Ida B. Wells Timeline

(1862 - 1931)

Ida B. Wells (1862–1931) was an African American journalist, educator, and civil rights leader who courageously documented and campaigned against lynching in the United States. Born into slavery in Mississippi, she became a co-owner of the Memphis Free Speech newspaper and used investigative journalism to expose racial violence. A founding member of the NAACP and a tireless advocate for women's suffrage, Wells spent her life fighting for racial justice and equality. More Less

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Early Life and Education

Born into slavery in Holly Springs, Mississippi

Jul 16, 1862

Ida Bell Wells was born into slavery in Holly Springs, Mississippi, just months before the Emancipation Proclamation. Her parents, James and Lizzie Wells, gained their freedom at the end of the Civil War, and the family remained in Mississippi as freedpeople.

Image source: Ida B. Wells

Enrolls at Rust College

Sep 1870

Wells attended Shaw University, later renamed Rust College, a Freedmen's school in Holly Springs. She excelled academically but was expelled after a dispute with the college president, reportedly over a confrontation involving her rebellious behavior.

Image source: Rust College

Yellow fever epidemic kills her parents

Sep 1878

A yellow fever epidemic swept through Holly Springs, killing Wells's parents and infant brother. At age sixteen, she took responsibility for raising her five surviving siblings, refusing offers to split up the family.

Begins teaching to support her family

1880

To support her younger siblings, Wells passed an examination and began working as a schoolteacher in rural Mississippi schools, earning a modest salary that sustained the family through difficult years.

Moves to Memphis for higher-paying teaching job

May 1884

Wells relocated to Memphis, Tennessee, where she could earn better wages as a teacher while continuing her education during summer sessions at Fisk University and LeMoyne College.

Civil Rights Activism

Refuses to give up train seat and is forcibly removed

May 4, 1884

Seventy-one years before Rosa Parks, Wells refused to move from a ladies' car on a Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad train to the smoking car reserved for Black passengers. She was dragged off the train by three men as white passengers applauded.

Image source: Chesapeake and Ohio Canal

Wins discrimination lawsuit against railroad

Dec 24, 1884

Wells sued the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad and won $500 in damages in a local circuit court. In 1887, however, the Tennessee Supreme Court overturned the verdict, ruling against her and deepening her commitment to fighting injustice.

Protests exclusion of Black Americans from World's Columbian Exposition

Jun 1893 - Oct 1893

During the Chicago World's Fair, Wells joined Frederick Douglass and others to protest the fair's failure to fairly represent Black Americans. They distributed thousands of copies of a pamphlet titled 'The Reason Why the Colored American Is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition' to international visitors.

Image source: World's Columbian Exposition

Founding member of the National Association of Colored Women

Jul 21, 1896

Wells helped found the National Association of Colored Women (NACW) at a convention in Washington, D.C., uniting Black women's clubs nationwide around causes including anti-lynching work, suffrage, and community uplift.

Image source: National Association of Colored Women's Clubs

Co-founds the Afro-American Council

1898

Wells was among the founders of the Afro-American Council, a national civil rights organization formed to combat racial violence and disenfranchisement, serving as its secretary before later tensions with Booker T. Washington's allies.

Image source: National Afro-American Council

Helps found the Alpha Suffrage Club in Chicago

Jan 30, 1913

Wells founded the Alpha Suffrage Club, believed to be the first Black women's suffrage organization in Illinois, to mobilize African American women voters ahead of Illinois granting partial suffrage to women.

Refuses back of march in suffrage procession in Washington, D.C

Mar 3, 1913

At the national woman suffrage parade in Washington, organizers asked Black participants to march at the rear. Wells defiantly stepped out of the crowd mid-parade and marched alongside the Illinois delegation, insisting on integrated participation.

Image source: Woman Suffrage Procession

Journalism and Anti-Lynching Crusade

Becomes co-owner of the Memphis Free Speech newspaper

May 1889

After writing articles for church publications under the pen name 'Iola,' Wells bought a one-third interest in the Memphis Free Speech and Headlight, becoming editor and co-owner of one of the most outspoken Black newspapers in the South.

Image source: Ida B. Wells

Publishes editorial criticizing Memphis schools, loses teaching post

1891

Wells wrote an exposé about conditions in Memphis's segregated colored schools, criticizing unequal funding and poor treatment of teachers. She was fired from her teaching position, freeing her to pursue journalism full time.

Lynching of Thomas Moss and the People's Grocery victims

Mar 9, 1892

Three Black businessmen, including Wells's friend Thomas Moss, were lynched by a white mob in Memphis after their successful grocery store competed with a white-owned store. The murders transformed Wells's life and launched her anti-lynching crusade.

Image source: People's Grocery lynchings

Publishes anti-lynching editorials urging Black Memphians to leave

Mar 25, 1892

Following the lynching of Moss and his partners, Wells wrote impassioned editorials documenting lynching and urging Black residents to abandon Memphis because it showed neither justice nor mercy. Thousands left for Oklahoma and other destinations.

Office of Free Speech destroyed; exiled from Memphis

May 27, 1892

While Wells was traveling in Philadelphia and New York, a mob destroyed the offices of the Free Speech and threatened to kill her if she returned to Memphis. She was warned that her body would be tied to a tree and branded. She never returned, beginning decades of exile.

Publishes Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases

Oct 1892

Wells published her first major pamphlet, Southern Horrors, which systematically debunked the myth that lynchings punished Black men for assaulting white women. She documented how many lynchings arose from economic competition, interracial relationships, and white efforts to maintain power.

Publishes A Red Record

Jan 1895

Wells published A Red Record, a statistical study of lynching based on careful research of press reports, tabulating hundreds of lynchings and analyzing their causes. It became a foundational work of data-driven advocacy journalism.

Image source: The Red Record

Purchases and edits the Chicago Conservator

1895

After marrying Barnett, Wells became part owner and editor of his newspaper, the Conservator, continuing to publish her investigative journalism while balancing family life and motherhood.

Image source: Ferdinand Lee Barnett (Chicago)

Investigates lynching of Frazier Baker and family

Mar 1898

When postmaster Frazier Baker and his infant daughter were murdered by a white mob in Lake City, South Carolina, Wells led a delegation to Washington to petition President William McKinley for federal intervention and prosecution.

Image source: Lynching of Frazier B. Baker and Julia Baker

Publishes Lynch Law in Georgia with W. E. B. Du Bois

Jul 1899

Wells published a pamphlet investigating the torture and lynching of Sam Hose in Georgia, with supporting material contributed by W. E. B. Du Bois, further cementing her reputation as the nation's leading anti-lynching investigator.

Anti-Lynching Crusade Abroad

Begins speaking tours of Great Britain

Apr 1893 - Jun 1893

Invited by British reformers including Catherine Impey and Isabella Mayo, Wells lectured throughout England, Scotland, and Wales, exposing American mob violence to international audiences and generating pressure on the United States.

Second British lecture tour builds international anti-lynching movement

Mar 1894 - Jun 1894

On her second tour abroad, Wells spoke to packed audiences across Britain and helped establish the British Anti-Lynching Committee. Her speeches prompted public debate and condemnation of lynching on both sides of the Atlantic.

Later Life and Legacy

Marries attorney and editor Ferdinand Barnett

Jun 27, 1895

Wells married Ferdinand L. Barnett, a Chicago lawyer and founder of the Conservator, Chicago's first Black newspaper. Unusually for the era, she hyphenated her name, becoming Ida B. Wells-Barnett, and continued her activism after marriage.

Begins writing her autobiography, Crusade for Justice

1928

In her final years, Wells worked on her autobiography, Crusade for Justice, recounting her battles against racism, sexism, and violence. The unfinished manuscript was published posthumously in 1970, edited by her daughter Alfreda Duster.

Runs for Illinois state legislature as independent candidate

1930

Wells ran as an Independent candidate for the Illinois General Assembly, becoming one of the first Black women in the United States to run for public office, though she was unsuccessful.

Dies of uremia in Chicago

Mar 25, 1931

Ida B. Wells-Barnett died of kidney disease in Chicago at age 68, leaving behind a legacy of fearless investigative journalism and lifelong activism against lynching, segregation, and the disenfranchisement of Black Americans.

Autobiography Crusade for Justice published posthumously

1970

Nearly four decades after her death, Wells's daughter Alfreda Duster edited and published her autobiography, reintroducing her pioneering work to new generations of readers and scholars.

Key Facts

Ida B. Wells was born enslaved in Holly Springs, Mississippi on July 16, 1862, just months before the Emancipation Proclamation took effect in her area.
In 1884, she was forcibly removed from a whites-only railroad car and sued the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, becoming one of the earliest known Black Americans to litigate segregation.
After a lynching in Memphis in 1892, Wells began her anti-lynching crusade, publishing 'Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases,' which exposed lynching as a tool of racial terror rather than justice.
She was a founding member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909, though her contributions were often overlooked by male contemporaries.
Wells fought for women's suffrage, famously refusing to march in the back of the 1913 Washington suffrage parade, and later founded the Alpha Suffrage Club for Black women in Chicago.

Source

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