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In 2018, we printed the first box of Black History Flashcards Volume 1 not knowing if anyone would care.

We’d spent months researching. Debating which stories made the cut. Arguing over which faces deserved to be on those first 52 cards. We wanted every single one to matter — not just as trivia, but as doorways into conversations we knew Black families needed to have.

Eight years later, families are still buying Volume 1. Not as a nostalgia piece. As a foundation.

Here’s why.

The Fundamentals Don’t Get Old

Volume 1 covers what we call the “can’t-miss” figures — Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X. The names that every Black child should know before they leave elementary school.

But here’s the thing: knowing the names isn’t the same as knowing the stories.

Our cards don’t just list achievements. They tell you that Harriet Tubman was a spy for the Union Army. That she led the Combahee Ferry Raid and freed more than 700 enslaved people in a single night. That she did all this while living with seizures from a traumatic brain injury inflicted by an enslaver.

That’s not trivia. That’s inspiration. That’s the difference between knowing about someone and understanding what made them extraordinary.

The Questions They Spark

Every card in Volume 1 ends with a conversation starter. Not a quiz question — a real question.

“What would you risk for freedom?”

“How do you stand up when everyone around you is sitting down?”

“What does it mean to change your mind publicly, the way Malcolm X did?”

These aren’t questions with easy answers. They’re questions that build critical thinking. Questions that help children see themselves in history. Questions that turn a five-minute card game into a thirty-minute family discussion about values, courage, and strategy.

The Foundation for Everything Else

We’ve released other volumes since then. Volume 2 goes deeper into science, technology, and invention. The Women’s Edition centers Black women’s contributions specifically. The Africa Edition connects our history to the continent.

But families keep coming back to Volume 1 because it’s the foundation.

You can’t understand Mae Jemison (Volume 2) without understanding the space race and civil rights. You can’t appreciate Ida B. Wells (Women’s Edition) without understanding Reconstruction and lynching. You can’t grasp the full scope of Black resistance without knowing what came before.

Volume 1 is where the timeline starts.

What Parents Tell Us

We get emails. DMs. Comments at events.

“My son asked why his school doesn’t teach this.”

“My daughter said she wants to be ‘brave like Harriet.’”

“We do three cards every night at dinner. It’s become our thing.”

One grandmother told us she uses the cards to homeschool her grandchildren — that Volume 1 is her entire Black history curriculum for the first semester.

Another father said his teenage son, who’d never shown interest in “school stuff,” started reading the cards on his own and asking questions about the Black Panthers.

This is what we hoped for. This is why we keep printing them.

The Gaps Are Still There

Let’s be honest about something: public school hasn’t gotten much better at teaching Black history since 2018.

In many states, it’s gotten worse. Book bans. Curriculum restrictions. The same old “slavery-to-Martin-Luther-King-to-Obama” timeline that leaves out everything complicated, everything radical, everything that explains why we’re still fighting.

Volume 1 doesn’t solve that. But it fills the gaps.

Every family that works through these cards is building a counter-narrative. A foundation of knowledge that can’t be taken away. A set of reference points for understanding current events.

Start Here

If you’re new to Urban Intellectuals, start with Volume 1. Not because it’s the oldest, but because it’s the most important.

The fundamentals matter. The foundations hold everything else up. And these 52 cards — each one researched, debated, and designed with intention — will give your family something that no app, no video, no worksheet can provide.

A shared vocabulary for discussing Black excellence. Black struggle. Black future.

Get Volume 1 today and start the conversations that matter.

Which figure from Black history would you add to Volume 1 if you could? Hit reply and tell me.

Love, peace, and power to the people.