Civil Rights
Movements, leaders, victories and the continuing fight for equality.
Explore the people, places, events, achievements, struggles and stories that shaped our journey.
Movements, leaders, victories and the continuing fight for equality.
Innovation, patents, science, technology and world-changing contributions.
Pioneers, champions, Negro Leagues, records, activism and excellence.
Meet the people whose lives, choices and achievements shaped the journey.
Black towns, communities, institutions and places where history happened.
Moments that changed communities, movements, institutions and the nation.
In August 1908, a white mob attacked Springfield, Illinois’s Black community, destroying homes and businesses and lynching two Black men. National outrage over the violence helped spur the movement that created the NAACP the following year.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985

Bengaline is a rayon-and-cotton material which became fashionable for women and children to wear in the 1880s and 1890s. It offered the impression of genuine silk but was made with lesser amounts of silk than cotton. Lizzie Borden stated at her August 1892 inquest that she was wearing a dress made of bengaline silk on the morning she was accused of murdering her father and stepmother.
The fabric went out of fashion when completely smooth-surfaced materials became popular. Piqué, coachman's whipcord, diagonal serge, and surah are similar to bengaline silk. Surah was once known in France as silk serge.[1]
Bengaline silk sold for $2.50 per yard in 1889 but was sometimes discounted to sell for $1.25 per yard.[2] A heavy lined, long cloak for infants, with deep bengaline silk embroidery, retailed for $7.98 at a Manhattan, New York clothing shop, in 1893.[3] Diagonal striped dresses featuring the fabric were popular in the spring of 1912.[4]
Cotele was a French term to describe bengaline.[5]Côtelé driven from costelé refers to a ribbed pattern.[6]
Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
Bengaline is a rayon-and-cotton material which became fashionable for women and children to wear in the 1880s and 1890s. It offered the impression of genuine silk but was made with lesser amounts of silk than cotton. Lizzie Borden stated at her August 1892 inquest that she was wearing a dress made of bengaline silk on the morning she was accused of murdering her father and stepmother. The fabric went out of fashion when completely smooth-surfaced materials became popular. Piqué, coachman's whipcord, diagonal serge, and surah are similar to bengaline silk. Surah was once known in France as silk serge. Bengaline silk sold for $2.50 per yard in 1889 but was sometimes discounted to sell for $1.25 per yard. A heavy lined, long cloak for infants, with deep bengaline silk embroidery, retailed for $7.98 at a Manhattan, New York clothing shop, in 1893. Diagonal striped dresses featuring the fabric were popular in the spring of 1912.
Cambric or batiste is a fine dense cloth. It is a lightweight plain-weave fabric, originally from the commune of Cambrai (in present-day northern France), woven greige (neither bleached nor dyed), then bleached, piece-dyed, and often glazed or calendered. Initially it was made of linen; from the 18th and 19th centuries the term came to apply to cotton fabrics as well. Chambray is a similar fabric, with a coloured (often blue or grey) warp and white filling; the name "chambray" replaced "cambric" in the United States in the early 19th century. Cambric is used as fabric for linens, shirts, handkerchiefs, ruffs, lace, and in cutwork and other needlework. Dyed black, it is also commonly used as the dustcover on the underside of upholstered furniture.
Houndstooth is a pattern of alternating light and dark checks used on fabric. It is also known as hounds tooth check, hound's tooth (and similar spellings), dogstooth, dogtooth or dog's tooth. The duotone pattern is characterized by a tessellation of light and dark solid checks alternating with light-and-dark diagonally-striped checks—similar in pattern to gingham plaid but with diagonally-striped squares in place of gingham's blended-tone squares. Traditionally, houndstooth uses black and white, although other contrasting colour combinations may be used.
Calico (; in British usage since 1505) is a heavy plain-woven textile made from unbleached, and often not fully processed, cotton. It may also contain unseparated husk parts. The fabric is coarser than muslin, but less coarse and thick than canvas or denim. It is still very cheap owing to its unfinished and undyed appearance. The fabric was originally from the city of Calicut in southwestern India. It was made by the traditional weavers called cāliyans. The raw fabric was dyed and printed in bright hues, and calico prints became popular in Europe.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Madam C.J. Walker