Founded in October 1966 by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale in Oakland, California, the Black Panther Party for Self Defense gained world-wide media attention in May 1967 when Seale led a contingent of heavily armed Panthers into the California state capital in Sacramento to demonstrate their opposition to a proposed law that would restrict the right to carry loaded weapons on city streets. In the months and years that followed, the Panthers stayed in the public eye as newspapers recorded a string of events including dramatic demonstrations and news conferences, shootouts, police raids, arrests, hijackings, trials, murders.
We have compiled and mapped more than 500 incidents involving the Black Panther Party in dozens of locations stretching from Berkeley to Algeria. The maps and timeline below are based on information drawn from newspapers and thus reflect not the day-to-day activities of the Party (the social service programs, community education, training and organizing campaigns) but instead more sensational events that editors considered newsworthy. Data were drawn from the following newspapers: New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, The Black Panther Intercontinental News Service, Berkeley Barb, Berkeley Tribe, Chicago Defender, Pittsburgh Courier, Baltimore Afro-American, Wall Street Journal, Seattle Times.The maps are hosted by Tableau Public and may take a few seconds to respond. If slow, refresh the page.
Move between three maps and timelines
Sources: These maps and charts are based on data on Black Panther Party activities as recorded in the following newspapers: New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, The Black Panther Inercontinental News Service, Berkeley Barb, Berkeley Tribe, Chicago Defender, Pittsburgh Courier, Baltimore Afro-American, Wall Street Journal, Seattle Times
Research: The BPP project began as a collaborative class project in History 105 “The Peoples of the United States” in Winter 2016. Kevin Baum, Neil Blaine, Annelise Blanchard, Lindsay Boone, Connor Castro, Mitchell Henderson, Cindy Lee, Jillian Kaufman, Matthew Kelleher, Sungjoon Kim, Devin Mutha, Bao Ta, Nicholas Wedler, Zachary Williams, Steven Yong searched the ProQuest Historical Newspapers collection, gathering information and summarizing events. Arianne Hermida researched events in the Seattle Times, The Black Panther (available on It's About Time: The Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni), Berkeley Barb, and Berkeley Tribe (from the Independent Voices Collection).
In these maps we track the geography of the BPP in the six metropolitan areas where the Panthers enrolled that largest number of members and made the greatest impact: Oakland-SF Bay Area; New York; Chicago; Los Angeles; Seattle; Philadelphia. The maps show BPP offices, facilities, and the location of key events, combining historic images when we have them with google street views of the locations today.
