Biography

Ida Bell Wells was born in Holly Springs, Mississippi on July 16^th, 1862. She was born into slavery during the Civil War. Once the war ended Wells-Barnett’s parents became politically active in Reconstruction Era politics, and instilled into her the importance of education. After her parents died from a yellow fever epidemic in her hometown, Wells was left to raise her brothers and sister, so she took a job as a teacher. Eventually, the family moved to Memphis, Tennessee where she continued to work as an educator. 

After the lynching of one of her friends, Wells-Barnett turned her attention to white mob violence. She became skeptical about the reasons black men were lynched and set out to investigate several cases. She published her findings in a pamphlet and wrote several columns in local newspapers. Her expose about an 1892 lynching enraged locals, who burned her press and drove her from Memphis. After a few months, the threats became so bad she was forced to move to Chicago, Illinois.

Wells-Barnett traveled internationally, shedding light on lynching to foreign audiences. Abroad, she openly confronted white women in the suffrage movement who ignored lynching. Because of her stance, she was often ridiculed and ostracized by women’s suffrage organizations in the United States. Nevertheless, Wells-Barnett remained active the women’s rights movement. She was a founder of the National Association of Colored Women’s Club which was created to address issues dealing with civil rights and women’s suffrage. Although she was in Niagara Falls for the founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), her name is not mentioned as an official founder. Late in her career Wells-Barnett focused on urban reform in the growing city of Chicago. She died on March 25^th, 1931.

“Biography: Ida B. Wells-Barnett.” National Women’s History Museum, https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/ida-b-wells-barnett. Accessed 7 Mar. 2024.