1998-present Birthplace: Los Angeles, California National Youth Poet Laureate of the United States Poet Activist Author Model. Amanda Gorman was raised by a single school teacher mother, along with a twin sister and older brother. She was diagnosed with an auditory processing disorder and a speech impediment in kindergarten. She struggled with pronouncing “R” sounds which caused problems into her early adult years. Poetry recitals helped her overcome her impediment. Gorman u

1954-present Birthplace: Tylertown, Mississippi First African American student to desegregate an all-white school at 6 years old Civil Rights Activist Author Recipient United States Presidential Citizens Medal 2001 Ruby’s birth year coincided with the US Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in Brown v. The Board of Education of Topeka Kansas, which ended racial segregation in public schools. Southern states continued to resist integration and in 1959 Ruby attended a segregated N

Katherine Coleman Johnson 1918-2020 Birthplace: White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia Widowed mother of 3 in 1959 remarrying 3 years later Mathematician whose calculations of orbital mechanics and trajectories for NASA were critical to the success of the first US space flight, Apollo 11 . Author Katherine Johnson’s intelligence and skill with numbers was recognized when she was a child. She was attending high school at age 10, graduating from West Virginia State College with

1820-22(?)-1913 Birthplace: Dorchester County, Maryland – born into slavery Conductor of the Underground Railroad Soldier Nurse Suffrage Activist Author Harriet Tubman was born to Harriet Green and Benjamin Ross. However, her birth name was Araminta Ross. At age five she was rented out as a domestic servant, at the age of 12 while trying to prevent her enslaver from beating an enslaved man who tried to escape, she was hit on the head with a two pound weight leaving her with