When she was 10 years old, Amariyanna Copeny, former Little Miss Flint Michigan, wrote a letter to Barack Obama about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. Her letter and her subsequent fund raising effort lead to Obama authorizing $100 million to fix the crisis.

"Sometimes, I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me. How can any deny themselves the pleasure of my company? It's beyond me." --Zora Neale Hurston

“There was very little that was written for and about the Canadian Black community, and the presence of Black people as part of Canadian history…It was a passion of mine to see how we could make this happen – to have Black history be part of the curriculum, and Black people acknowledged and celebrated in the Canadian mosaic.”
— Jean Augustine, PC CM CBE, first Black woman elected to Canadian Parliament

Viola Irene Desmond (July 6, 1914 – February 7, 1965) Canadian civil and women's rights activist and businesswoman of Black Nova Scotian descent. In 1946, she challenged racial segregation at a cinema in New Glasgow, Nova Scotia by refusing to leave a whites-only area of the Roseland Theatre. Desmond's case is one of the most publicized incidents of racial discrimination in Canadian history and helped start the modern civil rights movement in Canada.

“I consider myself a crayon... I may not be your favourite colour, but you’re gonna need me to complete your picture.”
-Lauryn Hill

Rt. Hon. Dr. Louise Bennett Coverly, aka "Miss Lou" to many Jamaican children. The list of her accomplishments is long and distinguished. But the most important (to me) is she formalized Jamaican patois into a written language. She formalized our voice, on our own terms. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W58MtDzanqA

"Make a million dollars,
make a million mo'...
Tax time come around,
still a nigga po'!"
--Erykah Badu

"You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them."-- Maya Angelou

"You don't make progress by standing on the sidelines, whimpering and complaining. You make progress by implementing ideas."
--Shirley Chisholm.