Sankofa Chronicles: A Black History Podcast

Mr. Black History

Sankofa Chronicles: A Black History Podcast brings history to life. Moving beyond daily facts, we explore the full spectrum of Black history—from groundbreaking African American achievements to untold stories across Africa and the global diaspora. Unearth forgotten historical figures, celebrate enduring legacies, and connect the past to the present. Subscribe now! figures, celebrate enduring legacies, and connect the past to the present. Subscribe now! movements across Africa and the global African diaspora. ​Each episode explores the legendary figures, cultural movements, and transformative

  1. 2d ago

    The Chef Who Taught America to Eat - James Hemings

    Before mac and cheese was America's comfort food, it was James Hemings's French training on a plate. Enslaved at Monticello, summoned to Paris at nineteen, head chef at the American embassy at half the pay of the man before him. He cooked the dinners where America was bargained into being — then had to buy his freedom by teaching his own brother to replace him. His sister Sally was in Paris too, and this episode says the quiet part plainly: the children she bargained for were Thomas Jefferson's. A story about the price of keeping a Black family together when the system sold families apart — and how the man who taught America to eat got written out of the cookbook. Featuring the research of Annette Gordon-Reed and Monticello's historians. This is Sankofa Chronicles: A Black History Podcast — Wednesdays belong to food origins.

  2. 3d ago

    Sister Rosetta Thorpe - The Godmother of Rock and Roll

    Sister Rosetta Tharpe invented rock and roll — and history erased her from it. Before Elvis, before Chuck Berry, a Black gospel woman from Cotton Plant, Arkansas plugged an electric guitar into the Pentecostal shouting tradition and created the template: heavy distortion, lead breaks, and pure showmanship. In 1938 alone she signed with Decca Records, played the Cotton Club, and sang gospel at Carnegie Hall. Her 1944 "Strange Things Happening Every Day" became the first gospel record to cross over. Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, and Elvis all learned from her — yet she died in 1973 in an unmarked grave, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame didn't induct her until 2018. Featuring her biographer Gayle Wald and scholar Maureen Mahon on the Black woman behind rock's birth. If this episode moved you, follow Sankofa Chronicles — and send it to one neighbor who needs to hear it.

  3. 4d ago

    The Southern Underground Railroad: The War America Fought Against Black Freedom: Negro Fort, the Black Seminoles, and the Letter That Survived

    In 1816, a single cannonball wiped out a free Black town in Spanish Florida - and it was ordered from the top of the U.S. government. This episode of Sankofa Chronicles: A Black History Podcast uncovers the hidden history of Negro Fort, the Black Seminoles, and the decades-long war America waged against Black freedom in Florida. Mr. Black History traces the story from the deadliest cannon shot in American history through the First and Second Seminole Wars, Andrew Jackson's invasion, General Thomas Jesup's broken promises, and the one surviving letter from a Black Seminole leader named Abraham - a receipt on freedom that outlasted an entire system built on chains. This episode explores Black maroons, fugitive slave communities, the Underground Railroad's southern routes, Seminole resistance, and the true cost of America's war against Black liberation - a story of courage, betrayal, and survival that still echoes today. Keywords: Black history podcast, Negro Fort, Black Seminoles, Seminole Wars, Andrew Jackson, Southern Underground Railroad, Black freedom history, African American history, maroon communities, Florida slavery history Sankofa Chronicles: A Black History Podcast - we go back to bring it forward. Keep reaching back. Keep learning forward

  4. Oct 2

    The Mutual Aid Nation: Susu, Black Wall Street, Mound Bayou & Black Banks

    What did we build in the fifteen years we were actually free? In this episode, Mr. Black History traces the mutual aid nation — the Black economic world built on trust when banks wouldn't serve us, insurers robbed us, and the government looked away. From the West African susu — neighbors pooling money on nothing but reputation — to the Freedman's Savings Bank and its three million dollars in vanished Black savings. From Mound Bayou, the all-Black Mississippi town, to Maggie Lena Walker's St. Luke Penny Savings Bank, to the Black Wall Street they burned in Tulsa in 1921 and the Freedom Farm cooperative Fannie Lou Hamer planted anyway. Featuring the words of James Baldwin, W.E.B. Du Bois, Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King Jr., Booker T. Washington, Maggie Lena Walker, Fannie Lou Hamer, Ella Baker, and A. Philip Randolph — grounded in scholarship from Jessica Gordon Nembhard, Mehrsa Baradaran, Shennette Garrett-Scott, and Scott Ellsworth. The circle, the bank, the town, the farm. Built by us, for us, when nobody else would build it. Follow Sankofa Chronicles and send this one to a neighbor who needs to hear it.

  5. Oct 1

    I Am Sam Cooke

    This story is about Sam Cooke and how Black talent is constantly exploited. The Intellectual Property of Black artists is the most hunted Black business. This is the story of a door left open and how generational wealth is sucked out of our community.

  6. Sep 29

    We Were Never Just Slaves: Maroons, Queen Nzinga & the Haitian Revolution

    Resistance ran a whole spectrum — from a newspaper on a cabin wall to a republic in the Caribbean. In this episode of Sankofa Chronicles, Mr. Black History walks that spectrum: the everyday resistance historian Stephanie Camp uncovered in the plantation South, the 1755 poisoning case of Mark and Phillis, the maroon towns that won freedom with a clause, Queen Nzinga of Angola — who fought Portugal for thirty years — and the Haitian Revolution, the one revolt that won outright... then paid France for its own freedom until 1947. Drawing on Stephanie Camp, John Blassingame, Sylviane Diouf, Linda Heywood, Carolyn Fick, C.L.R. James, and Michel-Rolph Trouillot — with the honest middle intact: Nzinga owned slaves, the maroon treaties sent runaways back, and the fight was never simple. Next: The Mutual Aid Nation. Keep reaching back. Keep learning forward.

  7. Sep 28

    The Southern Underground Railroad: The Seminole Alliance

    Inside the Seminole Nation stood Black towns — free, armed, and organized. In this episode of Sankofa Chronicles: The Southern Underground Railroad, Mr. Black History traces the Black Seminole alliance: the maroon town of Angola on the Manatee River, Pilaklikaha — Abraham's Old Town — and the tribute system historian Kenneth Wiggins Porter called "vassals, not slaves." Meet Abraham, interpreter and lieutenant to head chief Micanopy, and John Horse — Juan Caballo — who co-led his people across the Rio Grande into Mexico in July 1850. Drawing on Daniel F. Littlefield Jr., Kevin Mulroy, Jane Landers, and Virginia Bergman Peters, this episode tells the alliance straight: it was not equality, the old respect hardened over time, and the fight over Black Seminole membership continues to this day. Next: The Seminole Wars Were Freedom Wars. Sankofa means go back and get it. Keep reaching back — and keep moving forward.

  8. Sep 25

    The Hush Harbors: Secret Worship, the Exodus Story & Nat Turner

    Enslaved men and women risked whippings and death to pray in secret. In the swamps and thickets of the antebellum South, they built hidden worship spaces called hush harbors - and there they created something entirely their own. This episode of Sankofa Chronicles: A Black History Podcast goes deep into the world of the hush harbor, drawing on the work of historian Albert Raboteau and firsthand accounts from formerly enslaved people like Peter Randolph and Wash Wilson. Discover the coded songs, the lookouts, and the upside-down pot that muffled the sound of secret prayer meetings. Trace the Exodus story from an enslaved Virginian's 1723 letter to the Archbishop of London, through Phillis Wheatley's writings, to the spirituals "Go Down Moses" and "Steal Away to Jesus" - and understand why Harriet Tubman earned the name Moses. Finally, step into the story of Nat Turner, the visionary preacher whose 1831 uprising in Southampton County, Virginia shook the South and led lawmakers to outlaw Black preaching and Black gatherings altogether. This episode covers slave religion, African American spirituality, the Underground Railroad, Harriet Tubman, the Nat Turner rebellion, and the hidden history of Black resistance in America. Perfect for listeners interested in Black history podcasts, African American history, and the untold stories behind American slavery and faith. New episodes drop weekly. Subscribe to Sankofa Chronicles and go back to get the story they didn't teach us.

See All (47)

Trailer

About

Sankofa Chronicles: A Black History Podcast brings history to life. Moving beyond daily facts, we explore the full spectrum of Black history—from groundbreaking African American achievements to untold stories across Africa and the global diaspora. Unearth forgotten historical figures, celebrate enduring legacies, and connect the past to the present. Subscribe now! figures, celebrate enduring legacies, and connect the past to the present. Subscribe now! movements across Africa and the global African diaspora. ​Each episode explores the legendary figures, cultural movements, and transformative

Information