Wells-Barnett, Ida Bell (1862–1931)

US journalist and political activist. She joined the staff of New York Age in 1891 and embarked on an anti-lynching campaign, lecturing widely throughout the USA and England and founding anti-lynching groups as well as clubs for black women. She served as secretary of the National Afro-American Council 1898–1902 and helped found the National Association of Colored People (NAACP).

The daughter of slaves, Wells was born in Holly Springs, Mississippi. She was educated in a segregated school and became a teacher in Memphis, Tennessee. Losing her job in 1891 as the result of a suit she had filed against state segregation laws, she began a career of political activism after moving to New York City. She later married and settled in Chicago in 1895, where she founded Alpha Suffrage Club, probably the first black women's suffrage organization. She also founded the Negro Fellowship League in 1910, to provide assistance to newly arrived blacks from the South, and served as a Chicago probation officer 1913–16.

Her autobiography, Crusade for Justice, was published posthumously in 1970.

Wells-Barnett, Ida Bell (1862–1931)

US civil rights advocate. In 1892, as part-owner and editor of a Memphis newspaper, she published articles denouncing the lynching of three acquaintances; warned to stay out of town, she went to the Northeast and became a renowned antilynching activist, publishing several works on the subject. She was secretary of the National Afro-American Council (1898–1902) and helped found the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1910. She also campaigned for women's suffrage.

Born a slave, Wells-Barnett was born in Holy Springs, Mississippi. She attended Rust College after emancipation and taught school in Memphis, Tennessee (1884–91). She was eventually fired for writings critical of segregated education. She married a Chicago editor and lawyer in 1895.