Benjamin Banneker

On this day…Mar 12, 1791 - Benjamin Banneker was commissioned to lay out Washington D.C. Most of the credit for the survey, design and construction of our nation’s capital is given to Pierre L’Enfant.

It is a little known fact that a black man of African descent is principally responsible for the layout and construction of the District of Columbia.

Benjamin Banneker was an Astrologer, Astronomer, a Master Mathematician and the first known black man to publicly protest slavery in his prolific letter to then president, Thomas Jefferson. This has been a Breath Of My Ancestors Minute w/Ty Gray-EL…We Must Never Forget.