved and later the first Black American to graduate from West Point, Henry Ossian Flipper is America’s overlooked, trailblazing antihero.

Don’t Call it a Riot

Los Angeles 1992, policing, and the long history of urban protests in the United States