This weekend, two trailblazing black newspapers were honored in New Orleans’ French Quarter with a new bronze plaque that heralds their achievements and their contributions to America’s black press and, by extension, black life.

Ida Bell Wells-Barnett—abolitionist, suffragist, journalist and organizer—is a legend. She is the blueprint for black women journalists who write and report on white supremacy, sexual and state violence, and modern-day lynchings carried out by police officers across the country.

On Women’s Day, the New York Times published an interactive collection called “Overlooked,” a series of obituaries written for notable figures who are long gone but for myriad reasons were not recognized by the Times when they died. In it, the Times acknowledges that over the years, it has repeatedly neglected to…

Editor’s note: For Black History Month, The Root is speaking to the relatives of our most cherished African-American heroes in a series called Living With History. To open the series, we interviewed a descendant of Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington. Today we feature Michelle and Daniel Duster, the…