Robert Sengstacke Abbott (1870 - 1940)
Born in 1870, Abbott's grandparents had been slaves and his father, Abbott, died when he was young. It was from his step father that he received his second surname, Sengstacke. Abbott graduated from Chicago's Kent College of Law in 1898, but was racial barriers kept him from practicing. So instead, he started the Chicago Defender Newspaper. It became a literary home for African American discussions, issues, and art. Gwendolyn Brooks, Willard Motley, and Langston Huges all featured on there and the newspaper advocated for the betterment of African Americans through migration, shining light on injustice and encouraged unapologetic blackness. Abbott died in 1940 in the Robert S. Abbott home, what is now a historical landmark.
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